In The Boss's Bed

“Hey!” Abby yelled, attempting to take back her drink. Maya assumed that she was more upset about her stolen drink than she was about the newly vacated seat next to her.

“I can’t believe you dared me to do that.” Maya looked back at the bar and saw that the man she had kissed was gone, but the bartender was still there. She was suddenly parched, and she certainly couldn’t go back up there. She didn’t think she could even face him again. How was she supposed to get another drink? Or even pay her tab when they were ready to leave? She’d thought of none of those things when she had made the stupidest, most impulsive decision of her life in kissing the stranger at the bar. “Oh, God, I need another drink.”

“So get your own drink.” Abby snatched back her bottle. “I cannot believe you actually kissed him! I’m superimpressed.”

Maya measured the distance between herself and the bar and caught the eye of the bartender, who was watching her with curiosity. “I can’t go back up there. He was talking to the bartender like they were friends or something. I just can’t do it.”

Abby pushed herself up from the table. “Fine, I’ll get you something. Vodka? Or do you want something a little crazier in celebration of your turn as a woman who kisses strange men in a bar?”

Maya brought her forehead to the table. “Vodka’s fine,” she muttered.

With Abby gone, Maya had a chance to think about what she had done. What if the man wasn’t single? She hadn’t seen a wedding ring, but that didn’t mean anything. He could have taken it off—which would make him the scummiest guy in the world—or maybe he had a girlfriend. Does that make me a home wrecker? Not if I haven’t actually wrecked his home. And she wasn’t going to do that. She had no intention of actually seeing him again.

And, holy shit, she had basically assaulted him! Maya began to panic as the thought overtook her. If a man had walked up to her and just kissed her, forcing his tongue in her own mouth, she would be outraged! He would definitely be rinsing her pepper spray from his eyes and icing his groin all night. How dare you, Maya? If she ever saw him again, she would definitely have to apologize, grovel even. She felt awful. This would be the absolute last time she “lived a little.” She didn’t understand how Abby could do whatever she wanted without worrying about the consequences of her actions. But it certainly wasn’t how Maya chose to live her life. Not by a long shot.

She was almost shaking with panic when Abby came back to the table with their drinks and pushed the pink one toward her. “The cute bartender Trevor poured you a double. He figured you needed it.”

“Oh, my,” she sighed. She took a drink and grimaced at the taste of the extra alcohol. She drank again, and this time the beverage slid down her throat more easily. She wasn’t a big drinker, but with the strength of the drink, plus the two or three she’d had earlier, she started to feel her uneasiness and panic slip away. A warm sensation rose from her belly and she felt herself relax a little.

“So,” Abby said, taking a sip of her beer. “Tell me about the kiss.”

The kiss. Maya could still feel his lips on hers, and the coarse stubble of the five o’clock shadow that covered that strong, broad jaw grazing roughly against the soft skin of her face. She could smell his cologne, a blend of citrus, sandalwood, innate maleness. And she heard his groan, which had vibrated through her when his lips parted and his tongue found hers. Maya recalled the sense of loss she had felt when she’d pulled away. Kissing him was wrong, but that didn’t stop her from wanting to feel the dark, handsome stranger all over her body.

And Abby wanted her to tell her about the kiss? How could she put it into words? Were there any words to describe the feeling of being pressed against him? She struggled to find them, to come up with anything that would even come close to relating the experience to another person.

“It was good,” she said simply, knowing that good didn’t even come remotely close to describing the kiss.

“‘It was good,’” Abby repeated, clearly unconvinced. “Just ‘good’?”

“It was really, very good,” she said with a shrug.

Abby laughed. “The way you looked when you came back to this table told me that it was more than just ‘really, very good.’”

Maya flushed, suddenly warm. From the temperature of the club? The alcohol? Her reaction to the man? “What does it matter?” Maya finished her drink in one long swallow, dismissing it. “He’s a great kisser. But in this city? It’s not like I’m going to see him again.”

Abby smirked, pursing her cherry-red lips. “Montreal might be the second largest city in the country, but I think it’s smaller than you think. You just might encounter him again.”

