Page 12 of Sin

“Well,” he says after a beat, “that’s probably a good thing.”

I stare at the closed office door. Maybe. But it sure as fuck didn’t feel good.

Wilder sighs and scrubs a hand over his jaw. “Listen, I get it. You’ve been married to Jenna a long time, and I’m sure things get stale.” He points at me. “Just don’t fuck it up by sleeping with an employee.”

“I’m not going to sleep with her.”

“Fuck her. Whatever the hell you want to call it.” He leans back in the chair. “Just… don’t.”

I don’t answer immediately because the truth is ugly. The truth is I haven’t wanted someone like this in years. Maybe ever. Not just physically—though Christ knows that part’s bad enough. It’s everything about Laurel. The way she argues with me. The way she refuses to be intimidated. The way she walks into rooms full of powerful men and somehow becomes the most dangerous person in them.

She makes me feel restless. Wired too tight beneath my skin like I want to wreck something. Or someone.

Wilder watches me carefully. “I think you should remove yourself from this project.”

“No.”

His brows lift. “You sure about that?”

“I can handle it.”

“Can you?” He pauses deliberately. “Because from where I’m sitting, you looked about two seconds away from dragging her into your lap.”

I glare at him. “You’re exaggerating.”

“The fuck I am.”

Silence stretches between us.

Then Wilder says, “It’s the seven deadly sins, Sin.”

Something dark flickers through me.

“It’s literally designed to tempt people.” He gestures vaguely toward the hallway where Laurel’s office sits. “And now you’re flying across the country alone with a woman you clearly want.”

“I said I can handle it.”

“Yeah?” He tilts his head. “Then why are you looking at her office door like you’re thinking about kicking it open?”

Because I am. Because every instinct in me is screaming to go back down that hallway and finish whatever the hell almost happened in there. To crowd her against that desk until she stops pretending she doesn’t want me too. To see if she’d still argue with me while I kissed her breathless. Jesus Christ. I shove up from my chair and stalk toward the windows overlooking downtown Chicago. The city stretches below in steel and glass, but it does nothing to cool the heat crawling under my skin.

“I’m not going to touch her,” I say finally.

Wilder snorts softly behind me. “You keep saying that like you’re trying to convince yourself.”

My jaw tightens. He’s not wrong. That’s the problem. Because the second Laurel looked at my wedding ring, guilt hit me hard enough to make me feel sick. She reminded me—without saying a damn word—exactly who I’m supposed to be. A husband. Not some asshole fantasizing about his employee bent over her desk in the middle of the workday.

“You love Jenna,” Wilder says quietly.

“I do.”

But even as I say it, Laurel’s face flashes through my mind again. Her flushed cheeks. Her sharp mouth. The way her voice shook just slightly when she said, I think you’re married. Like she hated that fact as much as I did in that moment.

Wilder exhales slowly behind me. “Then act like it.”

That one lands. Hard. Because he’s right. And I hate him for it.

A knock sounds at my office door before I can answer.