Peacock

by Nora Flite

  “What are you doing?” I cried. She looked right at our boss, her smile so wide that it was slightly maniacal.

  “Travis,” Riley said, and it was then that I realized that Riley’s scheme went well beyond some kind of immature prank. She was out for blood. “I need to tell you something. In spite of every rule against it, apparently because she's just too weak to say no... Tazzy’s been dating a guy she met through Perfect Click.”

  18

  Gasps rose up around the room. The investors were whispering to one another, and murmurs had risen up from my co-workers in the crowd. Meanwhile, my heart pounded out a stuttered rhythm in my chest.

  Dating through the site was strictly against office policy. I’d signed that contract when I’d started, fully aware of what I was agreeing to. It was considered a misappropriation of company resources, inappropriate in the extreme. And sure, I knew that I was fudging the rules when I agreed to go on a date with Simon in the first place, but it wasn’t supposed to be for the sake of love. It was supposed to be for a really fucking dumb bet.

  But love was what I’d found. Love, and so much more.

  In my fear, my eyes sought out Simon. He flashed me a reassuring smile from across the room. It helped a little, but didn’t calm me completely. After all, I was in big shit now.

  “Are you sure this is appropriate, Riley?” I asked, trying to keep my voice low. Everyone was staring at us. “It doesn’t seem like this is the right time.”

  But Riley was just standing there, microphone in hand, her wicked grin showing every single one of her teeth.

  “She broke the rules, Travis. Aren’t you going to say anything?”

  “Oh, come on, Riley!” I snapped. This was getting ridiculous. Riley might be a jerk, but she’d agreed to the bet, too. “What’s your problem?”

  “You are my problem,” she hissed back. Then she turned back to Travis. “Well?”

  Our poor boss; he looked at our investors in a panic. “I’m sure there’s an explanation for this. Tazzy is one of our top employees. She would never—”

  “She did!” Riley said, her voice cresting in nearly a whine. “Her date’s right there. You can look him up yourself. Peacock87.”

  I saw Simon lift his chin at the mention of his screen name. Everyone turned to look, but he did them one better. He took wide strides across the ballroom until he came to stand beside Travis. It was funny to see them next to each other. Travis looked a little bit like a kid playing dress-up in his dad’s clothes. Simon, on the other hand, looked like he’d been born in that tux.

  “Simon Cavanaugh,” he said, extending his hand. “You must be Travis Barclay. I really admire the work of your company.”

  Travis was turning beet red. He didn’t know who this big, intimidating guy was or why he’d be interested in Perfect Click.

  “That’s nice,” Travis said thinly. Then his gaze flicked over to me. His voice was cold. I’d never heard him so angry. “Tazzy, is this true? Did you meet this guy on our site? You know that’s against company policy. I thought you were better than this.”

  I deflated. It didn’t matter that I nailed the presentation, only that I’d nailed Simon. Maybe life would have been easier if I’d stuck to my strict anti-love policy after all.

  I formulated my answer. I could tell Travis about the bet, how it hadn’t meant to be serious even if it turned out that way. I could tell him how despite our best efforts, Simon and I had found ourselves falling in love. After all, Travis ran a dating website. Maybe he had a heart, deep down inside.

  But based on his expression, I wasn’t so sure. My shoulders sagging, all I managed to say was, “Yeah. It’s true. I met Simon on Perfect Click.”

  There was a rush of low murmurs from the crowd. I could see people whispering to one another as they soaked up this juicy office gossip. Beside me, Riley was beaming. Every part of her plan was coming together. She wasn’t just out to break my heart. She was going to ruin me professionally, too.

  Anger rattled inside of me. My hands were shaking. In that moment, I didn’t care if it cost me my job—I was going to destroy her like she'd destroyed me.

  But then Simon stepped forward, holding his hand out to Riley.

  “If I may, Riley?”

  She looked dumbfounded. But Simon had that way with words, that incredible command presence that made people obey. So she handed over the microphone

  I was afraid. I didn’t know what was going to happen next. But everything I’d known about Simon said that he took care of things—that he took care of me. So I gave him an encouraging smile. He grinned back at me, then he turned that thousand-watt glow back on all of my co-workers.

