Off the Record (Record #1)(49)
Author: K.A. Linde

She really wanted to, but tonight was not the best night. “Brady, I can’t.”

“What? Why not?” he demanded. She could tell he was impatient.

“I’m working. I have this huge article I’m putting together. I’ve been working on it for hours.”

“Then you need a break. I’m already in the car. I’m not turning around,” he said simply.

Liz sighed. “Seriously. I’m worried if I take a step away I’ll lose my entire focus on it. This is a big deal for me.”

She really wanted him to understand. She had a life separate from him. Her job as a reporter was what she had been striving toward for a long time. She wasn’t willing to give up her dreams any more than he was willing to give up the campaign. And in reality, neither of them should have to. They should be able to make this work while still being the same people. She wondered whether that was ever going to be possible.

“Liz, I haven’t seen you in three days. That is three days too many. I’m coming to see you. Where are you?”

“If you want to come watch me work, then you can. I would think it would be pretty boring,” she said, closing the lid on her water bottle and walking back into the empty office.

“My time with you is never boring. Are you at home?” he asked.

“Oh, about that…” Liz said.

“What?”

“My roommate came back into town. She was in London—I won’t even try to explain why—but I don’t have the house to myself anymore,” she explained.

“So, you should get picked up somewhere else?” he asked dryly.

“Oh my God, you can’t come watch me work,” Liz said, shaking her head.

“I’m not coming to watch you work. I’m coming to f**k you,” he nearly growled at her through the phone.

His voice sent shivers down her spine as she thought about their sex life. They were having sex more each week in stolen secret moments than she’d had when she had been dating her last boyfriend. And she had been practically living with her boyfriend at the time. It was exhilarating and incredible each time she was with Brady.

Plus, she couldn’t deny that she enjoyed getting to know him on a more personal level when they met. Some of his walls had started falling the more time he spent with her. After the incident with his sister, he had told her all about his family—his father, the politician; his mother, the professor; his younger brother, Clay, the law student; and his younger sister, Savannah, who would be attending UNC in the fall. She had even learned that Savannah was planning to major in journalism. Liz sure as hell hoped that she didn’t try to get on the paper.

She needed to make a decision. She stared at her open Word document and then exhaled softly. She knew that she had work to do, but she wasn’t really making all that much progress with it anyway. It might be better to look at it fresh tomorrow. And anyway, she really wanted to see Brady.

“I’m at the office.”

“In the Union?” Brady asked.

“Yeah. Do you know where the paper is?”

“Ten minutes,” he said before the line went dead.

Almost exactly ten minutes later, Liz heard the door to the newspaper office open. She peeked her head around the corner of Hayden’s office and couldn’t help but let a big grin spread across her face. Brady Maxwell was in her office. He was on her turf. And he looked really f**king hot.

He looked as if he had come straight from the office in black dress slacks and a tucked-in blue button-down. His jacket had clearly been discarded in the car. It was too hot for pants and a long-sleeved shirt, but she knew that he wouldn’t have gone into work in anything else. His dark eyes caught hers across the room, and she smiled. Her whole body ignited in that one look. How did he do that?

She opened her mouth to say something. Greet him, maybe? She couldn’t even remember. Because as soon as he reached her, he grabbed her around the middle, pushed them into the office, and crushed their lips together. Liz tilted her head back, reveling in his kisses. She heard him kick the door closed, but all she could think about was his lips, his hands, his body.

Liz couldn’t get enough of him. He was sucking the breath right out of her. It had only been three days. Three days didn’t normally feel like such an eternity, but now, standing there in his arms, she had no idea how she had been able to go the interminable amount of time without him.

When he broke away, it took her a bit to regain control of herself.

“Baby, it’s really good to see you,” he groaned against her mouth.

Liz nodded her head. She didn’t even have words. With him standing in front of her now, she couldn’t even remember what she was doing before he arrived.

“I can’t tell if you’re happy I’m here,” he said sarcastically, with a knowing look on his handsome face.

Arrogant son of a… she thought.

“I can’t believe you’re at my office. That’s basically public territory, Brady,” Liz said, sliding her hands up around his neck.

“It’s the middle of the night. That’s hardly public,” he corrected.

“As close as it’s been since we were at the Jefferson-Jackson gala,” she whispered. She hoped she didn’t sound as if she were complaining. She liked her time with Brady. Some days it didn’t feel like enough, and she wished for more. But not now, not when she was in his arms.

“And probably as close as its going to get,” he said, setting clear boundaries.

She knew that all along. They couldn’t meet in public. That would defeat the whole purpose of what they were doing.

“As long as I get to be close to you, then I don’t care,” Liz said, gripping the collar of his shirt in her hands and tugging him back down. “And anyway, maybe I like the secret,” she murmured seductively against his mouth. Her tongue darted out and licked across his bottom lip.

His hands gripped her sides and then his mouth claimed her once more. She saw where this was heading fast.

“I like this,” he said, his hands running to the hem of her cotton sundress. He slid them up the other side of the material across her thighs. Liz sucked in quickly at the sudden contact.

“My dress?” she asked as he walked her back slowly toward the very cluttered desk.

“Your body,” he muttered, his fingers finding the lacy edge of her thong. Liz shivered at his touch. She hit the edge of the desk.

“Brady,” she said when he tried to help her onto it.