by J. S. Cooper
That Night with My Boss
J. S. Cooper & Helen Cooper
Thank you for reading That Night with My Boss.
This is the prequel novella to the full-length book Falling For My Boss.
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About That Night With My Boss
Can one passionate night change everything?
"Scott Taylor is a Sex God." That's what Elizabeth Jeffries told her best friend Lacey, the moment after she laid eyes on him. It wasn't just because his azure blue eyes seemed to pierce her soul, or the fact that his dark silky hair drew her fingers in like a magnet. It wasn't even that he smelled like sex on the beach on a cool balmy night or the fact that when he grabbed her around the waist and drew her to him, she lost her breath. No, those weren't the only reasons why Elizabeth called Scott a sex god. They weren't even the reasons why she decided to spend the night with him. Or the reasons why she decided to accept the one job that would change her life and complicate everything they had.
No, the fact that Scott Taylor was a Sex God was the reason she was drawn to him, but the reason why she stayed was a whole lot more complicated.
Prologue
“Do you want to know what I’m going to do to you?” His voice was soft as he whispered into my ear. My legs shook and my skin tingled at the feel of his warm breath. He didn’t wait for me to answer before he continued talking slowly in a seductive voice. “I’m going to tie you up so you can’t move, then I’m going to spray whipped cream on your breasts and then I’m going to—”
“Scott!” I cut him off, my face going red as Alice and Liv looked at me with confused and interested expressions from across the room, where they were looking at a photo album from their high school days.
“Yes, Elizabeth?” He stepped back and smiled at me innocently.
“Stop it¸” I hissed at him when I saw his sister, Liv, and her best friend, Alice, looking away.
“Stop what?” he said with a smirk and ran his finger across my lips gently.
“You can’t do that.” My eyes flashed at him as I looked at the two girls again. What was he playing at? Was he going to expose me and the fact that we’d already met? Heat spread across my face and warmed my belly as I stood there in front of him. Oh¸ God, he wasn’t going to tell them about our shared past, was he?
“I think you’ll find I can do what I want,” he said casually and then leaned back down to whisper in my ear again. “And I think after I’ve sprayed the whipped cream on your breasts and down your stomach, you’ll be begging me to do what I’m thinking about doing next.”
“What’s that?” I swallowed hard, not believing I was allowing myself to question him. Like I even cared about what he was going to say. Like I wanted his lips on me. Again. I shook my head slightly, to remind myself that I certainly did not want his lips on me again. No sir. No thank you. I didn’t need to feel the incredibly hard and sensuous Scott Taylor sliding—
“Are you listening to me, Elizabeth?” He blew in my ear and I jumped back suddenly. “Or should I say, Eliza” —he paused and grinned widely— “Doolittle?”
“What do you want me to say, Scott?” I said, my tone rising as I was unable to stop myself from giving him the reaction I knew he wanted.
“I want you to say that when I fuck you the next time, you won’t be playing any games.”
“The next time?” My jaw dropped, both at the crudeness of his words and the fact that he thought we were going to get together again.
“Yeah.” He smiled and his blue eyes gazed into mine with an amused expression. “Only this time, you’ll be the one getting the shock of your life.”
Chapter One
“Sex on legs,” I mumbled to myself as I stared at the photo, my heart beating fast. The man, Scott Taylor, looked like he was about six-foot-two, with dark hair and dark navy-blue eyes. There was a five-o’clock shadow on his jawline and he was glaring into the camera, his lips twisted at the corners in a slight scowl. To say he was sexy was an understatement. This man, this Scott Taylor, was the picture of a perfect man. He looked absolutely gorgeous and I knew that the photo was affecting my decision of whether or not to take this particular job.
"Lacey, " I groaned into the phone. "They want me to dress up like a secretary and then go into his office and give him a lap dance. I just don’t know if I can do that." I blushed as I stared at his photo and I knew I was lying. I’d have no problem giving McHottiea lap dance—if he were my boyfriend, but he wasn’t my boyfriend. I didn’t even know him. He didn’t even know I existed. And he had no idea that his friends at work were trying to pull a sexy prank on him.
