Excerpt from Her Gentle Capture, second story in The Alfieri Saga
Oh, he made her mad! In fact, no one had ever infuriated Adriana so thoroughly!
Shifting uncomfortably in the contoured plastic chair that was too high to easily cross her legs, she resented even his choice in furniture. She didn’t care that he probably hadn’t helped choose it. He never sat down here in the depressingly grey cafeteria so he wouldn’t have any idea how uncomfortable the chairs are, she thought.
She tossed the unnaturally orange cracker filled with wanna-be peanut butter back onto her paper napkin, dusting her fingers and taking a sip of her diet soda. She was even reduced to lunching on chemicals, she realized. She used to be so healthy, but now? She didn’t have time to go to the grocery store lately. When she came home from the office at night, all she wanted to do was crawl into bed and recover from the relentless demands of him.
Why did he even keep her around? Any report she handed to him was wrong and he spent the next hour telling her how to fix it. Any analysis she submitted wasn’t deep enough or long enough. And when she tried to get help from someone other than him, he snapped at her, telling her that he was the one who wanted the report and he should be the one to instruct her on how to fix it.
Adriana looked down at her chemical and salt-laden lunch and lost her appetite. She was quietly sitting in a lonely corner of the cafeteria, trying to get a few minutes of peace. Peace from a man she had wished to perdition on more than one occasion. Why couldn’t others see through the charming personality that Mitch Powell showed to the outside world? She acknowledged that he was astonishingly good looking with that tall, virile physique and the intelligence to back up that look. But they should talk to the people who shivered in their boots whenever those laser blue eyes slashed in their direction during a meeting. She remembered the first time it had happened to her and, even now, she shivered with a strange sensation that she couldn’t identify, just like she’d done that day.
Her cell phone buzzed and she desperately wanted to ignore the text that had just blinked onto her screen. She knew exactly who had sent it and she didn’t want to see the message. She even turned her phone over so the screen was facing the table instead of staring up at her. While she glared at the inanimate object, deep down inside, she knew that ignoring the message would only make things worse. She rubbed her forehead, trying to work up the strength to read the message. Taking several deep breaths, she calmed herself down. She could do this, she told herself. She was a strong, capable woman with a good mind and a great attitude. Well, except when it came to him.
Shaking her head, she tried to dismiss the negative feelings and anxiety. This was her job. She couldn’t ignore the text. With shaking hands, she picked up her phone and glanced at the message. “Reports are incomplete. We’ll discuss.”
No “hi” or “hello”. Not even recognition that she’d gotten the rotten personnel reports to him earlier than requested. Just a horrible admonishment that she hadn’t completed them to his satisfaction.
And what was wrong with them anyway? As far as she knew, they were complete and accurate. She’d double checked her numbers before finalizing the information, knowing that the man had a brain that could retain the most minute details. She’d ensured that all of the personnel pages linked together with the financial calculations she’d done for him yesterday and everything was right on target.
She stared at the message while her mind went over the reports, trying to think back, go through the details again. What could possibly be wrong with them? She’d done all the requested charts, pulled up extra data to validate her assumptions and even gone so far as to get competitors’ data so she could show how far ahead his company was compared to the others in the industry.
She tossed her crackers and diet soda into the trash with a flourish of frustration. She couldn’t even finish her “meal”, as pathetic as it was, because she was too angry and resentful to eat anything now. It didn’t matter that she didn’t want the stuff anyway. It was the principle of the issue!
She counted to ten, trying to calm her racing nerves and quiet her trembling knees. Unfortunately, the first time through didn’t help, so she did it again, counting to twenty this time, taking deep breaths. She’d learned this technique early on while working with Mitch Powell. She refused to let him know how nervous he always made her feel, because he might like that and Adriana was against giving Mitch Powell any sort of pleasure.
