Page 22 of His to Claim (The Owner’s Club #2)

Delilah

Five days. I've been Graham Ellsworth's assistant for five days, and I already have enough information to destroy his life three times over. I've also had an obscene amount of orgasms in varying locations, but who's counting.

It's insane that he's given me this level of access.

His calendar, his contacts, his financial passwords—all of it sits right there on my computer like Christmas morning wrapped in corporate negligence.

I've memorized his security protocols, mapped out the building's blind spots, and identified at least six different ways to transfer funds without triggering immediate alerts.

Any rational criminal would have already cleaned him out and disappeared to a non-extradition country.

Instead, I'm sitting at my desk pretending to organize his travel itinerary while trying not to think about the way he cornered me in the elevator yesterday.

How his hand found the small of my back and pressed until I arched against him, his mouth at my ear promising things that made my knees weak.

"You've been avoiding me," he'd murmured, fingers tracing the outline of my hip through my skirt. "Don't."

Or the way he's been leaving increasingly bold messages on my desk.

Yesterday's note simply read: I can still taste you from Tuesday.

Today's was even worse: Conference room B is soundproof.

Just saying. Both written in his elegant handwriting on expensive stationary like he's discussing quarterly budgets instead of the various ways he wants to bend me over his desk.

They're calculated. Deliberate provocations from a man who knows exactly how to unravel my carefully constructed composure. Graham Ellsworth doesn't do anything without purpose, and his purpose seems to be driving me slowly insane with want.

The worst part is how effective it's been.

"Miss Reeves," his voice comes through the intercom, low and commanding, "could you bring me the Morrison files? And maybe some of that coffee that definitely won't be drugged this time?"

It’s a joke he wont let go of. There's dark amusement in his tone that makes heat pool low in my belly. He's remembering our first encounter, probably imagining what I might slip into his drink if he gave me another opportunity.

"Right away, Mr. Ellsworth," I reply, grateful for the excuse to move.

Sitting still while cataloging his vulnerabilities is becoming increasingly difficult when all I want to catalog is the way his hands feel on my skin, or how he's started timing his meetings so he has excuses to call me into his office throughout the day.

I gather the files from the cabinet—noting, automatically, that the lock could be picked in under thirty seconds—and prepare his coffee exactly how he likes it. Two sugars, splash of cream, no pharmaceutical additives. Though the temptation is always there, for entirely different reasons now.

As I approach his office, I can hear him on a conference call, and I pause in the doorway. Something I've been noticing more and more this week makes me hesitate before knocking.

Graham is... different when he thinks no one's watching.

Gone is the playful charm, the constant undercurrent of amusement that colors every interaction we've had.

In its place is something sharp and focused and utterly commanding.

His voice carries the kind of authority that makes million-dollar decisions seem casual, and his eyes hold a calculating intelligence that explains how he built an empire before thirty.

I've caught glimpses of something deeper too—the way he quietly arranged a substantial bonus for a junior employee whose mother needed surgery, his patient explanation to accounting about why certain "discretionary expenses" that benefitted employee work-life balance were non-negotiable.

Small moments that lodge themselves in my chest like splinters, making this job infinitely more complicated than it should be.

Most rich men are assholes and therefore easy targets. It’s easy to steal from someone who deserves it. It’s significantly harder to do it to a man who appears to be a genuinely good person, despite his devilish tongue.

"The offer is non-negotiable," he says into the phone now, his tone leaving no room for argument. "You have forty-eight hours to decide whether you want to sell to me voluntarily or wait for me to acquire you through less... friendly means."

The threat is delivered with such casual menace that it makes my pulse quicken. This is the predator beneath the pretty smile, the man who doesn't just succeed in business but dominates it. The man who could crush me without breaking a sweat if he ever decided I was a threat worth eliminating.

He catches me watching and our eyes meet through the glass. For a moment, something electric passes between us— recognition, maybe, or acknowledgment of what we both really are beneath our carefully constructed facades.