Maya leaned back in the booth, the back of her head resting on the plush leather upholstery. She inhaled deeply. Yeah, the alcohol was definitely pumping through her veins. She quickly put the gorgeous man at the bar out of her mind. She was now ready to have fun. When a song she loved drove through the speakers of the club’s sound system, she stood quickly. A little too quickly, as evidenced by her slight wobble. She grabbed Abby’s hand.

“Come on, we’re dancing!”

Abby’s mouth dropped in surprise and she squealed with glee. “It’s about time, Maya. I love the new you.”

At that moment Maya did, as well. The music pumped, as did her body to the beat. She focused on nothing else but how she felt at that moment. She dismissed all thoughts of her upcoming final exams and her 9 a.m. class, and she allowed Abby to pull her into the center of the dance floor. But neither her mind nor her body could forget the handsome stranger. In an attempt to shake his image from her mind and the feel of his lips burning on her own, she danced harder. But it was no use; he wouldn’t leave her. Perhaps instead of just kissing him, she should have talked to him, asked him his name, gotten his number.

Maya stopped dancing, however, when some movement caught her eye. It was him, and he was standing on a staircase which overlooked the dance floor. He stood with his arms crossed over his chest. And she was transfixed when he raised his hand to scrub along the rough bristles of his jaw, before dragging it through his dark hair.

It would have been her chance—to go up and talk to him. If only she had time to cross through the packed dance floor to get to him. She felt a sharp pang of remorse when he turned and walked up the dark staircase, forever relegating himself to her memory as the handsome stranger. She shook her head at the events of the evening. It was fun, but it was definitely over.

2

THE NEXT MORNING Maya awoke with the worst hangover of her life—not that she had many in her life to compare it to—but this was definitely the worst! She groaned at the buzzing alarm on her cell phone and, with her eyes tightly shut, felt around her night table for it. When she couldn’t manage to turn it off with her eyes still closed, she threw it into the pile of dirty clothes in the corner of her room. But much to her chagrin, doing so did nothing to silence the dreadful racket, and she pulled her comforter over her head.

Once Maya managed to roll out of her bed, she pulled on a tank top and a pair of shorts. She padded barefoot to the kitchen, where she found Abby sitting at the narrow breakfast bar, with her head on the table—thankfully she had managed to make some coffee.

“Can we just skip class today?” Abby pleaded, obviously not faring any better than Maya. “Also, can we just skip today, in general? And don’t answer too loudly. Please.”

Maya poured herself a cup of coffee and sighed. “I wish we could do both of those things, but you know Carmichael is gonna test us somehow on the guest lecturer.”

“Why is he so evil?” Abby whined.

“Because he’s tenured.” Maya laughed quietly. “Also he’s a very sweet old man and not at all evil, and you know it. And he didn’t make us stay out last night until 3 a.m.” She closed her eyes and groaned. God, 3 a.m. It had been years since Maya had even thought about staying up that late. She brought the mug to her lips, holding back a slight wave of nausea as she sipped her black coffee.

“Don’t remind me,” Abby groaned. “Oh, man, we were out so late. I don’t even want to know how much I owe you for all those drinks.”

Maya opened her mouth, but the words stopped as a thought struck her. “Huh. Actually, I just remembered something. I didn’t pay anything for them. When I went to settle my tab, the bartender told me it was taken care of.”

“Really? Taken care of?” Abby raised her head. “What does that mean?”

“I don’t know who, but someone paid for our drinks. I didn’t think about it too much because I was so drunk.” She pursed her lips in question. “Who would do that?”

“I have no idea,” Abby replied, raising her eyes to meet Maya’s. “Unless it was that man you sucked face with.” She grinned. “Wait. That wasn’t grammatically correct, was it? Uh, how about ‘the man with whom you sucked face’?”

Maya’s mouth dropped. “What? No. That’s not possible. Why would he do that? Why would he pay for all of those drinks? It couldn’t have been cheap.”

“Well, I don’t know. Perhaps it has something to do with the gorgeous, exotic creature who walked up to him and shoved her tongue down his throat,” Abby surmised. “Maybe he thought you would find him again, to properly thank him for taking care of your tab. You said he seemed friendly with the bartender.”

