If I Only Knew(44)

I lean back in my chair, waiting for hell to freeze over.

“Not going to happen,” I laugh. “I make it a point not to lie if I can avoid it.”

“This will change your mind.” Milo places the paper in front of me with Darren’s signature.

“You got the permit?”

“We damn sure got the permit.”

“It’s signed?”

He smirks. “Signed, sealed, and delivered, baby.”

“You’re sure? You didn’t forge it or something?”

He shakes his head. “Absolutely not. We’ve had our walk-through inspection and are fully permitted to build. It’s one hundred percent done.”

I get to my feet, taking the papers in my hand and read them aloud. “Darren Wakefield approves the plans to have Dovetail Enterprises break ground and then it’s signed,” my voice gets higher as I continue.

We did it.

We really did.

That crazy ass scheme of his worked and we got the permits.

“See?”

“Milo!” I yell and rush toward him. “I can’t believe this!”

He catches me in his arms and twirls me around. It’s been hell with this freaking permit, but we did it.

“Believe it, sweetheart. Now, say the words . . .”

Darren continued his games after the inspection, holding us in limbo for the last few days, but we got it. Callum is going to be so relieved and I might actually get to keep my job. All because of Milo and his crazy plan that actually panned out.

“You really came through for me, Milo,” I smile at him as he sets me down. “You’re amazing and brilliant and whatever else you want to hear.”

“No, you are.” Milo winks at me and I suddenly realize how inappropriate that was.

After my wine-fest with my friends, I made a promise that until Milo and I talked, I would not allow myself the opportunity to cross any lines. I’m not a sleep-around girl. I don’t do one-night things. I need stability, rules, definitions in relationships, and someone I can count on.

That talk taught me that I can’t function in disfunction.

Milo is the epitome of that. He’s reckless, spontaneous, lives his life without rules and that works for him, but that will never be how I operate.

I take a step back, but he follows me.

“I appreciate all your help getting this done for the team. We needed this win, and you brought it home for Dovetail,” I say, trying to slip back into boss and employee mode.

“I don’t give a fuck about Dovetail.”

My heart begins to race as Milo takes another step closer. He’s stalking me, and I’m trapped with nowhere to go.

“Okay, well, whatever your motives were, thank you.”

“I did it for you,” he says as his body is almost touching mine.

I can’t think when he’s this close and says things like that. It makes it too hard to remember that we can’t go there.

“Don’t say that.” I turn my head to the side.

“It’s the truth.”

Our eyes meet and I want so badly for this to be another time in my life. One where I wasn’t worried about everything and all my stupid rules. I would let him whisk me away to the kind of world he lives in. Why can’t I have what I want? Will I ever allow myself a chance to live and not be worried about everyone else? No. I won’t. So all the other questions . . .

My heart races as I answer myself and tell him, “It doesn’t matter.”

“The fuck it does matter. I did it for you. I didn’t do it for Callum or this silly job he’s trying to teach me a lesson with. I don’t give a damn about any of it.”

“Why?”

“Why do you think, Danielle?”

I try to move out of his grasp but he cages me in. “I don’t know what to think. It doesn’t make sense.”

“I know.”

My chest rises and falls as my breathing becomes labored. “What are you saying?”

“I’m saying that I have feelings for you. That no matter how many times I tell myself you’re off limits, I find myself wanting to touch you.” He lifts his hand slowly, pushing the strand of hair that fell in my eye.

“We’re not kissing again,” I say. “Not until we talk about all of this and come up with some plan.”

Milo grins, his lips brush against my ear and I shiver. “Who said anything about kissing?”





Chapter Twenty





Milo





I’m a bastard.

I’m a selfish bastard but I can’t seem to fucking care.

Her lips part and desire swims in her blue eyes as she tries to fight it. Watching her like this is reason enough to keep going.

“I’m saying we can’t kiss,” her voice is soft and there’s no conviction in her words. Her body moves toward me, even though there’s very little space left to go, and I know she wants to kiss me.

I glide my finger down her neck, loving the silky feel of her skin. She’s absolutely breathtaking right now.

All day I watched her walk around in her pencil skirt with her white blouse that I could see through with the right light. I thought about tearing it open, watching the buttons fall around us as I sunk my cock in her. Each time she sighed, I imagined her lying beneath me as I dragged different sounds from those plump lips.