When she once again felt a bit more in control, she buttoned her suit jacket, stood up straighter, firmed her resolve and then almost stomped to the elevator. She’d show him finished! She’d just quit! She’d get out of this stupid company and…what? Her steps faltered as she stepped into the elevator. She hesitated to press the button that would make the car go up to the top floor, worried about her next step. Quit her job? What would she do next? Go crying to daddy and ask him to give her a job in one of his companies? Admit that the horrible and obnoxious Mitch Powell had won?
Never!
She pushed the button and, while waiting for the elevator to take her to the top floor, paced back and forth, taking more deep breaths. She could do this! She could get it right and smugly rub his nose in her reports’ perfection.
She might be learning a great deal by working for this man, but that didn’t mean she had to like him. He had pathetic, adoring fans wherever else he went, she definitely didn’t need to be part of the insipid crowd. They were a groveling, ignorant throng that didn’t know the despicable man beneath the…she hesitated because she didn’t feel like complimenting him right now, but he truly was handsome. She’d give him the strong features, the hard jawline. And those blue eyes could be warm. Not when he was looking at her, but he had moments.
Okay, and he was tall and well-built. That was an inescapable fact. Powerfully well-built, unfortunately. She’d harshly admonished herself for staring at his impressively broad shoulders on several occasions lately. She also had to give him credit for working out. The other men in the office generally had varying levels of belly flab. Not on Mitch Powell! She suspected the man worked out like a demon. He had to in order to keep that level of fitness.
Some might even call him “buff”. Not her! But some might.
Then again, Lucifer was reportedly a very beautiful angel and look where he lives now! She stifled a chuckle at this thought.
At least it was quiet over here in her silent, peaceful little corner of his empire. Sitting down behind her desk, she pulled up the reports in question, skimming through the information to try and figure out what might be missing. She’d been so careful, she couldn’t imagine what she might have done wrong. As she looked through the charts and graphs, she shook her head, confused. It was all there! What could he possibly think was missing?
She felt his presence before she heard the voice. There was just something about the man that made the air around him vibrate with energy.
“Where have you been?” the deep, irritated voice demanded, stepping into her tiny, grey office. He barely even looked up from the file folder he was reading. Just a simple flash of those cold, crystal blue eyes towards her, then back to business.
Adriana jerked as soon as she heard his voice and almost fell off of her chair. The tall, muscular man standing in her workspace should not be here! He was the CEO of Powell Enterprises! He’d never come to her office before. She’d received many…many calls from him demanding that she hurry down to his office. But he’d never deigned to come to hers. It was such a deviation from what she was used to that it took her a moment to catch her breath.
“Sir!” she stammered out, trying to stop herself before she actually toppled off of her chair onto the floor.
Mitch looked down at the woman who had been invading his dreams and driving him crazy with her non-interest. She was so incredibly beautiful. She reminded him of a classical Greek goddess with those lovely, brown eyes and her soft, blond hair that seemed to shimmer in the hazy sunlight streaming through her office window.
Damn, he wanted to touch her hair, to see if it was made of silk or satin. Hair just wasn’t supposed to look that glowing unless one was on a Hollywood movie set or in a shampoo commercial.
Forcing his mind back to business was difficult when she looked up at him like that. He wanted to kiss her. To make love to her and feel her soft, pink lips….
Mentally, he shook his head, trying to concentrate. “Where were you?” he demanded again, this time a bit too harshly since his hands were itching to pull her into his arms and run his fingertips over her skin.
Adriana had no idea what had happened over the past thirty seconds that had put him into an even worse mood, but his very presence in her office meant he must be pretty frustrated. He stared down at her from his enormous height like she was some sort of bug he wanted to step on.
Where had she been? She’d been working her butt off for him since six o’clock this morning without a break. Brutally suppressing her anger as well as the other unidentifiable and strange sensations running through her mind and body, she focused only on the issue of the reports.
“Um…I went to lunch, sir,” she replied, trying to take a deep breath and calm her rising temper. But her office was too small and his spicy, male scent filled her nostrils, making her head swim and her heart start pounding a crazy beat. Good grief, she was twenty-four years old! She shouldn’t react this way when a man stepped into her domain. Especially one as rude and obnoxious as Mitch Powell.