"No way, are you a stripper now?" my best friend, Lacey, asked in a shocked voice. "I thought you only did singing birthday-grams and stuff like that at your job?"
"We do." I sighed. "But my boss sometimes gets special requests and they pay more."
"How much more?"
"Like two hundred dollars," I said and I groaned again as I fell back on my bed and held Scott Taylor’s photo up in the air. "Is two hundred dollars worth losing my dignity over?" I asked Lacey, wishing that she were here in person to give me advice and shake me out of even considering taking on this job. The sad part was that the extra two hundred dollars wasn’t the draw; meeting Scott Taylor was.
"There aren't many things I wouldn't do for two hundred dollars," Lacey said and I laughed.
"When are you coming to visit me?" I asked her softly, trying not to sound like I was whining. Though I really was. It was miserable not having my best friend close to me.
"Soon," she said in a cheery voice. "Just as soon as I finish my first book."
"You can write here," I said. "And you can stay with me. Rent free."
"Eliza, I love you, but you can barely pay the rent. Imagine if we both got kicked out. Where would we go?"
"I miss you. I wish you would just move here already." I moaned into the phone. Lacey and I had been friends since we were four years old. We became best friends at seven and we sailed through high school and college together, joined at the hip. It was only after college ended that things went awry. I moved away to the city to pursue my lifelong dream of being an actress, and Lacey moved back home to write a book. Or rather I should say the book. The book was going to be a blockbuster. It was going to be so fabulous that every literary agent and publisher would be dying to get their hands on it. Then Lacey would become rich and famous and take care of us until we found husbands. The other plan was for me to star in a blockbuster movie alongside Bradley Cooper and become rich and famous and take care of her. So far, neither of our plans were working. Her book had ten pages and my acting career was non-existent, aside from the roles I played for ‘Candy Canes Birthday Grams’. Candy Canes was actually run by a man named Bob Johnson and he was about as sketchy as you would expect a fifty-five-year-old man with a big beard and a closet full of wife-beaters to be. I'd taken the job because I'd been desperate to make some money, but some of the assignments I'd been given recently were seeming shadier and shadier. However, this one was pushing the limit the most. What would it mean to give a lap dance to a stranger? Granted, it was a joke, but would it make me some sort of cheap hussy?
“What are you going to do, Eliza?” Lacey asked me eagerly and I knew that she loved my dilemma.
“You got the photo I sent you, right? Bob gave it to me to show me the client wasn’t some sketchy guy.”
“Yes, he’s hot. Super hot.” Lacey laughed. “You should go for it. I mean, how lucky are you to get paid two hundred dollars to meet him?”
“I’m doing more than meeting him. I’m pretending to be his new secretary then I have to give
him a lap dance in his office. Then his coworkers will burst into the room and say, ‘Surprise!’” I explained to Lacey. “I just don’t know if I’m going down some sort of slippery slope if I agree to this job.”
“Do it!” She giggled. “What’s the worst thing that can happen?”
“You’re a bad influence, Lacey.” I sat up and shook my head at the phone.
“That’s why you love me,” she said and I could picture her light brown eyes crinkling at the corners as she giggled.
“If I take the job, will you come visit? I can use the two hundred to pay for your ticket,” I said and ignored the stirring in my stomach that said that I should put the $200 in the bank.
“That sounds like a deal to me,” she agreed. “I can’t wait.”
“Neither can I,” I said softly, but I wasn’t talking about her visit.
***
“So what you going to do, Liz?” Bob’s eyebrows furrowed as he gazed at me with eager eyes. He was trying so hard to act as if he didn’t care if I said yes or no, but I knew that all he could think about was the money that he was potentially going to pocket. I figured he was getting 50% of whatever was being offered, which was dreadfully unfair, but what could I say or do? Not much, really.
