Chapter 3: Office Hours, Overtime Pleasures
The wine at Darcie’s tasted like vinegar, but Casey drank it anyway. Her friend’s small apartment was a sanctuary of battered paperback books and thriving plants, a stark contrast to the greasy chaos of The Tipsy Barrel’s alley.
“So,” Darcie said, kicking her feet up on the coffee table. “You and Matty.”
“There is no ‘me and Matty’.”
“Bullshit.” Darcie took a deliberate sip. “Lewi said the vibe in the alley was… charged. And you came back in looking like you’d been hit by a pleasant bus. Your lips were practically glowing.”
Casey covered her face with a cushion. A muffled groan escaped. “It was a mistake. A heat-of-the-moment thing. Jamie was being a monster, Matty lost his temper, I was upset…”
“And then he kissed you.”
Silence. Casey lowered the cushion. “Yeah.”
“And you kissed him back.”
“I really did.”
Darcie’s smile was small, knowing. “About time.”
“Darcie! He’s my boss. He fired someone last night. What if people think he did it because he’s into me? What if they think I’m… I don’t know, sleeping my way to a better wine pour?”
“First of all, you’re a terrible schemer, you blush when someone orders a French 75. Secondly, Jamie got himself fired for being a disgusting prick. Matty just finally did what everyone’s wanted him to do for a year.” She leaned forward. “The real question is, what are you going to do now?”
Casey didn’t have an answer. The memory of the kiss was a live wire in her stomach, sparking every time she replayed it. But the practicalities formed a cold, heavy lump right beside it. Monday’s shift loomed.
The bar on Monday afternoon was a tomb, silent except for the industrial hum of the coolers. The scent of bleach and lemons hung in the air, a sterile mask over last night’s stench of beer and conflict.
Casey was restocking glassware, the clink of each pint glass abnormally loud, when the staff door opened.
Matty walked in.
He looked tired. His hair was less neat, his blue eyes shadowed. He carried a cardboard box with Jamie’s name scrawled on the side—probably the crap Jamie kept in the staff locker. He saw her and stopped. The distance between them, from the bar to the door, felt like a canyon.
“Hey,” he said, his voice neutral, professional.
“Hi.” She placed a glass down carefully.
“Quiet today.”
“Yeah.”
He set the box on a table and ran a hand over his mouth. The gesture was so familiar, so him, that it sent a shiver through her. This was the man who’d kissed her until she saw stars against a brick wall. And now he was her manager, in a silent, cleaned bar.
“Look, Casey…” He started, then stopped. He glanced toward the office door, then back at her. “Can we talk? In the office. For a minute.”
Her pulse hammered in her throat. “Okay.”
She followed him, the familiar route feeling like a walk to the gallows. The office was as it always was: dim, cluttered, dominated by the ugly green glow of the ancient computer on the desk. The safe hummed in the corner. He didn’t sit behind the desk. He leaned against it, crossing his arms, then uncrossing them, as if he didn’t know what to do with his body.
“I owe you an apology,” he began, his eyes fixed on a spot on the floor near her feet. “For Friday night. My conduct was completely unprofessional. I took advantage of a volatile situation, and I put you in an uncomfortable position.”
It was a manager’s speech. Pre-rehearsed. It made her want to scream.
“Is that what it was?” she asked, her own voice quiet. “Unprofessional conduct?”
His gaze snapped up to hers. The careful mask slipped, just for a second. She saw the frustration, the want, the same storm that had been in his eyes in the alley. “You know it wasn’t.”
“Then don’t apologize like it was a HR violation.”
“But it is one!” He pushed off the desk, taking a single agitated step. “I’m eight years older than you. I sign your paychecks. I have a duty of care. What I did… what we did… it complicates everything.”
“It was a kiss, Matty. One kiss.” The lie tasted bitter. It had been a universe contained in a kiss.
“And if I could go back, I wouldn’t change it.” The admission burst out of him, raw and startling. He shook his head, a sharp, frustrated motion. “That’s the problem. I wouldn’t change a second of it. And that means I can’t be trusted.”
The air in the small room grew thick, charged. The hum of the computer, the safe, the coolers outside—it all faded into a dull buzz. All she could hear was his breathing, slightly ragged. All she could see was the tight line of his shoulders, the way his hands flexed at his sides.
She took a step toward him. Then another. The space between them evaporated. She wasn’t thinking about HR, or gossip, or Jamie. She was thinking about the taste of his mouth, the feel of his hands on her waist, the way he’d called her an “unavoidable fact.”
“So what do we do?” she whispered, now standing so close she could see the faint stubble shading his jaw, the darker ring of blue around his irises.
His control was a thin, fraying thread. She watched the battle in his face—the responsible manager warring with the man who’d pinned her in an alley. The man was winning.
“Casey,” he said, a warning and a plea.
She reached out, one tentative finger tracing the line of his belt buckle. He sucked in a sharp breath.
That was all it took. The thread snapped.
His hands came up to frame her face, his touch suddenly desperate. “Tell me to stop,” he murmured against her lips, but he was already kissing her, and the words were lost.
