Sex, Lies and Dirty Secrets

by Jamie Sobrato

  “I liked your parents,” he said. “They were nice.”

  Also a little wacky, and clearly not aware of what a great daughter they had, but that was their own loss.

  “Yeah, well. I liked having you there. I mean, I’m sorry you had to eat microwaved meat loaf, but as far as parental visits go, that was one of the more pleasant ones. Having you there helped.”

  “So I’m still not seeing what the big problem is.”

  “I’m not supposed to like you!” she said a little too vehemently.

  “You’re not?”

  “I’m supposed to be cool and detached, because this is our little meaningless office fling, and instead I’m falling for you.”

  “Oh.”

  “That’s what’s wrong!”

  Griffin was tempted to point out that he was falling crazy in love with her, but in her current state, he wasn’t sure how the news would be taken. Better to wait until she was in a cheerier mood.

  “You know, it’s not unheard of for office romances to work out,” he offered, searching for solid ground.

  She sighed. “I’m supposed to fall in love with a dark, brooding lone-wolf type. I’m not supposed to be with a gregarious all-star jock.”

  “Did you visit a fortune teller?”

  “I just know. We all have our fantasy mate, and…”

  “And I remind you too much of those guys in high school who ignored you and made fun of you?”

  She said nothing.

  He wanted to tell her to get over it, but he realized that would make him sound like an insensitive jerk, and probably dark, brooding lone wolves never said insensitive things to their lovers. He also considered pointing out that maybe she’d taken all those romance novels she read too seriously, but again, it wasn’t going to score him any points.

  “Macy, I know we’re both ad people. We deal with images all the time. But this is a case where you have to move beyond the image. You’re putting the wrong spin on this situation.”

  Finally, she smiled. “You mean, I should be looking for the value-added features in our relationship?”

  “Absolutely. Spin it the right way, and you can sell yourself anything.”

  “I like that.”

  They rode a few minutes longer in silence as they neared the entrance to Highway 101.

  And when he was about to take the on-ramp, Macy said, “Ooh, look. McDonald’s drive-through. Let’s get milkshakes.”

  Griffin slowed the car and flipped on the turn signal. He wasn’t positive he’d completely dodged the our-relationship-is-doomed bullet, but once he had Macy home, naked and thoroughly satisfied, he was pretty damn sure he could sell her anything. Including a commitment with him.

  In fact, after getting to know Macy privately from all these different angles, falling for her harder and harder, he was beginning to understand that he wouldn’t have any peace in his life until he knew Macy was not only his for the night, but his for keeps.

  MACY HAD SUGGESTED they go to his place tonight to avoid anymore phone calls from her mother, and Griffin was happy to oblige. He liked showing off his bachelor pad. It wasn’t very big, but he’d done some remodeling, and he thought he’d done a damn good job.

  Granite countertops, custom maple cabinets, refinished hardwood floors. He’d even painted the walls. Okay, they were all beige because he didn’t know what other color would match everything, but still. It looked better than white.

  Griffin had a feeling that this was his last chance to prove to Macy that he cared for her enough that their working together didn’t matter. All that mattered was the way he felt, and of course, he realized, that wasn’t exactly fair. The way she felt mattered just as much, and she’d already made clear her desire not to get themselves entangled any further.

  He watched her checking out the books on his shelves as he undressed. She could browse all she wanted, but he had one thing in mind tonight. Sexual persuasion.

  His shelves contained lots of American classics like Hemingway, Thoreau and Emerson, and a hodgepodge of more contemporary classics. He’d studied English in college and had first started collecting classics to impress anyone who checked out his bookshelves, but once he’d finished school and had time to read for pleasure, he’d discovered that he actually liked the classics.

  “Have you read all these?” she asked.

  “Yep, most of them a couple of times.”

  “I never would have labeled you a literary type.”

  “It’s my dirty little secret. I might lose my all-star jock image if word ever got out.”

  “Your only dirty secret?” she asked, eyeing him with mock suspicion.

  “Well, that and the fact that I’m about to sleep with one of my subordinates.”

  “Oh, so now that you’ve got me alone in your apartment, I’m your subordinate.”

  “Only if it turns you on,” he said, catching her hand in his and pulling her close so that she could not just see the evidence of his arousal, but feel it, too.

  Her body molded against his, and she rested her head on his chest instead of looking up at him. The gesture created a heavy feeling in his gut, as if he was about to lose something dear.

  “No comment,” she whispered.

  “Do you ever read anything besides romance novels?” he asked.

  “Why? You have a problem with them?”

  “Not at all. I’m all for guys in billowy shirts and girls in revealing dresses.”

  “Haven’t you ever heard that saying about not judging a book by its cover?”

  “Sure. I was just wondering if you’ve ever read Hemingway’s A Farewell to Arms.”

  “I did in college. I remember it was really depressing. I hate tragic love stories.”

  “I feel the same way right now that I did when I read that book—like a world has ended.”

  She frowned. “Why?”

  “I don’t want to just gaze across the room at you knowing I can’t have you. What’s the fun of that?”

  “You’ve got me right now.”

  “I mean tomorrow, and next month, and next year.”

