Where should I go? That’s always the question. Usually I’m off to meet a date from online. I always know that she just wants money, but that’s ok, since I also know I can get laid. Hey, I’ve got needs, right?
Or if there’s nothing lined up online, maybe I’ll normally head to a bar or a club. Or a fancy place for lunch. But, recently, ever since I started yet another company, these places are horribly boring and completely filled with sycophants, people who just want to get close to me for my money and nothing else. Men and women of all types sidling up to me. That’s what happens when you’re famous and in all the papers and magazines just for being rich. There’s no way to avoid it.
So, to hell with all that. Today, I’m going somewhere new.
I swerve in and out of cars, reaching 100 MPH at one point. I keep going and going, driving all the way through the city. As the time passes, the sun has shifted in the sky. I know there’s no way to get what I want in this city.
I need to get out.
Half out of boredom, and half out of a need to explore something new, I find myself having driven all the way out of the city, cruising along country roads, with the tall New York state trees shielding me from the harsh sun.
I’m somewhere in the Hamptons now. My mind was wandering and racing so much on the drive out here I barely even noticed that I’d arrived.
I pull the bike up to a small corner store that sells the basics, just the regular supplies. It doesn’t look like there’s much to this town. From the main street, it looks like just any other sleepy small American town, with not much going on, but I know that the private residences here are simply loaded with wealth. This is where the richest of the rich of New York City and all over the world come to party and relax on the weekends. The only reason I don’t own a house here is simply out of my growing distaste for hanging around other rich people—they all just talk about money and money and more money, and I want something more, something different out of life, I guess.
People probably think that the reason I don’t have a house out here in the Hamptons is because I’m not an outdoors guy. They’ve only seen me in the magazines in the city, so they figure I’m just another city guy. But, in reality, I spent half my childhood and early adult years out in the wilderness on furious trips and camping excursions. I know not only how to hunt, but how to clean a fish, how to field dress a deer, and how to start a fire with practically nothing except what I can find in the woods.
“Howdy,” says the man behind the counter, as I walk into the simple general store.
“Anything going on here tonight?” I say.
The man gives me a curious smile and shrugs his shoulders. “Depends what you’re looking for, I suppose,” he says.
“I’m John Clark,” I say, knowing that my name is usually enough of a password whenever it’s needed.
“Ha,” says the man. “You think I didn’t recognize you?”
I shrug my shoulders. “It’s hard to keep track of my name in the papers these days. I don’t know how often it’s appearing.”
“Must be a nice problem,” says the old man. “Hey, maybe I should introduce you to someone here.”
He calls over a tall man who’s well dressed. He’s over at the canned foods aisle, and he comes over and shakes my hand. It turns out he’s another CEO type, but he’s slightly more interesting. He’s not from NYC, and instead is from California. He only comes out to the Hamptons once in a while to organize massive parties.
“Why don’t you come out tonight?” he says. “If you don’t have anything else to do.”
“I would,” I say. “I am looking for something to do. But, to tell you the truth, I’m trying to get away from the CEO NYC scene.”
“You’re in luck then,” says the tall man. “This is going to have just as many regular folk as CEOs. To me, the Hamptons is my escape from the suffocating tech scene out west where I am in California”
So I agree and I take his card and the address. I spend another couple hours wandering around the small town. I park my motorcycle, and I go hiking up into the hills for a while. Occasionally, I pull out my pocketknife and cut down a stick to whittle.
When the time comes, I make my way to the party.
To my surprise, the location of the party is an enormous mansion on the lake. The host claimed that the party was for normal people, but when I get there, there are valets, caterers, and all sorts of staff. It clearly just isn’t any relaxing lake party. This is looking just like another one of the CEO parties that I’m trying to avoid, except that it’s in the Hamptons instead of Manhattan. I’ve had enough of this shit. And the valet gives me a completely bewildered look when he sees my motorcycle.
“Don’t worry about it,” I say. “You don’t need to park it. I’m not going to stay anyway.”
He gives me an even more confused look, but shrugs his shoulders and nods. I guess he figures if he doesn’t have to deal with me, then his job is easier. What does he care if I leave the party before even setting foot in the mansion?
I roar the engine and start circling back around the driveway. I’ve only gone about 100 feet down the driveway, when an old rambling beat up car passes me. There are two people in the old car and the one in the passenger seat is only about two feet away from me on my motorcycle. She turns and looks at me. They’re on their way into the party. I pass them going slowly.
The woman is the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen. Despite the horribly old car she’s driving, she looks incredibly beautiful in an elegant gown. Her hair is up in a fancy style, and she’s wearing just enough makeup to make her look insanely hot.
My head won’t turn back around to look forward as I drive past them. I just keep staring at her, and she keep staring at me. We don’t exchange a word.
Weird. She looks somewhat familiar. I’m normally good with faces, but maybe I met her in a wildly different context, where she wasn’t dressed up as nicely as she is tonight.
I make a snap decision. CEO fancy parties be damned. I’m going to return to this one. I need to talk to this woman if it’s the last thing I do. I haven’t yet reached the end of the circular portion of the driveway, so I just circle back around once more.
