After Office Hours

Ava Reynolds thought the new marketing assistant job would be simple. Good salary. Clean slate. At twenty-six, she’s only ever dated men, and she’s never questioned that.

Then she walks into the glass-and-steel offices of Ward & Associates in Boston and meets Elena Ward.

Elena is forty-four, the CEO, and impossible to ignore. She runs meetings with a steady voice and a single raised brow. Controlled. Precise. The kind of woman who doesn’t waste words. Ava tells herself it’s just admiration.

A company crisis changes that.

Late nights stack up. Shared coffee in dim conference rooms. The soft hum of the projector after midnight. Strategy sessions stretch long past business hours, and their conversations drift off script. A look lingers. A pause holds. What starts as respect turns into something Ava can’t quite label and Elena won’t.

The risks are real. One misstep could cost Ava her job. Elena’s reputation could fracture just as easily. HR policies, office gossip, and a sixteen-year age gap stand between them, solid as walls. Still, every brush of fingers over a document, every quiet confession in an empty hallway, weakens the distance they’re trying to keep.

Ava is only beginning to understand what she wants. Elena is afraid to want at all.

In a world built on control and image, will they protect their careers or choose each other?

***

Discover more unforgettable awakenings in the First Women series where falling for her is only the beginning.

They never thought they’d fall for a woman.
They definitely didn’t expect her to be older.

In First Women, desire doesn’t sit quiet. It shows up and asks questions they’ve never had to answer. Each story follows a woman who’s lived by a clear script career, dating history, family expectations until one connection knocks it sideways. The neighbor across the hall. The mentor with sharp eyes and steady hands. The fire captain giving orders over the crackle of a radio. The executive who lingers a second too long. The woman who looks at her like she already knows.

Age gaps bring tension to the surface. First touches land soft, then linger. A hand at the small of her back. The scent of perfume on a borrowed jacket. What starts as confusion turns into heat and then into something that won’t be brushed off.

These standalone romances are steamy, emotional, and close enough to feel real. They trace the instant attraction shifts into identity, and the older woman who makes turning back impossible.

Once you see yourself clearly, can you pretend you don’t?