You’re pressing me back against the mahogany shelving, and for a second, I’m terrified the first editions won't be the only things bruised tonight.
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You’ve got your hand on my hip, Bennett, and Silas has his mouth on my neck, and frankly, the inventory list on my clipboard is the last thing on my mind. We are tucked into the Rare and Unusual section, where the air is thick with the scent of old leather, dust, and the heavy, caramel notes of the bourbon Silas brought over an hour ago. The store is locked—the heavy oak doors of The Dog-Eared Page are barred against the Savannah humidity—but I can still hear the cicadas screaming in the live oaks outside like they’re cheering us on.
You’re looking at me with that specific expression you get when you’ve found a typo in a final proof: focused, hungry, and a little bit annoyed that you can’t control the outcome. Your fingers are digging into my skin through my silk skirt, and I can feel the heat radiating off you, a sharp contrast to the cool glass of the display cases. Silas is a different kind of heat. He’s behind me, his beard scratching against the sensitive skin just below my ear, his breath hot and smelling of oak-aged rye. He’s the one who started this, the regular customer with more money than sense and a penchant for first editions that keep us both late on Tuesday nights. But you, Bennett? You’re the one who’s been wanting to do this since I hired you three years ago, right after the ink dried on my divorce papers.
Everything about this is a bad idea. I’m your boss. Silas is a client. We are surrounded by three hundred thousand dollars' worth of fragile history. And yet, when you pull me closer and your other hand finds the curve of my throat, I find myself wishing the shelves would just give way so we could sink into the floor.
***
It started three hours ago, though if I’m being honest, it started the day you walked in for your interview wearing that linen shirt and a look of quiet competence that made me want to give you the keys to my house along with the keys to the register. You were the only man in Georgia who didn’t look at my ‘Divorced’ status like a clearance sticker at a yard sale.
“We’re closing in ten, Cassidy,” you said at 8:50 PM, leaning against the counter. You were doing that thing where you roll your sleeves up to your elbows, exposing those forearms I’ve spent far too much time imagining wrapped around me. The shop was quiet, the way a bookstore gets when the light starts to fail—the shadows between the stacks lengthening like long, dark fingers.
“I know, Bennett,” I replied, not looking up from the ledger. “Silas called. He’s coming by to look at the 1924 edition of ‘The Great Gatsby’ we pulled from the estate sale in Beaufort. He said he’d bring something to help with the transition into the weekend.”
“It’s Tuesday,” you pointed out. You walked over, and the floorboards groaned under your boots. I love that sound. It’s a grounded, masculine sound that cuts right through the flowery prose I spend my days editing. You stopped just behind my chair, and I could feel the space between us vibrating. “He spends too much time here.”
“He spends a lot of money here,” I countered, though I knew what you were getting at. You didn’t like the way he looked at me. And you definitely didn’t like the way I didn’t look away.
When the bell over the door chimed, it wasn’t just Silas who walked in. It was the smell of the rain that had been threatening all afternoon and a bottle of Eagle Rare that cost more than my first car. Silas doesn’t just enter a room; he occupies it. He’s older than you, Bennett—closer to my age—with silver at his temples and a way of speaking that sounds like it’s been smoothed over by a century of fine dining.
“Cassidy,” he purred, ignoring you entirely as he set the bottle on the counter. “Bennett. I hope I’m not interrupting the inventory. Or are you two just rehearsing your own romance novel?”
I felt you stiffen behind me. You’ve always been protective, like a hound dog guarding a porch, but tonight there was something sharper in your gaze. Maybe it was the way the humidity made my hair curl. Maybe it was the way the light caught the amber in the glass as Silas poured three generous fingers of bourbon into the mismatched tumblers I keep in the back.
***
Now, your mouth is on mine, and it’s not a rehearsed romance. It’s messy. It’s hard. You taste like the bourbon and the mint gum you always chew, and you’re kissing me like you’re trying to claim territory before Silas can get any further. I’m pinned between you, my back against his chest, and I can feel him unzipping my skirt. The sound of that zipper in the silence of the shop is like a gunshot.
“Easy,” Silas murmurs against my hair, his hands sliding under the silk, finding the lace of my underwear. His palms are large and warm, his fingers calloused from flipping through thousands of pages. He finds the crease of my thighs and I let out a sound that would make my Sunday school teacher faint dead away. It’s a low, guttural moan that vibrates against your lips, Bennett, and I feel your cock twitch against my hip, hard and urgent through your khakis.
“Cassidy,” you growl into my mouth, your name for me sounding like a prayer and a threat all at once. You pull back just an inch, your eyes dark and wild. “You sure about this? Because once I start, I’m not stopping for the first editions or the law or anything else.”
“Shut up and touch me,” I tell you, and I’ve never been more certain of a sentence in my life.
