Tuesday starts with a professional distance that lasts exactly until Adison leaves for her ten o'clock meeting.
"I'll be back in two hours," she says, gathering her bag with the exhausted efficiency of someone running on spite and caffeine. "Don't burn anything down."
"We'll try our best," I say, and she's gone before the words finish landing.
The office feels different immediately. Smaller. More dangerous.
I'm reviewing contracts at my desk when Zachary moves past me toward the filing cabinet. His body brushes mine—close enough that I smell his cologne, that clean expensive scent that's been haunting me since Friday night.
"Excuse me." His voice is professional, careful.
I shift to give him space, and that's when his hand finds the small of my back.
The touch is brief. Necessary. Completely innocent to anyone watching.
My breath catches. His palm burns through my blouse, and I feel heat flood low in my belly, my pulse hammering in places that have no business responding to something this subtle.
Then he pulls away, retrieving whatever file he actually needed, and moves back to his desk like nothing happened.
I stare at my computer screen and see nothing except the ghost of his touch still burning against my skin.
So, on Wednesday he brings me coffee.
"Thought you might need this." He sets it on my desk mid-morning, and I look up to find him watching me with an expression I can't quite read.
I reach for the cup, and our fingers brush during the handoff. The contact sends electricity straight through my nervous system—his thumb grazes my knuckle and suddenly I'm drowning in a sense of memory of Friday night.
I think I'm obsessed.
Ten minutes later I'm still staring at the same email, rereading the first sentence without comprehension because all I can think about is the calluses on his fingertips and how they felt between my thighs.
"You okay?" Zachary's voice pulls me back.
"Fine." I force myself to look at him, and the heat in his gaze makes my stomach flip. "Just tired."
"You should rest more." His eyes hold mine for a beat too long, and the concern in them feels intimate in ways that make my chest tight. "Take care of yourself, Violet."
The way he says my name undoes something fundamental in my composure.
On Thursday he leans over my desk to review a document I'm working on, and his breath ghosts against my neck.
"This section needs revision." His voice is low, professional, but his proximity is anything but. "The language is too vague."
I'm not hearing words. Just feeling the deliberate nearness of his body, the heat radiating off him, the way goosebumps rise on my arms when he shifts closer. My nipples tighten against my bra, and I pray he can't see the evidence of how much his presence affects me.
"Violet." He shifts slightly, and his chest brushes my shoulder. "Are you listening?"
"Yes." The lie comes out breathless, unconvincing. "Revision. Got it."
He stays there another moment—close enough that I could lean back and feel more of him, close enough that the restraint required not to is physically painful.
I'm wet already, aching, and all he's done is stand near me and breathe.
Then he straightens, moves away, and I understand with perfect clarity that he's testing boundaries the same way I am.
Seeing how close we can get before the pretense shatters completely.
Before one of us breaks.
By Friday the performance has become art neither of us believes in anymore.
Adison leaves early for a doctor's appointment—alone, because Jake's still in Texas being a coward—and her absence changes the air quality entirely.
"I need to grab something from the file room." I stand, and the excuse is transparent enough that I'm not even trying to sell it.
Zachary nods once, and his eyes tell me he knows exactly what I'm doing.
I walk down the hall feeling my pulse in my throat, my hands, between my thighs where I'm already slick with wanting him. The file room door is heavy when I push it open, and I step inside pretending to look for documents I don't actually need.
Thirty seconds later I hear footsteps.
The door opens. Closes. Locks.
"Looking for something?" Zachary's voice carries heat that makes my knees weak.
"Not anymore." I turn to face him, and the hunger in his expression steals my breath.
He crosses the space between us in three strides, and then his mouth is on mine and I'm drowning in the taste of him. His hands find my waist, pulling me closer, and mine find his hair, and within seconds I'm pressed against the filing cabinets with cold metal at my back and heat everywhere else.
"We shouldn't—" I gasp when his mouth moves to my neck, when his teeth scrape against my pulse point.
"I know." His hand slides up my ribcage, thumb brushing the underside of my breast through my blouse. "Tell me to stop."
"Don't stop." My skirt rides up as his thigh presses between mine, and I grind against him shamelessly. "God, don't stop."
His hand works the buttons of my blouse open—one, two, three—and then his palm is on my breast, kneading through lace, and I make a sound that's half whimper, half demand.
The filing cabinet digs into my spine but I don't care, don't care about anything except the way his erection presses hard against my hip and the desperate need building between my legs.
"Violet." My name sounds wrecked in his voice, like prayer and possession combined. "If we don't stop now—"
"Then don't stop now." I pull him closer, kissing him harder.
His hand moves higher under my skirt, fingers tracing the edge of my panties, and I'm ninety seconds from letting him take me right here against government-issued furniture when someone knocks.
Sharp. Professional. Impatient.
"Why is the archive closed?" A voice from accounting calls through the door. "I need to access some files."
Reality crashes back with the force of ice water.
We separate with difficulty—his hands leaving my body slowly, reluctantly, like breaking contact physically hurts. I'm breathing too hard, lipstick definitely smudged, blouse half-open, and his shirt is rumpled where I grabbed it.
"Just a second," Zachary calls, his voice remarkably steady given the circumstances.
We attempt to look professional, which is impossible. My hair is a disaster. His collar is askew. Anyone with eyes will know exactly what we were doing.
He straightens his collar while I button my blouse with shaking fingers, and his eyes meet mine with heat that hasn't diminished at all despite the interruption.
"Saturday." His voice drops low enough that only I can hear. "My place. No interruptions. No witnesses. No pretending this isn't exactly what we both want."
My heart hammers against my ribs, pulse racing, core still aching with unfulfilled need. "Okay."
"Say it." His gaze holds mine, demanding. "Say you want this."
"I want this." The words come out fierce, certain, breathless. "I want you."
He steps back, putting professional distance between us, and unlocks the door.
The person from accounting looks between us with barely concealed suspicion, but Zachary's already moving past her, leaving me standing there with my pulse racing and arousal still slick between my thighs and the promise of Saturday burning through every nerve ending.
I've just agreed to jump off a cliff.
And I have no idea if there's anything waiting at the bottom except more falling.