Often (Book 1)

Chapter 7 - M

Minji

I spent the better part of Saturday running at the lake, trying to get some air, some distance, some clarity to my thoughts. Even so, the hour-long drive to my parents' house gave me plenty of time to return to the tangle of frustrations in my head: Miss Pham, how I hated her, how much I craved her, the flowers Jay sent. Leaning farther back into the seat, I tried to let the soothing sound of the car engine calm me. It wasn't working.

So here were the facts: I felt possessive of her. Not in a romantic sort of way, but in a "hit her over the head, drag her off by the hair, and fuck her" way. Like she was my toy and I was keeping the other boys in the sandbox from playing with her. How sick was that? If she ever heard me admit to that, she would cut off my balls and feed them to me.

Now the question was how to proceed. Obviously Jay was interested. How could he not be? All he had was secondhand information from my family, who obviously adored her, and I'm sure they'd showed him at least one photograph. If that was all I knew about her I'd be interested too. But there was no way he could have an actual conversation with her and still find her appealing.

Unless he just wanted to fuck her . . .

The sound of the leather steering wheel straining under my grip told me I'd be better off not thinking about that.

He wouldn't have agreed to meet her at my parents' home if all he wanted was sex, would he? I considered this. Maybe he really did want to get to know her better. Hell, even I could admit to having been a bit intrigued before we actually spoke. Of course, that hadn't lasted long, and she'd proven to be one of the most aggravating people I'd ever met. Unfortunately for me, she was also the best sex I'd ever had.

Fuck, he'd better never get that far. I wasn't sure I knew where to hide a body around here.

I still remembered the first moment I saw her. My parents had come to visit me one Christmas while I was living abroad, and one of my gifts had been a digital photo frame. While going through the photos with my mom, I paused the slideshow at a picture of my parents standing with a beautiful dark brown-haired girl.

"Who is this with you and Dad?" I asked. Mom told me that her name was Hanni Pham, and that she worked as an assistant for my dad and was all kinds of wonderful. She was probably only twenty in the photograph, but her effortless beauty was arresting.

Over the years her face would pop up in photos that my mom sent to me; company functions, Christmas parties, even parties at the house. Her name was brought up occasionally as my family recounted stories about the general goings-on of work and life.

So when the decision was made that I would come home and take over as COO, my father explained that Hanni was getting her business degree, had a scholarship that required real-world experience, and that mine would be a perfect job for her to shadow for a year. My family loved and trusted her, and the fact that my father and brother had absolutely no reservations about her ability to handle the job spoke volumes. I immediately agreed. I was a bit worried that my appreciation for her appearance would interfere with my ability to be her boss, but I quickly reassured myself that the world was full of beautiful women and it would be easy enough to separate the two.

Oh, how stupid I'd been.

And now I could see all the mistakes I'd made over the last few months, how even from that first day, it was all leading up to this.

To make matters worse, I couldn't seem to seal the deal with anyone lately without thinking of her. Just the thought of the last time I tried was enough to make me wince.

It was a few days before the Window Incident—as I was now referring to it—and I had a charity event to attend. Coming into the office I was stunned to see Miss Pham in an incredibly sexy blue dress I'd never seen before. The minute I saw her I'd wanted to throw her on the desk and fuck her senseless.