Page 61 of Burden of Proof

The comment was asinine. Like I had any choice.

“Of course,” I said, sinking into the expensive leather.

“This will be quick,” Caleb said. “We just wanted to congratulate you.”

My teeth chattered together once, and then I clamped my jaw together hard so they didn’t do it again. “Congratulate me?” I echoed.

“We’ve talked it over,” Walsh said simply. “You’ve been here for your whole career, Covington, and you’ve done good work by us.”

“You’ve been on an upward trajectory since day one,” Winters said, nodding agreement with Walsh. “And you’ve taken the rest of us with you.”

“We’re thinking non-equity, Covington.”

I nodded, grateful for the offer and even more so that I wasn’t being asked to come up with a six figure buy-in for the honor.

“I’m…I don’t know what to say.”

“Hopefully yes,” Winters said with a low laugh.

“Yes,” I said quickly, nodding along in case the word didn’t make it out of my mouth loudly enough. “Obviously, yes.”

“We’ll finish drafting up the papers then and get them to you before the end of the day.” Caleb stood up and shook my hand, then Walsh shook my hand, and that was that.

The thing I’d waited my whole career for was finally mine, and it had been fifteen-some-odd years of work for a two-minute conversation. The reality didn’t feel real, and I made it back to my desk with sweaty palms and trembling fingers. I had known this was coming. Caleb had told me as much, but hearing the actual words, knowing the new contract was on its way to my inbox…

Lincoln was the first person I wanted to tell.

Fishing my phone out of my pocket, I opened my messaging app to text him, finding the one he’d sent me over lunch still unread. It was a video, and the freeze frame thumbnail looked like he’d taken it in my shower. Groaning, I jumped up from my desk, closed my office door, and locked it before sitting back down and digging out my headphones.

I pressed play and Lincoln’s face filled my screen, his hair wet and slicked back, his chest dripping.

“You just left for work and I’m so fucking hard for you, Daddy,” he said, voice not much more than a long and drawn-out moan. “Fuck. Fuck. I can still feel you inside of me.”

Arousal churned low and hot in my belly, my cock immediately jerking to full mast at not just the sight of him, but the sound of him. I watched rapt as Lincoln stroked himself off in my shower, twisting and tweaking the barbells in his nipples while he dirty-talked me the whole time.

I want to tie you to your bed and tease your asshole until you come, and then tease you until you can’t come anymore. Until you’re just gasping and begging.

And then I want you to wake me up in the middle of the night…I need it. Need you to just take me. Want you to…

Tell me where to come. Tell me where I can come. I’ll come on your face, Daddy. Sir, oh fuuuuuuck…

Lincoln was a vision, flushed and coming apart against the back wall of my shower, and I was seconds away from coming in my fucking pants at my desk, dick untouched. I wanted to do all of the things he’d asked for. I wanted to give him everything. Even as I watched him pull himself together long enough to get back to his phone, my mind raced with fantasies of flip fucking him until we were both a sticky and sated mess.

I needed a detour to the bathroom, but right as I pulled the headphones out of my ears, I heard Lincoln’s voice. The video cut off abruptly, and I sat back down in my chair, restarting it from the beginning and dragging the cursor back through to the very end. The camera was focused on his chest, water droplets racing down over his nipples as he picked his phone up from wherever he’d propped it up to film.

“I think I’m in love you,” Lincoln whispered, and then the video cut to black.

The words were so quiet I almost missed them. They were clearly an accident, not meant for me, but I’d heard them just the same. At the sound of his voice, my balls churned and heat exploded at the base of my spine, shooting hard and fast like a gunshot.

I think I’m in love with you, he’d said.

And in reply?

I’d shot my load into my pants.

CHAPTER 19

LINCOLN