The problem is, I'm starting to suspect that what Graham really is might be infinitely more dangerous to my carefully guarded heart than I ever anticipated. And what I really am might get me killed if he ever stops finding my games entertaining.

Then the call ends, and just like that, the mask slides back into place. His expression softens into that familiar grin, the dangerous edge disappearing so quickly I almost wonder if I imagined it.

"Enjoying the show?" he asks as I enter with his coffee.

"Just admiring your... negotiation style," I reply, setting the cup on his desk. "Very persuasive."

"I have my moments." He leans back in his chair, studying me with those perceptive eyes. "Most people find business calls boring."

"I'm not most people."

"No," he agrees, "you're definitely not."

The way he's looking at me makes my skin feel too tight, like there's electricity running just beneath the surface.

I want to tell him that he doesn't need to keep up the charming playboy act with me, that I've seen glimpses of who he really is and found it infinitely more compelling than the surface charm.

But that would be crossing a line I can't afford to cross. This is a job. He's a mark. The fact that he might actually be a decent person beneath all that wealth and danger doesn't change the fundamental equation.

Except maybe it does.

He stands and moves around the desk, his fingers gliding along the top of a frame half-tucked behind his monitor.

The first time I saw it, I thought it would be the usual corporate award or a photo op with a politician—but it isn’t.

The cherry wood frame housed a cat. Mostly gray, with splotches of black and white, and sprawled across this very desk like it owned it.

The engraved plate at the bottom read Smoke.

The picture is unguarded in a way Graham never is, proof that he lets something into his world that doesn’t bend to his rules. I shouldn’t care, but I do.

He comes to lean against the desk directly in front of where I’m standing.

Too close. Close enough that I catch the scent of his cologne—Acqua di Gio, because of course it is, because he's exactly the type of devastatingly attractive businessman who would wear the cologne that makes women lose their minds.

Close enough that I can see the genuine concern in his eyes when he says, "Sophia, are you alright? You look a little... flustered."

Flustered. That's one word for it. Another word might be terrified, because somewhere in the last five days, this stopped being just a job and became something infinitely more complicated.

"I'm fine," I lie, taking a step back. "Just... sorry, I think I need some air."

"Sophia—"

But I'm already moving, practically fleeing from his office like a coward. I don't stop until I'm out of the building entirely, standing on the sidewalk gulping down lungfuls of Manhattan air that doesn't smell like expensive cologne and kindness I don't deserve.

My phone buzzes with a text:

Graham

Everything okay? You left like the building was on fire.

I stare at the message, thumb hovering over the keyboard.

How do I explain that I'm falling for a man I'm supposed to be stealing from?

That every small kindness makes the deception feel heavier?

That I've started looking forward to his terrible jokes and thoughtful gestures more than I look forward to the payday this job represents?

Just needed some air. Back in five.

Take your time. The files can wait.

The kindness in his response makes my chest ache.

This would be so much easier if he were just another entitled rich asshole.

Instead, he's complicated and intelligent and apparently capable of genuine human decency, which makes everything about this job feel like I'm betraying more than just his bank account.

There’s too many people on the sidewalk outside and I still don’t feel like I can breathe correctly. I need a moment away from all of the noise to just think.

I find a narrow alley between Graham's building and the adjacent office complex, a forgotten slice of concrete where the city's maintenance crews dump their equipment and nobody bothers to go.

The brick walls provide enough shelter that I can finally breathe without feeling like I'm drowning in expensive cologne and complicated feelings.

Iris is right. I'm in too deep.

This was supposed to be simple—seduce the mark, gain access, take what I need, disappear. Instead, I'm standing in an alley trying to convince myself that Graham's small kindnesses don't mean anything, that the way he looks at me is just part of whatever game he's playing.

Because everything is a game for him. When you have eight billion dollars, when you own hotels and reshape entire industries before lunch, life becomes a series of amusing diversions. It's all just entertainment for a man who's bored with conventional pleasures.