Club Wonderland Read Free

all the women in the office, she was the one in whom Gael seemed least interested.
    But a girl could still dream.
    “Case files were apparently moved on Janine, and she lost track of them. She didn’t realize it was due up.”
    Petra claimed men with brown eyes weren’t as attractive as other men. Alice loved to argue that point with her, always ending her rebuttal same way—Petra couldn’t say that until she’d looked up into Gael’s eyes.
    Alice held his gaze as long as she could—an embarrassingly short period—before turning her attention to her monitor. “That’s bad news. I take it she needs some help to get things ready to go?”
    “Yes. I need you to take this file and see what’s missing. It’s for an accident claim. The client is the insurance company. We believe the driver has exaggerated the nature of his injury in an attempt to get a larger settlement. There was supposed to have been research done, social media review and the works, but it didn’t happen.”
    Alice took the file and bit the inside of her cheek when his warm fingers rubbed against hers. Wow, she must be really hard up if such an innocent touch nearly sent her over the edge. She was ready to throw herself on her desk and beg for...well, anything at this point. “I’ll clear my calendar and get it done this morning.”
    You’re so easy , girl.
    Gael didn’t say anything immediately, which forced Alice to look up once more. If she had one complaint about the man, it was that he rarely smiled. Even now, when she was doing him a favor, there wasn’t any hint of softness in his expression. No grateful sparkle in his eyes that said, hey , Alice , thanks so much for saving my ass. Not even a glimmer of something that could be mistaken as attraction.
    Life really wasn’t fair.
    His black hair was short at the sides and longer on the top, allowing the weight of it to fall over his forehead and ears. His cheeks were smooth, but by the end of the day they would be covered with thin stubble. By then his tie would be loose, and if she was really lucky, he would have rolled his shirtsleeves up to his elbows. Every inch of Gael was rock hard. She had no idea if he had the capacity to be soft on an emotional level. Not that softness was necessary.
    And there was no way she was going to examine what that said about her .
    Alice gave him a little smile, hoping it would melt the ice. A few times in the past, she’d been a bit more blatant with the flirting, but that hadn’t gone so well. Better to be subtle. “Is there anything else I can help with?”
    “No. Please take the file directly to Mr. Gibson when you’re done.”
    Okay, maybe she was being too subtle. “Will do.”
    And that was that. Gael turned around and marched back into his office, leaving Alice alone to clean up someone else’s shit.
    “Thanks so much, Alice. It’s really awesome of you to do this,” she muttered, hating that she sounded like a six-year-old. If she were the type of person to feel sorry for herself, she might think that this was typical and would mope. She hated moping.
    Suck it up , buttercup.
    The July heat had been oppressive the past few days, making it nearly impossible to sleep and giving her an extra dose of crabbiness to fight against. Her window air conditioner couldn’t quite kill the humidity in her old home, leaving her feeling sticky day and night. Now that she was faced with a time-sensitive case, the rest of her day wasn’t going to get any better.
    “Okay, time to pull up your big-girl panties and get to work.”
    At least she would have her shopping trip with Petra to look forward to. There was nothing better than being able to force fashion on her friend—
    “Alice.”
    She froze, her hands hovering over the keyboard as she turned to look at where Gael stood in the doorway to his office. She shivered at the intensity of his stare, hating the way he turned her body into a quivering mass without even being aware of it.
    “Yes,