Falling For My Dad's Friend: A Steamy Standalone Instalove Romance Read online

  CONTENTS

  Falling For My Dad’s Friend

  NEWSLETTER

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Epilogue

  Extended Epilogue

  Extended Epilogue

  Extended Epilogue

  NEWSLETTER

  A MAN WHO KNOWS WHAT HE WANTS

  BRATVA BEAR SHIFTERS

  LAIRDS & LADIES

  RUSSIAN UNDERWORLD

  IRISH WOLF SHIFTERS

  Collaborations

  About the Author

  FALLING FOR MY DAD’S FRIEND

  AN OLDER MAN YOUNGER WOMAN ROMANCE

  _______________________

  A MAN WHO KNOWS WHAT HE WANTS, 289

  FLORA FERRARI

  Copyright © 2022 by Flora Ferrari

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  The following story contains mature themes, strong language and sexual situations. It is intended for mature readers.

  FALLING FOR MY DAD’S FRIEND

  My dad chose his job over his wife and daughter, but now that I’m older and finished with college I want to get to know him.

  When he asks me to visit him I say yes.

  I expect to get to know my dad in a way I never got the chance to but I don’t expect to be offered a job as his boss’s assistant.

  And I certainly don’t expect to fall for his boss.

  His boss who also happens to be his best friend.

  Magnus is as mysterious as he is handsome. But would an older, wealthy, and handsome man like him who could have any woman he wants want a girl like me?

  I’m a virgin with no experience except with a boy who thought bringing me down was the way to treat a woman. But Magnus is no boy but a real man.

  I should ignore this attraction, he’s my boss and my dad’s best friend with a mysterious job that I’m pretty sure is dangerous.

  But I can’t stop thinking about him and if the heated look in his eyes is any indication I don’t think my feelings are unrequited.

  * Falling For My Dad’s Friend is an insta-everything standalone instalove romance with a HEA, no cheating, and no cliffhanger.

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  CHAPTER ONE

  Magnus

  I slam my fist down on the table, the sound echoing through the dining room.

  The man at my side, Renner Langley, doesn’t even flinch, not that I expect him to. He’s always been right by my side, following me like a shadow I can’t shake not that I would ever want to.

  For years, we’ve been as thick as thieves. He is my right hand, and closest friend, we were raised practically like my brother. There is no one closer to me, no one I trust more than Renner.

  I sigh, blowing air through my nose. The papers that are spread over the table, illicit agreements with petty criminals and other major organizations, barely shift. They’re the source of my ire. One of them, however unimportant as it may be, is missing from the shuffled piles.

  I try to control the press of anger that tears through me like a wildfire.

  “These things happen,” Renner says in a calm voice. “We have a new secretary. Your mother hired her. She probably just mixed up the files.”

  “She better hope we find them,” I respond in a hard voice. My teeth are clenched so hard for a moment that my jaw aches. “Or she’ll be out on her ass by the week’s end.”

  Renner stares at me and for a moment, I think I see a challenge in his eye. But it’s gone in a flash. He shakes his head as if clearing whatever thoughts entered his mind. Good. My right hand man has no business testing my authority.

  “I’ll keep that in mind,” Renner says, nodding as he runs a hand through his graying brown hair. “Now, there’s the matter of your father’s estate. What are you going to do? Your mother wants to keep it in the family.”

  “My mother still harbors sweet sentiments for my father,” I tell him, rubbing a hand over my face. “I have no qualms about selling it and forgetting him altogether.”

  Footsteps echo down the hall over the polished hardwood floors just outside the room.

  “Well, my love,” my mother calls from the doorway. “I suppose we should talk, then.”

  Piper St. James still carries herself like she did decades earlier. Her limbs are stiff, but her back is straight and her posture is all but perfect, her trousers crisp and pleated. Her fur coat is faux because she’s always cared more for animals than people. Her eyes are a sharp blue, the icy color of a harsh winter.

  She is the backbone of the family, of the entire business.

  Long, silver hair is swept back in an elegant updo, accentuating her features. She points a finger right at me as she comes over.

  “My boy,” she says in a soft voice. Her voice may be soft but there is power there, beneath the gentle facade, and I raise my chin in her presence. “You must accept your father’s misgivings and move on.”

  My father was a weak man, too soft-willed to ever be a leader. He taught me that the soft-hearted never succeed and that the only way to win is to push. His portraits still hang on the walls of the manor around me, a picture of strength, though I know the truth. He continued the business his grandfather built, but my mother was the one always behind him. She was the one that carried the family in the end.

  But I learned from his mistakes. No one needs to push me.

