Breach: The Boxset (2 page)

With my annoyance at its limit, I got up and headed out, leaving what was bound to be a peep show. I was almost running as I muttered about refilling my coffee.

Upon entering the break room, I heaved a sigh at the sight of the empty coffee pot. Oh well. It meant fresh coffee for me and more time away from him.

“Hi, Lila! How are things going with Nathan today?” Caroline, my one friend and ally, asked in a teasing tone. I’d told her all about the situation with the asshole. The smile on her face faltered when she saw my expression. “Homicide is
not
an option.”

I couldn’t help but chuckle at her dead-on comment. “Are you sure about that, Carrie?”

“Yes. The Boob Squad still coming around?”

“Boob Squad member number seven is in my office as we speak.” I plastered a fake smile on my face, attempting the best impersonation of them I could muster.

“Boob Squad” was the name Caroline had bestowed upon all the women who now seemed to have a route past our—my and Nathan’s—office.

She attempted to reassure me. “I’m sure it’ll get better. Everything has an adjustment period, right?”

I laughed at her optimism. “Sure, why not? Maybe hell will freeze over as well?”

I watched the coffee pot fill up and pulled it from the burner before it finished. I wished her a good afternoon with my now full cup in hand and turned to head back. As I left, she begged me not to end up in jail, but I couldn’t make her any promises.

When I returned, Boob Squad number seven was nowhere to be found, and I let out a sigh of relief.

“Which girl do you have your sights set on?” I took my seat, caffeine injection number five for the day in hand.

“Excuse me?”

“Which one? They’ve all been vying for your attention. Each wondering which one of them you’ll pick to screw first. I’m amazed they’re throwing themselves at you, not even caring about their jobs.”

“You’re talking about the non-fraternization policy.”

“Holloway is very strict on it now, ever since the Antonio and Karen incident. Lots of drama and problems there as a result. So, now they get rid of one or both parties. That’s why it surprises me so many of them are willing to give up their jobs for your junk.”

His face lit up with that smirk that made me—and every other woman in the office—wet. “I do have pretty impressive junk.”

I snorted, rolling my eyes. “
Please
.”

“Do I need to prove it to you?” He stood, hands at his belt buckle, pulling the leather through the first loop.

I hid my eyes behind my hand. “Keep it in your pants, Casanova.”

“I’m surprised you care about them.”

“I don’t.”

“Then don’t worry. One of the reasons I agreed to come here was because of their strict enforcement of no office fraternization. I thought it would keep them away, but it doesn’t seem to be enough.” He sighed, his expression becoming dark, turbulent.

“Do you want me to throw you a pity party because women are throwing themselves at you?”

My eyes widened at the look on his face. His eyes were now dead, holding none of the light and humor they did a moment before. The smile fell from my face. The arrogant look I’d been seeing over the last few days was gone, the playful glint replaced with a tortured darkness. My jaw slackened as the atmosphere changed.

“They should all stay away from me.” His voice was barely above a whisper as he spoke, right before getting up and leaving.

I couldn’t help but stare after him for a few moments before my gaze moved back to the work in front of me. A shiver ran through me as realization dawned.

There was much more to Nathan Thorne than what appeared on the polished surface.

CHAPTER 2

I spent the following weeks trying to work out the enigma that was Nathan Thorne, but to no avail. After his mood-altering comments, he had escaped, returning sometime later as the man I’d known up to that point. With careful glances, I watched the way he interacted with others, but there was no hint of the pain I’d seen in his beautiful features.

Whatever plagued him was hidden well under his charismatic personality and good looks. The one glimpse I’d been privy to kept me up at night. What an odd thing for a man like him to say.

I should’ve been more concerned with the fact that I was losing sleep over a man I couldn’t get along with—something I couldn’t afford as I already didn’t sleep much—and he’d become the star in all of my fantasies.

“Morning,” I said with a yawn as I trudged in on Friday, the end of Nathan’s third week with Holloway and Holloway.

