Ambition 2: A Dark Billionaire Romance (Driven)

by Landish, Lauren

  “Eyes on me. It’s time to work, got it? Don’t you so much as look at Tabby until we’re done.” It was actually cool, seeing her get strict like that. If Sophie ever got tired being a super friend, homemaker, vigilante and whatever else, she could always have been a damn good drill instructor.

  "I understand," Patrick replied. "I'll do my best."

  "You better," Sophie said, “Mark’s not the only one who can kick your ass.”

  "Where is he, anyway?"

  “Shopping for a few things,” Sophie replied. "He'll be back by dinner time. Now, get changed, be back here in five minutes for warm up."

  Patrick nodded and disappeared, never once looking at me again. Sophie turned to me with a grin. "I think I'm going to like this workout. Now, do me a favor."

  "What?" I asked, my nervousness evaporating under the light of Sophie's smile. Seriously, having her around makes life so much easier.

  “Do you thing, but don’t tease him, I don't need him dropping something on his toes."

  "So no hip extensions or toe touch deadlifts?" I asked.

  Sophie rolled her eyes and shook her head. "No, and they're called Romanian deadlifts.”

  While I’ll admit I enjoyed blowing off a little steam, not all of that came from what I was actually doing. Instead, there was a certain sadistic pleasure that came from watching Sophie put Patrick through his paces. She wasn't mean, and after that first time, she never even had to raise her voice except in encouragement.

  But she wouldn't let him slack off, she wouldn't let him stop. I was amazed as she knew exactly what psychological buttons to push, how to get him to keep going. She twice stopped the to check his back, peeling off his tank top the second time to allow her to keep track. His stitches had come out nicely, but still the skin wasn't fully healed. He had a bright pink line that blazed against his skin as he worked, getting darker and darker as his skin flushed. Because of his new work and the need to hide his wound, he hadn't gotten any sun on his upper body in weeks. Trust me, if you ever want to prove that a man is of Irish heritage, just have him stay covered up in an office job for two weeks. Actually, it’d probably been more than that, considering how long Patrick had been working at city hall.

  Despite his paleness, he was so handsome it made my throat close up. I kept losing count during my own exercises, and finally just went until my muscles ached, before I said screw it and sat back for another half hour and watched.

  Finally, Sophie called an end to it, and Patrick collapsed onto the mats, dry heaving into the convenient plastic bucket Sophie kept on hand for just such purposes. "You did good. Next week, we can really begin."

  Patrick nodded dumbly, unable to form words he was still sucking air so hard. Sophie came over to me and leaned in. "He did do well. Even if he did keep looking over to you."

  "Did not."

  Sophie looked at me, smirking, and nodded. "Just in the tired bits, when he needed a little extra motivation, I saw his eyes flicker over. You want to get out of here and get washed up for dinner?"

  "Sure. Thanks, Sophie."

  She shook her head lightly. "Don't thank me, thank Mark. I'd have put a bat upside his head, you know."

  I laughed lightly and patted her on the cheek. "I know. That's what makes you so awesome. All right, I'll get washed up for dinner."

  After a quick shower, I came into the dining area to find Mark serving up plates. "I heard Patrick survived," he said with a smile as he used a spatula to serve up large squares of lasagna onto our plates. "What did you think?"

  "He's got a long way to go," I replied, "but like you said, he's got guts. He never gave up."

  Mark heard the tone of my voice, and smiled. "I see. Well, have a seat, everything should be ready soon."

  After such an intense workout, Mark had been generous with dinner, making sure that Patrick got the largest serving of food. Like a couple of nervous parents, Mark seated Patrick across from me, with Sophie on one side of me and Mark on the other like a pair of guardian sentinels. Conversation was light, and avoided both business and politics. In fact, for a lot of it Sophie asked Patrick about his childhood, and how he'd grown up in the city orphanage system.

