“Don’t forward my calls,” he spat out, quickly signing the last form and tossing the pen onto my desk. “If there’s an emergency, contact Henry.”

“Bastard,” I murmured to myself as I watched him disappear.

To say my weekend sucked would be putting it mildly. I hardly ate, I hardly slept, and what little sleep I did get was interrupted by fantasies of my boss naked above me, beneath me, behind me. I almost wished for the return of classes just so I had something to distract me.

Saturday morning I awoke frustrated and crabby but managed to somehow get myself together and take care of housework and grocery shopping. Sunday morning, however, I was not so lucky. I woke with a start, panting and trembling, my body sweaty and twisted in a mass of cotton sheets. The dream I had was so intense it had actually brought me to orgasm. Mr. Ryan and I had been on the conference table again, but this time we were both completely naked. He was on his back and I straddled him, my body sliding back and forth, up and down his cock. He touched me everywhere: along the sides of my face, down my neck, across my br**sts, to my hips, where he guided my movements. I fell to pieces when our eyes met.

“Shit,” I groaned as I pulled myself out of bed. This was going from bad to worse, quickly. Who would have thought working for an angry jackass would result in my getting f**ked up against a cold window at work and liking it?

I started the shower, and as I waited for the water to warm, my thoughts began to drift again. I wanted to see his eyes looking up from between my legs, wanted to see his expression as he climbed on top of me, pushed into me, felt how much I wanted him. I ached to hear the sound of his voice saying my name when he came.

My heart sank in my chest. Fantasizing about him was a one-way ticket to trouble. I was on the cusp of getting my graduate degree. He was an executive. He had nothing to lose, and I stood to lose it all.

I showered and dressed quickly to meet Sara and Julia for brunch. Sara and I got to see each other every day at work, but Julia, my best friend since middle school, was tougher to nail down. She was a buyer for Gucci and dutifully filled my closet with samples and overstock. Thanks to her and her discount, I owned some of the most beautiful clothes money could buy. I still paid a pretty penny for them, but it was worth it. I made decent money at Ryan Media, and my scholarship covered all of my school costs, but even I couldn’t spend nineteen hundred dollars on a dress and not want to off myself.

I’d sometimes wondered if Elliott paid me so well because he knew I was the only one who could handle his son. Oh, if only he knew.

I decided that it would be a bad idea to talk to the girls about what was going on. I mean, Sara worked for Henry Ryan and saw Bennett around the building all the time. There was no way I could ask her to keep that kind of secret. Julia on the other hand would kick my ass. For almost a year she’d listened to me complain about what a dick he was, and she would not be happy to find out I was screwing him.

Two hours later I was sitting with my two best friends, drinking mimosas on the patio of our favorite restaurant, talking about men and clothes and work. Julia had surprised me with a dress made from the most sumptuous fabric I’d ever felt. It sat in a garment bag slung over the chair next to me.

“So how’s work going?” Julia asked between bites of her melon. “That douche of a boss still giving you a hard time, Chloe?”

“Oh, Beautiful Bastard.” Sara sighed, and I carefully studied the condensation on my champagne flute. She popped a grape into her mouth and spoke around it. “God, you should see him, Julia. It’s the most perfect nickname I’ve ever heard. He is a god. And I mean that. There’s nothing wrong with him, physically. Perfect face, body, clothes, hair . . . Oh, God, the hair. He’s got that artfully arranged messy thing going on,” she said, motioning above her head. “Looks like he just banged the hell out of someone.”

I rolled my eyes. I never needed a reminder about the hair.

“But—and I don’t know what Chloe has told you—he really is awful,” Sara continued, growing serious. “I mean, I wanted to shove a pocket knife into each of his tires within the first fifteen minutes of meeting him. He is the biggest dick I’ve ever met.”

I almost choked on a piece of pineapple. If Sara only knew. Truly, the man was blessed in the man-parts department. It was unfair.

“Why is he such a jerk?”

“Who knows?” Sara said, and then blinked away as if she was really considering whether he had a good excuse. “Maybe he had a hard childhood?”

“Have you met his family?” I asked, skeptical. “Hello, Norman Rockwell.”