by Ella Brooke
“Mother,” Grant objected, pocketing the panties.
Adele threw her hands up in exasperation. “I cannot for the life of me understand why you haven’t yet settled down and gotten a real job.”
“Enough,” Grant snapped. “Look, I know you don’t respect my business, but we are doing well. I live off my earnings, and not yours, and I have for some time. I think Dad would’ve been proud of what I’ve created, even if neither of you actually understood it. And if being a billionaire isn’t good enough for you, I don’t know what else I can do to make you happy.”
Adele pressed her lips into a fine line. Grant wondered for a moment what had gotten into him. He normally weathered her complaints without much objection other than to clarify things that were directly wrong. But the way she had talked about Kit, even not knowing who she was…
Grant shrugged. “I’m not going to give up an internationally successful business to muck around in someone’s bowels. So you’d better get used to your son being the next Mark Zuckerberg.”
“There is nothing more important in this world than saving a life,” Adele said, spitting out every other word.
“You save them one at a time,” Grant replied. “Then you demand that they pay you for it. I might not be saving their lives, but I’m helping them live it. And this is a very hard world to live in.”
Adele ran her hands over her severe A-line skirt and then pushed herself to her feet. “If you’re not going to be civil, Grant, I will take my leave.”
“You can go ahead and leave if you’re going to continue to insult my livelihood and my girlfriend.”
Adele turned her gaze on him again. “Girlfriend? As in singular?”
“Yes. Girlfriend. And you know her, besides. You just called the daughter of Dad’s favorite anesthesiologist garbage.” Grant gestured for the doorway. “So. I appreciate that.”
Adele narrowed her eyes as though trying to remember.
“And no, you won’t be meeting her any time soon. Not unless I’m convinced you won’t do anything to hurt her. She means very much to me, and you’ll be happy to know that she’s had her life together for much longer than I have.”
She took a step toward the doorway. “That sounds like a distinct step up.”
He felt a bit nervous then. He wondered if it wouldn’t have been wiser not to let his mother know who he was dating. While he hadn’t given Kit’s name and clearly his mother didn’t remember it, she could find out easily.
“If you manage to keep it going, I would appreciate you introducing us before you get married. I had no idea you had a girlfriend. Just a few weeks ago, I remember seeing your face in the tabloids with another unfamiliar girl.”
Grant wasn’t going to give her the satisfaction of saying that his relationship had only existed for roughly two weeks, so instead, he led the way out into the hall. “You need to be more cautious of where you get your gossip, Mom. Working in a hospital, I’d hope you knew that.”
“Oh, darling, don’t get me started on the gossip going around the hospital these days.”
Of course, she proceeded to get started on the gossip around the hospital, and Grant made her some coffee, hoping that the little coffee addict he loved wouldn’t come home while his mother was still there.
After Adele had left, Grant took out his phone and sent Kit a text:
“Could you take off work for two weeks?”
Chapter Eight
Kit
Grant had done some swift talking to get Kit two weeks off. He’d come back to the firm to talk to the partners personally, telling them that he was interested in their relatively small firm specifically because he’d known Kit for so long, and he would like to take her with him as he considered expanding his business so they could discuss the kind of workers’ rights she specialized in. He’d only known that was her specialty for about an hour before speaking to Mr. Gable and Mr. Pines, but it still worked.
As a result, Buck found himself with several extra cases dumped in his lap (among others, but the other associates weren’t likely to complain), and Kit found herself quickly packing for a trip overseas. Luckily, she’d recently renewed her passport for a trip to visit a friend in Canada.
They took a private chartered jet, with Grant assuring her she would have time to rest on the plane and that he would try to make as much time as he could for her. Once they’d reached cruising altitude, Kit showed him that she needed no rest, and the two of them made use of the long, cream colored sofa along the side of the plane.
She’d ended up wearing him out, and then the two of them rested together until it was time for dinner.
After the long flight, Grant took her to their suite at the top of a towering hotel where he started a steaming hot bath for her while he went to make a video conference call to his partner back in San Francisco.
Kit wouldn’t kid herself. This was a business trip. He might be gone a lot, and he didn’t really need her to consult. But she would have a better chance at spending time with him if she were here than if she were at home, and…if she were really honest with herself, while the last two weeks had been a whirlwind of passion and fun, she still wasn’t sure about their relationship.
It was new, and it could be fragile. He’d had such a history of being a playboy.
So Kit slipped out of her rumpled plane clothing and slipped into the hot bath. She did her best to let her anxieties go, from her fears about her budding relationship with Grant to her position at the law firm. Though she loved her work mostly, there were a number of cases coming across her desk lately that were an ethical conflict, supporting employers and finding loopholes that allowed them to take advantage of employees without facing any consequences. She didn’t have enough clout to challenge the partners about these choices.
After her bath, she put on a robe, poured herself some complementary sake, and sat on the bed watching the television. She checked her phone, flipping between the clocks for Japan and San Francisco. It was late in Japan, but back home, it was nearly eleven am. She took a moment, tried to think who would be free, and called her father.