  "Well, Tabby knows most of it, so I'm sure you guys do too," Patrick said after setting his fork down. "But here's a story that you guys don't know yet. I was thirteen, and had just transferred from the Patterson Youth Home to Goldwell Hall, which is where they house the junior high school and high school aged kids. It's a rougher place than Patterson, where there was always the hope for some of the kids of at least getting foster parents. By the time you reached Goldwell, you were pretty much assured of only staying a ward of the state for the next five years. Nine out of ten kids who left Goldwell before eighteen did so because they were doing stints up at Juvenile Corrections."

  "Sounds horrible," I said, taking a deep drink of my lemon water. After a large glass of fruit juice to make sure my body had some sugar after my workout, I always shifted to lemon water. "How did you survive?"

  "At first I really struggled," Patrick admitted. "A lot of the kids fell into gangs, and as you know I did as well, but never as hard as some of the other guys did. Part of it was because of Leon."

  "Who was Leon?" Sophie asked, intrigued. She’d obviously already forgiven him, and I could tell she could see in him the same qualities I did. Twice she'd given me a sideways glance during dinner, smirking around her fork. She liked him, and was giving me her opinion again.

  "Leon was the boxing instructor who came by twice a week to pick up guys and take them over to a dingy local place. I tagged along the first time mainly because I had just gotten my ass kicked by a couple of seventeen year olds who were the floor bosses for my area, and I wanted to at least put up a fight. Leon could see a lot of anger and rage in me and felt sorry for me I guess."

  "Did he ever put you in the ring?" Mark asked.

  Patrick leaned back and laughed, long and hard. "Yeah, but he wasn't happy about it. I may have had a lot of anger back then, but I had the technique of a gorilla. Put my head down and start swinging for the fences,” Patrick said laughing.

  We all had a chuckle, and by the end, I was feeling better. Mark and Sophie glanced at the two of us, and Mark put his hands on the table. "Well, I think I'll go ahead and clear the table. Sophie, if you'd help me, I think Tabby can walk our guest to his car?"

  Sophie and I nodded, and Patrick thanked Mark before following me out to the front door. We didn't say anything, but there wasn't a need to. Pausing at the open door, Patrick turned to me. "Tabby....."

  "It's okay," I replied, putting my arms around his neck. "I know you were just saying what you felt."

  "I've been in pain for days, worse than getting shot," he murmured, looking into my eyes. "I kept waking up at night, thinking I'd never have you in my arms again."

  "I've missed you too," I told him. His arms went to my waist, pulling me closer, and we kissed, healing the pain in our minds and in our hearts.

  There, on the entry to my house, I gave him entry to my heart, saying with my lips and my hands what my voice just couldn’t quite do. Not yet. He held me, and we spoke a silent language to each other that was beyond time, beyond anything except that of the heart.

  Chapter 7

  Patrick

  For the rest of the month, things fell into a good regularity. I would have said comfortable, but the training program that I’ve been on was anything but comfortable. I didn't even have the benefit of using the clearly awesome bathtub that Sophie, Mark and Tabby could use, restricted to only using the shower after my workouts when they invited me to eat with them. I measured time not so much by the calendar, but by the size of Sophie's belly, which went from flat to definitely starting to bulge slightly. I wondered just how big she would get before finally having her baby.

  The month was basic training, plain and simple, and I loved it. Sounds weird, but I did. Four days a week, Sophie put me through workouts that left me aching and nearly staggering b
ack out to my car every time. At least once a week, but often twice, either she or Mark would lead me through martial arts practice. I thought I knew a good amount after my years of boxing and the things I'd picked up in the streets. That notion was quickly put to rest after having a woman nearly five months pregnant hand me my ass. Admittedly we weren't going full strength, but still.

  Working with Mark was a lot rougher, a lot more full contact, but also more fun. I didn't have to hold back with him at all, and in fact I couldn't. If I did, I was more than likely to end up twisted into a very uncomfortable position with my toe trying to be jammed into my ear. I think Mark enjoyed it too, since I was big enough he could go harder than he did with Sophie.

