Legal Action (Surrendering Charlotte Chronicles)

by Kimball Lee

  “I’ll meet you there,” she said and she saw Bly’s jaw clench.

  Witt laughed, “of course, you run the show, after all. Exceptional closing argument, by the way.”

  They watched him walk away and Billy said, “Time for a celebratory lunch, you name the place Charlotte.”

  “I can’t,” she said, feeling so annoyingly aroused with Alexander Bly watching her, his face dark and brooding. She remembered masturbating to the memory of those eyes, her body exploding to the sound of that calm, deep voice in her head.

  “Of course you can,” Billy said, “now, what will it be Charlotte? French, Italian, you pick, it’s your day.”

  She knew she was blushing and that it always showed on her pale cheeks, the sweet kiss of death, Jorgen had called her looks. White skin, black hair and blue eyes, an irresistible Southern belle he’d said.

  “I have an appointment, a new client coming in at one, but thanks for being here for the verdict.”

  Jack caught her arm as she turned to leave and laughed, “Mr. Bly is your one o’clock appointment. We thought we’d bring him by to see you in action. We wanted him to know how good you are at what you do, that you’re much more than the young woman he might remember. We didn’t tell you about him as a client because, let’s face it, you hate being remembered as…” His voice drifted off.

  “Fine,” she said and she knew she sounded a little unnerved, but she was just enough of a Southern belle to be gracious. “Bertrand at Mr. A’s,” she said curtly, “I’ll meet you all there.” She turned and was gone before any of them could stop her.

  ***

  The men were already seated at a window table with a glorious view of downtown San Diego and glimpses of the Pacific Ocean. Waiters scurried to set up a champagne cooler and placed small plates of bread and steamed crab claws by each place setting.

  “What took you so long?” Billy asked. Pulling out a chair for her as they all stood up. He seated her next to Bly and it unsettled her, she didn’t want to be that close to him.

  “Shouldn’t I sit across from my client?” she asked, “so we can size each other up, see if we’ll be a good fit?”

  As the words left her mouth she saw Alexander Bly’s eyes sparkle and she knew her flaming cheeks were giving her away again. Damn, she thought and wondered why all this heat was rising in her now. She’d had to pull her car over in a quiet neighborhood on her way to the restaurant and slip her panties off, they were so damn wet. When she’d touched her clit it was practically vibrating with need and she’d leaned her head against the steering wheel and pictured his face. She’d climaxed almost immediately.

  She was shocked at the quickness and power of it. She sat there panting, unable to raise her head for a few minutes. God, what was wrong with her? It was true, she hadn’t had sex in what felt like forever, she’d had a ‘friend with benefits’ for a while, but she’d ended it some months before. She was twenty seven and had only had slept with two men in her life. Jorgen had been the first and she’d actually married him. The other was what she liked to think of as her ‘favorite mistake.’

  A waiter brought champagne, Veuve Cliquot, her favorite, and they toasted her victory.

  Billy raised his glass a second time and said, “And that Charlotte can give Bly International exactly what they need.”

  “I’m certain she will,” Bly said calmly and they all touched their glasses together.

  Jack and Billy were studying their menus, she didn’t need to, she knew the menu by heart.

  Bly didn’t look at his menu either, he looked at her and she saw what she’d seen in his eyes years back. Lust, plain and simple, sexual need.

  “So you’re dating our future governor?” he asked, out of the blue, and quickly drained his champagne glass.

  “Witt? No, we attend events together. He hasn’t decided to run for governor yet.”

  “So you’re not dating him but he tells you his political plans? How about his personal hopes and dreams?” His voice had an edge to it, as if he were annoyed.

  She didn’t answer, just sipped her champagne and stared out the window at the blue of the ocean in the distance.

  The waiter appeared and Bly said, “You haven’t looked at the menu.”

  She ordered the prawns, then looked at Bly and said, “I don’t need to, I always know what I want.”

  “At least you think you do,” he said, looking into her eyes, holding her gaze in his. He handed the menu to the waiter without looking up and ordered the trout with asparagus.