  “I want you to understand why I want to keep the old place,” my mother says, looking very serious. She is a small woman, tiny in stature, but she exudes power and strength.

  “We should discuss this later,” I say, keeping my voice even. I don’t want to talk about William St. James or my temper might burn a hole right through me. “I’ll have the cooks prepare something and we can talk over dinner.”

  “I’ll do it,” she chimes and moves to stand in front of the fireplace. “Your new assistant will have them fix it. You don’t need to worry about it.”

  I look over at where she stands, shaking my head in dismay.

  “Assistant, mother?” I ask her, leaning my palms on the table and bowing my head over my documents there. “I thought she was a secretary for the business. I’ve told you I’m done with assistants. The last one was too incompetent to even tie her own shoes.”

  My mother just stared at me with a glint in her eye and then turned back to the fireplace, warming her thin fingers.

  Renner begins to gather the papers from the long mahogany table, pushing them into Manila folders that will only land on my desk later.

  I glance up at the sharp click of another pair of heels and stare without restraint as a woman I’ve never seen before enters the room.

  I’ve only ever dreamed of meeting a woman like the one who stands across from me.

  Though an icy winter has fallen over the city, her legs are long and tanned in her tight, blue skirt, her supple breasts near
ly spill over the top of the elegant, silk blouse she wears. Her blonde hair falls in soft curls over her shoulders.

  There’s a tray of coffee cups in one hand and a brown delivery box in the other. The smell of cinnamon and brewed coffee grounds wafts through the room.

  She sails into the room, puts the box down on the table, and distributes the coffees between the three of us.

  “Hot brown sugar espresso,” she says to my mother, who looks pleased as she takes her drink, wrapping her hands around the cup.

  “Americano with three sugars and no cream,” she tells Renner, handing him his coffee of choice.

  She stops in front of me, looking up at me with large emerald green eyes. I can’t stop myself from looking her over. The soft curves of her body are obvious beneath her tight clothes. She’s at least two decades younger than me, but all I can only think about is being alone with her, pressing my body to hers, feeling her curves beneath my fingers.

  I don’t even know her name, but I feel like I know her.

  My body aches and my blood sings for her. She calls to something deep inside of me like some sort of siren, pulling me in without even trying.

  “Black coffee, dark roast,” she says. Her fingers brush mine as she hands over my cup.

  “You know how I like my coffee,” I say. It’s not a question, but she nods.

  “I know almost everything about you,” she tells me in her pretty voice, and all I imagine is her lips on my ear, whispering sweet nothing to me with our bodies pressed close and warm.

  Her face goes pink when she realizes what she said. “I— I mean, I know everything about you in a professional sense, of course, sir.”

  I stare down at her, my gaze firm, but she doesn’t look away. I like that she doesn’t look away. She wants to, but she doesn’t.

  “Almost everything?” I question, all my focus is on her like it’s just the two of us in the room, everything else fades away.

  “I did my research,” she says. Her fingers graze the table, lingering over the wood.

  “You know what I like, then,” I say, my voice only loud enough for her to hear.

  She stares at me, swallowing hard. “I— uh, I got cinnamon rolls for everyone as well.”

  “Oh,” my mother says in a bright voice. “I do love a good cinnamon roll.”

  “Magnus St. James, I’d like you to meet your new assistant,” Renner tells me. I can feel my mother watching the exchange. “This is my daughter, Cassandra Langley.”

  “You can call me Cassie,” Cassandra says in a soft voice that sounds like the slow burn of a dream I’ve had before. “I’m happy to do whatever you need, and I mean that.”

  And doesn't that just sound like the beginning of a bad decision?

  I hold my coffee tight, burning my fingers as they curl over the top of the cup. Renner’s daughter. My best friend’s daughter.

  What a day.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Cassandra

  The eerie quiet of the St. James manor is like a veil, covering the house in a thick fog. The rooms seem never-ending and though I know that there are people inside, I don’t hear them. It’s been the same for the entire week I’ve been working in this house.

  Every room I enter, every staircase I descend, a hush falls over the space.

  They don’t want me to know something, I’m sure. What that something is, I’m not so sure.

  I never ask my dad what his job entails and he’s never explained it to me. For years, my mom kept my dad’s work in the dark. I knew it had to be something dangerous, even back then. Ultimately, his job was what tore them apart. My mom still talks about it to this day.

  My Cassandra, she says when she’s too deep into a bottle of blood-red wine. You look so much like your father that I wonder why I don’t hate you too.

  I don’t think I look like my dad. His hair is brown while mine is the same soft, curly blonde that my mom has. Sometimes I can see the resemblance in the tilt of his smile or the bright green of his eyes, but nothing more.

