by Blazie James
“Robert, damn it. And it’s not my company. If it were my company, we wouldn’t take beautiful restaurants with personality and something significant to contribute to the community and turn them into pre-packaged crap with a nice label and an effective social media marketing campaign.”
“Stop being dramatic!” Dad said.
“This family needs some more fucking drama!” God! I would never hit him, of course, but every time I talked with my father about the company it felt like we would come to blows.
“Junior. Tres—Sorry, Robert. The two of you need to calm down and stop acting like children.”
“Only one of us is acting like a child right now,” Dad said.
"It's really clear," I said. I kept my voice even and tried to be as professional as I could. I would have liked to pretend it was to ensure what I had to say was clear. The truth was I knew it would infuriate my father if I dealt with the situation unemotionally, like a hardass across the table at a negotiation.
"I want to make sure there are no misunderstandings. You signed a ten-year contract and put me in charge of the acquisitions department. If you want to fire me, that's fine. The liquidated damages are in the contract and they’re enough to fund a small equity fund I can leverage into a large equity fund. Otherwise, you stay out of my division. That was the clause I insisted be put in the contract and it is there. If that no longer works for you, pay me off and I’ll go do what I want to do in the first place. Otherwise, don’t try to manage me at all. I am going to hold you to the contract.”
“What do you think you’re going to accomplish?” my father asked, standing up. He was in full lecture the misbehaving son mode, and that didn’t help me maintain my resistance to giving in to desperately wanting to punch him in the nose. It didn’t help me at all.
“I’m not sure I know what you mean,” I said. Of course, I knew exactly what he meant.
“You just obligated us to keep seventy-eight employees at a location and—”
“It’s The Mill, dad. It’s not a location. It’s a restaurant with roots in the community and it’s already run perfectly well and it doesn’t need Fieldscom’s goddamn help.”
“Watch your language, Tre— Robert,” my grandfather said. He was trying at least.
“What help? That’s not what we do. We’re building a company, not helping restaurants.”
“Of course not. We destroy restaurants.”
He looked at my grandfather and gestured to me. “See? See the kind of juvenile stupidity I’m stuck dealing with here?”
“How in the world is that juvenile?” I asked. “This is all a moot point anyway, Dad. You have two options and only two. Pay me the liquidated damages in the contract or shut the fuck up because my contract says very clearly you have no choice.”
“I said watch your language, young man.” God, there was nothing to make me shrink quite as quickly as when my grandfather spoke with authority.
“I apologize, Poppy. My emotions are high right now.” I wasn’t ready to give in, though. To my father I said. “Let me say it without the cursing. You can elect to terminate my relationship with the company and pay the ten years’ worth of salary and estimated bonuses. I’d be willing to accept twenty-eight million although that’s on the low end. Otherwise, I am not interested in this conversation, your insistence on which is a direct violation of the terms of our employment agreement.”
I nodded and headed to the door. “We’re not finished, Tres!” my father shouted.
“Let him go, Junior,” my grandfather said and I was pretty sure I’d never loved him as much as I did then. I walked out of the office, my father hot on my heels.
My cousins saved me. “Uncle Cousin!” They shouted. They were twins, about twenty-four years younger than me. Tina and Terry. Yeah, my uncle thought it made sense to name twins Tina and Terry. How they settled on Uncle Cousin was beyond me.
They threw their arms around me and started begging for an impersonation of a cartoon squid I did pretty well. My Uncle Thomas, who was only two years older than me, ushered them away with a smile. When they said, “Uncle Grandpa and Grampa!” I knew I was free. I made my way to the executive elevator feeling pretty victorious.
When I stepped into the elevator, though, the triumphant feeling disappeared. I had to call Hillary and deal with that whole situation. I pulled up my phone but there was no signal. “Thank God for small favors,” I muttered. Forty-two floors of avoidance. Of course, it didn’t make me feel any better at all because I ended up staring at the floor display above the elevator doors and even though there weren’t any stops on the way, the ride was terrible.
Of course, getting to the ground floor wasn’t any relief.
I decided to face it head-on and just call but my phone chimed. It was a text from Hillary. You must be the sexiest and smartest man on earth! Call me!
I stood in the obscenely opulent lobby of the Fieldscom Tower and stared at the text. Was it sarcastic? I couldn’t figure it out and finally took the plunge and tapped to dial her number. I held my breath and when she answered she said, “When are you going to fly back out here so I can show you how good it can be when we have a day or two off?”
“I…” I took a deep breath. I didn’t want to screw up whatever was working here. “I thought you were angry with me.”
“I was,” she said cheerfully. “And I was even more angry when you said you’d have to call me back.”
I felt like I was walking in a minefield. “Then why are you being so nice to me right now?”
She laughed and said, “Because you never hung up. I heard you talking about the company. Why did those kids call you Uncle Cousin?”
Relief flooded me. She heard everything about how I felt. “It’s a long story,” I said.
“Well then,” she said. “You’re going to have to get that cute rear end of yours out here to tell it to me.”
How in hell everything was suddenly right in my world, I didn’t know. It was, though. “Are you a gambling woman?” I asked.