“I’m not sure,” I said casually, though I was pretty sure I was going to take the job. I was hoping that by faking nonchalance, Bob would panic and offer me more money. At least that’s what the self-help book that I’d been reading had said to do when you wanted your boss to give you a raise: make them think that they were going to lose you (this only worked if you were a valued employee, which I hoped I was).
“You’re going to make two hundred dollars.” Bob’s squinty eyes were almost popping out of his face. I stifled a giggle as I saw the panic cross his face.
“Yeah, but two hundred isn’t much. Not worth losing my dignity over.” I was lying about the first part. Two hundred dollars was a lot to me, but I wasn’t going to let Bob keep $200 as well, not when I was the one pretending to be a stripper and having to shake my lady bits. I wasn’t going to be acting like a stripper for $200, not even if the guy looked like Scott Taylor.
“I thought you said you needed to make every extra penny that you could?” Bob looked at me suspiciously. I knew by the way his eyes narrowed that he was wondering if I was lying.
“I do, but I’m not so desperate that I’m willing to let all my standards go.”
“Three hundred, then,” he said with an annoyed expression.
“You’ve got a deal,” I said quickly, forgetting my qualms in a heartbeat. Three hundred would help to buy Lacey a plane ticket to come and visit me and would pay off all my monthly bills. I’d almost feel like I was rich, not having to worry about if my electricity was going to get cut off before payday. I knew I always had the option of getting a proper job, a 9-5 that would pay the bills slightly better, but I knew that a 9-5 would never give me the option to go to acting auditions, and without the auditions I’d never make it as an actress.
“What about two fifty,” Bob said and I shook my head at him, wondering if he’d lost brain cells in the bill cans stacked in his office.
“You already offered three hundred and I accepted,” I said adamantly. “And I want the cash before the job or I’m not doing it.”
“You can trust me, Elizabeth,” he said and frowned. “No need to be acting all hifalutin on me now. You know you’ll get your money.”
“I want a stack of twenties in my hand.” I pursed my lips and put my hands on my hips. “Without them, I don’t take this job.”
“I can get someone else to do it, you know,” he said in a huff, but we both knew he was lying. Bob only had three other employees: one was a middle-aged man who thought he was the second coming of Hulk Hogan, another lady was in her early seventies, and I was pretty sure she was the Hulk’s mom, and then there was Jessica. Jessica was eighteen and a bookworm. She used all the money she made to buy books. She wore big owl-like glasses, baggy jeans and had never been on a date. I knew that there was no way in hell that she’d take the job. And Bob was too cheap to hire anyone else.
“Oh, okay then.” I smiled sweetly. “If that’s what you want to do.” I turned around and walked towards the door. “I’m going to go get the clown costume for the birthday party this afternoon. See you later.”
“Wait.” Bob’s voice sounded panicked. “You can have the job with Scott Taylor. I offered it to you first. It wouldn’t be fair to you if I let Jessica have it.”
“Yeah, thanks, Bob.” I rolled my eyes before turning around to look at him. “Have my money ready tomorrow and we’ll have a deal.”
***
“Do you have my money, Bob?” I stood in the doorway to his office and raised an eyebrow. He was busy stuffing his face with a Big Mac and I was half worried he’d spent my money on the dollar menu at McDonalds as he had so many bags on his table.
“The bank could only give me two hundred,” he said as lettuce flew from his mouth. I looked away as my stomach rumbled and I tried not to laugh.
“Oh, did they run out of money?” I said and then looked back at him, my right hand on my hip.
“Yeah,” he nodded, his beady eyes looking at me carefully. “So I can only give you two hundred.”
“Well, I guess you’d better call Jessica and see if she can do the job.” I turned around. “Oh and join a bank that is able to provide its customers with more than two hundred dollars at a time.”