  She was silent for a moment, a little crease forming between her eyebrows.

  “Sometimes it’s more fun to want something than to have it.”

  “In your case, I can confirm that’s definitely not true.”

  “Well, thanks, but—”

  “I know, I know. I’ve heard it all before.” Griffin’s throat tightened. He’d never felt as if so much was at stake. He’d never felt so wildly, blindly in love before, and he needed to know that Macy shared his intense feelings. He tilted her chin up until she was looking him in the eyes.

  “I love you,” he said, and the words felt as natural and simple as the act of breathing.

  Macy’s expression transformed then, but not in the way he was expecting. He watched all the softness vanish from her features, replaced by a hardness that he knew had to spell bad news.

  “Griffin, there’s something I have to tell you,” she said.

  He imagined the possibilities. Maybe she had huge, unbelievable credit card debt, or maybe she had a weird foot fetish, or maybe she was a member of a cult. He could get past that stuff.

  “Don’t look so solemn,” he said, nudging her. “How bad could it be?”

  “I’ve got something really awful to tell you.” She broke free from his grasp and paced across the room, putting some distance between them, leaving him standing there naked and exposed.

  “What?”

  “I had an agenda last weekend when we went to Las Vegas. I was trying to dumb you down with sex.”

  “What?” His brain tried to process her words, but she wasn’t making any sense.

  “Didn’t you feel kind of fuzzy-headed Monday after our trip, when you were doing the presentation?”

  Griffin recalled how he’d felt as if his thoughts were stuck in molasses. His brain had been operating at reduced capacity that day and even the next day. But no way was it because of sex
…was it?

  “Yeah, so?” he said.

  Macy looked as if she was about to confess to capital murder. “A friend of mine is a scientist, and she’d just completed a study on the effects of sex on human intelligence. She told me about how she’d discovered that sex temporarily reduces our mental capacity, and—”

  “That’s impossible.” Griffin crossed his arms and paced across the room. When he spotted his pants and boxers on the floor, he grabbed them and tugged them on, his mind stumbling around the facts.

  Stumbling. Was it really impossible? He’d had sex earlier today. It’s possible he wasn’t thinking at full capacity.

  Damn it.

  “Griffin, I’m sorry. I feel awful about having manipulated you. It was a nasty, underhanded thing to do.” Macy was walking toward him now, but he didn’t want her too near, where he could forget what he was supposed to be pissed off about.

  He took a step back away from her. “What do you mean you manipulated me?”

  She sighed, and her pained expression grew even darker. “I didn’t come at all during that weekend in Vegas.”

  Whoa! He stopped his pacing, and the air left his lungs.

  “You really were faking it? The entire time?”

  She nodded. “It was an act,” she said, her gaze focused on the shiny wood floors.

  “But why?” Though the truth was lurking in the dark recesses of his brain, trying to find its way out.

  “I wanted to keep you from being mentally sharp during the presentation.”

  “That’s…diabolical.” Big word for a guy who’d just been dumbed down by sex, but he couldn’t think of a better way to describe it.

  “If it’s any consolation, it was really hard not to come with you. I definitely got the bad end of the deal.”

  “It’s not any consolation, not when I thought we were two adults being upfront with each other.” He grabbed his shirt and tugged it over his head, shoved his feet into his shoes and headed for the door.

  But damn it, this was his apartment. She was the one who needed to get the hell out.

  The more he thought about what she’d done, the more pissed off he got. His thoughts were emerging from the molasses, and now he understood exactly what was going on here. He’d been had.

  Macy came toward him again, but he held up a hand to stop her.

  “I’m very, very sorry,” she said. “It was a crappy thing to do.”

  “You need to leave now,” he said as he opened the door. “I’ll call you a cab. You can wait in the lobby of the building until it comes.”

  She made a weird gasping sound, and he realized she was crying. She picked up her purse from the coffee table, then cast a pitiful look in his direction. He almost wanted to take her in his arms, but how could he?

  When would he know when she was being fake and when she was being real? Had he fallen in love with a real woman, or an act?

  “Could we please talk about this first?” she said. “It’s more complicated than it sounds.”

  “We’re finished talking. I don’t know when you’re lying and when you’re telling the truth, anyway.” Macy wasn’t the woman he thought he’d fallen in love with at all.

  He’d fallen for her act. Like a fool.

  He could fall once, but not twice. “If you want the damn promotion so badly,” he said, “You can have it.”

  16

  MACY FELT like a small, slimy toad. She’d known telling Griffin the truth would suck, but she hadn’t anticipated just how awful she’d feel once he knew about her betrayal.

  She’d taken a cab home, then tried for hours to sleep, but whenever she dozed off, she was awakened by nightmares. She got up early Sunday morning and tossed the sheet back on the bed, which mocked her with its emptiness now.

  Where she and Griffin had made love less than a day ago, she’d now get to while away her days and nights alone, left with nothing but cold memories of a relationship she’d let herself get too invested in. A relationship that had been doomed from the start.

  She spent the morning cleaning the apartment with her old Guns N’ Roses CDs turned up extra loud in the hope that the screeching heavy metal would drown out her thoughts. It only occasionally worked.

