Everything Gained Read Online Free PDF Page A

like that before I'd still be working with him?"
    There was a noticeable pause.
    Nina was infuriated by the fact that he didn't agree with her immediately, as if he thought that she might have been running around on him with Dunn. She looked Gain in the eye and let her face go a careful blank, then took two deliberate steps away from him and turned to run up the stairs, throwing herself onto their bed and curling up into a ball.
    She felt as guilty as she did angry, only the anger was harder to sustain. Why hadn't she noticed that Dunn was becoming attracted to her? The answer was all too easy: she was too wrapped up in her husband - even when they weren't necessarily connecting all the time - to even see another man. When Dunn had taken her into his arms she was so surprised that she'd actually wanted to laugh out loud, but she'd been able to stifle the impulse, barely.
    She'd not wanted to insult Dunn's ego, although she was wondering exactly why she was worrying about that. He certainly knew she was a married woman - a happily married woman... although perhaps she'd been complaining about Gain a bit too much to him, about how they weren't able to be together much anymore since both of them were working all the time.
    But she'd never in her life seen any man the way she saw Gain - as a husband, a lover, and a disciplinarian. He was everything to her and for her. He was her rock, her stable base. He'd always been there for her and he always would be. He let her fly free, but also knew exactly when the right moment was to reel her in.
    She trusted him with her life - she did it every time she lay beneath him opened herself up to him, and, even more so, every time she lay over his lap, or bent over whatever piece of furniture was convenient, or even that rock hard thigh of his. He was a big enough man that he could snap her in two without so much as thinking about it, although he always treated her like she was made of spun glass - even when he was waling away on her bottom.
    It was the combination of his size and his protectiveness that had always attracted her - even though he had always had a tendency towards bossiness, especially with her, and he'd laid down the line with her several times while they were dating. He'd threatened to spank her more than once, sometimes casually and sometimes more seriously, and she had been smart enough not to push him to see whether or not he'd actually do it. She had a good idea that he most certainly would.
    And before he'd proposed, before he'd gotten down on one knee at the first restaurant they'd gone to together, he told her flat out that if they got married, he expected her to obey him, and that if she didn't he wouldn't hesitate to tip her over his knee when he felt she needed it.
    She'd laughed nervously, but he'd been deadly serious - and when he'd presented her with a ring not three minutes later, she'd known exactly what she was saying "yes" to.
    She'd never regretted it. Not once. She'd loved him for longer than she could remember - Dunn Plourde notwithstanding. How could he possibly think that she'd put up with Dunn acting inappropriately for one minute? Did he think the job meant that much to her? Did he think she was the type of woman who would lead a man on? Or even worse, actually go through with something like that?
    If someone had asked her before this incident whether Gain knew her well, she would have answered with an emphatic "yes".
    But now she wasn't so sure, and that uncertainty cut deep into her heart.
    She didn't get much time alone to think about the situation, though, because Gain of course followed her up the stairs.
    The first words out of his mouth when he appeared in the doorway were, "Are you sure you're all right."
    "Oh, I'm fine," she answered angrily. "Except for the fact that my husband apparently seriously thinks that I've been whoring around on him."
    Gain looked thunderstruck. He hadn't been thinking of it that way at all. He just knew how much this