“Wait, wait.” Bob jumped up and I turned around again. “I spoke to the manager and he was able to get them to give me another hundred.”
“Uh huh,” I said, wondering what sort of fool he thought I was. “Where’s the money?” I held my hand out and waited. Bob looked annoyed and I could tell that he was trying to think of something else to say to keep some of the money.
“Here you go.” Bob handed me a stack of bills and I frowned when I looked down and saw a bunch of ones. What a jackass! “Now, you also have to sign a nondisclosure form.”
“What?” I narrowed my eyes. “Why?”
“You’re not allowed to tell your new boss that his friends hired you as a gag.”
“I’m not going to tell him,” I said, exasperated. “Well, not until the fake lap dance and the reveal when his friends burst into the room at the end of the day.”
“That’s kind of changed,” Bob said as he handed me a piece of paper and a pen. “Sign here.”
I looked at the contract and saw that the client’s name was “H Smith”. I frowned and then signed the paper quickly and then looked up at him. “What’s changed?”
“Well, you’re not going to reveal yourself right away.” He grabbed the paper back from me.
“Hmm, okay?” I frowned, not understanding.
“The guys who are hiring us think it will be even funnier if you work there for a week and give him the lap dance at an office meeting.”
“What?” My voice expressed my horror. “Are you joking?”
“No.” He grinned. “I told them that won’t be a problem.”
“I’m not working there for a week for three hundred dollars.” My voice rose. “You can’t make me do this, Bob.”
“You just signed the contract.” He shrugged and walked back to his desk. “And you took the money already.”
“For a one-day job, not a one-week job,” I protested. “This isn’t right, Bob, and it seems unfair to Scott Taylor as well. A week is a long time to fool someone and the whole ‘lap dance at an office meeting’ seems sleazy.”
“We don’t create the rules, we just follow them.”
“These aren’t rules, Bob. This is ridiculous.”
“I thought you said you were a good actress?” He paused and gave me a questioning look and I could feel my stomach curdling. “A good actress can take on any job.”
“I am a good actress,” I retorted back to him. I hated when he pressured me into these roles. In fact, I hated Bob. I knew I needed to get a new job, b
ut I’d just been too lazy to find one.
“Then take this job and shut up,” he said as he sat back down on his chair and started eating some French fries.
“You’re an asshole,” I said and was about to leave the office when he said the words that changed everything.
“You’ll get paid three hundred a day for a week,” he said and I froze. Was he being serious? Three hundred a day was a lot of dough.
“So I start on a Monday and end on a Friday?”
“You start next Monday,” he said as he took a large sip of Diet Coke (oh, the irony). “You’ll be in training as the secretary and flirting all week. The office party is on a Saturday. You’ll go to the party, give him a dirty lap dance and then his friends will come in and tell him ‘surprise’ and your job will be done.”
“Uhm, what’s a dirty lap dance?” I frowned, my heart racing. Everything seemed simple enough except for the dirty lap dance. What exactly were these guys hoping was going to happen, and why?
“A lap dance in a short skirt and a bikini top.”
“Are you joking?” I glared at him. “Bikini top?”
“Pretend you’re acting in Dreamgirls with Elizabeth Berkeley.” He paused from eating and I watched as his eyes glazed over. “Maybe you should even watch that movie for some tips.” He swallowed hard as he daydreamed. “Watch how she swings her hips when she’s in the casino. And then when she bends back and she rubs her titties in his face and he’s motor-boating. Hmm.”
“Bob!” I shouted, feeling sick to my stomach. “Are you out of your mind?”
“Oops, I got carried away.” He looked at me guiltily. “Sorry.”
“Uh huh,” I muttered, feeling like I needed a shower.
“Just watch some movies, learn the moves and show up on Monday and do your job,” he said and then opened a file. “We have some birthday parties coming up this weekend. Do you think you’ll be able to dress up as an elephant on Saturday?”
“An elephant?” I shook my head. “No.”