  Sometime around noon, Carson had called, telling her another trip to Vegas had come up for tomorrow, and would she like to come since it involved the art side of the project? While her stomach had lurched at the thought of going back to work, she’d jumped at the chance to get the hell away from the office.

  He said Griffin wouldn’t need to make this trip, and panic swirled in her belly. What if he was planning to quit because of her? She wouldn’t be able to live with herself.

  Once Macy had cleaned the apartment within an inch of its life, she went to the bathroom and took a shower, lingering too long under the hot water. Then she dressed in a pair of black yoga pants and a stretchy white tank top, pulled her wet hair back into a ponytail, and went to the kitchen to look for chocolate.

  All she found were some old, grayish-looking chocolate chips in the refrigerator, a box of See’s Candies left over from Christmas with only the hated pieces of toffee left in the box and a disgusting chocolate-flavored energy bar purchased over a year ago during one of her misguided healthy-eating campaigns.

  “Damn it,” she muttered.

  She wished like crazy she hadn’t estranged herself from her best friend. Sure, she had other friends, but she’d always turned to Lauren when she needed a shoulder to cry on or a chocolate delivery person.

  And really, if her love life and her work life were going to be royally screwed, she needed to fix something. She needed to make amends with Lauren.

  But the thought of doing so left her wanting chocolate even more. She went to the fridge and pulled out the bag of chocolate chips, made a point not to look at the best-if-used-by date on the package, and flopped down on the couch.

  Fifteen minutes later, the bag was empty, and she’d worked up the nerve to pick up the phone.

  She grabbed the receiver from the end table and dialed Lauren’s number. As the phone rang, her stomach churned. After four rings, the answering machine picked up, and Macy debated whether to hang up or leave a message. She’d just hang up, except Lauren almost always screened her calls.

  Then she heard the beep. “Lauren, it’s me, Macy. Please pick up the phone if you’re there. I owe you an apology, and we need to talk. Lauren? Please? I know you’re there reading the paper—”

  “Talk,” Lauren said, her voice on the line now.

  “I’m sorry. Can we be friends again? I need a friend right now.”

  Lauren made an offended noise. “So this call is all about you needing a friend right now? It had nothing to do with me needing a friend to stand by me when I’m trying to ward off attention from a guy I don’t want? It has nothing to do with me needing a friend not to give out my phone number to said guy?”

  “I’m so sorry. I was a lousy friend. I should have been on your side and not Carson’s.” Macy peered into the yellow chocolate chip bag, hoping she’d overlooked a few.

  “Give me one good reason why I should forgive you?”

  “I’ll pay to have your number changed?”

  “I don’t want to have my number changed. I want Carson to stop calling me.”

  “I’ll talk to him and make sure there are no more calls. I just thought—”

  “I know, I know, you just thought I need to get hooked up with some guy so I can get married and become a breeder and live happily ever after.”

  “That’s not it. I just thought you two were good together.”

  “Spare me the fairy-tale endings, okay? I’m happy alone, and that’s the way I want it. If we’re going to be friends, you have to accept that.”

  “I promise, no more meddling in your love life.” Though Macy really didn’t get it. While she was always looking for the right guy and never finding him, Lauren was so uninterested in guys, they couldn’t help but be interested in her. M
acy needed to learn from that disinterested aloofness.

  But no, she’d tried before, and she’d failed. She couldn’t hide the fact that she loved men, loved being in love, and wanted to find a guy who would love her.

  The thought nearly made her lose her chocolate chips. She’d found that guy and she’d screwed him royally. She had no one to blame for her unhappiness but herself. She’d gotten so caught up in stupid images, she’d never stopped to consider the true nature of their relationship.

  “So what happened that’s brought you groveling back to me?” Lauren asked, her tone less hostile now.

  “I ruined everything with Griffin…. I told him about my efforts to dumb him down with sex, right after he told me he loved me.”

  “Oh, dear God. Why do you have to be so honest?”

  “He was furious. I think he might turn down the promotion now just so he’ll never have to work with me again. Or maybe not. I’m not sure.”

  “Turn it down for you?”

  “Because of me.” Macy filled Lauren in on all the details of the past week. When she finished, Lauren was silent.

  “Are you that shocked by my failure?”

  “No, I’m just…well, I’m sorry. I gave you bad advice.”

  “You have nothing to be sorry for. You were just trying to help me get the promotion, and you couldn’t have known Griffin would fall in love with me.”

  Her throat tightened up at those last words, and tears stung her eyes. She’d never minded playing games casually—playing the clueless ingenue, letting guys believe whatever they wanted about her if it meant having the upper hand.

  Until now. She’d never played with such high stakes before, and she’d never once wanted to stomp on any guy’s emotions. Especially not Griffin’s. Not after she’d gotten to know him.

  “But in a way this is good news, right? Because if he doesn’t want the promotion, that means you can take it.”

  Macy sighed. She’d tried to imagine that as a bright side, but it didn’t work that way. “I’ve already told the senior partners I didn’t want the job. I couldn’t take the promotion now if it’s offered to me. I’d always know I got it using underhanded means—and that I’d gotten it by stepping on other people. I couldn’t live with that.”