The valet gives me the most perplexed look I’ve ever seen on anyone. He actually opens his mouth and says, “What the hell, man?” which is so unprofessional I actually laugh at him, rather than getting annoyed.
Another valet has already taken away the horribly old car of the two women, and I catch a glimpse of the beautiful one’s ass as she slinks into the house. The door closes behind her before I can even get off my motorcycle, but the image of her delicious ass is still stuck in my head.
“You can’t park this, can you?” I say to the valet.
“Shouldn’t you be wearing a helmet?” he says.
“I don’t wear helmets when I don’t feel like it,” I say. “Now answer the question.” If this guy were one of my employees, I’d fire him in an instant. But that’s a discussion for another time.
“I can’t,” he says. “You can go put it in the garage by yourself,” I guess.
“Very professional of you,” I say sarcastically, and once again I turn on the motorcycle and slowly ride towards the garage where I park it.
Between the cobwebs, I park the motorcycle. All the while, the only thing I can think about is this gorgeous woman in the slinky evening gown. As I walk across the lawn, towards the mansion, I’m positive that I’ve met her somewhere before. But, where? I know that I know her, but I also know it’s from some context that I wouldn’t necessarily expect. I feel like I’ve met her recently, and that I’ve met her a long time ago—all at the same time. It’s that feeling that you get when you have met someone but you feel like you’ve already known them for a long time.
“Can I take your coat, sir?” says the attendant inside the house.
The mansion is even more luxurious inside than outside.
I scan the party. I’m not sure exactly how I’ve en
ded up here for a moment. Wasn’t I trying to get away from all this bullshit? And here I am again.
Then I remember: I’m here for that woman that I saw. The most gorgeous and mysterious woman I’ve ever seen in my life…the one who seemed so familiar, as if I had just met her in some other context.
I scan the room…and…there she is.
I catch just a glimpse of her chest as she walks into the other room. She’s already out of reach again. Is she headed into the kitchen?
I push my way through the crowd, not even bothering to apologize when I knock into people. I knock over their champagne glasses and I step on men’s dress shoes by mistake. But by the time I get to the other side of the room, to the door that I saw this gorgeous creature disappear through, she’s already gone.
The next room is just like this one, but with fewer people in it. An oriental carpet and an ornate chandelier decorate the room, which is otherwise fairly bare, except for a couple horrendous portraits of disgusting monarch types.
She’s gone, no where to be scene.
Sarah
“Come on,” says Janet, pulling me by the hand outdoors. We’re at the craziest house I’ve ever been to. It’s not only luxurious and obviously owned by someone with a ton of money, but it’s inhabited by the richest of the richest and the most famous of the famous. It seems like every step I take, Janet has to drag me away from staring at some famous celebrity or someone I’ve seen in the gossip columns of the newspapers. “Come on,” says Janet again, really pulling on my hand this time.
“But, I just saw…” I say, realizing I don’t actually know his name, but I do know that I’ve seen all his movies. I guess I’m just used to these Hamptons parties.
“You’re going to embarrass me,” says Janet. “Plus, we didn’t come here to ogle celebrities. We came to celebrate your new job.”
“You mean my job, not my new job,” I say. “After being unemployed for over a year, I don’t really have an “old” job that this can be a “new” job in relation to.”
“You’re so weird,” says Janet, taking some champagne from a passing waiter who’s wearing a suit. She hands two glasses to me, and keeps two for herself. “We’re supposed to get drunk,” she says, somewhat seriously, with a very serious expression on her face. “You haven’t had fun in so long that you don’t remember how you have to do it. But that’s why you have me here, and I’m here to tell you that the thing to do is to get drunk, and then the fun happens.”
“How can you have fun when you’re so serious all the time?” I say, laughing at Janet.
“Just wait and see,” says Janet, giving me another serious glare. She downs one champagne glass, and then the other. Then she takes two more from another passing waiter.
I take a meager sip of my own glass. I’ve never really been one to get drunk or wasted. I’ll have a glass of wine once in a while, but heavy drinking isn’t really my thing.
“Come on,” says Janet, downing another glass, a glassy expression appearing on her face. “Bottoms up!”
I take a small sip just to appease her.
“Let’s check out the garden,” I say, and it’s my turn to pull Janet away from the champagne waiter.
“I’m staying here,” says Janet, obstinately.
I’m getting annoyed with her, because the next time I turn to talk to her, she’s chatting up some movie star, and ogling him quite clearly. She’s flashing her breasts at him and sticking out her chest.
“So much for not ogling the famous,” I mutter under my breath.
Janet pretends to not even see me so I just walk into the garden by myself.
The night is gorgeous and slightly cool. I shiver a little in my jacket.
I think about the last year, and about today.
I can’t believe I finally have a job after all this time. This means that I can finally move out of my Mom’s apartment, which is becoming more than cramped. This means I can get my own place. This means that, maybe, just maybe, I’ll be ready for another relationship in a couple months, once I’m established and on my own, with my own apartment.
