Saving the CEO (49th Floor #1)(20)

She turned. “Let’s get to work.”

…

Jack watched Cassie take in the view. She was a brilliant blot of scarlet against the gray buildings and white sky of the December afternoon. Damn. Was he a complete idiot? Jack had rules, yes, but he was not generally in the habit of rebuffing the advances of scorchingly hot women.

She was right, technically. There was nothing inappropriate about the dress—she was covered from neck to toe. And yet…

In fact, he thought, trying to compose himself, it looked not unlike something Amy would wear. The difference was the stylish vice-president of Winter Enterprises would have worn the dress in black or gray. Not this ridiculous blazing scarlet.

For the first time in a long time, Jack was facing a situation he honestly didn’t know how to play. Part of him—including the part of him currently straining against the fly of his jeans—wanted nothing more than to rewind, go back, and make good on his threat to bend her over the reception desk. But he’d already been intimate with her, and he tried to keep a cap on the number of encounters he had with any single woman. He was serious about not doing relationships. Dead serious. They distracted him from what was important—work. Limiting himself to one-night stands was a defense mechanism he consciously and cheerfully deployed. He had a lot to protect. Not a heart, no—at least not that kind of heart—but a man didn’t build a company from nothing into the powerhouse that was Winter Enterprises without subjecting himself to a little discipline.

So the fact that he was contemplating another round with Cassie was, frankly, a little concerning. As his eyes slid over those wicked red curves, a thought dawned. In one sense, he hadn’t actually been with Cassie at all. He’d left their first kiss with the worst case of blue balls in the history of the universe, and at their second encounter, he’d spent himself in the snow like an untried boy.

She turned from the window with a spark in her eyes that seemed to simultaneously ignite in his chest. If he could just be inside her once—bend the rules a little—then maybe he could get this all-consuming lust under control enough to get some damned work done.

“Let’s get to work,” she said.

Well, so much for that idea.

The mischief was gone from her eyes, replaced with a look of pure determination. If she had sleeves, she’d be rolling them up right now. “I want to see your books. And please tell me everything isn’t password protected on Carl’s computer.”

“I may be an idiot when it comes to numbers, but I’m not that stupid. Crossing to his desk, he powered up his MacBook, silently ordering himself to get it together.

“You’re not an idiot,” she said.

Instead of answering, he picked up a remote control and aimed it at the built-in cabinetry. A door retracted to reveal a flat screen TV.

“Fancy!” exclaimed Cassie.

“Where do you want to start?” he asked, opening some documents on his computer. “How about the current quarter’s balance sheet?” With a few keystrokes he had the document up on the screen.

“Still fancy!” Cassie laughed.

He shrugged. “It’s just Bluetooth.”

She performed an exaggerated shrug in return. “I guess I’m a cheap date.” But then she crossed her arms, narrowed her eyes, and gazed up at the screen. For a minute the only thing that moved in the room were her eyeballs. He could practically see the gears turning in her head.

“Okay. What will Wexler expect me to know? I guess maybe the best thing is to just keep going back in time, so I can get a sense of the company’s recent history?”

Silently, he projected another file onto the screen. Another jumble of numbers. He was accustomed to not “getting” numbers. When he was alone like this, or with someone he trusted—and somehow Cassie, whom he’d known for all of four days, fell into that category—they didn’t send him into a panic. He didn’t fully process what he saw, but since no one was expecting him to, it didn’t really matter.

She turned. “What is it like, seeing all this?”

Had she read his mind? “You mean with the dyscalculia?”

“Yeah. Is it like looking at another language?” Then she added, “But only answer if you want to. It’s none of my business.”

“It’s a little like another language. But it’s not that I can’t identify numbers.” He pointed to a cell on the spreadsheet. “I know a seven when I see it.” He pointed to another number, one in red. “Or a negative one hundred grand—that’s bad, right?” She whipped her eyes to his, adorably gullible. He grinned. “I know that’s bad—I’m just teasing. I know the numbers; I just can’t put them together very well. I can’t do anything with them.” He cocked his head. No one had ever asked him to explain before. His father had tried to beat it out of him, but never once had anyone asked what it felt like. “It’s kind of like this,” he said, an analogy crystallizing itself in his mind. “If I taught you to say something in Japanese, you could learn how to say it. Like, Tamago kudasai.”

“You do not speak Japanese!” she exclaimed.

“I do, a little, but that’s not the point. Tamago kudasai. Say it.”

“Taman…” She crunched up her nose, and he instructed himself not to lean over and lick it.