“Hey, Kit-Kat!” her father said cheerfully.
Kit smiled, draping her arm over her stomach and leaned back to talk to James Hardwick. She only got around to calling every couple of weeks. “Hey, Daddy. We landed about an hour ago.”
“Sounds exciting! Have you been out to see anything yet?”
“No! It’s almost three am here!”
“Oh, well, I guess you’ll be seeing a lot of stars then.”
“The hotel is really beautiful. I’ll go out tomorrow to explore a little while Grant is at meetings.”
“That’s great, sweetie,” James said. “You know, I was really happy to hear from your mother that you kids were dating. I always thought he was a good boy, even if he had his wild patch.”
“You and Mom were talking about me?” Kit had a hard time believing that her parents spent much time consulting one another about her. They’d divorced when she was twelve.
“Catherine was concerned. She and I do talk occasionally.”
“Why was she concerned?”
“Probably because she knew that you and Grant dated before, and I didn’t. I wish this weren’t so, but young men can be incredibly immature. I told her that the Grant you knew then probably had wildly different priorities than the one you know now.”
“That’s what he says.” Kit pushed back her cuticles and pouted a little. “Do you think it’s possible to really change that much?”
“Honey, you’ll have to be the judge of that. He always seemed to really like you, though.”
She sighed. “There’s a difference between a guy liking you and a guy wanting something serious with you.”
“True. I ought to know that, shouldn’t I? Your mother and I like each other well enough; we just don’t get along enough to make a marriage.” James sighed. “Tell me all about what you’re going to go see. And don’t forget to take a ton of pictures
when you’re there.”
By the time she’d gotten off the phone, it was nearing four am, and Kit was quite sleepy. She knew that if she had any chance of beating jetlag, she would have to try to sleep immediately, so she made herself a cup of St. John’s Wort tea, which she’d brought from home with her, and laid back with her iPod, listening to soft music until her lids grew heavy.
Just as she was about to drift off, the door cracked open. It was Grant. She put her iPod aside, and he kicked off his shoes and climbed into bed with her, bowing his head into her neck.
“I’m so glad you’re here with me,” he said softly.
Kit said nothing; she didn’t know what to say. So she just combed the back of his hair with her fingers until she could hear his breathing change. It took her a little bit longer to doze off, but soon they were both deeply asleep and curled up in each other’s arms.
***
The following few days, Kit made good on her promise to take a lot of pictures. She visited temples, parks, and the SkyTree. She found her appetite was no match for the wide variety of foods available on the street and in the malls. For three days, she came home exhausted and full, and she dozed off on the sofa waiting for Grant to arrive.
When he did, she comforted him. He seemed very tired himself, and very stressed.
Eventually, she asked him what was weighing on him, and he downloaded the situation in large chunks of information as she listened, lounging in a loose robe.
“I see,” Kit said when he’d finished. “Legally speaking, you aren’t required to do more than you are.”
“I know. Everyone expects something more anyway.”
“I was going to say: Legally, you don’t have to. Ethically, you ought to try. Because your service is used by major businesses, the whole contractor bit isn’t meant to fall under organizations like yours. That’s what you do when you’re doing small jobs, starting your own business, or your friend has a business that is too small to require more than a few workers.”
Grant bristled at this. “Really? You agree with these reporters?”
“I agree that you should do something. Not having your specific paperwork, I couldn’t say exactly what you could do. But if you, as a billionaire running a hugely successful company, could make some changes to your business model that might make you a slightly smaller amount of money, but would help your users a lot… That would change the whole game. It would change the levels of expectation.” Kit shook her head as she thought about it. “You’d be the leader in the industry.”
“They aren’t paid regular paychecks, though. I couldn’t, say, provide regular insurance without that. I can’t even take out regular taxes.”
Kit thought for a moment as she stretched her legs to the end of the sofa. “Let me think on that one. I know that some small companies can arrange for connections to insurance companies. Even if you were just setting things up to make it easier for the contractors to survive off of their earnings through SideHustle, that would be something.”
She paused and stretched her arms over her head, yawning. “Also, a lot of what you put in is automated. You could send them quarterly tax forms so they could report their earnings in a way that benefited them more. I’d have to access a computer to show you the papers. Taxes are a bitch if you don’t do them right. I’m not even kidding. And it’s more complicated than your average person knows.”
Grant stood up and padded around the hotel room. “So, we could assist them less in a material sense, but more in….” He waved his hand around. “A supportive sense. In a legal sense.”
“You already give them training, don’t you? You could make part of that training a mini-how-to on self-employment. It would take some time to set up, but there’s a lot of things you could do structurally that would allow you to be on their side without changing the nature of freelancing.”
Grant stopped and looked down at Kit where she lay. He stared at her for so long that Kit grew a bit uncomfortable and glanced away.
Then he said, “Jesus, you’re fucking smart.”
“I’ve been telling you that I’m smart since I was a teenager.” Kit put on a cocky tone that didn’t match how she felt.
“True. But we both know that I wasn’t that swift on the uptake back then.”
“Nope.” She watched as Grant sat on the floor below her and took her hand in his.