“Did you finish your meal?” he asked, his voice only slightly less dictatorial.
She swallowed painfully when those eyes moved down her figure and she shook her head. “I threw it away when I got your text. I’m trying to figure out what is missing now, sir.”
He crossed his arms over his massive chest, those blue eyes looking down at her as if he could see right into her head. Could he know how much he irritated her? Or how nervous he made her feel? Surely she could hide some of the crazy emotions he generated within her, couldn’t she? Adriana didn’t want to be transparent, but this man understood the way people thought, almost like he could read their minds. He seemed to know what they were thinking even before they thought it. Which was probably one of the reasons he was so brilliant at business.
She was being silly, she told herself. He couldn’t know what she was thinking or feeling. He probably didn’t respect her because she was always “sirring” him, but what was a woman to do? The man was a horrible boss, intimidating as all get out and never said a simple, kind word to anyone. At least not that she’d heard so far. Of course, she’d only been working here for a year and had only been in this position for the past two months. So it was possible that he had said something nice to someone at some point in his life. She simply hadn’t been a witness to such an outrageous act yet, so she doubted the possibility. Until evidence is shown…her father had always told her.
Mitch looked around, his eyes taking in the cramped space that barely allowed for a desk and a filing cabinet. “Why the hell is your office so small?” he asked suddenly, looking around at the grey walls, the tiny window with the grey blinds that looked out onto the bleak exterior wall of the next building. “And why don’t you have any pictures of your family? Are you an only child?”
She let out a bark of laughter at the question and shook her head. Her four brothers would love to hear someone ask that kind of a question. They would immediately swoop in and make their presence known. “Hardly,” she admitted, then realized who she was talking to and that he probably didn’t actually care if she had any siblings. Refusing to look down and be intimidated by the dark look in those blue eyes, she raised her chin defiantly. “I don’t have any pictures here because I haven’t had much time yet.”
He wasn’t relenting on the issue. “But you’ve been here for months. There’s been plenty of time.” He tucked the reports he’d been reading under his arm and glared at her, trying to figure out what was going on in this woman’s life. She was fascinating. And he couldn’t decipher what she was thinking. He saw her porcelain cheeks turn slightly pink but her dark blue eyes were closed off to him right now.
Adriana rubbed her forehead, trying to figure out why he even cared. “Yes, sir. I’ll get pictures in here as soon as possible. But let me work on this report first. I’ll try and figure out what is wrong with it and get it back to you as soon as possible.”
He was silent for so long, she looked up from her computer. He was staring at her with an odd look in his eyes and she swallowed painfully, wondering if her words had been impertinent. But why did he care if she had pictures or not? And why was he asking about her office location and its size? He had to know about her office. He’d assigned it to her! She’d just thought it was yet another way for the man to show her the difference in his position within the company versus hers. But she didn’t need a tiny, cramped office space to know that. It was painfully obvious.
He nodded as if mentally coming to some sort of conclusion that he wasn’t going to share. And then he said the words that she’d been dreading ever since he’d walked in. The words he said every time she had to re-do a report for him. “Bring your computer to my office. We’ll work on it together,” he told her. With that, he walked out, leaving her with her mouth hanging open and confusion in her eyes.
“Work together again?” she whispered. “Oh no!”
His head popped back into her office. “And get maintenance to move your office closer to mine. I don’t like you being this far away from me. I’ll need you closer when we start doing additional projects together.”
Her mouth quickly snapped shut but the amusement in his eyes told her he’d heard exactly what she’d just whispered. Cripes!
He disappeared again and she let her head fall onto her open palms. Why did he do this all the time? The man ran a global empire! Why did he feel the need to show her, in painful detail, all the things she should have done on her report? Things she hadn’t thought to include or that he wanted shown in a different way. No matter how hard she worked, she never got out of these sessions. He always wanted more!
