by Seth Eden
He smiled slowly, a glint in his dark eyes. “You heard me correctly. Your salary would be ten times what you’re being paid currently.”
“I…” But I trailed off, having no idea what to say. This came from so far out of left field. I felt I needed to be honest, though. He might be under the impression that I had more going for me than I actually did. “I don’t know if I’m qualified for such a position.”
“Qualifications are less necessary in this situation. I would train you. But I do have a caveat: This is a high-priority position. There’s a certain level of… confidentiality that would need to be applied. We wouldn’t want to announce the fact that we have more than a certain amount in our safe, for example.”
“I understand,” I said, thinking of all those fast food joints that put a sticker on the drive-thru window saying the attendant had no more than fifty dollars in change at any given time.
He cleared his face of all emotion. “So, what do you think?”
The idea of this promotion or whatever he wanted to call it was enticing. I couldn’t deny that. I’d never been given a raise while working here, and the possibility of receiving extra money made exciting visions dance in my head.
I wouldn’t have to struggle so much from paycheck to paycheck. I could make sure my parents were taken care of without having to take on the double and triple shifts I worked now. I might even have some free time on my hands.
Yet, I’d told him I wasn’t qualified.
Was this because of that kiss I’d given him? Would he expect more from me in the future? Sexual favors, perhaps? If so, I’d be incredibly stupid to put myself in that position. Still, I’m the one who kissed him, not the other way around. He hadn’t made a single inappropriate move or harassed me in any way.
Then my brother’s voice echoed in my head, “The Varassos are nothing but trouble.” I still didn’t know how I felt about that. Finally, I answered my boss, putting myself out of my misery by dodging the question altogether.
“Can I think about it?” Coward.
“Yes.” As if he could hear the internal tug-of-war I was engaging in, his features softened into something less neutral and more friendly. “Tell you what. We can do this on a trial basis, if you like. I’ll train you and then give you some time to see how you do. If you decide it isn’t for you, you can go back to being a server. No harm. No foul.”
“I wouldn’t lose my job?” I questioned him.
He crinkled his brows. “No. It would be foolhardy of me to let you go considering what I’ve seen out of you.” His eyes, already dark, seemed to darken further as they focused on my lips. Did he mean that as a double entendre? But then his gaze flicked back up to mine.
Something about seeing his eyes get all intense like that did peculiar things to me. I felt heat swirl low in my belly and had this crazy impulse to kiss him again. And this time, it would be more than a quick peck. But then, someone knocked on the closed office door.
Marco called out without opening it, “Yes?”
“I was looking for the restroom?” An unfamiliar voice came through. Must be a customer.
“Down the hallway. Second door to your left,” I spoke up, then heard footsteps fading away.
I returned my attention to Marco, but the interruption had caused whatever might’ve burgeoned between us to pass. He twisted in his office chair to the computer monitor, powering it on. “Will you give me an answer by this Friday?” he asked, his back to me.
“Absolutely,” I replied, and feeling dismissed, left.
8
Marco
I was going to have to watch myself around Kelly. Perhaps because it’d been so long since I’d been sexual with anyone, the memory of her kiss, chaste as it had been, made that side of myself reawaken. Last night, I’d had an explicit dream about her and woke up so frustrated I’d taken a cold shower.
It had helped, but the moment I saw her, all that imagery had come back. When she’d been in the office with me, I kept remembering flashes of how she’d looked bent over the office chair with those long shorts of hers pushed down to her ankles. It’d left me hard and aching for her, making me grateful that I’d remained seated so my lap had been hidden by the desk.
In a way, it was nice to know that despite my injuries I was still me. That one of my favorite aspects of my old life might be possible again at some point. But by the same token, it was inconvenient. I couldn’t go there with Kelly. Hell, I couldn’t go there with anyone. Not yet. Maybe not ever.
I couldn’t imagine any woman being interested in a rendezvous that would be more likely to end with her feeling squeamish or even nauseated, rather than sated.
Yesterday, I’d spent time on the computer going through the financial reports. For a small, one-off restaurant, Organic Eats took in a substantial amount.
I’d need to hire more staff now, to make certain all requirements of both the original business and the fresh influx of cash could be met. Alessandro had offered to enlist some people for me—his way of continuing to treat me with kid’s gloves—but I told him I’d pass. I yearned to handle every bit of this alone.
I could still be of use to my family, no matter what they thought. And I’d prove it.
When Friday rolled around, I went in early, arriving before anyone else. I’d hired five additional servers and two cooks, enabling the business to have room to grow unhindered. I felt anxious about Kelly’s choice.
She’d more than demonstrated herself capable of her job, and I had no doubt she’d could handle this new position as well. While she could turn me down, I sincerely hoped she wouldn’t. I looked forward to working more closely with her.
She bustled in fifteen minutes before her shift was due to begin, her light floral aroma drifting over to me. I could close my eyes breathing her in for the next hour and be perfectly content. Maybe longer.
“I’d like to try the office manager gig,” she told me, her fists clenched at her sides as if to give her strength.