This kiss wasn’t like the alley. That had been fire and defiance. This was deeper, hotter, a deliberate uncorking of everything they’d denied. It was all tongues and teeth and shared, hungry breaths. Her back connected with the filing cabinet beside the safe, the metal cold even through her shirt. His body pressed against hers, eliminating any last fragment of space.
One of his hands slid from her face, down her neck, over her shoulder, tracing a blazing path to her hip. He gripped her there, pulling her firmly into the hard line of his erection. A helpless sound escaped her—a whimper, his name swallowed by his mouth.
“Hear that?” he breathed, tearing his lips from hers to trail kisses along her jaw, down the sensitive cord of her neck. “That’s what you do to me. Every damn day.”
His words, filthy and sincere, unraveled her. Her hands fumbled with the button of his jeans. He helped her, his own fingers clumsy with urgency. The rasp of his zipper was the loudest sound in the world.
He dropped to his knees.
The sight of him there, his blue eyes darkened with need looking up at her, sent a shockwave of pure heat through her core. He hooked his thumbs in the waistband of her jeans and her cotton panties, pulling them down just enough. His mouth was on her, and her head thudded back against the filing cabinet with a metallic bang.
There was no finesse, no gentle exploration. It was devouring. He licked into her with a focused intensity that shattered coherent thought. His hands held her hips steady as she trembled. Whimpers fell from her lips, a broken litany of “oh god, Matty, please.”
He groaned against her, the vibration tipping her closer to the edge. “That’s it,” he muttered, his voice rough, muffled against her skin. “Let me hear you. Always so quiet. Let go.”
She came apart with a sharp cry, her fingers tangled in his hair, her knees buckling. He held her through it, gentling his mouth until the last aftershock faded.
Before she could even catch her breath, he was rising, pushing her jeans down her thighs. He turned her gently, pressing her front against the cold metal of the safe. His hands were everywhere—pulling her hips back, sliding around to cup her breasts through her shirt, his mouth on her neck.
“I need to be inside you,” he said, the words a hot scrape against her ear. “Right now. Tell me you want it.”
“Yes.” It was barely a sound.
He fumbled with a condom from his wallet, sheathing himself. One hand guided his tip to her entrance, the other splayed flat on the safe beside her head.
He pushed in. Slowly. A relentless, breathtaking invasion that stretched her, filled her completely. They both froze for a second, united in a gasp. It was more intense than she’d imagined. More real.
“Jesus, Casey,” he choked out.
Then he began to move.
It wasn’t sweet. It was primal, a frantic coupling against office furniture. The filing cabinet rattled with every thrust. His rhythm was punishing, perfect. Each drive buried him deeper, hitting a spot that made her see white behind her eyelids. His praises were filthy, gorgeous whispers in the dim room.
“That’s it… take all of me… you feel unbelievable… my good girl… fucking perfect…”
His hand slid from the safe down her body, finding the place where they joined, circling her clit with a relentless, knowing pressure. A second climax tore through her, violent and silencing, a wave of pure sensation that locked her muscles around him.
With a ragged groan, he followed her over, his hips stuttering, his body pressing hers hard into the safe as he spilled into the condom.
For a long moment, there was only the sound of their ragged breaths, the occasional creak of the filing cabinet settling. The smell of sex and sweat and stale paper filled the small room.
Slowly, he softened inside her. He pressed a damp, tender kiss to the back of her shoulder before pulling away. The loss of him, of his heat, made her shiver.
They dressed in a silence that was neither awkward nor comfortable, just stunned. He disposed of the condom in the small bin under the desk. She pulled her shirt straight, her fingers trembling.
He finally looked at her, really looked. His hair was a mess from her hands. He looked wrecked, satisfied, and utterly terrified.
“Well,” he said, his voice hoarse. “That definitely wasn’t the talk I had planned.”
A startled laugh burst out of her, sounding slightly hysterical. He smiled, a quick, fleeting thing that didn’t reach his worried eyes.
The bar’s back door slammed. Lewi’s voice echoed from the main room. “Casey? You here? Delivery guy’s up front with the kegs.”
Reality flooded back in, cold and bracing. They were at work. Their friends were just outside.
“I have to…” she gestured vaguely toward the door.
“Yeah.” He ran a hand through his hair, trying to smooth it. “Go. I’ll… I’ll be out in a minute.”
She nodded, unable to form words. As she reached for the door handle, he spoke again, softly.
“Casey.”
She turned.
“This changes everything,” he said. It wasn’t a regret. It was a statement of terrifying, exhilarating fact.
She walked out into the bright, bleach-smelling bar, her body still humming with the echo of him. Lewi was wrestling with a keg line. He grinned at her. “There you are. You okay? You look flushed.”
“Just… hot in the office,” she managed.
Her phone, tucked in her back pocket, buzzed. She pulled it out, her heart hammering against her ribs.
A text from an unknown number. But she knew.
It was one kiss. And it was everything. I’ll see you at close. - M