Page 8 of Daddies’ Dark Desires (Forbidden Fantasies #19)

GRANT

H arper doesn’t shoot straight up like any other employee—intern or no—would at my voice. She straightens slowly, peeking over her shoulder at me with feigned innocence that I would believe if I were anyone else.

It makes me step closer when she turns back to put away the file box she was rifling through. Like she’s ignoring my presence. Like I’m not her boss. Like I’m going to let her get away with being a brat.

“I asked you a question, little girl.” That has her back going rigid, and she spins toward me, hands on her hips and eyes on fire. Oh that did it.

There’s the response I want. I file that nugget away for later.

Her calm has burned away. “I am not a little girl.”

I use my size to tower over her, but her arms don’t drop. If anything, my nearness seems to puff her up even more. I close the distance between us almost completely, knowing I should very much be thinking of her as a little girl.

As my best friend’s daughter.

Completely off limits, but I can’t stop the way my body curls over hers, protective and primal. She doesn’t shrink back one bit, but her head tips back to maintain eye contact. We’re close enough to kiss.

At this angle, it’s hard to maintain her gaze instead of perusing her body. The way her hands are planted on her hips present her luscious breasts toward me, and her choice in tops creates a deep V from this angle, giving me miles of cleavage to ogle if I’d like.

The mere periphery of all her pale skin makes my insides burn. She’s no little girl. I have no arguments to deny that she is a fully formed woman.

Fuck, my hands clench into fists before I force them to relax.

Somehow, I keep myself locked in. So does she. The battle is sexier than I imagined. Most women can’t stand their ground against me. They cower and duck under my naturally honed authority.

Even when I’m gentle.

Harper doesn’t seem to struggle with it at all, staring me down like she’s about to eviscerate me with her plump, red-stained mouth.

“What. Are. You. Doing. Little girl?” I repeat myself. It’s never good to make me do so.

But the way annoyance squints her eyes at me is a damn aphrodisiac. “My job, old man.”

I scarcely squash a growl. That should hurt me some. I am far, far too old for her. Too old to be thinking the things I have been about her and her body. Twenty-six years older than the woman I’m boxing in.

Fuck, I’m a bastard. This is my best friend’s daughter.

Her effect on me should be more surprising, but it isn’t. Harper is the exact kind of woman I like. One that’s harder to find than I can properly express.

And it’s her spirit that hooks me the most. This brattiness that begs to be punished. To push and push until she finds the detonation button.

I’ve got a long fuse. A slow burn. She’s going to have to push a lot to break my resolve.

I have a bad feeling she won’t back down until she does.

“It is not your job to be rifling through the files in here. We have people for that. The very same people who have been depositing and retrieving files from your desk all week.” My body rocks and hers follows the move.

I’m prepared for a fight without the promise of follow through.

“So, tell me, what’s the real reason you’re in here? ”

“You’re the experienced investigator. Why don’t you tell me why I’m in here?”

The challenge in her lifted brow makes my hands itch to lean her over my knee and spank the insolence right out of her.

But I know what would send her in here instead of asking someone to follow protocol. She’s not wild with the rules. Harper is rather strict in the way she operates, so that means she’s digging for something that’s connected with her father.

She’s not going to find anything in here that we haven’t already been through. What sparked this search? The files she’s been going through shouldn’t have led her to in this section of the boxes.

I lean my hands on the stacks behind her, eliminating a few of the inches left between us.

Harper’s pupils blow wide. Nostrils flare. And not from fear.

God, I can smell the silky scent of her perfume, worn down to bare wisps from a full day. A few strands of her auburn hair have fallen from her updo, framing her round cheeks and big eyes.

The softer parts of myself want to tuck them away from her face, to allow myself that connection. A touch.

It’s difficult not to press her into the shelving unit with my body.

She must read something in my body language because she bites her lip at me. White teeth dipping into the faded red of her lush mouth.

Fuck, my gaze lowers to where they indent, and my heart pounds a little harder as I look into her dark chocolate eyes again.

“We’re going to have to set some ground rules for you, baby girl.”

Her nostrils flare again, and it’s intoxicating. And the way her gaze dips to my mouth then back up has need raging ruthlessly through me.

You’d let me completely defile you, wouldn’t you? You’d relish in it.

I’m not allowed to give into this desire.

Then, she uses the stacks to push up on her toes, so much closer than I should allow. “You want to set rules?”

Harper’s face turns so that her lips barely brush my cheek, hovering there for a beat. I’m frozen in place, forcing myself still—to not react to her teasing me with what I want.

“You’ll be the first to break them.” Her breath blows in my ear, and every muscle down my body tightens. My cock is straining against my slacks as her breasts brush my chest.

Fuck.

Harper slips out from between my arms and saunters away. Absolute confidence. No peeking back.

Still, I watch every inch as her hips swing as she leaves me hard, annoyed, and not nearly as in control as I thought.

Then, I spot the file boxes she’s been digging in and go cold. La Sangre Nueva.