Forever Blake (Once Upon a Player Book 3) by Elena Matthews (free books to read .TXT) 📗

New York. Maybe somewhere in Alaska though, where it’s not so frigging hot.”

I laugh as she stands from her seat, her latte in her hand. “I promise to only show areas where it’s fully fitted with air-conditioning. Deal?”

“Deal.”

She follows me out of the first-year associates’ office, and something occurs to me.

“What do you want to be called?”

“What do you mean?” she asks, her brows furrowing with an adorable frown.

Shit. Not adorable. Just an ordinary frown. Nothing cute about it.

“Well, you go by two names, and I’m not sure what you prefer in a professional setting.”

“I personally prefer Ever, but since my father insists on calling me Reagan and this is his firm, it’ll be easier for everyone to call me Reagan.”

“Okay, Reagan it is.”

I don’t let it show, but deep down, I am a little relieved. By calling her by her first name while we work together, I can easily differentiate between the beautiful woman I spent a hot, passionate night with and the smart, young girl who is my intern for the next nine weeks.

Ever and Reagan. I can totally pretend they are two different people.

I mean, I kind of have to.

I don’t have any other choice.

I have to be professional. Nothing more. Nothing less.

A few weeks pass by, and there have been no more tiffs between Reagan and me. She accepted my apology and forgave me, and we’ve been on great terms ever since.

After her first week here, she effortlessly fit in, and—I’m not bullshitting—she works harder than any first- or second-year associate I have ever met. She doesn’t sweat the big or little stuff. She’s calm and collected yet feisty enough not to let people walk all over her. She definitely takes after her father. In fact, I won’t tell him this, but she’ll probably be a better lawyer than him. There is no doubt about it.

For a twenty-two-year-old, she’s definitely taken me by surprise with how levelheaded she is. Most lawyers have an air of arrogance about them, and a lot of the time, they’re conceited fuckers—yes, I’m talking about me, too—but Reagan, she isn’t either of those things. She’s independent and strong, and most importantly, she cares about the cause and not the paycheck. I mean, lawyers all care about the cause in the beginning, but when the money starts rolling in, some people start focusing on the wrong things. Reagan’s drive for perfection tells me she won’t care about the money, and that’s impressive, considering who her father is.

Once she’s finished law school and passed the bar, wherever she chooses to work, they’ll be lucky to have her.

And, yes, I got all this within the three weeks that she’s been working with us at the firm.

The more I get to know her professionally, the more I want to find out about her. The attraction between us has simmered slightly, but some days, I can feel her electric charge from the other side of the building. She has a warm presence that I struggle to resist, but as her boss, I do resist. I have to.

There is too much riding on my job, too many complications to even take a whiff of her. She’s off-limits, and most of the time, it isn’t a problem, but on occasion, I can’t stop the thoughts from seeping in, especially when she comes into my office, looking perfect and so fucking amazing.

Like now, I sense her before I even see her, and as she approaches my office, I have to compress all the feelings that she evokes within me—the lust, the warmth, and everything else in between—and bury them as deep as they can go. Even then, it’s hard not to appreciate the tight-fitted pencil skirt and the tank top that accentuates her breasts in the best way possible.

Breasts I’ve had my tongue all over.

Shit.

Stop it.

I must not think of her like that.

She’s my boss’s daughter. She’s twenty-two. She is too young.

This is the mantra I say to myself, yet the more I say it, the less effect it actually has.

“Hi, Blake. Have you got a minute?” She asks as she enters, forgoing knocking on my door.

She knows I have a no-knock policy, and it’s impossible for her to knock because I recently took my door down. I had seen it on a TV show once—This is Us, I think it’s called. Roger or Randall or whatever his name is made a statement to his colleagues that his door would always be open, and he literally took the door off its hinges. Though I don’t care too much for the show itself—my damn sister made me watch it—I loved how bold it was of him. So, I had taken the idea from that and copied his policy as my own, wanting everyone to know that my door was always open.

Plus, it’s a great deterrent for whenever Reagan and I are alone, so I’ll never be tempted to do the things I know I can never do. Because you can’t be indecent in an office without a door, right?

“Yeah, sure. Come on in.” I wave her in, and she walks as elegantly as ever in her six-inch heels.

She stands on the other side of my desk and hands me two sheets of paper. “I was just checking over these affidavits, and something strange caught my eye. It’s about the same fraud claim, but neither statements match.”

I glance over both affidavits for a fraud claim against my client, and I spot the mistakes instantly. Huh, this just made this case more interesting.

“Good catch, Reagan. Thank you.” I set the affidavits in an enclosed file and set it in my drawer to settle that matter later. “I’m glad you came to see me actually. How do you feel about working a case with me?”

Her eyes lift with delight, her pretty blues glistening. “Are you serious?”

“As a heart attack. My usual associate is out sick today, and I thought it’d be a great learning opportunity for you. So, do you