You don’t need to be told twice. You hike my skirt up to my waist, the fabric bunching around my hips, and you lift me. I wrap my legs around your waist, my heels clicking against the mahogany shelf behind you. Silas is right there, his hands moving to my breasts, squeezing them through the thin lace of my bra until my nipples are aching points of heat. He’s watching us, his eyes narrowed with a voyeur’s intensity, and then he’s kneeling.
He doesn’t ask. He just pulls my panties aside and buries his face between my legs. The first lick is a shock—hot, wet, and incredibly precise. I arch my back, my fingers digging into your shoulders, Bennett, and you let out a hissed breath as Silas’s tongue finds my clit. He knows exactly what he’s doing. He treats me like one of his rare finds, something to be tasted and explored with a slow, agonizing attention to detail.
You’re watching him eat me, and the look on your face is the hottest thing I’ve ever seen. It’s a mix of jealousy and pure, unadulterated lust. You reach down, fumbling with your belt, and then you’re out, your cock thick and heavy, pressing against my wetness while Silas continues his work below. You’re rubbing the head of it against me, smearing Silas’s spit and my own cream across your skin, and I am losing my mind.
“Look at me,” you command, your voice cracking. I open my eyes, my vision blurred by the sheer sensory overload. You’re holding me up, your muscles straining, and you guide yourself in.
You’re big—bigger than I expected, filling me up in a way that makes me feel like I’m being stretched to the limit. I gasp, my head falling back against Silas’s shoulder as he stands back up to watch you sink into me. He reaches around, his hand finding your cock where it’s disappearing inside me, his fingers brushing against your balls, and you let out a low, rough sound that’s half-growl, half-sob.
“God, you’re tight,” you mutter, beginning to move. Each thrust is slow and deliberate, a deep, rhythmic pounding that echoes in the quiet shop. Silas isn’t idle; he’s behind me again, his hands on my hips, helping you drive into me. He leans over my shoulder, his mouth finding my breast, biting down gently through the lace until I’m screaming into the empty air of the philosophy section.
I’ve spent my life writing about the ‘pinnacle of desire,’ but this is different. This is the grit of the real world. This is the way your sweat drips onto my collarbone, the way the floorboards creak with every thrust, the way the smell of old paper mixes with the musk of three people who have stopped pretending they don't want to ruin each other.
You’re moving faster now, your breath coming in short, jagged bursts. You’re hitting a spot deep inside me that makes my toes curl, and I can feel the tension building, that tight, electric coil in the base of my belly. Silas feels it too. He moves his hand down, his thumb finding my clit and circling it with a rhythmic pressure that coordinates perfectly with your thrusts.
“Come for us, Cassidy,” Silas whispers, his voice like velvet and gravel. “Show us what you’ve been hiding behind that desk.”
I don’t have a choice. The world narrows down to the friction of you inside me and the pressure of Silas’s thumb. I’m shaking, my breath hitching in my chest, and then I’m falling. It’s not a graceful fall. It’s a violent, shaking release that pulls a long, high moan from my throat. My walls pulse around you, Bennett, clamping down on you so hard you nearly lose your footing.
You follow me seconds later. You let out a muffled shout, burying your face in my neck as you spill into me, your body shuddering with the force of it. Silas is right there, his hand reaching between us to catch the overflow, his eyes fixed on mine as he watches the light return to my gaze.
We stay like that for a long time, the only sound the heavy thud of our hearts and the distant hum of the refrigerator in the breakroom. You’re still inside me, smaller now but still connected, and Silas hasn’t moved his hand from my hip.
“Well,” Silas says eventually, his voice remarkably steady for a man who just helped orchestrate a scandal in a place of learning. “I think that Gatsby edition is definitely worth the asking price.”
You let out a short, breathless laugh, finally letting my feet touch the floor. You don't pull away immediately, though. You keep your hands on my waist, looking down at me with a tenderness that scares me more than the sex did.
“You okay?” you ask, your thumb tracing the line of my jaw.
I look at the two of you—my manager, who knows exactly how I like my coffee and my margins, and the man who treats life like a collection of beautiful things to be acquired. I’m a forty-two-year-old divorced woman in a town that thrives on gossip, standing in the middle of my livelihood with my skirt around my waist and two men’s scent on my skin.
“I’m better than okay,” I tell you, reaching for the bourbon bottle on the shelf. “But I think we’re going to need to stay late for inventory every Tuesday from now on.”
Silas smiles, a slow, predatory thing that makes my blood dance. You just pull me back in for a kiss that tastes like a promise I fully intend to make you keep. Outside, the Georgia rain finally starts to fall, a heavy, rhythmic drumming on the roof that drowns out everything but the sound of us starting all over again.
