mouth, hardly believing she’d said that out loud.
Roarke’s lips twitched. “I assure you, Ms. Scott, I can be much scarier. Ask anyone who has ever crossed me.”
Ava didn’t really like the sound of that. She’d be sure to displease him. There was no denying she could be a grouch, she had her off days like everyone else. Would he dock her pay if she said the wrong thing? Would he fire her if she didn’t make his coffee the right way? All sorts of scenarios raced through her head.
“Stop.” He said firmly.
Ava looked at him.
“You’re worrying too much.” He sighed. “And I’m coming on too strong. But you need to know who I am if we’re going to work together. Tell me, Ms. Scott, do you know what sort of clubs I own?”
Roarke looked down at the tiny woman sitting in front of him and cursed himself for scaring her. He tried to quell the stirring of arousal in his gut. His cock lengthened, pushing against his pants. What was wrong with him? She certainly wasn’t his type. He liked tall, curvy woman, not fragile little pixie’s with heart-shaped faces, large, green doe-like eyes and silky dark hair. No, not his type at all.
So why was his dick as hard as concrete?
Ava squirmed under his scrutiny and he almost smiled. Her gaze lowered to the floor.
A natural submissive. He wondered if she knew.
“I...ahh...ummm...” she stumbled over her words. So she did know he ran a BDSM club.
“Ms. Scott, if we are to work together then there are a few core things that I will insist upon. One is communication. The other is honesty. I cannot stand lies. Do you understand?”
She nodded and he worried about her being too timid. The last thing he wanted was an assistant who cried the first time he growled at her.
“Now, I will ask again and I expect an answer.” Roarke deliberately used his Dom voice and she reacted immediately, raising her gaze to stare at him with wide eyes. She nodded silently, her eyes dropping once more.
“No, look at me.” Where the hell was Sam? If he didn’t return soon to smooth over Roarke’s harder edges, she was going to flee.
Mind you, that wouldn’t be a bad thing. Ava was entirely too tempting, he wanted to train her, control her, protect her.
Possess her.
Maybe he should tell her that. It would have her running in less than ten seconds. Then he could hire himself someone he wasn’t attracted to in the slightest. Someone older, married, independent. Someone who’d stand up to him when needed. Not someone he’d spend all his time imagining in his bed or kneeling at his feet.
Dammit, where was Sam?
Ava shuddered, and his attention turned from his thoughts back to her. She nervously licked her lips, her eyes wide as she stared at him with a mix of interest and trepidation.
“What sorts of clubs do I own, Ava?” he asked.
“BDSM clubs, Sir.”
His cock throbbed. Down, boy. The Sir coming from her lips had sounded natural and far too sexy for his state of mind.
“And do you have any problems with working for the owner of several BDSM clubs?”
She shook her head, her long, dark hair moving about her head. “No, Sir.”
Roarke dropped his gaze to her lap where she was wringing her hands anxiously.
“Have you ever been to a BDSM club before?” he asked, quelling the urge to soothe her.
“No, Sir.”
He raised a brow. A complete novice. He wondered what sort of men she went for. Probably easy, sweet men who bored her in thirty seconds. Roarke shook off the thought. It was none of his business who she dated; he was hiring her to be his personal assistant. His old personal assistant had retired months ago and Sam had insisted that he needed one. He’d been relying on Sam too much to help him with the office work. He’d interviewed four other people before Ava.
None of them had intrigued him in the slightest.
He should hire one of them. But he wanted Ava. He hadn’t felt his much for anyone other than Sam in, well, too long to remember.
Hell, no