by Vivien Vale
“I’ll let you know,” I say with a smile. Kylie nods, smiling, too.
I can’t figure out if she still wants me. I know that she liked the other day. Does she want to do it again? I hope she does – God knows I want to do it again. I want to fuck her brains out. But I’m not going to push for something she doesn’t want, and I don’t know where she stands after she told me on Friday that it was a mistake. Although, she didn’t say she didn’t want to do it again.
Women are complicated. They don’t say things straight up, and then men get blamed for misunderstanding. And things are even more complicated in this situation because there’s more at play here than just our obvious attraction. She has an end game. So do I. But mine is changing. I’m not sure I really want to fuck her over like I did before. I want to find out more. Get in her head and understand why she’s really out to get RidgeCo.
But even more than I want to get in her head, I want to get in her panties.
I can’t very well ask her if she’s willing to do it again out here in the open, where everyone else can hear us. The only way to find out is to get her alone, again. Soon.
I look down at the file again, thinking.
“You know what?” I say. “Let me go over this now. Can you free up some time to see me in my office, later this afternoon? Let’s say, three?”
Kylie swallows. She hesitates before she nods. I can’t tell what she’s thinking; I don’t know her well enough. I can decipher her O face, her eyes when there’s lust in them, but I don’t know Kylie as a person. And I’m surprised by how much I want to. She’s supposed to be the enemy, but I’m finding out quickly it’s not that simple.
“Three it is, then.”
As soon as I get her alone, I want to talk to her. I want to ask her how she feels. I want to know what she thinks of us doing it before, of us doing it again.
“You don’t have to go over it all today,” she says. “We can discuss it another time.”
I shake my head. “I don’t have client meetings, for a change. Focusing on the project will be nice. I get so little time to do it.”
She nods. “Okay, I guess that’s alright, then.”
Tanya walks to Kylie’s desk and gives her a stack of papers.
“This is the report you asked for,” she says. She glances at me and smiles. Kylie takes the papers from Tanya, and I watch them interact. Kylie is respectful and helpful, but she doesn’t grovel or make it look like Tanya is in charge. She knows what she’s doing, and her grasp of authority is attractive.
Whenever I see her, I’m reminded of how good she can be at what she does. She has so much potential; she can go far in this company. I don’t know why she was a receptionist for so long – she told me a bit about her struggles – and I’m glad I’ve pushed her into a position where she can earn more and get noticed. The money would be well-deserved, I think. If she didn’t have ulterior motives. I wonder for the millionth time why she’s really out to get the company because I think she could really be great here.
“Do you have the printout I asked you for?” Leon asks Kylie, walking to her desk. He glances at me but ignores me, otherwise.
Kylie nods, not responding to his brash approach. She hands him a piece of paper. Leon looks at it with a frown.
“Is this all of it?” he asks.
“It’s everything I could find on it,” she says. “Will you let me know if there’s anything else you need?”
Leon grunts. “You know I will.”
He sounds grumpy. I’m getting irritated with the way he’s talking to her, and I’m not even involved in the discussion. If it gets to her, she’s not showing it. She respects Leon as her superior, and she treats him with a respect I don’t even think he deserves. Maybe it’s because she’s still new, and she doesn’t have the liberty to be sarcastic or have an attitude toward Leon. I hope that will change because he can’t keep being such a dick about everything.
“Can I talk to you for a moment, Leon?” I ask.
He nods, and I step to the side, so we’re out of earshot from the others. Leon follows me. He folds his arms over his chest and places his feet wide apart. The stance is both defensive and arrogant.
“Why don’t you lay off Kylie, Leon?” I ask. “She’s working hard.”
Leon raises his eyebrows. “I’m doing my job. Are you suggesting I don’t?”
I shake my head. “I think you can be nicer about it.”
Leon smiles at me, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. “Like you are.”
He can’t know anything, but my stomach turns, anyway.
“If you mean checking up on her to see if she needs help and mentoring her when she does, then yes, like I am.”
Leon shakes his head. “The two of you are alone an awful lot, don’t you think?”
“Did I mention I’m mentoring her? I remember saying it.”
Leon makes a face at me. I know he’s getting pissed, but so am I.
“I wish I had that much mentoring when I was new here,” Leon says.
I sigh. “That was before my time, Leon. I can’t do anything about what happened here before I was appointed CEO. I know what I can do now, and I’m doing it to the best of my ability. Please, don’t forget that I’m your superior. Your attitude needs revision.”
Leon laughs, and it’s one of those laughs that’s supposed to be a threat.
“I’ll back off from Jordan when I know that she’s capable of doing her job, but I don’t think a receptionist deserves a position as project manager on this, and I’m sticking to it. I believe you hired her because she has a pretty face and a good body.”
I am angry now.
“That’s degrading and insulting in every way,” I say. “I would be very careful about what I say next if I were you.”
My blood boils. I’m more than angry that Leon has reduced Kylie to someone intellectually incapable of doing her job, that he thinks I have it in me to look only at her body.
Leon makes a face at me, but he doesn’t say anything. Instead, he turns and walks away. But I swear I hear him mumble something under his breath that sounds like, “I know more than you think I do.”
