Forbidden Intern Read online

  “No, it’s not that.” Her voice is stronger, and I’m glad I reassured her.

  “What is it, then?”

  “I just … it doesn’t hurt too much, not yet, and I’m not scared.” The two conditions I gave her for telling me to stop. My good girl, following the rules.

  “All right. We’ll do just a few more, then, and we’ll count. Ten more …” The same easy way I’ve been spanking her. “And now ten more, a little harder.”

  “Oh!” She feels those, all right. Little gasping cries for each of them, leaving my cock aching. I could probably give her at least ten more, but that’s plenty.

  “You were a very good girl for me. I’m proud of you.” My hand slips between her legs to find her slick. I’m going to bring her right here, while she’s still over my knees.

  I find her clit, and she moans. “Hunter …”

  “Come for me, Lily.” My fingers work her steadily, rubbing and pressing, rolling and pinching, and when she comes apart, it hits her hard. Her cries echo off the walls, and I keep bringing her until she reaches a hand back.

  Damn. This may have been a mistake, because now I really, really need to fuck her. But if I make it quick, she’ll be okay.

  With that thought, she’s up in my arms and we’re heading for the bed. I lay her down and settle between her legs. When I slide inside her, her eyes widen with shock as pleasure and pain merge into a single, indivisible, irresistible entity.

  And when I start to move, her eyes roll back her head and she tightens around me. Within a minute, she starts to climax.

  I can’t hold back anymore. The beast snaps his leash, and I fuck her so hard there’s not a chance in hell I could stop.

  The harder I fuck her, the harder she comes, her nails scoring my back viciously, the pain driving me on. I pound her like a jackhammer, until my climax gathers in the base of my spine and explodes. I’ve never come so hard in my life.

  It takes all my remaining strength to roll off her and tuck her against my side. When I can speak again, I ask what I have to. “Are you okay?”

  Lily struggles up onto an elbow. Her face is slack with pleasure, her eyes heavy. She’s the most beautiful sight I’ve ever seen.

  “I think I have never been more okay in my life.” She pronounces it with the slow, careful diction of a drunk, and my ego struts around smugly.

  I bring the covers up over us and turn out the light. Lily settles in, one leg over me, her head on my chest. I’m drifting off to sleep when it hits me and my eyes open wide.

  No condom. Again.

  Shit.

  20

  Exactly What You Are

  Lily

  I walk into the Drake Building in a daze. Who knew that one month could totally change your life? Four glorious weeks of sex and spankings and more. It’s gone so quickly, and I’ll never be the same.

  The lobby is crowded with employees arriving, and I barely have the presence of mind to angle across it to reach Hunter’s private elevator. Vaguely, it registers on me that the security guard who’s usually there, a man named Bert whom I’ve been greeting every morning for the last several weeks, isn’t in his usual spot. I’m almost to the elevator when someone calls my name.

  It’s Holly, my lunch buddy. I’ve met other people in the building, but Holly and I still eat together most days. “Lily, are you okay? What’s wrong?”

  “I’m fine.” I shake my head. “Just … distracted.”

  “I’m surprised you came in today.”

  “What?” I look at her sharply, my brain fog clearing in the rush of adrenaline. “Why?”

  Her hand goes to her mouth. “No one told you? I can’t believe it.”

  “Holly, told me what?” I almost shout it.

  She doesn’t get a chance to answer. I’m suddenly surrounded by men. Three of them are board members. One of them is Bert.

  He’s usually friendly in a gruff sort of way, but not today. “Ms. Whitaker,” he says, unsmiling. “I’ve been ordered to escort you from the building.”

  “What are you talking about?” The group of men is herding me backwards, toward the door. “What’s going on?”

  As they force me out the doors, past a silent, staring crowd of employees, I catch sight of Holly.

  She’s smiling.

  They put me in a Town Car and drive me across town. No one will tell me anything. I try to text Hunter, and Winslow Wharton, the board member next to me, snatches my phone away.

  I try to grab it back. “You can’t take that! It’s my personal property.”

  “Right now,” he snaps, “it’s evidence.” I’m stunned into silence.

  We arrive at another building, where the men escort me into a small, windowless room containing nothing but a table and some chairs. We’re not at the police station, but it feels exactly like an interrogation room.

  The board members crowd into the space with me, forcing me around the table to the side with only one chair. Bert closes the door on us, and I have a feeling he’s taken up position outside.

  The three men opposite me are looking at me with varying degrees of contempt. I glare at them, furious and scared. Finally, Wharton says, “We know that you have stolen Drake Industries secrets and offered them to competitors.”

  “What?” It comes out a shriek. I can’t help it. “Are you insane?”

  “We have the entire chain of email messages between you and the contact for Tech Depot.”

  I gape at them before my mouth snaps shut. “Whatever you have, it’s forged.” My mind racing a million miles an hour. “Who’s running this investigation?”

  “That’s none of your concern.”

  I wish I had something to throw at him. “Whoever it is, they screwed up. How would I even get access to company secrets?”

  “We’re examining your laptop at this very moment.”