Not that I was counting.

“Coffee?” he asked, holding a cup toward me.

I eyed the cup before glaring at him. “Is it poisonous?”

He chuckled, the sound making wetness pool between my thighs. Stupid body, reacting to a man I couldn’t stand.

“No, Delilah. Fresh brewed.”

“Are you buttering me up for something?” I inquired before taking the cup from him.

“No. I saw you walking in when I was heading to get a cup of my own. With as much as you drink, I figured you’d need one.”

“Oh.” I was stunned he would do something nice for me. “Sorry… Thank you.”

I smiled at him, half-genuine and half-rehearsed. His face lit up for a fraction of a second before turning to a grimace.

“Don’t mention it.” His gaze returned to his desk and the papers that adorned it.

There it was: that faint glimpse. He stopped himself from what could’ve been a real smile, for reasons only known to him. What was it that had me so curious about him that, with each new insight revealed, left me breathless and wanting to know more?

I called it quits about six that evening, ready for the weekend. It’d been a long, frustrating week, and I was in desperate need of a drink to unwind. There was a bar within walking distance of my condo, one I’d been frequenting every weekend over the last few months.

“Hey, Lila!” John, the bartender, greeted as I entered.

“Hey, John!”

“Usual to start?”

I nodded, and he got to work on my shot and Long Island Iced Tea.

Not only did I need it to unwind, but it would also help me get some sleep.

“Tough week?” He handed me the shot before making my other drink. “Insomnia still got you?”

I tipped back the rum, cringing against the strength. “Yup. I feel like my brain should’ve melted at this point.”

“Holloway got you any help yet?”

“Yeah, he started a few weeks back, but he’s kind of a jackass.”

He gave me a sympathetic frown. “That sucks. He at least good looking?”

I eyed John for a moment, wondering if I was in some sort of setup. “Yes, he is. Fuck-hot and has every woman in the office chasing him around, hoping he’ll break and, I don’t know, just drop trou right there and plow into them.”

He snickered, handing me the Long Island. “Every woman but you?”

“What’s the point?” I shrugged. “First, he’s an ass. Second, he wouldn’t have any interest in me anyway, so why bother making an idiot of myself?”

“Honey, you are beautiful and sexy. I wish you could see that for yourself. You get my regulars all riled up when you come in here.”

“Yeah, well…” I trailed off. There was no response to give.

John left to tend to some other customers, leaving me sipping on my drink and contemplating a game on the TV screen in front of me. The sound of the door opening wasn’t uncommon, but the shiver that ran down my spine was not normal.

“Can I get a Dos Equis?” the newcomer asked.

I didn’t need to turn to know who it was, nor to know he was looking at me. I was too tired and too tipsy to care.

“Palmer?” I knew he was smirking by only the tone he used. Jesus, I couldn’t deal with him tonight.

Could I
not
think about him for five minutes? He had to be a drunken illusion, even though I had little to drink. There was no reason why he would be at my local dive bar.

I tilted my head toward him, his reliable smirk the first thing to greet me. Okay, not an illusion. “
Thorne
.”

He brushed off my attitude. “What brings you here?”

“I’m here every Friday. Why are
you
here?”

“I needed a drink. I just spent the last hour trying to lose Kelly. I think she was trying to find out where I live.”

“And of course you had to land in my bar.” I huffed.

“Does it have your name on it?”

“Here you go,” John interrupted, setting a bottle down in front of Nathan. “Wanna start a tab?”

“Sounds good.”

John smiled at me. “Lila, you good?”

Crap. He was going to give me shit about Nathan the next time I was in.

“One more.”

John nodded and went to make my second Long Island, leaving me once again with the asshole.

“
Lila
?” Nathan leaned his arm against the bar.

“Short for Delilah.” My tone was clipped.

“I’ve never heard anyone call you that nickname.”

“Only Caroline at the office does. Delilah is more professional, so only my friends call me Lila.” I hoped that would be enough to sate his curiosity.