Maya rolled her eyes, grimacing at the resulting headache. She would have to remind herself not to move her eyes for the rest of the day. “He thought I would repay him? That’s just gross.” She took a gulp of coffee, finished it and placed her empty mug in the sink. “And please, don’t remind me about that whole kissing-a-stranger thing,” Maya pleaded, glancing at the time. “And, to make this morning even better, we’re going to be late for class. I call first shower.”

* * *

CLASS HAD ALREADY started when Maya and Abby arrived, sunglasses on and heads pounding. They opened the closed door as inconspicuously as they could, to avoid attracting too much attention. They drew the eyes of the twenty-six other students in the class as well as Dr. Carmichael, who cast a disapproving glance in their direction.

They muttered their apologies, and Maya scanned the room. Abby’s plan to nap in the back was thwarted because the back rows of the small lecture hall were already occupied, and they were forced to sit at the very center of the front row.

They took their seats and Dr. Carmichael resumed his introduction of the guest lecturer. “Now that you’re all here,” he said, glancing at Maya and Abby. “Ladies and gentlemen, I know that your time here is drawing to a close and you’re all busy studying for finals, but today I invited someone to come in and talk to you, perhaps to inspire you on your paths in business and in the hospitality industry. The remarkable young man you are about to meet has done so much since he was my student, including becoming one of the most successful businessmen in his industry as a, how do the papers put it, nightclub mogul?” The professor laughed to himself. “Students, please welcome the owner of Swerve nightclubs, Jamie Sellers.”

The professor got Maya’s attention at his mention of Swerve Nightclub, and her eyes sharpened. But her mouth completely dropped when she actually got a good look at the man walking into her classroom. Jamie Sellers. The man she had kissed the night before. The owner of the damn club. The man who had paid for their many, many drinks and, if it was possible, looked even more gorgeous than he had the night before. Maya cast a quick look at Abby, whose eyes were as wide in shock as Maya’s, and she silently hyperventilated in her seat. In an act of desperation, she took a look under her desk. Is there enough room to crawl under there and die?

Maya watched Jamie’s acute eyes survey the class until they settled on her, sitting front-row center. Their eyes connected and she nearly trembled under his scrutiny. How could she be expected to sit still for fifty minutes with him in front of her? Mortification and sudden desire made her flush and she could feel her temperature rise.

Their eyes held for a beat too long, and Maya held her breath. She was relieved when his gaze roamed elsewhere. He cleared his throat. “Hey, guys. I don’t normally do things like this, but when Dr. Carmichael asked me to come in, how could I say no?” He cast an affectionate glance toward the professor. “Because I don’t believe that I would be the person I am today if not for him and his intervention.

“You see, I wasn’t always a ‘nightclub mogul.’” Jamie smiled and made air quotes around the phrase with his fingers. “I was a punk kid, my parents were never around and I just barely graduated from high school. I got into trouble quite frequently. But I met Dr. Carmichael one night while I was working as a busboy.” Jamie briefly described his history with Dr. Carmichael, and Maya admired how far Jamie had come in such a short amount of time. “He showed me that if you have a passion for something, no matter what’s standing in your way, you should go for it, and that doesn’t just apply in business, but in everyday life, as well.”

Jamie spoke with an enthusiasm to which Maya could relate, and she smiled, seeing a lot of herself in the man before her. She admired him already. As he told them the story of shedding the weight of a troubled upbringing and his transformation to successful business-owner, she held on to his every word.

“I wasn’t going to make a splash just washing glasses for a decade.” He laughed, as did many of the people in her class. “Although, as the boss, I fully appreciate each and every employee under me, from the busboys and waitresses to my club managers and executives. It is a team environment, and you should never forget that it is the people that matter most. If your people are happy, they’ll be motivated and make your customers happy. If you’ve got happy workers and happy customers, the profit won’t be far behind.”

Everything Jamie was saying made perfect sense to Maya, but it was when he looked at her that it seemed she could barely think straight. When his eyes connected with hers, she couldn’t hear what was going on around her or what he or anyone else in the class was saying. She could hear nothing but the sound of her heart beating in her ears. When his gaze connected with hers, she could only manage to fidget with her fingers, her pen. She straightened some papers on her desk, and then she straightened them again. Anything so she wouldn’t have to look back at the man in front of her. The man who seemingly made her cheeks flush and her skin tingle with a single stare.