  “It’s true. Tazzy and I met on Perfect Click,” he said. I blinked in surprise. Where was he going with this? My co-workers must have felt the same way. They were letting out grumbles of disapproval. “My handle was Peacock87. That name is . . . deeply meaningful to me, but it must have seemed silly to a stranger like Tazzy.”

  He glanced at me. I wondered for the thousandth time about the beautiful tattoos that covered his body.

  “When I was young, my mother raised peacocks,” he said. “On a farm in Indiana. That was a long time ago, but I’ve always held that memory close. My screen name was a reminder of that. We carry our histories with us, in our screen names and online profiles.”

  All eyes were on him as he strut side to side, fixated as he told his story.

  Simon turned to me. He looked me up and down, his eyes taking me in. Simon had seen all of me in a way that my co-workers never would. He knew the dirty parts, the hidden parts, the forbidden parts. But he’d seen past that, too, to the girl who had cared her whole life for her father and did everything she could to protect him. He reached out now, offering me his hand. I didn’t hesitate for even a moment. I took it, standing before the crowd beside him.

  “Tazzy didn’t seek me out on Perfect Click for sex or dating. I didn’t even have a picture of my face on the site. Look up my profile. You’ll see it’s true.”

  The investors glanced down at their iPads. A few of them smiled, especially the women. I wondered if it was the dog, Hershey, that melted their hearts, or the glimpse of Simon’s perfect, tattooed abs.

  “Tazzy and I met,” Simon went on, “Because we were a ninety seven percent match. I’ve seen your banner ads. Your ‘perfect couples’ are matched at seventy five percent. I’ve seen those television ads with all those lovebirds at the altar. If you’d asked me before all this happened if Tazzy would be the one, I would have told you ‘never.’ She’s too good. Too sweet.”

  That’s when I realized what was happening. Simon wasn’t just coming clean or defending me. He was marketing to every single person in that room. He was making them all feel something. And from their warming expressions, it looked like it was working.

  With his hand in my hand, I looked out at all of my coworkers. Wasn’t this what we’d all been working toward? Not just ad revenue, but real men and women finding their perfect, unexpected matches? From the looks they were giving me, I could see that my coworkers felt the same way. Even Jim, whose heart had been so recently broken twice, was giving us an appreciative nod.

  “So fire Tazzy if you need to,” Simon said. “But if I were in your position, I’d be putting her in all of your banner ads. Not because she’s beautiful, even though she is. But because she embodies everything your company stands for.”

  In front of the whole crowd, Simon drew me close to him. And the funny thing is that I wasn’t afraid anymore. I wasn’t the least bit embarrassed as he dipped my body low and let his warm lips touch mine. My body was alive with electricity as I tasted him, his inimitable flavor, and the insistent pressure of his lips and tongue. This wasn’t a demure kiss. This was a kiss that didn’t care who was watching, not even my boss. Then again, I wasn’t a demure person, either. Not anymore.

  It was only as we pulled away, the blood rushing from my ears, that I realized that my coworkers were applauding.
Only a trickle of approval at first, but soon the sound grew into a roar. It was Valentine’s Day. We worked for a dating website, for Christ’s sake. All of us were suckers for love deep down—especially my boss. He was nodding at me. Smiling. I felt relief wash over my cells. This wouldn’t be my end at Perfect Click. Not today.

  But then Riley stormed forward and grabbed the mic out of Simon’s hands. She was the only one who wasn’t smiling.

  “You’ve got to be kidding me,” she snarled into the microphone. “Do you really think that you guys were a perfect match? How naive do you have to be? You with him?”

  She gestured wildly at the pair of us. I glanced at Simon, took in his handsome features and how you could tell his body was fitness magazine cover worthy beneath the layers of cloth of his tuxedo.