  Jack and Billy were busy ordering, unaware of the tension between the two.

  “Where are you meeting him tonight?” He refilled his glass and sounded more than irritated.

  “The Mayor’s Gala at the museum in Balboa Park,” she said, twisting her long hair into a make-do chignon. She pinned her hair absent-mindedly and wanted to add, not that it’s any of your business.

  “Good,” he said, his eyes studying her pale, graceful neck, “then I’ll be sure to see you there.”

  ***

  She looked through her closet that evening for the perfect dress to wear. Funny, she wouldn’t have really cared if she’d been dressing just for Witt, but she wasn’t. The thought made her mad, she absolutely hated feeling that she was not in control, and she wasn’t. Her body had already betrayed her today. She heard the locker room banter as Finn and JP burst through her front door and beer bottles being grabbed from the fridge and opened. She threw the dress she was holding on the bed, leaned over the railing of her loft bedroom and shouted at them to go away and never come back.

  They stared up at her for a minute then both started up the stairs talking about her as if she weren’t there.

  “Probably that time of the month, you know how she gets,” JP said.

  “Yeah, right bitchy she gets, it’s a shame. Is that it, old girl, PMS?” Finn asked, and he and JP laughed, stood drinking their beers, stared at the pile of gowns on her bed.

  “Shut up, both of you and stay out of my apartment unless you’re invited, which you never will be again!” She sank to the floor on top of a pile of lingerie and started to cry.

  “Just look what you’ve done, JP, you insensitive bastard. You’ve made her weep and I can’t bear to see her unhappy.” Finn sat down beside her and hugged her to him, JP offered her his beer.

  “I hate beer,” she said, “and I have nothing to wear tonight.”

  “Take a drink, my love,” Finn said, “you’ll feel better and what the fuck are all these dresses? It looks like a God-damned explosion in Saks Fifth Avenue.”

  She took the beer and drank, shivered at how awful it tasted and they all tried not to laugh.

  “Jon Paul over there is an ignorant animal as you can well see,” Finn said, meaning JP, who just shrugged his shoulders. “So tell me what it is you require and I will take perfect care of you.”

  “I require the perfect dress to wear tonight, it’s the Mayor’s party so it has to be presentable but I want to be sexy, too. Which really sucks, because I don’t usually want to look sexy and… I don’t know!”

  “Aren’t you going with Witt the twit?” JP asked, pushing a pile of dresses aside and stretching out on the bed. “I thought you didn’t really like him, are you gonna sleep with that dick-wad? Please say “no,” I’m pretty sure he doesn’t even have a dick!”

  “Yes, I’m going with him, but I wanna look good for someone else.” she said, and there was misery in my voice.

  “Hey, a new rooster in the hen house, should we get all defensive, Finn?”

  “Absolutely, mate. We should start peeing on furniture and marking our territory immediately. We should pull out the big guns.”

  “Hush, the both of you, don’t make me laugh. I’m happy in my misery.” She said and she did begin to laugh and Finn offered her a drink of his ghastly beer and even though they were both rough and tough and had zero taste in clothes, they helped her pick the perfect dress.

  ***

&nb
sp; It was a dove grey, gossamer gown in a Grecian style. The neckline plunged but there was silver cording that wrapped from below her breasts to her waist that kept it from being too revealing. It clung to her upper body, emphasizing her high breasts and small waist and flowed around her legs as she moved.

  Witt met her at the doors to the museum, smiling hugely as he looked her over from head to toe. He placed a hand on her lower back and in they went. They drank champagne and mingled, talked to the mayor then Charlotte wandered off, bored by the inane banter.

  She stood looking at a Gauguin painting, caught up in the colors and forms, the primal sexuality of it.

  “Animalistic isn’t it?” Bly was standing behind her, close enough that they touched, but she kept her back to him. “You came without me again, didn’t you? Before you got to the restaurant today, just so I’d see it on your face and imagine how you must have looked and sounded.”