He can’t mean he knows about Kylie. Can he?
When I look at Kylie again, she’s buried in her work. I don’t want to bother her. Especially as irritated as I am now. It’s better for me to retreat to my office and work through it. I need to calm down.
I walk to my office and sit down behind my desk. Leon rubs me up the wrong way, sometimes. I don’t know how to deal with him now – I don’t want to fire the guy with his wife being so sick, but he can’t keep doing this at the office. He undermines my authority, and he pisses me off.
Kylie actually deserves her position more than anyone else in the company, in spite of my inside knowledge about her plans to try to take down the company. Her résumé stood out from all the others long before I was aware of what she was up to.
And yes, I fucked her, and I think she’s the hottest thing I’ve ever seen, but I sure as shit didn’t hire her because I thought it would be easier to get into her panties.
Leon is way too upset over Kylie’s promotion. There’s something I can’t put my finger on, Something that’s not quite right.
I’m going to have to do something about him if he doesn’t reign in his bad attitude.
I close my eyes and take a deep breath, trying to calm down. I can’t let Leon work me up like this. I’m his boss, and he shouldn’t piss me off the way he does. I open the file I got from Kylie and start reading through her projections and ideas.
And again, I’m impressed by the way she thinks, by the way she approaches her work. She is technical about it, approaching the business side of it logically, but she has a creative flair that makes her work unique and I like it.
I am engrossed in her work, and as I page through it, my bad mood dissipates. I see a side of her here that I don’t know yet, and I like it.
When I’m done, I’m glad I asked her to come t
o me so soon. It’s not just because I want to see her as soon as possible, but because I want to talk to her about her work. Maybe, this time, I’ll get around to it.
I lean back in my chair and look around my office. I’ve had her everywhere in here I can except for the floor. I glance at the couch. I can almost still feel her lips around my cock. Just the thought of it makes me want it again. I harden, and I want her. I don’t think I’m ever going to not want her. She’s sexy and beautiful and intelligent. The whole package.
In spite of all the reasons I shouldn’t, I want her. I want her all to myself. In just a short while I’ll find out if she wants me, too.
Kylie
I didn’t go to Wes’s office. In fact, I didn’t even stay at work. I became so nervous about our meeting, about what he might expect from me, I started feeling sick. After lunch, my stomach was a knot of nerves, and I couldn’t concentrate.
Tanya asked me if I was feeling alright because I looked pale. When I told her I felt sick, she suggested I go home.
I didn’t wait for her to tell me twice.
I fear seeing Wes, alone. I don’t know what he wants from me. Okay, that’s a lie. I know what he wants from me. I even know what I want from him. But I don’t know if it’s a good idea. I need to stay far, far away from this guy. He’s bad news. The bad ones are always the most attractive and this one is my absolute weakness.
I’ve always thought I was immune to men. I want to be with someone, sure, but I don’t need to be. And if a man is flirting with me – no matter how charming – if I’ve made up my mind about it, it’s not going to happen.
I used to take pride in being able to walk away.
I realize now I just haven’t met the right kind of guy, yet. Or is that the wrong kind of guy? I don’t know. And not knowing is what makes me unsure about Wes.
He’s not at all how I thought he’d be. I’m starting to second guess everything.
My dad was a cheating son of a bitch. He had an affair when I was in high school, and my mom found out. Not that my mom was blameless. I found out years later that she had an affair first. In fact, she used to work for RidgeCo way back in one of its pre-IPO iterations. She was a receptionist, just like I used to be. Except she worked for the owner of the company. Who also turned out to be a cheating son of a bitch. He seduced my mom. I don’t know all the details, but I do know he was a manipulative womanizer. My mom was one of many. And he has the nerve to institute a no fraternizing policy?
So both my parents cheated, ripping apart our family and leaving my mom and I practically destitute, especially when she was fired from RidgeCo. It’s the main reason I want to make the company pay. Its very owner almost singlehandedly destroyed my family.
So yeah. Obviously, I don’t trust men. They’re all the wrong guy, in my opinion. So, it’s hard for me to decide what Wes is. I can’t seem to stay away from him, which is unusual for me. I’m always able to keep my head in the game. I can’t help but wonder about him, what more there could be if I dared to pursue it.
But I don’t think that’s something I’ll be able to do. I don’t know if he wants anything more than sex. Most women don’t want sex without any strings attached. They want love, commitment, monogamy. I don’t care about those things. At least, I didn’t. Now I’m starting to wonder if I should care about those things.
I doesn’t bother me that I don’t have it, but it bothers me that I don’t care about having it.
Is it Wes that brought on this change? Or my new job that, for the first time ever, will allow me to think about myself because I can take care of my mom and Gran now? Or is it that Wes seems like he’s actually a decent guy and I’m questioning everything I thought I knew and believed?
It’s too much to think about, too many questions, and that’s just another reason why I should stay away from Wes.
Which is why I ran like a coward yesterday, why I didn’t go to that meeting, why I don’t know how I’m going to avoid him for the rest of the week, or the month, or my career.