“I don’t want to talk work anymore today, but would you like to sit in on my next video conference with Tyrese? If you don’t mind giving up part of your vacation, that is.”
“I could do that.” Kit stroked the fingers of her free hand along his arm.
“I didn’t mean to need you so much,” he said, almost apologetically.
“You’re allowed to need me.” Kit leaned over to kiss him.
***
Grant’s step was much lighter after Kit spoke with his partner and HR people. In fact, the meeting had lasted almost two hours, and at some point, Grant had just sat back and drunk his tea. When they’d finished, he’d jokingly called her “boss” and been so relaxed that he felt comfortable about going out.
On Kit’s arm, he let her drag him to one of the ramen places she’d found. Even better, he’d let her order for him in Japanese. Her mastery of the language was a little shaky, but she’d taken a couple years in college just for fun. Now, they ate and laughed together (Grant had said he was afraid she’d order him something with eyes still attached), and then moved on to a karaoke bar called Lovenet.
There they sipped sake in a hot tub while picking songs to sing along to. Kit had always suffered from a love for karaoke, while never being blessed with a sense of pitch. Grant tolerated this with a wicked grin on his face, happy to take pictures and sing along to the chorus.
Grant was a good singer, however, and belted each number out as though he had an audience of thousands, rather than just the one. Kit rubbed the ball of her foot along his legs and tried to tickle him and make him laugh so he’d screw up his song. Grant cracked once, and then never again. His level of investment in mastering karaoke was impressive.
Meanwhile, the more sake Kit drank, the freer she felt. The pretty little bottles with Hana Awaka printed over the labels contained a delicate, slightly sweet liquid as smooth as water and just as easy to drink. Grant preferred the white labeled sake, but he went through them just as quickly. It wasn’t long before little pink and white bottles lined up along the side of their hot tub. She wanted to keep going from bar to bar, annoying the staff and downing the fragrant rice wine that had made her want to do this in the first place.
After their session, however, Grant demanded they move on because he needed dessert, and he dragged her from the karaoke bar to an ice cream shop. It was brightly decorated with pictures of their specialty cones in which the ice cream was shaped like different animals. The cups they ordered came in a trio of flavors with a thin cookie on the side. Kit had ordered matcha flavor, strawberry, and persimmon.
“You spoil me,” Kit accused.
“I’m spoiling myself.” Grant slowly licked matcha ice cream from his spoon. “Do you have any idea how long it’s been since I went on a vacation?”
“Was it after our day trip to Roswell?”
The way Grant’s eyes lit up made bringing up the memory worth it. It wasn’t as fond a trip for her since she’d gotten food poisoning and had been sick the whole way back.
“Yes! That museum with the fake ‘reenactment’ of meeting aliens, and the autopsy!”
“I loved how all their street lights had slanty, black alien eyes on them.”
“Remember that Mexican restaurant that had the mural of the little green men in Mariachi outfits?”
“That was so terrible.”
“Great margaritas, though! I remember their food being excellent.”
Kit pointed at him with her spoon. “I remember otherwise.”
Grant raised his eyebrows, then laughed. “Well, never order seafood from someplace landlocked. We’ll have to
find a nice sushi place while we’re here. You can’t get it more authentic.”
“I don’t know. Sushi always looks good, but the idea of eating something that’s straight up raw is a little yucky.”
Grant took her hand. “You trust me, don’t you? I’ll make sure we go to a place that’s good.”
“Well, fine.”
“I was wondering…“ He paused and looked at Kit so seriously that for a moment, she felt her stomach clench and her heart flutter.
“You were wondering what?” Kit asked hopefully. Was this it? Was he planning to make this thing between them real? So soon?
“I would appreciate it if you’d come along with me for the rest of my meetings with the Japanese office for SideHustle. You have a keen mind for business, and of course, your legal acumen is such a benefit. We have lawyers on retainer, obviously, but it’s really not the same. We need you.” Grant’s thumb rubbed up and down her hand. “I need you.”
Kit didn’t know if there was a word for being both excited and let down. On the one hand, she wanted to be more confident in her relationship with Grant. On the other, he was clearly now seeing her as more than a plaything and a diversion. As part of his business, she would be a part of his life, and she herself had thought they might be moving too quickly.
It was hard to slow down when she wanted something so much. In spite of their start, in spite of both of their flaws when it came to dating, this had been the best relationship she’d ever managed in her life. Best to keep it slow and steady, let it build naturally. Kit didn’t want to disrupt what they had in any way.
“I like to be needed,” she replied finally.
Grant smiled, and the two of them shared a cold matcha kiss.
Chapter Nine
Grant
Grant stood in the distance, watching Kit as she stretched over a towel on the sparkling white sand of Shirahama Beach. She wore a navy blue bikini with white polka dots, and Grant raked his eyes over her luscious, warm flesh. Kit had seemed a little shy directly after changing into her bikini, but Grant loved every inch of her body and how it looked as she lounged there. Indeed, even how her bare hips had swayed sauntering down the sand, and the way her ass moved when she’d bent over to lay down her towel.