  He ran his hands along her bare arms and she stood perfectly still, her heart hammering in her chest. He moved forward so that he was pressed to her as he held her arms lightly, his front to her back.

  She felt his erection hard against her and she worked to slow her breathing. She closed her eyes and knew this was going to be nothing but trouble. His erection was as huge and hard as she’d imagined.

  “Why are you here with him, Charlotte? He’s a waste of your time. I can’t get you out of my head, you’ve fucking haunted me for six years. I actually thought I’d buried your memory somewhere deep, someplace where I wouldn’t think about you while I fucked other women. Then I saw you at the light yesterday and I could hear the sound of your voice on the phone that day. I knew what you’d done, I could tell you’d just cum, you were breathless from the power of it. I was furious that I hadn’t taken you right there in my office when I knew we both wanted it. I had to lock my office door as soon as you hung up and I barely got my cock out of my pants before I was cumming like nothing I’d ever felt before.”

  She was afraid to move or try to speak. All she wanted to do was move her hand behind her and grasp his massive cock and then lie down on the cold marble floor with him. She wanted to see the look on his hard, masculine face as he pushed into her. Watch his face change as he felt how hot and wet he made her. She gathered herself and turned to face him, she would tell him to go fuck one of those other women, she was sure he was ruthless at it. To save her the heartache of a man like him, a man used to having whomever and whatever he wanted. She turned and looked up at him and his mouth was on hers, hot and scorching and making her forget that he was wrong for her. Her hand went to his erection, she couldn’t stop it.

  He groaned and whispered, “Where have you been, baby?” His hands were in her hair then one went to cup her ass.

  Her hand moved along the length of his cock, felt the thick veins pumping. She couldn’t believe how incredibly long it was, it’s heat radiated through his slacks.

  “Come with me,” he said, “and I mean that in more ways than one. Let’s leave now Charlotte, go to your house or mine, it doesn’t matter, we both need this.”

  “Charlotte?” Witt’s voice was incredulous.

  She froze at the sound of it but Bly didn’t seem to care.

  He kissed her lightly on the mouth, looked deep in her eyes then finally moved his hands away from her and stepped back. He turned to face Witt and she heard the venom in his voice when he said, “you should take better care of your date, Counselor.”

  Witt looked at her with fury in his eyes and said, “come on Charlotte, I’ll take you home.”

  “I think she can decide who she wants to leave with,” Bly said, and he stepped toward Witt, his voice was dark and menacing.

  Witt started to say something more, his eyes furious, his pride obviously hurt.

  She walked away from them both, then looked back over her shoulder and said, “I drove myself here tonight and I can get myself home.”

  ***

  Charlotte had been able to get to her car and drive away quickly. She could see both men standing in the parking lot as they watched her leave. Her phone started ringing immediately and she let it go to voice mail. It kept ringing all the way to her loft, Witt’s name showed up now and then but mostly it was an unidentified number. She knew that had to be Alexander Bly whom she had just kissed while she slid her hand up and down his impressive cock right in the middle of the Mayor’s Gala. She knew she should be ashamed but she wasn’t.

  She’d always done what was expected of her, she’d put herself through school by working hard. Yes, she’d earned a scholarship for cheerleading but that had just been a means to an end. She didn’t care for the whole, “look at me, I’m a cheerleader,” thing, it’d just been something she’d done well. She’d sucked at softball and basketball but she was limber and her legs were long and strong. She was smart except for Algebra and Calculus or anything to do with math, she made only passing grades in those classes and it brought down her GPA. So she’d turned to cheerleading and earned a scholarship that had taken her out of Greenleaf, Mississippi and paid for her college degree.

  Of course, the magazine layout paid for law school and maybe she was only ashamed of that because she hadn’t meant for it to be overtly sexual. They were not the sort of pictures in Playboy, they were simply extremely suggestive. It had been highly erotic because she and Jorgen were young and in heat and that fact burned on the pages. Of course, she’d gone on to marry the man, but people didn’t care about that.