I get dressed for work. I put on black dress pants and a butter yellow blouse that makes my skin look more like porcelain than it already does. I brush my hair and braid it loosely. When I’m done with my makeup, I head to the office. It only takes twenty minutes to get to the office from my place, and I’m one of the first people there.
I don’t see Wes on my way to my desk, and I’m relieved when I sit down. I can’t stop him from coming to check on me the way he sometimes does, but this is a good start.
When I open my email, I have five new ones. Two of them are spam – where do they get my email address? One is from my mom, one from Tanya and one is from Wes. It’s flagged urgent, and my throat swells shut. My heart beats faster, and I’m scared to open it.
I tell myself not to be a coward and open the damn email.
Miss Jordan,
Please see me in my office first thing tomorrow morning regarding your office hours.
W. Wagner
It’s so damn formal. Miss Jordan. W Wagner. It makes me even more nervous because I can’t avoid him now. I have to see him. I did something wrong, and I must face it. But he’s not even calling me Kylie.
I take a deep breath and blow it out, slowly. I’m not sure what he’s going to say to me, but I did feel sick yesterday. He doesn’t need to know why, but I’m not lying. And Tanya suggested I go home early. She’s not my boss – she doesn’t have the right to tell me it’s okay – but I listened because I needed it. It was what I wanted to hear.
I wish I had handled it differently, now. I should have known. I should have marched up to that office and told him how things are, where we stand. What is it they say about hindsight?
But, of course, I don’t know what I would have said to him. To tell someone else where you stand you need to know where you stand, and that’s something I haven’t figure out, yet. I think that’s why I’m so nervous. I think that’s why I don’t want to see him. I think seeing him today won’t make anything better. I seem to have met my match when it comes down to men that are charming and flirtatious with me, men that want something I’m not willing to offer. In this case, I know I’m willing to offer it, and I’m scared. I think I’m in way over my head.
I touch my hair, straighten my clothes and check my phone before I get up and ride the elevator up one floor to Wes’s office.
When I knock on the door, he calls for me to enter and I take a deep breath before I walk in. He’s sitting behind his desk. He’s wearing a dark blue suit with satin in the weave so it shimmers a little. His shoulders look broader in the dark color. His face is serious when he looks up at me.
I close the door behind me and walk to his desk. I don’t sit down until he tells me I can. He gets up and walks around his desk. He sits on the edge of his desk, his body turned a little away from me, and I can’t help but feel that I’m in the principal’s office for doing something wrong.
“You left early yesterday,” Wes says.
I nod.
“We had a meeting. Did you forget about it?”
I don’t want to lie to him. He’ll know, anyway. I have a feeling he will. So, I shake my head because I knew about the meeting. Until now, I haven’t said anything.
Wes sighs like he’s exasperated.
“Why did you leave, Kylie?” he asks. I don’t know how he means for the question to come across, but it sounds like he’s been wounded, somehow and it makes me feel bad. Something has changed between us.
“I was feeling sick,” I say. I want to add that Tanya is a witness, but I don’t want to sound like I’m defending myself.
Wes looks at me for long enough that I fight the urge to squirm.
“That’s not it, is it?” he asks, and his voice is so soft I can barely hear him. He’s not looking at me. Instead, he looks down at the carpet, and I wonder why he’s so emotionally involved in this. It was just sex, no strings attached, right? I don’t know what to make of how he’s reacting toward me.
&nbs
p; I think about what I can say. The truth is usually the best way to go.
“I don’t know how to answer that,” I say.
Wes frowns at me. “What do you mean, you don’t know how to answer that?”
I shrug. “I don’t know how to explain it without making things worse.”
Wes looks at me with a face I can’t read.
“You’re avoiding me, Kylie. I don’t think it can get much worse than that.”
I swallow. Maybe he’s right. I take a deep breath and let it out with a shudder.
“I want to fuck you,” I say.
He can’t hide his surprise. He looks like it’s the last thing he expected to hear.
“I can’t help it,” I carry on without giving him a chance to speak. I focus on his chest, on his tie, until I get everything out. “But I don’t want to get in trouble. If I can’t help myself around you, and I don’t want to lose my job, not seeing you seems like the only way to do it.”
I finally have the courage to look up at his eyes again. They’re a deep green, full of disbelief and something that looks like happiness.
“I have to admit, that’s the last thing I thought I would hear you say,” he says.
“What did you think I was going to say?”
He opens and closes his mouth, sawing his jaw without saying anything. Finally, he pulls up his shoulders. It’s refreshing to see a man who’s always so in control at a loss for words.
Finally, he sighs.
“Of everything I hoped you would say, this is what I wished you would say.”
I blink at him. Of course, that’s what he wants from me. He slides off the edge of his desk and takes my hand, pulling me up to my feet. He steps closer to me, so close a sigh would press us together. I can feel the heat radiate off his skin through his suit, through my clothes. He smells like cologne the way he did at Alchemist, and his eyes are full of promise.
His hand lifts to my cheek, and he strokes my skin with his thumb. His face dips toward mine, and I wait for him to inch closer until our lips touch.