  Best of all was that all this training with Mark and Sophie was that I was able to spend time with Tabby. There was a brimming sexual tension between us, but for both of us, it was an undercurrent. Part of it was that I was so damn physically exhausted that I doubt I could have had sex even if Tabby had danced naked through the gym after a workout. Instead, we found more and more in common, which was unexpected considering the difference in our backgrounds.

  I think the reason we connected was that we both were orphans in our own way. Towards the end of the month Tabby told me about the way her parents had reacted to her sexuality, basically making her emotionally an orphan from her teen years. Afterwards I had excused myself to go vent my frustration, Sophie finding me twenty minutes later in the gym, beating the hell out of a punching bag. "At least you're doing better than Mark last time he got this pissed off," she noted. "He didn't wear any gloves."

  I ignored her, pounding away until the tide of my anger subsided. "Why?"

  "Why what?" Sophie replied. "Are you asking why he didn't wear gloves? Why I'm here? Why the Spartans are only two and two despite having one of the better defenses in the league this year?"

  "You know what I mean," I replied, peeling the gloves off and throwing them across the gym in a final spurt of defiance. "That someone like Tabby is left feeling as alone and abandoned as I did? Fuck, I can at least understand if not like my feelings, my mother was a drug addicted fuckup. But to do that to your own flesh and blood while they live with you? How could someone do something so shitty to someone so adorable?”

  "Welcome to the question I've asked myself for most of the time I've known her," Sophie replied, still leaning against the wall with a bemused expression on her face. She did that a lot when she was in her teaching mode, like the answer was clear, but she was still taking the time to explain it anyway since I wasn't connecting the dots. "I still don't have an answer, but I don't think one exists. It doesn't stop me from trying to answer it though. You know what I do instead?"

  "What?" I asked, wiping my face with a small towel that had been hanging on the wall. I realized it was one of Sophie's and folded it up. "Sorry. I'll wash it."

  She waved it off. "Forget it. But what I do is, I love Tabby for who she is. If you want my advice, do the same. Not that you aren’t already. But her own family was stupid, and she can’t take more heart break.”

  I nodded firmly, which said all that needed to be said.

  Sophie left, and I followed back into the main house after putting Sophie's now dirty towel into the laundry. Tabby met me near her room, taking my hand. "I didn't mean to upset you," she said, giggling when I pulled her into a hug. "Although I guess you weren't that upset."

  "Never could I be upset with you," I answered, inhaling her clean, subtle scent. She didn't wear perfume, she didn't need it. "I just don't want to see you in pain. Ever."

  Tabby let go of me and stood back. "You know you can't prevent that. Nobody can."

  "Doesn't mean I don't want to try," I said. "I just want to see you happy, no matter what."

  Tabby stood up on her tiptoes, and kissed me. I was surprised at first, then kissed back, her lips and tongue soft and wonderful. I wanted her so badly, but I was already exhausted even before my burst on the bag. Despite her body being pressed against me, despite the soft swell of her breasts against my chest and her hips pressed against me, my body wouldn't respond. I was so damn exhausted. We parted, and she chuckled when she saw my hangdog expression. "Don't worry about it," she said, rubbing her hands over my chest. "First of all, you're drained from today. You've been going through so much stress physically and mentally I'm surprised you even think of sex with me."

  "I dream of you more often than you'd believe," I said honestly. I shook my head, realizing how I sounded. "Wow, that was creepy. Not over obsessed stalker type at all."

  Tabby laughed and kissed my chest through my shirt. "That's okay, I know that what's here is clean enough. Listen, let me talk to Sophie and Mark. You don't have anything late night tomorrow, do you?"

  "No, why?" I asked, a thread of hopeful anticipation making my pulse quicken. Or maybe it was just feeling Tabby so close to me in the privacy of the hallway, knowing her bedroom was so close I could imagine it.

  "Because tomorrow is date night, just you and me Councilman McCaffery. And not here at Mount Zion, either. We've had enough chaperoned dinners with the rest of my real family. We're going to go to a perfectly normal restaurant down in your district, and have a perfectly normal, public date night. If it gets out that you've got a girlfriend, I'm more than happy to be known as that too."