  “Good. Then you’ll see that it doesn’t even connect to the company intranet, let alone the internet.”

  The men exchange glances. “We’re trying to give you the chance to come clean without being arrested,” Wharton says.

  “Oh, hell no. I want the police. So I can bring charges against all of you.”

  “Ms. Whitaker, you’re not doing yourself any favors.”

  “You’re not listening. You’ve been suckered. Someone is playing you for fools. If you don’t want your eventual humiliation written up in the Wall Street Journal, you’ll pull your heads out of your heinies and figure out what’s really going on.”

  One of the other board members, a man named Fletcher Gordon, speaks up. “We’re also aware that you’re having an affair with Hunter Drake.”

  That brings me up short. I thought we’d been careful, but I guess things like that always come out. “Yes,” I say quietly. “That part is true. The rest of it is, pardon my French, bullshit.”

  The men all seem taken aback. “You admit to the affair?” Wharton says.

  “Why wouldn’t I?”

  Gordon tries again. “You’re in league with other employees--”

  He breaks off when I toss my employee badge, in its lanyard, onto the table. “Does this thing track my movements through the building?”

  Wharton stares at it like it’s a bomb. “I believe so.”

  “Then take it. Check it. You’ll see that I’ve only ever been in the parking garage, the cafeteria, or Mr. Drake’s office, or en route to one of them. I’ve never been anywhere else in the building, I’ve never been on the company’s servers, and I’ve never corresponded with anyone in the company outside of Mr. Drake. Nor have I ever been in contact with anyone from Tech Depot.”

  Gordon glares at me. “You used pillow talk to learn what Mr. Drake was planning.”

  My last nerve snaps. “I’m in love with him! I would never do anything to hurt him.” Which reminds me why I was in a daze this morning. Tears threaten, but I blink them back. “Look, if you would just contact Mr. Drake, this can all be cleared up.”

  Wharton says, “Who do
you think sent us to question you?”

  “What?” I whisper.

  “Who do you think ordered you to be kept out of the building?” He leans forward, his dull brown eyes glinting maliciously. “Mr. Drake knows exactly what you are.”

  Then Gordon is talking, but I don’t hear him. I don’t hear anything over the blood pounding in my ears.

  Mr. Drake knows exactly what you are.

  21

  Fugitive From Love

  Lily

  When my interrogators give up trying to talk to me, they take me home. It’s still morning; my parents will be gone all day at work. I can’t call them, can’t drag them into this.

  My heart feels dead in a way that’s permanent. If Hunter believes that I betrayed him, then nothing in my life makes sense anymore. And it must be true, because otherwise he would have protected me. Warned me, come to me, something.

  Which means I’m alone.

  Once I accept that, my next steps are obvious. I can’t stay here. Wharton kept my phone, so Hunter won’t be able to track me down if he decides he misses his plaything.

  I pack carefully, trying to plan ahead as best I can. When I’m ready, I write a note to my parents.

  Dear Mom and Dad,

  I’m going away for a while. Please don’t try to find me.

  You’re probably going to hear a lot of lies about me in the days and weeks ahead. Please don’t believe them.

  I’ll contact you when it’s safe.

  All my love,

  Lily

  That won’t accomplish anything except freaking them out, but I can’t explain everything in a note.

  I drive to the bank and go inside and empty my checking and savings accounts and cash in all my CDs. It’s enough money to last me a few weeks, until I can find someplace to hole up and look for a job. It crosses my mind that I’m behaving exactly like a fugitive from justice would, getting ready to go on the run.

  No one will believe me if I tell them I’m a fugitive from love.

  My car breaks down 200 miles out of town. I empty the car of anything valuable, hitch a ride into the next stop down the road, and catch a bus.

  22

  Under Radar

  Hunter

  “What do you mean, you can’t find her?”

  The PI I hired spreads his hands. “I’m sorry, Mr. Drake, but this girl is off the grid. I found her car, broken down on the side of the road.”

  That damned car. I knew I should have gotten her a new one.

  “She’s paying cash, probably using false names, and she’s got a burner cell phone, if she’s got any cell at all. No one knows where she is, including her parents. No one remembers seeing her or talking to her.”

  If I could give the fucking universe a kick in the nuts right now, I would. As if Lily could ever be anything but memorable.

  “Eventually,” the guy says, “she’ll run out of money and use a credit card. Or she’ll call her parents. Something will give. But right now, she’s doing a good job of staying under radar.”

  “Keep me posted.”

  He leaves, and I go back to cleaning up the shitstorm that’s hit my company, because it has to be done.

  But my mind is on Lily.

  23

  It’s My Job

  Lily

  I set a plate of eggs and bacon down in front of a guest, top off their coffee, grab their companion’s iced tea glass for a refill, and swing by the next booth to tell them I’ll be right with them. While I’m scooping ice into the tea glass, another party comes in and sits in my section.

  Waitressing is hard work. I’ve been here a week, and I think I’ve lost ten pounds even though I’m hungry all the time. But I’m earning enough to cover the rent on the tiny little place I rented, plus some of my expenses, so my cash hoard will last me a while.

