"Your girlfriend is going to be back any minute with Kate's coffee," she warned a nonchalant Johnny six weeks later. He stood between her parted thighs, admiring her body through the tight designer black dress from her perch atop her desk at the Crimson office. Lulu had slipped out twenty minutes ago for their daily latte run in anticipation of Kate's arrival, and she due to return right about now. However, Johnny didn't seem to have a care in the world as he moved his hands along the sloped curves of her waist and laid teasing kisses on her bare shoulder. "Johnny, seriously, we could get caught."

"Suddenly worried about Lulu?" he laughed humorlessly as he trailed his lips along her bicep and down to her dainty wrist. Pressing one final kiss on her pulse point, he finally ended his lustful attack on her willing body. "Come on, Jones, I know better than that."

Maxie hooked her arms around his neck and brought him to her for a long kiss just to prove that she didn't care if they were caught. She couldn't let him think she had suddenly gone and grown herself a heart like that stupid Tin Man from The Wizard of Oz. She was far too removed for that possibility. "I just don't want her to make a scene," she told him as she pushed him away and hopped off the desk. Maxie straightened her skirt and checked her reflection in the window on Kate's door. "The last thing I need to deal with all day is Lulu's inane whining. It's going to be a busy day, and Kate is going to need both of us to be at the top of our game."

Johnny grinned as he watched Maxie switch from hot and bothered to professional and unattached quickly. That was one of the things he had come to appreciate about her in the short time they had been hooking up, ranking right up there with her insatiable libido and fondness for talking dirty in bed. Nothing caused the blonde to blush. "Well, maybe I should just go then…" he drawled as he backed her up against a wall. Maxie started to push him away when he caught her hands and crushed them between their bodies. "I mean, if you want me to stop, you just have to tell me."

"Stop," Maxie demanded weakly, her own voice betraying her as Johnny knelt before her. He lifted the train of her dress just enough to press an open-mouthed kiss over her belly button, a move he knew was sure to weaken her defenses. Bringing her thigh up over his shoulder, he continued his assault on the soft skin of her abdomen for a moment. His lustful haze was only broken when her patent leather stiletto came crashing to the floor beside him. "I mean it, Zacharra, we have to stop now."

Untangling her leg from his shoulder, Johnny turned away and readjusted the uncomfortable action now taking place below his waist. Maxie collected herself again, trailing her fingers through her hair nervously. "Sorry, Maxie, I didn't mean to push you…"

She smiled up at him reassuringly. Despite their no-strings-attached approach to their little affair, Johnny was still her friend, and she didn't want him to feel like he had crossed a line. "Trust me, it's not easy for me to stop either," she confessed. "In fact, I want you to keep that in mind for later, when we don't have to worry about being caught by my boss and Lulu. Say, maybe I happen to find you in the hotel parking lot around lunch time. We could have a little afternoon delight…"

Johnny imagined a little rendezvous with the blonde seductress in the backseat of her sporty little red convertible. "I might be able to make the time."

"Well, you check your schedule, Zacharra," she grinned as the elevator dinged, signaling Kate and Lulu's arrival. Maxie instantly slipped into professional mode, placing her headset on her ear and scurrying over to her fashionable boss to roll calls from the night before. Johnny hung back for a moment, watching as his girlfriend interacted with the woman he was sleeping with.

"Check your schedule for what?" Lulu asked as she came over to kiss Johnny hello. She tossed the empty coffee carrier in the recycling bin and sat down at her desk to start her morning work. "What do we have planned?"

"Oh, you know that benefit that we're helping Kate with next week," Maxie lied as she closed the door to Kate's private office behind her. "I told Johnny that you would be counting on his presence and that he better clear his calendar for Wednesday night. Speaking of which, I guess I should see if I could finagle Spinelli into acting as my date."

"Yeah, because he is really going to put up a huge fight," Lulu said sarcastically as she typed away at her computer. Johnny's eyes darted over to Maxie as a surprisingly jealous streak flew through his body. He tried to tell himself that he didn't envy Spinelli for getting to have Maxie on his arm. It was just his possessiveness coming through. He didn't like anyone having anything that belonged to him, even if they were only using each other for sex. "I'm sure that Spinelli would love to go with you. His world begins and ends with you these days."

Maxie buried her face in her hands. She had long known that to be true, but it didn't make it any easier. She didn't want him to love her because she didn't want to have to be the one to break his heart. "Don't remind me," she implored. "What is it with that kid? He has a habit of falling in love with his blonde best friends."

"Well, he got over me eventually," Lulu shrugged as she smiled knowingly at Johnny. He had been a big reason that her friend had been able to move on. Lulu knew what it was like to be on Spinelli's pedestal, but she had never really minded it. She liked being the center of someone's world. She hoped that Maxie would come to the same realization and actually return Spinelli's feelings. He deserved to have someone love him, even if it was her. "So, do you think you'll be able to make it?"

"I'll try," Johnny promised as he kissed the top of her head. "I should get going. Coleman said that he has some stuff that needs fixing around the bar and offered to pay me to help him out. I'll see you at home later."

"Okay," Lulu bubbled without looking up. "Love you."

"Love you, too," Johnny replied automatically before retrieving his coat from the back of Maxie's chair. He leaned down closer to her and kissed just behind her ear after sneaking a peak to see if Lulu was watching them. Maxie shivered involuntarily before jabbing him sharply in the ribs. Johnny took a few steps back before saying anything to her. "See you later, Jones."

"Would you leave already, Zacharra? We have work to do, and you're distracting Lulu."

Johnny grinned at her suggestively, knowing that she was the only one distracted by his presence. He liked having just a little bit control over her, even if it was only for the moment. "You ladies have a delightful afternoon." Maxie blushed uncharacteristically at his insinuation. "Bye, Lu."

