Filthy Rage (Second Chance With My Brother's Best Friend, Book Five) by Paige North

clients, a big corporation we recently snagged from a massive design firm—a huge achievement on our part. Carl’s lazy, and he totally had the ass-chewing coming. I can’t count the number of times that balding prick has tried to pawn his work off on me, acting as if he’s doing me a favor by giving me “real business experience.” Thanks so very much, douche. I might not be your age, and no I’m not done with my schooling yet, but I’m not an idiot. I hate that he treats me like one. Like I’m a slave here to do all the shit he thinks is beneath him.
    Anyway, when Carl stutteringly admitted in the meeting that he hadn’t yet done his work, Dane’s voice dropped to a low growl, almost inaudible. I could see a slow throb in the pulse on the side of his neck. His eyes slit just a fraction, and his nostrils flared. But he never yelled at Carl, not once.
    Somehow, the man’s so much more…dangerous when his anger is quietly controlled. Like all that suppressed emotion is coiled up in him, just waiting for an opportunity to be freed. Does he ever release it? Does he go home and punch a bag, or run, or drink? How does he vent the day’s stresses?
    As he quietly gave Carl the business, I couldn’t stop staring at him. And…my panties got wet. I know, it’s crazy, and I feel super embarrassed even admitting that. But it’s true. And if I can’t tell you, my dear journal, who else can I confess my darkest sins to?
    I don’t know why he makes me so hot when he’s mad like that. Maybe it’s how there’s a spark of realness in his eyes whenever he gets in that zone, not just that impersonal, formal persona he puts on around us in the office. But I imagine what it would feel like if Dane got passionate, fired up beyond the point of suppression, then got it out all of his system by slamming me against the meeting room wall and fucking me. Pounding me over and over again until I was raw and sore and thoroughly pleasured and begging him to stop—but not really meaning it, of course.
    Because if he ever looked at me with more than professional courtesy, if he ever put his hands on my body, I’d never want him to quit.

    I stop writing then and press a hand to my warm cheeks. Just thinking about it has made that low pulse in my belly return, and I struggle to control my breathing and keep it quiet. Biting my lower lip hard helps curb my rampant emotions.

    T his craving for Dane is getting out of control. I can’t believe the feelings he brings out of me. No man has ever made me hurt and ache like this, like my body is both fire and ice at the same time. Just being in a room with him makes me throb all over, makes me feel feverish. I try so hard to keep a calm, even composure around him so he’ll never guess what I’m thinking.
    Actually, to tell the truth, I don’t know why I bother hiding how I feel. Dane isn’t going to notice me that way—he sure as hell hasn’t so far. I’m not insanely sexy. I don’t have huge, round breasts or super-long legs or glossy hair or a flirty style, like some of the girls who drop by to see him for lunch dates or whatever. I’m not overly witty and charming and dynamic.
    I’m just me.
    It’s not that I’m not proud of who I am—I work damn hard at school and in the office, and I’m honest and caring. But he and I are leagues apart. Worlds apart.
    And even if he did happen to see me as more than just a plain girl, he’s my boss. Nothing can ever happen with us, so I guess it’s good that it never will. But that doesn’t stop me from wanting it like I need my next breath of air. It won’t stop me from writing all of these fantasies down, if only to purge them from me. Maybe someday I can get ov—

    M y cell phone vibrates , startling me mid-word. I drop the pen and scramble for my phone, slamming the journal shut. The home phone line’s number pops up on my cell’s caller ID.
    “Emme,” my brother says, his voice sounding slightly ragged when I answer.
    “Hey,