  Men were turned on by the shots of Jorgen covering her naked breasts with his big hand while his other hand was under her cheerleading skirt. They’d both stared straight into the camera lens and looked as if they were about to climax. It was meant to be a five page layout but the editors expanded it to ten and the pictures were large, meant to be looked at and contemplated.

  In one shot they were naked and entwined on a bare mattress on the floor, her black hair fanned out around them. Another showed them from behind, they were side by side with their hands against a brick wall like criminals. He was naked and the shadow of his cock was barely visible. She wore the only piece of clothing, a small pair of men’s white underwear that rode up and revealed the rounded bottoms of her butt cheeks.

  Charlotte walked into her loft and Finn and JP were on the sofas watching TV. She wished she’d never bought that sixty inch flat screen. It was nothing but a magnet for those two.

  “Home so soon, my love?” Finn asked, not moving from the sofa.

  “What happened?” JP asked, “One look at you in that hot dress and old Witt soiled his pants on the spot?”

  “Oh shut up, you two, I’m throwing that damn TV off the roof if it’ll keep you in your own apartments.”

  “We’d just buy you another one, we like it here. Your couches are comfortable and ours that hard, leather, bachelor crap,” Finn said. “It seems you’ve run away from the ball, could you use a drink, Cinderella?”

  “Yes, and make it a stiff one,” she said as she went up to her bedroom to change.

  “You heard her JP. She wants a stiff one and far be it for me to deny her.”

  “Fine with me,” JP said, “but don’t forget our deal, if she does it with one of us she has to do the other one, too.”

  Charlotte walked downstairs in an old UCLA t-shirt and panties and said, “Will you two go find a couple of eager air-heads and leave me in peace for the night.”

  As the words left her mouth she turned toward the door, Finn opened it and Alexander Bly walked through it.

  “I believe your prince has arrived, Cinderella,” Finn said.

  Charlotte was speechless, she just stared at Bly.

  “May I come in?” he asked politely, but his voice was not happy. He looked at Finn, who was not quite as tall as Bly was, but he was ripped and sexy and shirtless with his Special Forces tattoos in plain sight.

  JP wandered over and he was just as good looking, but in a pumped up preppy way, at least he wore a t-shirt but his Marine Corps tattoo w
as visible on his forearm.

  Bly smiled coldly and said, “I feel like I’m breaking up a party at Quantico.”

  “They were just leaving,” Charlotte said.

  JP chimed in, “Honey, you always send us to our rooms when your boyfriends show up,” and he and Finn laughed.

  “She really does leave us out of all the fun, it’s not fair at all,” Finn told JP and he leaned against the door as Bly moved father into the loft.

  “As always,” Charlotte told the two, “go and never come back.”

  JP rolled his eyes and Finn took a swig of beer and she gave them both such a look that Finn said, “Yep, that’s the sound of the door hitting my ass on the way out, goodnight to all.”

  JP thrust a hand toward Alexander Bly and said, “I’m JP Thomas and that idiot is Finnegan Hale, we live in the other two lofts, nice to meet you…”

  “Alexander Bly,” he said flatly, grudgingly offering his hand.

  “Ah the man to whom the world owes a great debt for outstanding literary achievement,” JP said and then kissed Charlotte on the cheek and said goodnight.

  ***

  She picked up the drink Finn made for her, took a huge swallow, coughed and said, “I’m not gonna ask how you found me, you’re a billionaire, your ‘people’ know everything. I do want to say that I’ve been up since dawn, I’ve worked for months on the case I won today, you’ve appeared like a ghost from my past and I’m beyond exhaustion.”

  He stood with his arms folded as she talked and even as weary as she was, the volcano erupted in her stomach as she looked at him. He wore a perfectly cut tuxedo, his hair was smoothed back except for those disobedient strands that fell across his high forehead and a few lose waves. The tosseled hair made him look as if he’d just risen from bed and although his eyes were cold and his mouth was set in a hard line, he still looked like the fuck of the decade.

  She really did just want to lead him up to her all white bed and let him turn her every way but loose. She sighed and motioned to the little bar set up in the dining room, told him to help himself as she walked to the sofa and curled up.