“I’ll take a gamble on you.”
That gave me pause but I recovered and said, “How about a weekend in Vegas?”
“Really?”
“I’ll make all the arrangements.” What that really meant was one of my employees would make all of the arrangements.
Chapter Three
God, she was beautiful.
I loved the way her face lit up when she saw me. It was a damned sight better than the way she wore a perpetual scowl that first week. Hell, even when I lost control and screwed her like some kind of horny teenager at the restaurant she had a look disdain on her face.
Now, though, she looked at me with a different attitude altogether. It made me feel a whole hell of a lot less like an asshole. Of course, she smiled at me because she realized most of what made me an asshole had to do with the company and the family and not my own choice in the matter.
“Hello, Mr. Kensington,” she said with a smile.
“Hey now,” I replied. “Mr. Kensington is my father. Uh, and my grandfather.”
She laughed. “And your great-grandfather, too.”
I rolled my eyes. “You know they expect me to name my first son Robert.”
She put her arm in mine and led me toward the escalator. “I’ve already checked into the hotel. It’s kind of amazing how easy it is for rich people.”
"Well, we spend a lot of money at that place. Did you like that suite? You know, on any given day it's occupied there's a good chance it's someone from Fieldscom."
She shook her head. "I didn't have time to go into the room. The bellhop took my bags and…" she paused and then said, "We need to go to baggage claim first."
“I didn’t bring anything,” I said. “We keep an apartment in town so I have clothes there.”
“Who in the world keeps an apartment and still rents a suite so often?” I loved the mockery in her voice.
I pulled her to me and said, “Extremely attractive multi-millionaire
s.” Then I kissed her hard.
When we broke off the kiss, she said, “I think Robert is a nice name for a baby boy.”
“Nah,” I held out my arm for her and hoped like hell she would take my arm. She did. “I don’t want my son to be a fourth. He’s going to be an original.”
She patted my hand and said, “Get over it. You’re an original even if you have a few Roberts ahead of you.”
“Wow,” I said. “There I was trying to work out all my problems with my family and the solution was right in front of me! All I have to do is just get over it!”
She stopped and turned me to face her. “You want to get laid today or not?”
I smiled and lunged at her, lifting her up and throwing her over my shoulder. She laughed and beat at my back but I held tight. “Today?” I asked. “I’m getting laid all weekend.”
I carried her toward the doors until I realized I didn’t actually know where the car was waiting. Reluctantly, I put her down. “Don’t make me go caveman on you again.”
She held up a fist and an approximation of a tough face. “Just try it, buster.”
So I did. I waited until we were in the back of the car and then pulled her over my leg and started tickling her while making grunting caveman noises and saying things like, “Me Robert. Ugh. You stay in cave!” It was stupid as hell but a lot of fun. She finally cried out for mercy and I let her up. She climbed on top of my lap and kissed me and then raised an eyebrow.
We weren’t in a limo so I couldn’t react when she slipped her hand into my pants. “I don’t think you have all the control you think you have in this relationship, Robert,” she said. I held my breath and I felt myself blushing as though the driver could somehow see through her body to know what her hand was doing. She leaned forward and whispered in my ear, “God, you need to get me to the room!”
“Driver,” I said. “How far away is the hotel?” She squeezed me as I asked and my voice almost broke.
“About twenty minutes,” he said.
“Get us there safely in ten and I’ll give you a five hundred dollar bonus.” My voice was hoarse as hell. “You get a ticket, I’ll cover it and if your bosses give you any shit I’ll buy the company.”
“Yes, sir,” he said and the town car jerked forward.
She slipped her hands out of my pants and whispered, “It’s really good to have a millionaire for a boyfriend.”
Boyfriend? I could live with that. “Billionaire,” I said.
She bit my earlobe and said, “Stop bragging.”
The driver got us there in eight minutes, and miraculously the ever-vigilant Vegas police didn’t stop us. I grabbed a stack of bills from my wallet without counting it and pressed it in his hand. Then, I grabbed her hand and headed inside.
We walked through the bells, buzzes and clicks and flashing lights of the casino toward the elevators and I probably would have started in the elevator if it wasn’t full until the last two floors, the penthouse floors.
The top floor of the hotel had two suites, intended for Presidents and visiting dignitaries. It occurred to me I would be just as happy in a roadside motel if I were with Hillary. She waved the key over the scanner and I kicked open the door when it clicked and the little scanner light turned green. “Eager, aren’t—”
She didn’t get to finish. The moment the door was open, I grabbed her and yanked her to me, crushing her with a kiss and tearing at her clothes. She kicked off her shoes as I yanked her top up and off and then she had her hands on my belt, unbuckling and pulling until it thumped onto the floor.
By then, had my hands were deep in her pants and I held onto her plump, firm cheeks and slid her slacks to her thighs. I didn’t want to let go of the kiss yet, though, so I moved my hands up her back and unhooked her bra. A moment later it was on the floor as well. I grabbed her ass again and lifted her up, closing my mouth over her breast as I held her in the air.