  It was the first time Tabby had ever brought up the public potential of our relationship, and it touched me. "I'd enjoy that very much. Although the cynical part of me, or perhaps the side that's just gotten used to being a politician, is thinking about the potential press situation with that."

  "Oh, it can be spun the right way, very romantic like," Tabby chuckled, kissing my neck again. She knew just where to kiss, and I felt a surge between my legs that I didn't think I'd have the energy for. It was good to have this side of her back. “We just need to keep a good public relations person on speed dial."

  I could barely muster a reply as Tabby's tongue traced my neck and jaw, sending arrows of arousal through my body and straight to my cock, which surged to full hardness in my pants. She giggled when she felt it pressing against her hip, and reached down with her right hand to cup me, rubbing slowly. "My, you just might be Superman," she cooed, looking up at me. "Because your recovery is amazing, and I'm definitely feeling a man of steel."

  "That's your doing," I said, biting my lip as she squeezed and massaged. "You're so sexy you could probably bring someone back from the dead with a kiss." My god, I sounded so corny with that one, but Tabby didn’t seem to bat an eye at it.

  "Well then, tomorrow maybe you can show me how far back from the dead you are," she said, letting go of my cock and kissing me again. I was glad, because if she hadn't, I most likely would have come in my pants, she was that arousing.

  I think my hardon finally relaxed somewhere near downtown, but I wasn't sure.

  * * *

  The next morning, I was in my office when Gwen came in. "You're going to love this."

  "What?" I asked, looking up from the document I'd been reading, a statement on recent street repairs in Filmore Heights. I had to grin as some of the damage caused was the side effect of my earlier activities. Despite the price tag, after a month of training with Sophie and Mark I was feeling the itch to get back out there.

  "You've been sued," Gwen replied, handing me the file. "I just had to sign with the process server."

  "You're fucking kidding me," I replied, taking the folder. I opened it up, feeling my blood pressure rise. "You've got to be goddamn kidding me."

  "Nope," Gwen said. "They're saying that you and MJT used illegal means when you divvied out the contract on the HVAC for the first center."

  I could feel my rage building, and nodded. "Thanks. Let me give MJT a call, see if they have a legal team working on this already."

  "You want me to handle it, Boss?" Gwen asked. "Vanessa and I know some law groups we could get ahold of if we need."

  I shook my head. Law offices were the last thing I needed involved with all
of this. There were just too many potential problems with that, considering what MJT really was. "I'll talk with Miss Williams directly, but thanks. Can you clear my schedule for the rest of the day?"

  "Up until three. You've got your meeting with the Mayor then."

  I'd have to take it. "Thanks."

  I dialed up Tabby, indigestion growing in my stomach. She picked up, and I could hear it in her voice. It was the shakiness, the insecurity that I hated to hear. "I take it you got the paperwork too?" I started, sighing.

  "Yeah," she replied, still shaky, but handling it. "Pressman Contractors is suing MJT with you as a co-defendant. Fucking Pressman."

  "I know," I said. "Tabby, I know this is a hard thing to ask, but does MJT have a law firm it works with that can handle this?"

  "I'll have to talk with Marcus, although most likely Sophie will know more," she replied. I noticed she did that whenever she was referring to Mark in terms of business. Any other time, he was Mark to her. "But I think so. They might not be in the city, but I'll have to check. Patrick, you know this has nothing to do with the contract."

  "I know. We can talk about it tonight, if you want. Although I guess this ruins our date, doesn't it?" I said, shaking my head.

  Tabby's answer spoke to me about her strength and how hard she was trying to get past her traumas. "Fuck no. You and I are going out, you're going to take me to some decent little eatery in the your neighborhood, and I promise you we're going to have a good time. We'll see what happens after that."

  "I can dig it," I replied. "Listen, we'll get this taken care of. I know that."

  "Okay," Tabby said, her mood brightening. "So, any plans for tonight?"

  "Well, my neighborhood isn't exactly known for the high quality of its restaurants, so don't expect five star steakhouses," I laughed, "but yeah. What do you think of Cuban food?"