  My landlady, Mrs. Foster, is ninety years old if she’s a day. She lives on the other side of my duplex. When I knocked on her door in response to the For Rent sign on the empty unit, she invited me in for a piece of pie and a glass of tea.

  It wasn’t my plan, but I told her everything. I guess I had to tell someone. Two hours later, she handed me the keys without making me fill out an application.

  The next morning, I got hired at the diner. The owner is Mrs. Foster’s grandson.

  One of my booths signals for a refill and I swoop over with the coffee pot. Then it’s back to pick up more orders, then over to the two booths I haven’t waited on yet to get them going. And so it goes. An hour later, my shift is over and I’m dead on my feet.

  “Good work this week, Tillie,” Mr. Foster says. “Wish all my girls put in the effort you do.”

  Fortunately, he says this low enough that no one else hears. The last thing I need is for my fellow waitresses to take against me. “Thanks, Mr. Foster.”

  He shakes his head. “I could knock you over with a feather right now. You need to eat more.”

  I don’t tell him that I’m not doing such a good job of keeping food down these days. Or that sometimes just the smell of food makes me sick. I hope I don’t have to get a different job.

  Waving goodbye, I start the walk to my duplex. I’m off tomorrow, and looking forward to nothing more than sleeping in. If, that is, my body will let me.

  After that, I’ll catch the local bus and ride it as far as it goes, to a town a couple of hours away. That’s where I’ll use the cell phone I picked up at a drugstore to call my parents. I did that a week ago, and of course they’re worried and begged me to come home. I just told them I couldn’t, not yet.

  It’s hot today, the sun beating down along my route. I’m slow on my feet from hunger and fatigue, and by the time I reach the duplex my head is pounding. I get the key in the lock and stumble inside.

  There’s a huge tree in the front yard that shades both halves of the duplex, and I’ve never been more grateful than I am at this moment for the relative coolness inside. Dropping my purse where I stand, I make it to the bathroom, swaying over the sink, and splash water on my face. Fortunately, my bedroom is the next room down.

  The bed pulls at me like a gravitational force. I fall forward without undressing, and I’m out before I even hit the mattress.

  I’m having the most wonderful dream. Hunter and I are in bed, spooning. The heat from his body is so wonderful that I don’t even mind being too warm.

  Slowly, my eyes flutter open. The wood paneling of the duplex walls greets me, and then I register the arm around my waist at the same instant I realize I’m naked.

  I jerk away, but the arm locks tight, pinning me. “Settle down,” a grouchy voice says.

  A man’s voice. Hunter’s voice.

  “What are you doing here?” If I sound accusatory, I don’t care.

  “What the hell do you think I’m doing here?”

  I try to pry his arm away. “Leave me alone. Don’t touch me.”

  The next instant, I’m on my back and Hunter’s on top of me. He’s naked too, and my body is ridiculously happy to see him. And feel him.

  Except for the look on his face. He’s furious. With me.

  This is both deeply discomfiting and perversely arousing. Until I remember that he broke my heart. “Go away.”

  He doesn’t move. “You’ve lost weight. You have circles under your eyes. I found you passed out, with your door unlocked for fuck’s sake, and you were so exhausted you didn’t even wake up when I undressed you and put you to bed.”

  All of this he recites in a voice tight with anger, but it’s the words that penetrate. I stare at him. “You’re mad because I’m tired.”

  “Because you’re not taking care of yourself,” he snaps. “Goddammit, Lily, it’s my job to take care of you. You run off and I don’t know where you are, and then I find you like this?”

  I swallow hard, fighting back the emotion that’s threatening to swamp me. “You’re mad because you couldn’t take care of me?”

  “Yes!” he roars.

  24

 
The Woman Who Left Town

  Lily

  My heart melts. I lift a hand to his face. “I’m sorry, baby.”

  His face changes, and then he rolls us to our sides and his arms come around me tight, crushing me to him. “Don’t you ever. Ever. Leave me again.”

  I go still, wild hope battling fear. “Ever is a long time, Hunter.”

  He draws back far enough to look me in the eyes. “You told those assholes you were in love with me. Was it true?”

  I want to laugh and cry at the same time, but I can’t speak at all, so I nod. He gives me a short, hard, fierce kiss, then pulls me close again, like he can’t bear for there to be space between us.

  What he doesn’t do is tell me he loves me. Or even that he’s in love with me.

  Ignoring, for now, the ache in my heart, I say, “Hunter. What happened?”

  With a sigh, he rolls onto his back, tucking me against his side. “I told you I was having problems with industrial espionage.”

  “Yes.”

  “I was worried about the new project getting stolen before we could even get it off the ground.”

  “So you hired me.”

  There’s a pause before he says, “Yes and no.”

  I go up on my elbow to look down at him. “What does that mean?”

  “It means the real project was so top secret it wasn’t even in the building. You were a decoy.”

  “A decoy!” If I thought I could get away with it, I’d smack him. “Hunter Drake. You used me as bait?”

  He winces. “I thought of it as camouflage. At most, I thought someone might approach you with an offer.”