“I’m thrilled to hear it.”
“So what do I have to do?”
“Come here and I’ll show you.”
Over the subsequent six weeks, I gave Kelly instruction on everything I wanted her to do. The original owner had a single business account at a local bank branch picked up by armored truck every Monday and Friday. Since we had connections with a different armored truck company, I switched over to them, and increased the pickups to daily.
Then, I had them bring the deposits to seven different banks, each transaction kept to under ten thousand dollars total. Keeping these structured amounts below this threshold would mean the financial institutions would not be required to report it to the government.
By doing this, sending some through a shell corporation and sending any overage to our Swedish account overseas, the thousands in cash we received would then be retrievable by us without raising any eyebrows.
Kelly would keep two sets of books. The legitimate set would also go online and be used for tax purposes, while the other would be just for us. That way, we had both free-flowing cash and resources as well as the ability to avoid paying taxes on all but a fraction of our profits.
This method and ones like it were how we’d gone from poor Italian immigrants over a hundred years ago to a family with a billion-dollar fortune today. Just like with our drug import arm of the business, backups were in place in case any one bank or transaction was compromised.
We’d even been known to use our private jet to unload cash onto ships in international waters on occasion to allay the sort of suspicion raised when too much money appeared at once. With selected personnel located at the banks, on the ships, and at the airports, we were assured of an escape route for any issue we might encounter.
I’d created a kind of double-blind system for Kelly so she wouldn’t be aware of her collusion with us. Although she’d be working with two sets of books, I’d led her to believe that one set was for Organic Eats, while the other dealt with a side business I h
ad. Technically, that was true. Except for the side part.
I had her input numbers she believed meant hundreds when they meant millions in actuality. She didn’t need to know that the side business I referred to was the long-reaching drug import sales of opiates and illicit drugs into and out of Philadelphia.
And her not knowing would not only protect us should any government agencies come calling, it would also protect her. She couldn’t confess to a crime she’d had no idea she was committing, after all.
Just as I’d thought, Kelly turned out to be a quick study. She counted all the cash in the safe, created the various deposits, and handled all the reports without any problems. When she started, she’d seemed less than confident about her abilities, but as time drew on, she realized she could do it and do it well.
I’d promised myself I’d stay present at this bistro so that nothing unforeseen would crop up, which meant I spent nearly all that time with Kelly. I made sure our schedules matched up and was enjoying getting to know her. I was also conscientious about building her self-esteem, which seemed lower than it should’ve been.
I came into the office late one day, to see her blowing her bangs out of her face in agitation.
“What’s going on?” I asked her, sitting on one corner of the desk.
“Oh,” she glanced up at me in surprise. Her back had been to the door, so she hadn’t seen me observing her. “Nothing.”
“Doesn’t seem like nothing.”
“It’s just, a couple of the servers called in to work today, so I pitched in. I still got the deposits done in time for the pick-up, don’t worry. But I realized something while I was out there on the floor.”
She stared at her hands, and acid crawled up my throat. Had she realized what I was doing with the restaurant wasn’t exactly above board?
“It’s just… I miss my old job,” she said.
I let out the breath I’d been holding, and the acid receded. “You mean serving?”
“Yeah. Well. I think it’s more I miss interacting with the customers, you know? I used to be out there, mingling and shooting the breeze with people. Now, I don’t. Not that I don’t appreciate the huge raise and everything,” she put in as if afraid I’d see what she said as a complaint. “But I feel isolated being in here all the time.”
“I see no reason why you can’t mingle. You don’t even have to wait tables, you could just go out there and check on people. See if their okay, if they’re having a nice meal and so forth.”
“Really?” the green starbursts of her eyes bright. “You’d be cool with that? Even though I’m not a server anymore?”
“Why not?” I said, chagrined she felt less than happy about her circumstances. “I never intended for you to feel imprisoned in here.”
“I don’t feel that way. And it’s not that I’m ungrateful…”
“Kelly, you have so much to offer. If you want something, don’t be afraid to ask for it. Or even demand it.”
Her eyes went to her hands clasped on the table.
On the night we’d first met and I’d been in so much pain, she’d stood her ground and stayed with me, even when I didn’t want her to. It’s something I’d seen out of her more than once now; if someone was down or hurt, she felt compelled to help them. Compassion came so naturally to her. It almost felt as if she considered herself responsible for bolstering anyone in that state.
But when it came to her own wellbeing, her own choices, she came across as far less self-assured. I’d been attempting to work with her on that.
I put a finger under her chin, pulling her face gently upwards so she’d meet my eyes. “Ian told me you were the cream of the crop, and I agree. I wish you’d quit selling yourself short.”
I’d been so cautious with Kelly over the month and a half I’d worked with her. I’d known I was attracted to her, turned on by her, but since it couldn’t go anywhere, I’d made sure not to touch her. After the kiss she’d given me in passing, she hadn’t initiated anything else, and relieved, I’d done my best to stay professional with her.
Which wasn’t easy.