  “I’ll tell you what happened, Tazzy,” Riley went on sourly, her lips right up against the microphone. “You came waltzing into my office almost a year ago on your first day of work, bragging about the dates you’d been on. I kept thinking ‘Tazzy, Tazzy, where have I heard that name before?’ And then my ex called me up begging to meet me over coffee and he sat there bawling over the woman he’d dumped me for who had broken his heart like I didn’t matter at all.”

  I stared at her. At first, I had no idea who she was talking about.

  “Can’t even remember him, huh? His name was Elliott and he was a good guy.”

  Slowly it dawned on me. I remembered Elliott. Only he hadn’t gone by that name. He told me he went by Eli. Oh my god. Riley’s ex was the TGI Fridays jerk.

  I remembered how he’d needled me after he drove me home.

  “Please, Tazzy?” he’d begged in a whine. Suddenly he didn’t care at all about my supposedly hairy legs. “My last girlfriend always left me hanging. She was a total dud. I feel like you’ll really know what you’re doing in bed.”

  Ugh. Eli. A good guy, huh?

  “You could do better than him,” was all that I managed to say to Riley, and it was true. But she shook her head.

  “Don’t act like you understand anything about love,” she snapped. “I loved Elliott. He was going to propose to me and you took him.”

  Took him? Really? He had never said a word to me about having a girlfriend. We’d met in a bar, of all places. I wasn’t surprised when he showed me his true self, but hearing that he’d been dating Riley at the time was still a shock.

  “I had no idea,” I said softly. “He didn’t mention—”

  “Oh, come on,” Riley said. She was still speaking into the microphone, but it’s clear her words were just for me. “You didn’t care. Just like you didn’t care about the other guys. That’s why I changed the algorithm to set you up with Simon. I had to teach you a lesson.”

  “Wait,” Travis said. He pushed his glasses up his nose. This was serious. “What did you say about the algorithm?”

  Riley was so wound up that she didn’t even notice how Travis had tuned in. If he had a baby, it was that formula. People had offered to tweak it over the years, maybe improve it, but he always refused. It was his, and it was the heart of the site.

  And Riley had fucked with it.

  Now she waved her hand through the air. “Oh, it's nothing. I just tweaked it so that Tazzy—”

  “You can’t be serious,” he growled.

  “Well, I needed to make sure she met Simon. I knew he'd wreck her so—”

  “What exactly did you do to the algorithm?” he asked. Travis was really yelling now. Riley’s complexion went waxy, and her mouth dropped open.

  “No, no,” she said. “It’s no big deal. It was just for a few hours while I looked for matches at work together for our bet—”

  “Your bet?” Travis demanded. “What bet, Riley?”

  Now Riley glanced at me. I was still holding tight to Simon’s hand; I squeezed it. I needed his support now, more than ever, because when word got out about the bet, it would look bad on me, too.

  “I bet Tazzy that she couldn’t make a guy fall in love with her in a week,” she said weakly. “Not even if they were a near-perfect match on the site. I. . . I altered the algorithm for a few hours so that their match rate would be super high even though, like, they were really only a 4% match for real.”

  Travis was sweating. “You’ve got to be kidding me. You altered the algorithm for our entire website so you could play a prank on a coworker? And what do you think happened to our paying users who were looking for dates during that time?”

  “I . . .” Riley began slowly. She dropped the mic on the floor. The echo reverberated through the ballroom.

  It was as if everyone had been waiting for that sound. Conversation erupted across the ballroom. Even the investors were talking to one another, laughing loudly. So much for the presentation, and all of my hard work. This looked bad, really bad, for all of us. I saw Travis rush toward Riley. He was angry enough that his voice rose over the tide of conversation that had washed over the room.

  “I can’t believe you did this, Riley,” he said. He sounded hurt. Wounded. But Riley didn’t notice, or didn’t care. She just crossed her arms over her chest.

  “She deserved it,” she said. “I’ve been waiting to do this for a long, long time.”

  “Yeah, well, me, too,” Travis said bitterly. “You’ve been underperforming for ages, but I was too nice to can you. You’re fired.”

  Riley looked incensed, like she couldn’t believe it was really happening, even after everything that she’d done to me.

  After a moment, thunderous applause broke out across the ballroom. Riley looked like a deer in headlights. She took off, racing toward the door.