  I think my mom’s ire has more to do with my presence. I’m a constant reminder of the man who chose his job over his wife and child.

  I don’t hate my father, but I’m sure that she does.

  I blink slowly, looking around the hallway that leads to the portrait gallery and the dining room.

  The house is decorated in the opulence of old money, dimly lit by shuttered windows and flickering fireplaces. It smells of leather and cigar smoke, dark and heavy in the air. I want to marvel at how I ended up in this place, but I’m not really surprised at the turn of events.

  My mom and dad divorced when I was just a little girl and once upon a time, I only saw my father once every year.

  Now that I’m older, he insisted that I come and visit him. It only made sense at the time to take the assistant’s position that the sweet, sharp-tongued Mrs. Piper offered me.

  Though now, standing outside of the grand dining room, I rest my weight on the wall to catch my breath, wondering if I should regret my decision.

  It’s more than I ever anticipated and I doubt myself, feeling like a child in a room full of established adults. I’m only twenty-two years old, but it’s as if I’m a little girl again, reaching for things in high places that I can never have.

  Magnus St. James is at least twice my age and he might just be the most attractive man I’ve ever met in my life. And it might sound crazy but I feel it deep in my bones that he’s the man I’ve been waiting for.

  I was meant to be his and he was meant to be mine, no matter what.

  He’s been away on business since I came here. Before that, I had only seen a picture of him, just one, in my dad’s apartment. In the picture, the two of them have their arms slung over each other, like brothers in arms. Their faces were stoic, but the affection between my dad and his best friend was palpable.

  I wonder if I would think differently about Magnus if I had grown up beside him. But after a moment, I know. I would still feel this way about him.

  Whatever I feel for him is much too strong.

  I can feel my attraction for him burn in my core, and spread all the way from the tips of my toes to the top of my head. My entire body feels lit up just by knowing he’s in the same space I am.

  I want him like I’ve never wanted anyone. No man, no short-lived attraction, has ever compared to the way I feel now about Magnus St. James. The man is much more than the picture, he’s like some sort of…

  I take a deep breath, letting it back out again slowly through my nose. I look down at myself, smoothing down my skirt. Should I have chosen the longer one? He must think I’m so unprofessional from the way I flew around the room, giving out coffee like a barista.

  What was I thinking when I took this job?

  I want Magnus but he’s my dad’s best friend. He’s more of a man than any boy I’ve ever encountered. My last and only boyfriend was a flighty, vapid man if you can call him that, who only cared about himself.

  I thank my lucky stars I never let him pressure me into falling into bed with him. I only regret wasting my time with him. He was the only one who ever paid any attention to me and I foolishly thought I could count on him.

  But it didn’t take me long to decide that I deserved so much more than what he gave me, but now I know it for sure. I’m unsure of many things, but not that. I know my worth and I won’t settle for anything less.

  Magnus is so much more. But would he even be interested in a girl like me?

  “He’s not so very scary now, is he?”

  I spin around on my heels as Piper appears beside me, looking coy.

  “I don’t know about that,” I say, clearing my throat. “Did you need something from me— uh, ma'am?”

  I cringe internally at my blunder, hoping she didn’t notice.

  Piper just smiles, quirking one shapely eyebrow at me.

  “Please do ask the cooks to have dinner ready by seven,” she tells me, patting my shoulder as she passes by. “I think I m
ight take a before-dinner nap. Oh, Magnus would like to speak with you, my dear. Try very hard not to appear like a scared little mouse. My son is very much the hungry cat.”

  “Wait, you want me to talk to…him alone?” I ask her, feeling a sudden rush of fear at the thought.

  What if he doesn’t like me? What if I look like a fool in front of him when I want him so badly?

  “You will never know unless you try, my dear,” Piper says as if reading my thoughts.

  I want to say something, anything, but I don’t get the chance to.

  Piper leaves me alone in the hallway in a quiet shuffle of stiff feet and soft fur. Great. What a helpful exchange.

  My chest begins to bead with sweat. I take even breaths as I walk on my towering heels to the expansive office at the end of the hall, hoping I don’t trip and fall on my way there.

  I hesitate at the large oak door before I raise my fist to knock, but a deep voice tells me to come in before I can even touch my knuckles to the wood.

  Magnus leans over a large mahogany desk and I can’t help but stare at the wide expanse of his muscled shoulders under his blue dress shirt. His suit jacket is slung over a chair. In my mind's eye, I see myself stepping behind him, rubbing his stiff shoulders, ridding him of any and all stress in only a way I can.

  “You needed me—” I begin in a voice that I hope is strong and confident, but he raises a hand.

  “My mother hired you to work for me,” he says, not looking up from his work.