I wasn’t used to denying myself the pleasure of a woman, and there’d been more than once that I’d made an excuse to put a bit of distance between us. She was so unaware of her own gorgeousness, in body, mind, and behavior, that I found her difficult to resist. The fact that she remained right there within reach but off-limits might have something to do with it, too.
Whatever the reason, Kelly had stayed on my mind nearly twenty-four seven.
A week ago, after a sleepless night where I’d been plagued with fantasies about her, I’d gotten up to take yet another cold shower, something that had begun to happen almost every morning.
I’d been grumpy and short-tempered. My family had been letting it go, my brothers either throwing silent looks across the room at each other or getting up and leaving me to my sour mood, but I recognized that I’d become what Luca used to call me all the time.
An ass.
Knowing how I was acting and not being able to help it didn’t make me feel any better. After almost dying in that fire, I’d tried to curb that behavior, especially where Luca was involved. But I’d been feeling so tense for so many weeks at that point, I thought I might explode.
So that specific Sunday morning, as I stepped into my shower, I twisted the knob from cold to something much warmer. I allowed myself to fixate on some of the erotic images of Kelly I’d been dreaming about incessantly, soaped up my hand, and wrapped it around myself.
I imagined kissing her, touching her, tasting her. Then, I pictured myself pumping deep inside of her. It took all of three thrusts before I came, pulsing hard into my own hand. Afterwards, I had to prop myself up on the tile wall to keep myself from falling to my knees with the relief of it.
Christ, I’d needed that.
I’d continued this trend every morning since. It’d made seeing her every day more doable, had given me back some control. But I’d managed to avoid touching her like I was now, which though it was nothing more than a finger along the soft delicate skin beneath her chin, turned into a whole other ballgame.
Despite the contact being minimal, it affected me more strongly than it had before. Her light flowery essence enveloped me, and it took everything I had to drop my hand and pull away. Before I could bring myself to my feet, however, Kelly leaned in, lifting both of her palms to my cheeks.
Our faces mere inches apart, she closed the gap, again pressing her lips to mine. This time, though, instead of the slightest brushing of skin to skin, she pushed forward so more of her was up against more of me.
Any resistance to her evaporating like steam into the atmosphere, I wrapped my arms around her and pulled her close. Deepening the kiss so that I tasted some sweet flavor on her lips—watermelon?—I tugged her top lip into my mouth, suckling it. Not willing to stop there, I flicked out the end of my tongue until it touched hers.
She moaned, the sound of it inciting me to go further. I took in the rest of her reactions. The flush to her fair skin. The vein in her neck giving away her now rapid pulse. The way her breaths flowed in and out of her in a rush. How her eyes changed, going from that dazzling emerald to something far darker before they fluttered shut.
Her responsiveness enthralled me, so I touched that pulse point at her collarbone as I tasted a tender spot beneath her ear. Wanting to test if her heartbeat matched, I reached my other hand around to the front of her and laid it over her heart. Once I’d confirmed that it did, I edged my palm over enough to caress her breast through her shirt.
The nipple reacted, becoming a hard little peak, and needing to feel more of her, I moved to unfasten her bra. I’d just gotten it unclasped when she put both her hands in the middle of my chest and gave me a tiny shove. I was so caught up in the moment that this barely registered, and I’d yanked her shirt halfway up her torso before she raised her voice.
“Marco… Stop!”
In a lust-driven daze, I made myself draw back
, returning bit by bit to reality. My body throbbed with need, but she’d said stop, and I’d never do anything to a woman against her will.
I just wasn’t used to having her bring everything to a screeching halt in the middle like that.
“You all right?” I asked her, feeling strained and trying my damnedest to rein myself back in.
“I…” She seemed tremendously flustered as she seized the bottom of her t-shirt and adjusted it back into place. “I don’t know what just happened.”
“You kissed me,” I answered, not able to keep from grinning at her.
“And… and then you…”
“I kissed you back.”
9
Kelly
“That was way more than kissing me back,” I told him, even while he grinned at me like a cat who ate a canary. I bunched my long hair together and brought it to the side over my right shoulder. I was still attempting to collect my thoughts and all the wayward nerve endings making me tingle from top to bottom, from left to right, and everywhere in between.
From our first day together, a link had been forged between Marco and me, and it felt different than the connection I had with anyone else. It had stayed mostly in the background, like the hum of an air conditioner, something you could almost ignore yet was always there. But because of what had just happened between us, that hum had become louder and more powerful.
There was no way I could ignore it now.
Never in my life had I been touched like that. It’d felt like my body had gone up in flames. And Marco didn’t seem remorseful in the least. Of course, I’m the one who started this, so why should he be the one to feel remorse? But maybe remorse wasn’t the best term. Intoxicated might be better. Or astounded. Or even lightheaded.
If that had been a kiss, what had my former boyfriend been doing? What Marco had done had involved no slobbering, no awkwardness. It hadn’t repelled me in any way. Instead, it’d felt so delicious it’d made me nearly jump in his lap and grind up against him, and I’d never reacted like that in my entire life.