She hated these “tutorial” sessions! Her stomach felt like she was going to throw up at any moment when he was around her. It was worse when he stood behind her and pointed over her shoulder, his fingers popping into her line of sight, their shoulders touching and all she wanted to do was yell at the man to back up!
Pulling herself together once more, she mentally gave herself a pep talk. She could master this job and there wasn’t anything he could throw at her that would stop her from succeeding! She gathered up her computer and hurried down the hallway, trying to catch up with him. Unfortunately, she was only five feet, six inches while he was something like six feet, four inches. The man needed to be cut down to size both literally and figuratively. But who would do it? The man scared just about everyone else on Wall Street. No one took on Mitchell Powell and survived. He was the Terror of Wall Street. When he cast his eyes on acquiring a company, the owners started quaking in their board room. Mitch Powell never lost when he set his mind on a goal.
Adriana had come here to learn from the best. Well, the second best since her father, Damien Alfieri, was still the best in her mind. But she’d wanted to step out from under her father’s shadow, to learn on her own and show the world that she wasn’t afraid to do things by herself. She was her own woman!
Well, she would be as soon as she figured out what could possibly be wrong with the reports she’d just turned in. They were fine! He was just being a jerk. Besides, if he wanted something different, he needed to tell her! She couldn’t read his mind.
As soon as she stepped into the doorway of his office, she was lost, not sure what to do. She didn’t want to go into his office, feeling strange when she was so overwhelmed by his personality. But he wasn’t letting her stay in her “safe zone” outside of his office. How he knew she was standing there, she had no idea. “Set up over there on the conference table,” he commanded, not looking up from whatever he was reviewing on his desk.
She stepped inside, her knees slightly weak and her stomach quivering. She’d been in this office too many times and, stepping inside now, she still didn’t like it. It was too modern looking, too big and too sunny. He needed shades to block out the afternoon sun.
She walked in and took a seat at the conference room table that sat in one corner of his office. She took the seat next to the head of the table, not sure what to expect now.
Tossing down the papers he’d been reading, Mitch looked across the room where Adriana was primly sitting at his conference room table. “Okay, let’s get started,” he said and walked over to the chair next to hers. For the next four hours, he went over the reports, showed her what he wanted and how to get the data.
Adriana must have been extremely tired because, a long time later, a knock sounded on the door. Looking outside, she suddenly realized that the sun had already gone down over the horizon. Where had the time gone?
She watched him as he walked to the door then jerked in surprise when she realized that she was staring at the man’s butt! Okay, not just staring. She was silently admiring his butt. Her head was actually tilting, admiring the tight curve and the way his slacks smoothed over the area. Adriana groaned, then stopped herself when he looked back at her. “Are you okay?” he asked with curiosity in those scary-smart, blue eyes.
Adriana jerked her eyes back to her computer screen, refusing to look up at him in case he could read what she’d been contemplating in her eyes. “Yes! Of course,” she replied quickly, sitting up straighter in her chair and praying that he was too far away to see her face turn pink. His butt wasn’t that good! Okay, well, it was. But it was attached to the man so it didn’t count.
He started heading back to the table and she looked down quickly. Don’t stare at his shoulders, she told herself firmly. Don’t stare at his shoulders!
She looked up, involuntarily entranced by those broad shoulders. Good grief, fabulous shoulders and a great butt. What a waste. She sighed as he put several large bags on the table in front of her.
“Pasta okay with you?” he asked, taking a package out of the bag.
She suddenly realized that she was staring at his hands, her mind wondering about their strength and what his long fingers might feel like. When her eyes shifted back up to his, she felt her face turn an even more embarrassing shade of red. “Pasta?” she asked, blinking and trying to focus on the computer screen in front of her.
“Pasta. Food? Do you want pasta?”
