But now he put his finger on it.

She wore those damned boring-assed colors that were not her and he would put a million dollars—and he could literally do that, thank you very fucking much—on the fact that she wore those because her grandfather or father had told her that’s how she should dress to work for Hot Cakes.

He loved her in that red dress of Piper’s.

Not just because she looked sexy as hell but because he would bet another million that she really liked that dress.

The door to the powder room opened behind him and he turned to face her.

She came up short when she saw that he was still there.

She was back in her silky light blue blouse and the dark gray skirt. He found it interesting they were wearing the same colors today.

But he really fucking hated her outfit.

He frowned and moved to her desk to return the stress ball to its spot next to her plain black pencil holder. Damn, even the stress ball and pencil holder were boring. Dax had one that when you squeezed it the inner liquid squished out into multicolored bubbles. Whitney needed one of those. Desperately. Literally and metaphorically.

“You’re still here,” she said.

“You didn’t tell me if we’re going to dinner tomorrow night or the next night,” he said, tucking his hands into his pockets.

She tossed Piper’s dress over the back of one of the chairs that faced her desk and regarded him with narrowed eyes.

“Neither. But you already knew that answer. So why are you really still here?”

Ah, see, that was the other reason he hated her clothes. When she dressed like this it was clear that she felt more buttoned up and cool. Not at all vulnerable and sexy.

“I’m really still here because I want to know when we’re going out. We don’t have to go to Timothy’s. Hell, we don’t have to go to dinner for that matter.”

“Just straight to the hotel then?” she asked.

“Sure.” He shrugged.

“Well, I guess it’s a step up from the riverbank.”

He lifted a brow and took a step closer to her. He didn’t miss the way her breath caught for just a second. “You had no complaints on that riverbank, Whit.” They’d been so damned hot together. Even as teenagers.

She wet her lips. “I was seventeen. What did I know?”

Yeah, well, at seventeen Miss Whitney Lancaster had been the best sex of his life. And that was still true ten years later. And he’d absolutely tried to erase that memory.

“You knew that you were madly in love with me and that nothing felt better than when we were naked together,” he said.

She pressed her lips together, lifted her chin, and met his gaze directly.

He appreciated that. She was tough. She didn’t want him to see that he affected her. That made this all so much more fun.

He took another step. Now he could reach her. He wasn’t going to, but he could and she knew it.

“Go out with me.”

“No.”

“Let me put you up on your desk and convince you.” Damn, he wanted to do that so fucking bad he almost had to reach down and adjust his cock. He did appreciate dress pants and the bit of give they had compared to denim. He was going to have to remember that if he was going to have these conversations with Whitney.

“No.” But she swallowed hard after that one.

“Okay.” He took one final step. Now she had to tip her head back to look up at him. “Let me bend you over your desk and convince you.”

This time she had to swallow before she answered. “No.”

He studied her face. Her pupils were wide and round, her cheeks pink, her pulse fluttered at the base of her throat. “You think I’m testing you,” he said as he realized it.

“Are you?”

Well… He nodded. “Maybe a little. But not the way you think.”

“You’re not trying to find a reason to fire me?”

He was legitimately surprised that she thought that. “I don’t want to fire you, Whit.”

“No?” She looked skeptical.

“Oh, no,” he said. “I want you right here, front row, center, watching me and my friends turn this company into so much more than your family ever did with it.”

Emotions flickered in her eyes and he wasn’t sure if he should brace for a fight or… what.

Finally she nodded. “Good. I want all of that to happen.”

Yeah, he hadn’t been expecting that. Not even a mild defense of her family?

“But,” she said lifting her chin. “I want to… I intend to be a part of that. Not just sitting and watching.”

She did, huh? “Because you’re not really qualified to do anything else?” he asked, unable to resist the jab.

Hey, he wasn’t as big of an asshole as the Lancaster men, but he would never deny that he could be one. Unmistakably. Unapologetically, too. Most of the time.

She took a breath. “I’m an asset to you and this company,” she said instead of directly answering the question.

She was.

He nodded. “But you want to stay because you like that big old house you inherited from your grandma and you don’t want to have to move and buy something on your own?”

Did it matter why she wanted to be here? As long as she was and she was a witness to the great work he and his friends were doing here? Yeah, it did matter. She needed to know where she stood with him, but he needed to know where he stood with her too.

And he had a feeling she was going to lay it all out. And that he already knew.

“I do like that house,” she admitted. “This town is also my home. I don’t want to live anywhere else. And I don’t have a college degree to take to another company,” she said, her chin up again, her gaze on his. “And I don’t have any other experience except what my family gave me and I know exactly how that would look on a resume. But”—she took a breath—“what I really want is to take this company to levels my family never did. I want more markets, more products, and to double our bottom line. I want to expand the number of jobs here and to look at a second factory location. And I want to be a part of all of that.” She crossed her arms and took a deep breath. “I want to be a partner.”

He stared at her.

He hadn’t been expecting any of that.

He really hadn’t.

Whitney had always been sweet, dedicated to her family’s company because that had been ingrained since she’d been born, believing that her grandfather and father could walk on water, willing to go along with whatever they wanted or needed from her. She’d been a part of the company up to this point. So why did this all sound like she’d been frustrated and was so determined to grab on to this change in ownership as an opportunity?

“I—” he started.

“Which is why I can’t go out with you and I certainly can’t sleep with you,” she said.

Cam’s eyebrows rose. “Hang on now.”

“For one, it’s ridiculous to even think we should go there,” she told him. She dropped her arms, but she also moved behind her desk, putting the wide expanse of solid wood between them.

Cam knew that wasn’t an accident.

“We broke up ten years ago,” she said. “We are exes who haven’t exactly been friends. Why would you think we should go out?”