  I never saw her again.

  19

  The knocking on my door was incessant. I rushed to throw a silk robe over my shoulders. There was no way I’d be ready in time, not if people kept interrupting me. My mom had been in twice already to make sure every single bobby pin was in the right place in my hair. Even though I kept chasing her away, she kept coming back.

  “Hold on a minute!” I shouted, hustling toward the door. But when I answered, it wasn’t my mom behind it.

  It was Simon.

  He’d worn a tux today, my request. In so many ways, he reminded me of that day a year ago when we’d publicly became a couple in front of the whole office. I’d never seen him look more handsome, his dark eyes smoldering as he gazed at me. My chest squeezed at the sight of him.

  But we didn’t have time for this. I only had ten, fifteen minutes before Katie was going to come back and help me carry my train downstairs. I pushed him out.

  “You’re not supposed to see me yet!” I cried. Simon didn’t laugh. He only waited, watching me with a feral hunger.

  “It doesn’t matter,” he said, his voice commanding. “You’re not in your dress yet.”

  “It does matter,” I insisted. “It’s bad luck.”

  “Surely, you’re not that superstitious, Tazzy?” The corner of his mouth edged up, showing the razors of his teeth.

  “I’m not going to risk it on a day like today,” I said. But Simon didn’t turn around. He stayed there, looking gorgeous. Looking delicious. I glanced down the hallway, then I pulled him inside.

  “You have ten minutes,” I told him. He laughed a little. I watched as he unbuttoned his cufflinks.

  “Bend over that sofa,” he said, nodding toward the chaise beneath the window of the bridal suite. A smile touched my mouth at the sound of his command.

  “Why?” I asked, crossing my arms even as my body ached in desire for him.

  “I think you know why,” he said. “You’ve been a bad girl.”

  Two could play at this game. In my bare feet, I sauntered over to the chaise and put my hands down on the plush arm. Then I bent over. Simon had been seducing me for nearly a year now, and yet it never got old. I didn't tire of letting him dominate me, of hearing him tell me that I was naughty. He knew my basest desires, after all. Every single dirty one.

  Without being asked, I spread
my legs. I was wearing a powder blue thong with my corset. I wondered if he was going to spank me. I felt my muscles clench in anticipation as he stepped closer, his leather shoes sounding hollow on the fine wood floor.

  But he didn’t spank me, not this time. His broad hands caressed me instead. Then his fingers edged upward. I felt him tug at the laces of my corset.

  “This is done all wrong, Tazzy,” he said, gentle laughter in his voice. “We can’t have you going out like this.”

  He was so close that I could feel his erection through his tuxedo pants, right up against my body. My pussy throbbed at the pressure, but all I could do was stand there.

  “Well, you can blame Katie. She’s my maid of honor,” I said in a hushed voice. I exhaled in relief as he loosened the ties, relished the way his fingers graced every notched bone of my spine. My skin was prickly with desire for him, my belly was tingling.

  “I want to cover you in cum,” he growled. His hands moved downward and, in one smooth motion, pulled the corset laces tight, tighter than before, so tight that the air was stolen from my chest for a moment.

  “I’ll fix this,” he purred.

  “You’ve always been a fixer . . .” I said with a smile, remembering all the times he’d rescued me, starting with that presentation only a year ago. But I could hear Simon shake his head.

  “Don’t talk,” he said, hands moving downward, pulling the laces tighter still. I felt his cock swell in its fabric cage as he laced me up, all the way. I felt a little lightheaded, and dizzy with desire for him. We’d been playing with some light bondage lately. Handcuffs, blindfolds, that kind of thing. It was more exciting than I’d imagined, for both of us. And right now, I didn’t want to say a word.

  I could feel his hands make a quick, easy bow at the bottom. Then he arranged the laces just so over my ass.

  “The best wedding gift,” he said, pulling at the bottom of my thong. It was already wet with desire. He worked his index finger up and down my lips, dipping it inside. My tightly laced body wanted to arch with pleasure, but it couldn’t. So I only opened my mouth and let out a low moan.