EVIE

When I whirl in the direction of the voice, I see Alex, the company's CEO — all six-foot-something, dark hair and blazing black eyes — glaring at me from the door that had been closed a few seconds before.

"I-I..."

"Is that the corp comm file on the tire recycling program?" he growls and I nod enthusiastically. "Fucking marketing. They take so long with everything."

Hey! We do not! I want to shout, but he's obviously angry so I stand, frozen to the plush grey carpet.

"Gather those papers and get the coffee on. She'll be here soon."

She? Who? What?

"Uh, sir, I—"

Alex steps closer and his smell washes over me. Yum. I breathe deep a few times, trying to get more of his scent in my nose.

"I told the agency that I didn't want the girls to call me sir." He gives me a once-over, and I detect a suspicious, or possibly skeptical, look on his face.

"Sorry, sir," I look up, then down at my feet. "Sorry, Mr. Jenkins, but I think there's been a mixup."

"Yes. There has been a mixup. Corp Comm has fucked up and the agency obviously sent me a temporary secretary that's borderline mute. Go get the coffee. My grandmother will go ballistic if I don't have something hot and alcoholic waiting for her."

I blink at him stupidly. This is obviously the wicked Alex Jenkins. I feel sorry for his poor granny.

"The coffee's in there." With an arrogant gaze, he points at the door where he'd just emerged, then walks around the front of the desk and sinks into the black leather seat. "And make it strong."

Shaking, I collect the papers and set the file on his desk. I guess there's no harm in making the guy and his grandma coffee, right?

Sabrina would call me obedient for doing something like this, but I think it's just old-fashioned manners. Even if Alex Jenkins is a prick.

The room's actually something of a studio apartment, with a fancy stainless steel coffee maker near a small fridge, a clothing rack with identical dark suit jackets and white shirts, and a cozy-looking gray sofa that's aimed at a flat screen TV.

He must work so hard that he stays here sometimes. I fiddle with the coffee maker. As the machine churns out the fresh-smelling brew, a disconcerting realization comes over me.

He thinks I'm his secretary.

It's kind of funny, really, a man so powerful not knowing his own secretary. But he'd said something about a temp, and with the temper he just exhibited, I suspect that he goes through secretaries quite quickly.

Thank God I'm in a whole different department, away from such wrath. Even though he is impossibly sexy, I'd hate to be around such arrogance for forty hours a week. And he's probably the kind of boss to make his secretary work overtime. Unpaid.

Wait. I'm working overtime. Unpaid. I snort a little.

First I poured the coffee into a mug, then wonder if I should use one of the carafes. Figuring that I'll bring some to him first to get his approval — he seems like the kind of man who wants to approve everything in his orbit — I straighten my spine and walk into the office with the coffee.

He's sitting in the chair, his back to me, when I slightly bend to give him the coffee. When he whirls around, his knees brush my bare legs and I become flustered.

His hand flies up, and knocks the mug out of my grasp.

It splatters all over his white shirt, and my pink cardigan. He curses, loud and vulgar.

"I'm so sorry! Oh My God!"

I spring back, and run across the office and into the adjacent room to grab a towel. This is a disaster, and all because I wasn't more assertive about who I really am. Towel...towel...towel...I snatch a white, fluffy towel from a basket and run back in. Is the towel even clean?

By the time I fly back into the office, he has his shirt off.

I didn't know real life men are this muscular. I've seen guys like that on TV, but figured that pecs and abs and whatever those muscles on a guy's side are called were all computer-generated trickery.

Alex Jenkins is like a damned Rodin statue. Hard, sculpted and smooth. His skin is tan and...mercy, his shoulders have muscles that I didn't even know existed.

I shield my eyes with one hand.

"I'm so sorry, sir. You just startled me, that's all. Here's a towel." I hand it to him without looking. I feel my own shoulder with the opposite hand. Nope. I don't even have those muscles.

He utters a few more swear words. "Miss...Miss...what is your name, anyway?"

"Evie Cooper." I address the floor.

"Evie Cooper, look at me."

I raise my eyes, trying not to pay attention to his muscular arms, the planes and valleys of his six-pack stomach, the hardness of his pecs. No, I try to ignore the bronze of his skin and the sprinkling of hair on his chest. Attempt to block out his nipples, which are hard.

A brief fantasy of licking his nipples pops into my mind. Which horrifies me.

He's so beautiful.

I stare into his eyes, an act equally as dangerous as looking at his body.

He flings the soiled shirt into a wastebasket. "Get me a shirt and bring it here. And another tie. The red one. They're on the hook on the back of the door. And take off your sweater. Now."

I stand, frozen. He's telling me to take off my clothes. The very idea of it excites me. And scares me. "My...sweater?"

"There's coffee all over the front." He points at my chest.

A flush of embarrassment spreads across my face as I peel off my sweater. The coffee hasn't reached my black sheath dress. Thank God because it's my nicest work dress, and I don't have money for dry cleaning this week.

Looking about wildly, I wonder what to do with my sweater.

"Give it here." He extends his hand.

Keeping my gaze on the floor, I hand it to him. Our fingers brush against each other, and a flare of electricity travels from my hand, to my arm, right into my chest.

I scamper off, mortified. When I return, his back is to me, and he's staring out the window. The muscles in his back are just as impressive as the front.

"Sir. Mr. Jenkins. Here." I hold the shirt out and he whirls.

He steps forward and my heart pounds as he comes closer. I'm not used to being around masculine, powerful men.

Masculine, powerful, naked men.

Okay, I've never been around even a half-naked man before. Whatever. I swallow hard as I hold open the shirt. Attempting to be professional — there's that obedient side of me again — I help slide the shirt on those powerful arms.

He stares at me while buttoning the shirt. "Not a great first day, Evie."

Wordlessly, I hand him the tie. I'm not going to argue with him because I assume that this will be my last day at this company, because he'll fire me soon enough — either when he discovers I'm not his secretary or when he finds out I'm an intern in the incompetent corp comm department.

So much for getting a job here.

He slides the tie through his collar and glares at me. "Can you help me, please, instead of just standing there and gawking at my body?"

This is getting worse by the second. I'd just ogled my boss. Could he report me to HR for sexual harassment?

I stand in front of him, my breasts just inches from his chest. God, why is today the day I wore my thinnest bra? I can see my nipples poking through my cheap dress. Ugh.

Concentrate on the tie. Concentrate. My hands tremble. I haven't tied a man's tie since my father was alive. If I think too hard about the last time I did that — the night he and my mother died two years ago in a car crash, when I was twenty — I'll want to cry.

This is not the time to cry.

Taking a deep breath, I put my hands on either end of the red tie and look into his face. It's then that I noticed he's was staring at me with something other than anger.

An unfamiliar warmth spreads through my body, concentrating somewhere between my legs. His eyes are half-lidded, almost sensual. He smiles at me, but it's not a kind smile. It's a predatory smile.

"You do know how to tie a man's tie, don't you, Evie?"

I nod. "Which knot do you like?" My dad had taught me the Windsor knot, the half Windsor and the Four in Hand.

"I like knots of all kinds," he murmurs. "Usually I'm the one tying them, though."

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