Her arms wrapped around my shoulders and held me tightly. I nibbled and sucked as she moaned and then abruptly slid down. Her feet reached the floor just as I reached my knees and pushed her slacks and panties to the floor. She pulled at my shirt but I batted her hands away, put my hands back on her rear and moved my face forward.
She gasped as my tongue got to work, and any intentions she had of getting her pants off her ankles disappeared because her knees grew weak. She held onto my shoulders, moaning and almost whimpering. I felt pretty damned powerful.
I drove her wild like that for a while and she finally pushed me away and kicked at the clothing tangled at her ankles. I yanked at my shirt, tearing it but getting the damned thing off. By the time she untangled her ankles from her pants I was stepping out of mine and I all but attacked her. She let out a little cry as I lifted her up and pushed her against the door. A moment later, my mouth was on hers and her legs wrapped around my lower back as I pressed her body against the oak and guided myself inside.
I had enough sexual experience to be almost jaded. I had experience with Holly, too. Nonetheless, the sensation of her around me as I entered her surprised me with its power and intensity. She groaned with the penetration and I thought that was a pretty appropriate response because I felt the exact same way.
She held onto me as I buried my face in her neck, stroking my hair and making quiet vocalizations with each thrust. She tried to move her hands over my shoulder and my back but she was a bit panicky about falling even though I held her tightly. So, for the most part, she just ended up clutching my shoulder or the back of my hand.
I loved the feel of her and I loved the sounds she made. It was all so damned intense and it had been years since I felt like I was out of control. Hell, I might never have felt out of control before, even when I was. I moved faster and harder and my mind reeled from how I found myself swept up in the circumstances. When she cried out and came, it was all too much for me and I thrust hard, finishing as well as she shook between my body and the hardwood of the door.
We remained in that position for a little while, just waiting for our bodies to get back to normal and for our breathing to normalize as well.
After a while, I lifted her up and it felt suddenly odd to no longer be enveloped by her. I carried her to the settee in the entry room of the suite and set her gently down, collapsing next to her. She looked at me and then around the room. Then, she said something I never would have expected. “Doesn’t a really greasy hamburger sound good right now?”
I turned to look at her, dumbfounded, and she smiled and said, "Oh. What I meant to say was something else. Gee, that was great. My God, that sex was amazing. Oh wow. Will. I. Ever. Experience. Sex. Like. That. Again." I stared in wonder. We'd just established a half hour ago that I was a billionaire and she was about as intimidating as a lion might be intimidated by a baby gazelle.
“You keep up that attitude and I’m going to take you to the bed and give you an experience.”
She tilted her head. “Isn’t that the whole point of the weekend or are you just a big talker.”
I think my jaw dropped and I said, “I think I love you.”
“You haven’t even known me a month.”
“All right,” I said. “To the bed it is.” I stood and hoisted her over my shoulder just like at the airport except she was naked this time. I landed a spank on her rear and said, “Experience that.”
“Like I said,” she laughed. “Big talker.”
I landed two harder spanks, one on each cheek, and the yelp was very satisfying. I made my way past the living room, dining room, second living room, office and anteroom to the master bedroom and every time she tried to say anything I spanked her again. We got to the room and the sex was, again, fast and furious and ultimately satisfying.
When it was over and she rested her head on my shoulder, I reached for the hotel phone and called the front desk. I was immediately patched through to an executive, who assured me he would send up greasy hamburgers with greasy fries, greasy onion rings, and any other greasy things he could fin
d. When I hung up, she whispered, "Good boy."
The whole weekend was filled with sex, sometimes rough and ready and sometimes gentle and beautiful. She seemed to love playfully driving me to spank her and she seemed to love when I did.
I couldn't deny there was something very satisfying about eating at a four-star restaurant, watching her fidget, and knowing it was because it was hard to sit still after two pretty strong spankings in a row. When we weren't sleeping with each other or eating, we gambled. She only wanted to play the slots, and I loved how her eyes lit up with the dollar slots.
The whole weekend was glorious but my mind raced the entire time because I hadn’t been entirely honest with her when I told her I thought I loved her. It wasn’t something I thought. It was something I knew.
Chapter Four
“Just go,” Hillary said. “You’ll feel better.”
I snorted. “Feel better? What the hell? It’s going to be the worst damned couple of hours of my life.”
I heard her laugh on the other end. “Until the next family dinner. Look, just go and get it over with. I mean you’ll feel better when it’s finished and you don’t have to keep dreading it.”
I sighed. “When you’re right you’re right. You know, this would be a hell of a lot easier on me if I spent dinner knowing as soon as I was through with it I’d be going to see you.”
“Well, unless you plan on hopping on a plane and showing up, you’ll just have to wait until next weekend.”
“Fair point,” I said. “Okay, I’ll go get through this. Will you be up late tonight? Be great if I could at least call you when I get back to the hotel.”
“I’m three hours behind you. How you can be some kind of brilliant international businessman when you can’t remember time zones is just beyond me.”
I laughed at that.
For most of my life, nobody dared to even tease me. Hillary was strong enough to treat me any way she wanted. I loved that.
“Okay,” I said. “I’ll call you when I’m back.”
“Talk to you then,” she said.
