Page 18 of Untouchable

There was no reason she should be so fascinating to him. But the sex had been really good. That was reason enough, as far as he was concerned.

Sex had been boring lately. He dated often enough but never for very long. The women would start to whine or cling or demand he change his habits. So he’d send them an expensive gift and end it with as little mess and drama as possible.

More and more, he’d been using women from an expensive escort service since it was easier and cleaner. But that got old after a while too.

Kelly was the first woman to leave him wanting more in a really long time.

After reading the file, he slid it in his top drawer and tried to focus on work again. He had to talk to Richard Helms, who led his marketing division. Helms was putting up a fight about Caleb’s directive to trim the marketing staff by ten percent, so now Caleb had to deal with the headache.

He didn’t take pleasure in layoffs. They were unfortunate but necessary in the current environment. Sometimes hard decisions had to be made to protect the company—even if it meant hurting people in the process.

One of the reasons he was sitting where he was now was because he could make the hard decisions without flinching.

Business was business. And taking it personally was always a mistake.

Almost three hours later, he was leaving the building, having gotten through the conversation with Helms and two more hours of work besides.

The cute blonde who was temporarily working building security in the lobby smiled at him as he walked by.

He smiled back. They’d had an eye flirtation going on for a few weeks now ever since she’d begun the job—filling in for one of the regular staff who was out for surgery. As soon as her temporary position was over, he was definitely planning to give her a good fuck.

He had no doubt she’d be amenable to the idea.

He stopped at the coffee shop next door to grab a coffee and mentally cringed when he saw who was behind the counter.

He never should have screwed that redhead. He’d known she worked next door to his building, so he would likely continue to see her occasionally. They’d had one hot night, and he would have been satisfied with the encounter, but she’d kept coming on to him in the days afterward until he’d had to be rude to get her to back off.

She looked at him now like he was some sort of monster as she coldly handed him his coffee.

It had been one time, and he’d never claimed to want anything but sex. If she’d imagined something else might happen afterward, then she’d deluded herself.

He didn’t do relationships. He simply didn’t have time. He liked women and he liked sex but only if things were kept simple.

And he hated this lingering messiness, a silly girl’s attempt to guilt him into thinking he’d treated her poorly.

He forgot about the redhead as soon as he’d crossed the street, walking the two blocks to the hotel bar where he’d arranged to meet Kelly.

He arrived a few minutes after seven and glanced around to see if she was there yet.

When there was no sign of her, he went to the bar and ordered a scotch, glancing down the line of stools and idly admiring the long legs of one of the women sitting on the opposite corner. He glanced up, but she wasn’t pretty enough to interest him, so he let his gaze move on.

At a quarter after seven, Caleb was starting to get annoyed. Being a few minutes late for a date was normal. Women seemed to do it on purpose so they could make an entrance or feign a degree of disinterest. But Caleb was not used to waiting this long for anyone.

She better not have stood him up.

He wasn’t a fool. The sex had been just as good for her as it had been for him. There was no way she was faking her responses to him.

No matter what she said, she would want to get together with him again—just as he wanted her.

If she didn’t show up, then she was playing some sort of game, and women never won when they tried to play games with Caleb.

He was starting to get angry when he saw her enter. She was dressed differently tonight—wearing heels and a short, sexy dress in a striking shade of bronze. Her hair was pulled back in a loose braid that was unexpectedly sexy.

She’d obviously made an effort with her appearance, which confirmed his belief that she wasn’t indifferent to him.

She smiled distractedly when she saw him and came over, setting the beaded clutch she held on the bar.

“I was starting to wonder if you were going to come,” he said with a familiar tightening of his groin from the sight of the clear, fair skin of her neck and shoulders, the graceful lines of her arms and legs.