* * *

AFTER ONE OF the most uncomfortable hours of his life, Jamie said goodbye to the class and wished them luck in their future careers. He shook Dr. Carmichael’s hand and quickly left the classroom. He stopped in the hallway outside to pull out his phone to see how many calls, texts and emails he had missed. There were many of each. He sighed. Once again, he thought of the empty assistant’s desk in the corner of his office and remembered that he had to get on with hiring someone new. Martin wasn’t coming back, no matter what price Jamie offered him.

Jamie put his phone to his ear, when he felt the soft touch of a hand on his arm. He turned and saw her. Maya Connor. The woman from the bar last night. The woman who had been sitting front and center during his talk. How many times was he forced to tear his gaze from her, only to have it roam, out of his control, back in her direction. How many times had he tripped over his own tongue when he thought of her arms around him and her body pressed against his? More than once the blood that fueled his brain, his speech and any logical thought he’d formed surged south. Luckily, he’d worn dark pants, so his innermost thoughts and desires remained secret to the class. But the fact that he couldn’t seem to control his hormones, as if he were a horny teenager, bothered him right in the control-freak tendencies.

Last night he’d watched her from the staircase leading up to his office, and he had to hold himself back from going to her. He had spent the rest of the night watching Maya from his office through the window that let him see what was happening in his club. No matter where she was in the crowd, he had always seemed to be able to find her. Like a siren in the fog, she drew him in whether he liked it or not. On the dance floor, she’d moved effortlessly to the beat of the music. He had pondered arranging a VIP table for them, but he remembered the frightened look in her eyes after she’d kissed him, and he thought better of it. He wouldn’t want to scare her off, and he certainly wanted to see her back in his club again.

Jamie knew that he had to be careful. Thankfully, he hadn’t seen any pictures or videos posted of their kiss. He’d spent the morning scouring the worst of the online tabloids, especially Montreal Secrets, run by John Power, which had been decidedly poor in their treatment of him since he’d opened his first club.

In this case, he’d gotten lucky. He couldn’t afford any bad press as he was about to embark on one of the most daunting projects of his life, and he certainly didn’t have time to be in a relationship, or even just casually see anyone. Every bit of focus had to be put toward his work.

“Listen, Mr. Sellers,” Maya said, interrupting his thoughts. She averted her eyes and was clearly embarrassed. He enjoyed the way her brow creased and the way she brought her bottom lip between her teeth.

Jamie was watching her mouth, wishing that his lips, teeth and tongue were there, joined with hers. So he didn’t realize that she was still speaking and he had to force his eyes back to hers. The beautiful, dark, almond eyes he recalled from the previous night. He was lost.

“I’m really sorry about last night,” she stammered. “I shouldn’t have kissed you. It was inappropriate, and it was—”

“It’s okay,” he said, assuring her with a smile.

“It’s really not,” she insisted. “It’s just that my friend Abby dared me to do something reckless, and I’d had a bit too much to drink. Oh, and can I assume you paid for our drinks?” He nodded. “It was sweet, but really not necessary. Here, let me pay you back.” She reached into her purse and pulled out her wallet. “How much do I owe you? I made sure to tip the bartender. I hope it was enough for how much the bill must have been—”

He put a hand on hers, stilling her. “Don’t.” He forced himself to ignore the sizzle he felt when his fingers touched hers. “Keep your money. It’s not a big deal. It was only a couple of drinks.”

She laughed. The sound pulsed pleasantly through him. “I think it was more than a couple, if how I felt this morning was any indication. And for your information, just so we’re clear, that’s not why I kissed you. This isn’t some scam I have to get free drinks. I didn’t even know who you were. I just thought you were some sexy guy at the bar—” She stopped suddenly, and her eyes widened, the flush returning to her cheeks. She laughed once more, shakily, bringing her palm to her forehead. “I’m rambling again, aren’t I? I do that when I’m nervous. I just can’t stop talking sometimes. It’s this thing I do.” She was speaking so quickly that Jamie could barely keep up. She gesticulated wildly. “I say something embarrassing, and then I keep talking to try and talk my way out of it. And I just can’t stop myself. I go on and on and on and on. And I can’t stop.” She paused. “I should just stop talking, shouldn’t I?”