She stared at the bag, noticing his long, sexy fingers once more. Sexy fingers? Since when did the man have sexy fingers? Hadn’t she ever looked at his fingers before? Of course not, she reprimanded herself. She was a business woman. She did not notice a man’s butt, shoulders or fingers!
What was he saying? Something about food. Yes, food would be good. Pasta! “Yes. Pasta is great. I love pasta. Red sauce, white sauce. Any kind of pasta. My father is Italian so…” her voice trailed off as she realized she was rambling. “Yes. Pasta is wonderful.”
He looked down at her from his great height, his blue eyes becoming more curious and amused as her silly digressive gibberish petered to an awkward halt. Perfect! She amused him! Just the impression she wanted to make. It was already bad enough that he thought she was an idiot, now she was entertainment. Her father would be so proud!
He chuckled and handed her a box filled with something that smelled incredibly good. “Pasta with seafood,” he announced and handed her a set of silverware.
She took the box with trembling fingers and her face felt like it was on fire. Where had her mind gone today? She looked out the window and realized that it was now dark outside. Great! She was noticing her obnoxious boss was hot and she was losing track of time. In other words, she was losing her mind.
“Are you feeling okay?” he asked as he took another box out of the bag.
She sighed and opened the box, smelling the incredible scents of scallops and shrimp in a cream sauce with lots of garlic. “Wow!” she said with feeling. “I didn’t realize how hungry I am.”
“Next time, don’t throw your lunch away.”
She took the napkin he handed to her and smiled weakly. “It was just peanut butter crackers,” she explained. “No great loss.”
He froze when she said that, astonished that she’d eaten so little during the day. “Why were you just eating peanut butter crackers for lunch?”
She shrugged and spread the napkin carefully over her lap, trying very hard not to dive into the food like a starving, voracious hooligan. But her stomach growled at that point, giving her away.
“Eat,” he told her, not waiting for her response, and pulled out the chair next to her again. He’d been sitting there before but he was closer now. Or maybe he was the same distance away from her, but the lack of afternoon sunshine made everything seem more…intimate. This new position was scary. Different scary, she realized.
“Okay, look at these numbers here,” he said, using his own fork to point to some numbers on the screen. “They need to be over here in this data.” He pointed to several other tables that needed to be updated. Unfortunately, Adriana was acutely aware of his broad shoulders that bumped hers several times. And that smell! His male scent was driving her crazy. Her body was doing something weird every time she smelled that citrus scent! It was like…
“Are you listening to me?”
She jerked her head around and…whoa! His face was much closer than she’d thought. In fact, he was so close, she could almost feel his breath on her cheek. Good grief the man smelled incredibly good! No man should smell this…delicious. She felt almost dizzy as she inhaled his strong, male scent, wanting to close her eyes and savor the smell.
She suddenly realized that he had stopped talking and she was just staring at him. “What?” she asked when she saw the strange look in his eyes.
“You’re not paying attention, are you?” His voice sounded deeper. Huskier. Or was that just her imagination?
“Yes,” she whispered, not sure what was going on right at the moment. He was still a jerk and she really, really didn’t like him. So why was she wondering what it would be like to kiss him? Why was her mind wondering if his lips would be soft or firm? Would his kiss be demanding or gentle? She wasn’t sure which she would prefer but she’d like to experiment. With him!
Adriana suddenly realized that her thoughts had veered away from business once again and she shook her head. Numbers! Data! Focus on the reports!
She swallowed and looked down. “Sorry. I guess I’m hungrier than I thought.” She tried to take a bite of one of the plump scallops but as soon as the meat was in her mouth, she couldn’t chew. He was watching her with that strange light in his blue eyes. She didn’t understand and the smell, the heat of his body was starting to make her feel uncomfortably warm.
He pulled back and glanced at his watch. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize how late it was. Why don’t you eat your pasta and then we’ll pack it up for the night?”