It seemed to, because that was where the conversation stopped. I was not in the mood to talk. All I wanted to do was drink, then crash. I was exhausted and tired to the point of tears.

Sleep called to me. I needed to shut out the world and turn off my brain. He made no move to speak as we sat next to one another. The feeling that we were in the same boat came over me as we stared at the screen in front of us. There seemed to be a weird tingling, an almost buzzing sensation, crossing between us. I wondered if he felt it too, or if my tipsy brain was imagining it.

An hour later—after I downed my second Long Island—I was ready to go home. I paid my tab, said goodnight to John, and told Nathan I’d see him on Monday before I stepped out into the cold early-March air.

After I had walked a couple of blocks, I noticed the sound of footsteps following me. I turned to find Nathan about thirty feet behind me.

“Are you stalking me now, Thorne?” I turned back around before I became dizzy, fell down, and embarrassed myself.

“You wish, Palmer. I’m headed home myself, and making sure you get home all right in your drunken state. Last thing I need is to be implicated because your drunk ass was last seen with me before you disappeared or wound up dead.”

“I can take care of myself. Don’t worry your pretty little head.” I walked up to the door of the fifteen-story luxury condo building I lived in. “Well, I’m home, so off you go.”

He followed me in anyway, and I lucked out that an elevator was waiting in the lobby. I waved hello to Mike, the night guard, and walked in. When I turned to press the button, Nathan was entering as well.

“Seriously, Thorne, you can go home now.”

He chuckled before leaning in to whisper in my ear. “I
am
going home.”

His statement hit my brain at the same time his scent did, and I staggered back. The man was the most powerful walking aphrodisiac I’d ever encountered.

His hand shot out to grab my arm, steadying me. I gasped at the contact. Electric tingles coursed through me where his hand was and turned to fire between my legs when his grip tightened. I groaned to cover up my slip, but it might have come out as a moan instead.

“Do you really live here?” I whined, pleading to God that it wouldn’t be true.

“Fourteenth floor.”

The floor just below the top penthouse held not two, like most floors, but one large condo—four bedrooms, four baths, much larger wrap-around veranda, and way out of my price range.

“You’re telling me I can never get away from you?”

“What, you think because we live in the same building that I’m going to come find you? Dream on, Palmer. You’re not that pretty.”

I flinched at his words, an involuntary reaction I’d never gotten over. I tried to keep the words from repeating, from drawing up others like it, but it was futile.

“I know that, asshole.”

He chuckled, and then stopped once the words processed, his eyes wide. “Wait… What? You’re agreeing with me?”

“Of course I am. I’m not stupid,” I said, the words screaming in my mind. “I know I’m plain, boring and a workaholic…useless.”

I slapped my hand over my mouth. My drunken brain was revealing things I never wanted anyone to know, least of all him.

But the words remained, repeating over and over like a broken record until it was taking everything I had to keep them down. I was stronger than them.

“Lila?” he questioned.

I wasn’t so drunk that I didn’t notice the use of my nickname.

“Sorry, I’m a depressed drunk.” I plastered a fake smile on my face. The elevator pinged, alerting me we’d arrived on the eleventh floor. “Have a good weekend.”

I waved, but didn’t give him time to respond or talk about my rant. I made my way down the hall and into my condo, flicking lights on as I moved through to my bedroom and to the bathroom. Standing at the mirror, I stared into a copy of the unique grey-green eyes that haunted me and repeated my mantra, the one that always brought me back. It calmed me, but the memories started trickling through the cracks Nathan had unknowingly created.

I sank down to my knees, my fingers gripping the sink as I tried to glue the fissures back in place.

It was apparent then that Nathan could be my undoing.

It was midway through the next week, and it had been a long day. I was exhausted since I hadn’t slept much the last few nights, and we were still in the office working, even though it was almost ten in the evening. I struggled to keep hold of my verbal filter since my patience was almost non-existent at that point.