It was Jamie’s turn to laugh. This woman was not only gorgeous, but she was also absolutely delightful to be around. “I really wish you wouldn’t.” He opened his mouth to continue when he heard a familiar voice over his shoulder.

“Jamie, Maya,” Dr. Carmichael said, placing an arm over each of their shoulders. “I’m glad you had a chance to get acquainted.” He smiled indulgently at them both. “Jamie, Maya is one of the finest students I’ve ever had the pleasure of teaching.”

Jamie looked at her, wonder raising his eyebrows. He knew that Dr. C.’s compliments were not easy to come by. He’d had to work long and hard before he had earned any of his own. He knew Maya must be something special to have deserved such commendation. “Is that right? That’s certainly high praise, indeed.” He nodded appreciatively. “Any plans for after graduation?”

She exhaled slightly and allowed the rigidity in her posture to relax slightly. The shift was subtle, but he noticed. Clearly, she was a woman who was most at ease with her work.

“I’ve got nothing concrete lined up yet, but I’m interested in hotel management,” she told him, her voice giving away the fact that she had definitely memorized the answer and used it often. “I’ve got a career path that I’d like to follow to make that happen.”

“That’s great. It’s important to stay focused on your goals.” Jamie’s phone started ringing in his left hand, and he held out his right to Maya. “Maya, it was a pleasure meeting you today,” he added for emphasis, before turning to his mentor. “Dr. C., I’ll be in touch. Let’s have dinner some night when I’m not quite so bogged down with work.”

The professor smiled. “Well, son, unless you’ve changed your ways recently, I don’t know when that will be.”

Jamie regretted not having time to catch up with his mentor. A man who had done so much for him and his career. “Thanks for having me.”

“Thanks for coming in, Jamie.” The man shook his hand and gave him a pat on the shoulder before releasing him, his eyes twinkling with obvious pride. “Look after yourself. But make sure you focus on what’s really important in life.”

Jamie looked quizzically at the professor before putting his phone to his ear, turning his back on the old man and the single most beautiful woman he had ever met. He had important business to conduct with the contractor on the other end, but it didn’t stop him from thinking about the woman who had come into his life, catching him off guard for the second time in just under twelve hours. He pushed all thoughts of Maya out of his mind. He had work to do, and he certainly didn’t have time for indulging fantasies of gorgeous graduate students.

“Scott, good to hear from you,” he said into the phone, pushing through the doors to the warm spring air.

3

LATER THAT NIGHT, Jamie still sat at his desk. Almost everyone else had gone home for the day, but Jamie remained. He needed to review some construction estimates and vendor contracts in order to begin construction on the new hotel he planned to build. This was the next step in his company’s future—upscale boutique hotels boasting the Sellers and Swerve name. Jamie shuffled through the stacks of papers and file folders on his desk. How did I get so unorganized?

Out of habit he looked over at the empty desk in the corner of the room that Martin once occupied. He sighed, lamenting his assistant’s absence and realized more every day how much he had come to depend on having someone else to help him shoulder the considerable workload. He thumbed through another stack of contracts, looking for a contractor’s quote that he needed for his newest acquisition—a small building he had bought in foreclosure near the downtown Swerve. He threw down the papers with a frustrated sigh and picked up his phone. Moving his fingers quickly, he typed out a message to his secretary, Mary, asking her to place an ad for a new assistant as soon as possible.

Jamie didn’t know what he would do without Mary. Like Trevor, she had been with him since the beginning, and she was integral in making sure the day-to-day operations ran smoothly.

He rubbed his eyes and let his thoughts roam once again to Maya Connor. With a smile, he recalled their encounters in the past twenty-four hours. First, she had kissed him and then she was sitting front-row center in Dr. C.’s class for his lecture, and then she approached him afterward, apologizing and offering to repay him in the most adorable way possible. Dr. Carmichael had called her his best student, and she must be to have earned his adoration. She would be finishing school in a couple of weeks, no actual job lined up just yet. Perhaps. Just perhaps...