"Bye, Sweetie," she retorted, turning to grin at him just before the elevator doors slid shut. "Gosh, I just love that boy sometimes. He can be so damn cute."

"Oh, yeah," Maxie scoffed as she busied herself with her work. The last thing she wanted to do was discuss how cute the man they were both sleeping with was. She didn't want to think of him that way. Sexy, alluring, forbidden – those were adjectives she could get behind. But cuteness, it just elicited all these relationship insinuations that were not at play between her and Johnny. "Enough about your mobster boyfriend. We need to pull those clothes that Kate wants for the June cover shoot and talk to the publicist that sent over the shoes for the May pictorial and set up a meeting with that new designer she found in SoHo last week…"

Four hours later, with Lulu on her way over to Lucky's to meet her brothers for their weekly lunch, Maxie strode out of the front entrance of the Metrocourt on her four-inch stilettos, determined to work off some of the tension that had built up in her body. Lulu seemed even more clueless about fashion today than usual and had actually sent the same set of headshots to two competing designers. Maxie had spent most of the morning soothing their bruised egos and negotiating which man would get to use which models. Her BlackBerry buzzed inside her clutch. She pulled it back and frowned at the message from Johnny. Where the hell are you? I don't have all day to wait.

Maxie spotted him leaning against her the driver's side door of her car when she entered the employee parking lot, his arms crossed against his chest in a sign that he definitely wasn't happy. "Oh, you'll wait for me," she demanded softly when she reached him. Johnny's lips tugged downward in a defiant grimace. "Come on, Zacharra, you know it's worth waiting for."

"I don't wait for anyone."

"Good thing I'm not just anyone then," she boasted silkily before pressing the button to unlock her door. Johnny climbed in the backseat first, not even bothering with the chivalrous manners of holding the door for her. Maxie rolled her eyes as she slid in beneath him and slammed the door shut. She thanked Mac once again for agreeing to the darkly tinted windows, knowing that no one would be able to see into the car. "Now, where were we this morning?"

"Right about here," he reminded her as he dragged her thigh back over his shoulder. He pressed himself between her legs to catch her lips in a lustful kiss. They only had about twenty minutes, and he planned on making every second count. Not even bothering with the technicalities of clothing, he dragged her body up to his and moved against her. "You have got to stop wearing underwear when we do this."

She started to make some remark but quickly snapped her mouth shut when Johnny tore the flimsy satin away. She knew that she should be angry that he had just ruined a very expensive piece of lingerie, but she just couldn't find it in her to give a damn right now. She slipped her hands between them to undo his zipper and moved over to straddle his lap. "I will if you will," she said as he settled himself inside her. A gravelly moan was his only response as he readjusted to the new sensation.

Neither Maxie nor Johnny said another word until it was over, which had become the case for them. Instead, they communicated by looks and touches and kisses when they moved together as one. She'd sometimes mix it up with a little bedroom talk, but when it was quick like this, it was all about the non-verbal. Maxie was breathless as she buried her head in his shoulder, both of them still panting from their mutual highs. His hands rested on her lower back. Neither of them made a move to disconnect.

Finally, once they had both caught their breaths, Maxie crawled off his lap and sprawled out on the seat next to him. "Good times, Zacharra."

"Back at ya, Jones," he grinned as he buttoned his jeans. He waited for Maxie to straighten out her skirt and smooth down her hair. She reached over and wiped away the last traces of her berry lipstick smeared along his mouth. "I think we're getting these quickies down an art."

Maxie had to admit that Johnny had quickly learned exactly how to get the desired results from her body in a matter of minutes. They didn't always have the luxury of time, so when the occasion called for it, she was glad that he had mastered his skills enough to bring them both off in record time. "It definitely did the trick."

"Bad day, huh?"

They settled into a friendly conversation as they often did after the task at hand was done. They could just go on as if nothing had happened. "Yeah, you could say that," she shook her head. "I swear your girlfriend still does not understand anything about this business after work at Crimson for all these months. She caused a complete disaster, and I had to fix that whiny little brat's mistakes once again."

"Don't call her that?"

"What? Johnny, you should have heard her. She was whining like a toddler all morning. It was excruciating," she complained. "I swear, if my job didn't depend on it, I would let Kate catch her some time just so that I didn't have to put up with her. She is supposed to make my job easier, but she only makes it harder because everything takes twice as long. I'm always correcting something she's done."

"No, I meant don't call her my girlfriend. Not when we're here like this."

She wanted to question his statement but decided against it. Instead, she only offered an understanding nod. "Well, I should really get back upstairs. Kate has about a million calls to return this afternoon," she sighed. "Thanks for hoping me blow off some steam and forget about work for a little bit."

"Just living up to my end of the deal," he said. "We're here to help each other forget."

Maxie smiled kindly before leaning over to kiss him chastely. "Do you want to go first or me?"

"You go on ahead," he answered. "I'll lock your doors when I get out."

"Alright," she agreed before Johnny brought her back to him for a final kiss. This was one was long and deep, his parting gift to her for a job well done. "I'll see you at Jake's later. Lulu wants us all to hang out there."

"Oh, great," Johnny muttered to himself as he let her go. "I'll be seeing you, Jones."

Maxie didn't dare look back as she headed toward the hotel, willing herself not to think about Johnny's comment to her too much. He was a moody mobster, so it would make perfect sense that he didn't want to think about his girlfriend while he was cheating on her. She had made him promise not to talk about Spinelli. If their goal of sleeping together was to forget, the last thing she wanted him to do was remind her of anything that mattered. It was a lie she told herself, that he made her forget. If anything, however, he was only making her remember that much more what it was like when two people really connect.