I’ve heard a lot of different rumors about my new boss, John Clark, and his strange way of running a business. For one thing, it was like no other interview I’ve ever had.
I mean, hell, I’m waxing all poetic about my new job, but it’s really nothing more than the simplest job you could have. It’s a cleaning job. I’ve going to be doing the least glamorous work in the world. I’m going to be scrubbing toilets and doing whatever the hell they tell me to do.
It’s not like I don’t have an education or can’t get another job in the future. I was training to be a nurse, actually. I would have gone to medical school, considering my grades and the recommendations I got, but it was way too much for me to afford.
I hit a serious patch of depression when my dad died and found that I couldn’t continue in nursing school. I dropped out, and I worked for a time at some low level jobs, but I Just couldn’t keep them up.
I’ve finally got a handle on my depression now, and I’m determined to work my way up again. I’m not going to settle for being a nurse. I’m going to do everything I can. Hell, maybe I’ll go back to medical school.
I change my attention from scrubbing toilets and minimum wage for a moment to that meeting I had with John Clark. He certainly was…hot. He’s honestly one of the sexiest men I’ve ever seen in my life. He has broad shoulders, and a slight stubble beard that compliments his piercing dark eyes. He really looks like a billionaire, if you know what I mean, and not in any negative way at all.
It was so strange that he wanted to interview everyone who worked for his company personally. But that’s his reputation. He apparently has a very unique way of doing business, and it’s obviously worked well for him, since he started out without any money at all and worked his way up all the way to the tippy top of a variety of industries. Honestly, I’m not even sure what it is that his company actually does. All I know is that I’m going to be cleaning one of the biggest and tallest and fanciest buildings in all of Manhattan. Well, it’s not like I’m going to have to do everything myself—I’m just one girl on a huge team, probably one of the biggest teams. I’ve never cleaned anything before, and my own room at my Mom’s apartment is incredibly messy. My mom actually laughed in my face when I said I was going to become a cleaner—“but you can’t even clean your own room. Is that what you want to do instead of becoming a doctor like you wanted to? You were valedictorian of your school, and now you’re cleaning floors?”
I didn’t know what to say. I mean, how else can I move forward? How else can I get on with my life if I don’t take a job like this?
I turn over my shoulder and look through the darkened garden to the open door. Inside, I can see Janet flirting quite severely with her catch, her celebrity.
I sigh, and look up at the moon.
There’s a noise behind me.
It sounds like someone is sneaking up on me. It’s all those creepy sounds from the movies—a twig breaking, a heavy footstep. Then I catch my breath and remember that I’m at an upscale party. A party that my friend dragged me to because she had an extra invitation. It’s a party that I don’t even belong at. I should be cleaning the floors here, I think to myself, rather than masquerading as a guest. I don’t really belong in this company of the famous, rich and beautiful.
“Hey, beautiful,” says someone behind me.
I turn around. So there was someone there!
I spin around, and almost gasp in surprise. I instantly recognize him. He’s my new boss, the famous CEO and billionaire John Clark, looking as hot as ever. Actually, he looks even hotter.
He looks hotter than anyone else at this party. He’s not wearing a suit like everyone else here. And he’s not clean-shaven. He looks rugged, with a motorcycle helmet under one arm. His eyes cut through everything, and seem to pierce me. He looks slightly bigger than I remember. Maybe that’s because he’s standing up now and he was sitting down th
e last time I saw him.
“Hi,” I say.
I figure he knows who I am and he’s just joking around with this “hey beautiful” stuff. There’s no way a billionaire like John Clark could think I’m beautiful, and there’s certainly no way he could be hitting on me at a party where there are women who literally work as models and movie actresses.
“What brings you to a party like this,” he says, handing me a drink.
“Oh,” I say. “Thanks, but I already have one.”
He takes it back, and tosses it back, down his throat in one gulp. But, unlike Janet, he seems to have a high tolerance and it doesn’t affect him. I really wouldn’t expect a couple drinks to affect him much, since he’s a big, powerful man, with a muscular build and broad shoulders. He looks like he’s the type they’d say has a “strong back,” whatever the hell that means.
He’s both lean and muscular, and I wonder if he’s ridden his motorcycle here all the way from Manhattan, because he’s a little sweaty, and looks like he’s been on the bike for quite a while. They say a woman is attracted to a man’s smell before anything else, and he smells fucking delicious. I just want to jump his bones already…it’s something about my hormones…or it must be, since no rational woman would want to jump her CEO Billionaire bosses’ bones right away, right?
“My friend had an invitation,” I say, hoping that this explains the presence of his newly-hired cleaner at one of the fanciest parties I’ve ever been to, one that I certainly don’t really belong at.
“I don’t know what I’m doing here,” says John. “I just had to get out of the city…I work in Manhattan at a company…well, you don’t really want to hear about it. I’m sure it’d be really boring for someone to listen to me talk about. And I’m always talking about it. Anyway, I just had to get away from Manhattan, from the clubs, the parties…everything is just all the same there.”
SEAL'd Lips: A Secret Baby Romance Page 17