She looked at the clock on her computer and was surprised to realize it was after eight o’clock. “Yes.” She replied. Stuffing a shrimp in her mouth, she stood up. Putting the pasta to the side of her computer, she gathered up all of the papers, stacking them into a haphazard pile. Swallowing the shrimp so quickly, she almost chocked on it, she closed the box nervously and stood up. “I’ll get out of your way, sir.” She grabbed all of the papers, her computer and the box of pasta, about to hurry out of the office. She suddenly stopped and looked back at him. “I’ll have revised reports to you by the time you come in tomorrow morning, sir.”
She was almost to the doorway when she heard him call out her name. “Adriana,” he said, that deep, sexy voice that had suddenly started to send crazy images to her mind. Images that she really, really shouldn’t be thinking about! Not with this man! Well, honestly, not with any man! Erotic images were…well, she’d never had any erotic images or fantasies. Not like…shoot! She was now wondering what this man’s chest would look like without that shirt on!
She finally forced her eyes to look up into his, nervous about whatever he was going to say this time.
“Don’t call me ‘sir’. My name is Mitch.” She nodded and was about to turn away, to head out of his office as quickly as possible, but he started speaking again. “And have the reports to me by noon. Not first thing in the morning. We’ll go over them together at that point.”
She nodded again, not sure what to say and not completely sure what was going on inside her head. She’d never imagined any man without his clothes on. Except Brad Pitt. Oh, and Chris Hemsworth. Well, and Daniel Craig. But for all of those guys she could explain her fascination. This sudden interest in Mitch’s physique didn’t make any sense. Adriana peeked back at him, then blushed when she found that he was watching her steadily, a strange look in his eyes. She turned around and hurried out the door, feeling foolish and not sure what was happening to her.
Mitch watched the beautiful woman walk out of his office. He would have paid a great deal of money to know what had just gone through her mind. That tempting blush was alluring and revealing, but not revealing enough. He wanted to understand her, to read her mind and know what shew as thinking.
Adriana Alfieri was amazingly lovely with a sharp intelligence and a quick wit that had hooked him from the start. Two months ago, she’d almost knocked him over when she’d walked into a meeting and he’d been fascinated ever since. Adriana had taken a seat off to the side during that meeting, but he hadn’t been able to concentrate on anything that was said. He’d been too focused on looking at her legs.
They were long, slender legs with sleek muscles, as if she was a runner. He hadn’t been able to control the x-rated fantasies. Not during that meeting, and they’d been getting more intense since.
Unfortunately for his peace of mind, she wasn’t just a lovely body. She had brains too! Several times since that fateful day, he’d overheard her in conversation and he’d walked away chuckling when she’d let a zinger fly. She found humor in the most interesting issues, like when someone had asked if she’d gotten coffee as she’d walked out of the kitchen with a steaming cup. She’d just raised her cup and said, “Could be. Might be vodka. I’ll never tell,” and just moseyed down the hallway.
Watching her hurry out of his office now, he couldn’t tear his eyes away from her incredible figure. Nor could he figure out how to get her attention so that she saw him as a man, or stop himself from seeing her as the most desirable woman walking the earth. One or the other had to happen and it had to happen soon. He was really getting sick of the cold showers he had to take every night just so he could stop fantasizing about those long legs and get some sleep. Besides, the showers weren’t very effective.
It occurred to him that the suit she’d been wearing today must have cost her a pretty penny. It was elegantly tailored and very sophisticated. His eyes narrowed as he thought about that suit. It looked vaguely similar to a suit he had bought for one of his mistresses last year. The suit had cost upwards of three thousand dollars. Now where would a woman at her pay level have gotten three thousand dollars for one suit?
He shook his head, trying to clear it of something so trivial. He didn’t care where she’d gotten that suit. As long as he got to take it off of her pretty soon. She was a mystery, but an exceptionally beautiful one. And he meant to have her. She’d been flitting around this office with those incredible legs for too long.
He thought about that blush and her glance backwards, wondering if it indicated what he wanted it to mean. Could she be attracted to him as well?
Time to test the possibility, he thought with relish.