by May Sage
Scrooge McFuck
May Sage
Edited by
Lisa Bing
Edited by
Tracy Vincent
Contents
1. Piper
2. Bennet
3. Piper
4. Bennet
5. Piper
6. Bennet
7. Bennet
8. Piper
9. Bennet
10. Piper
11. Piper
12. Bennet
13. Bennet
14. Piper
15. Bennet
16. Piper
17. Bennet
18. Piper
19. Bennet
20. Piper
21. Bennet
22. Piper
23. Bennet
Note from May
May’s Pack
This book is dedicated to J. A. Armitage’s Autocorrect.
Piper
“Yes, yes, oh yessss!”
The soundtrack was distracting to say the least but after sixteen weeks planted behind the dark mahogany desk in front of the CEO’s office, Piper was well trained in the art of ignoring illicit play by play, so she carried on typing a polite reply to the charity her boss, Bennet McFinnley, was sponsoring this quarter. Charity of her choosing, needless to say.
Yes, he was quite delighted to relieve himself of a fair chunk of cash, for the sake of his taxes and his image. No, he wouldn’t attend their gala or visit the sick children his money was helping – under no circumstances. Never, ever.
This wasn’t how Ben McFuck rolled.
“Just there baby, that’s it, harder!”
And while I appreciate the invitation… she carried on.
“Put it in my ass, Bennie. Please, fuck it hard.”
Piper’s fingers stilled over the keyboard, and she lifted her head, eyes darting towards the door.
Really? Did the guy actually believe those shrieks? It sounded like the girl had been practicing watching bad porn. In German.
She didn’t doubt that her boss could satisfy a woman – the way he moved, his confidence, his presence suggested as much – but Come. On.
Piper considered her option for a second, and resolved to do the one thing that would allow her to efficiently carry on with her tasks at this point; she grabbed her earphones and played her last track as loud as possible.
Fifteen minutes later, she hurriedly put it away as the corner of her eyes caught a movement: the handle of her boss’s door was being pulled down.
She knew what McFuck thought about unprofessional behavior in the office – well, anyone’s but his, in any case. Screwing his Stepford Girlfriend every other day was okay, but listening to Imagine Dragons on the clock? Big no-no, although no one ever made it to their floor uninvited.
Piper lifted her head from her handbag just in time to see the said girlfriend shoot her a smug smile, before stalking away, looking like the cat who’d eaten the canary. And the cream. She probably had, on the second score.
A minute later, Bennet McFinnley came out of his sex den, otherwise known as his office, looking as unperturbed and unruffled as ever.
Dark hair, always perfectly combed back, eyes the exact color of maple syrup, and that mouth she’d stared at dumbly for five whole minutes when he’d interviewed her to replace his PA three months ago.
Somehow, she got the job – more than likely, because no one else was desperate enough to apply.
Piper didn’t have the luxury of a choice; she’d barely made ends meet by herself before, and she had considered all sorts of unappealing options, like downscaling from her already cramped apartment to somewhere even worse, or taking another job, on top of the fifty hours she already packed in every week.
She hadn’t even let herself think it through, sending an email to register her interest immediately after she received news that the position of executive assistant had opened, and that their CEO would consider any administrative employee with over five years of experience in the firm.
Piper had worked with McFinnley Investments for so long she couldn’t recall a time before she’d started; the Founder, Chairman and former CEO, McFuck’s father, had been a friend of her dad’s, and he’d given her a part time job as a receptionist the summer before her first year of college.
The plan had been to finish her MBA, then climb her way up, learn the ropes and earn her place as an advisor, but life had happened – quite literally. She had a complicated pregnancy at twenty-three, and the doctor recommended cutting out everything that she found stressful.
That meant cutting out the parents who believed she should have had an abortion because John wasn’t whom they’d envisioned as a son-in-law – although, as it turned out, they’d been right about John – and cutting out school, too, because apparently, leaving to throw up every half hour was frowned upon. Strangely though, she hadn’t needed to cut out the job. It had been an extremely welcome surprise when Arthur McFinnley told her she was permitted to take as much time off on maternity leave as she needed to – he’d given her the benefit packages of full-time employees, and supported her better than any other friend or member of her family had before or since.
Twelve months later, when Piper returned to work, rounder, fuller, and exhausted as hell, everything about the firm had changed, because Arthur had retired, leaving his son in charge.
Until she started working as his assistant, Piper never had to deal with Ben McFuck, thankfully, but she’d heard the rumors – none of which were flattering. Still, she took the job; it had landed on her lap bang-on six months after John disappeared with all their savings and no word. By that time, she was running on empty, with an adorable little thing called Maya in tow.
The new job offered quite literally four times her previous salary, and all her worries dissolved the first time it hit her account.
Well, all of her former worries, in any case. New ones materialized themselves in the form of a rude, entitled, womanizing ass she called a boss. Damn if the apple couldn’t have fallen further from the tree.
But each time she wanted to snap and say something she would regret, she either remembered the little nest egg sitting in her bank, in case Maya got sick, or the fact that the man who’d fathered the asshole in front of her had been the kindest, most compassionate human being she’d ever encountered. She owed him, and that meant playing nice with Ben McFuck – or as he’d recently been re-baptized by Maya, after Piper confessed to some of his actions: Ebenezer McFinnley.
She wasn’t sure which name she preferred; both certainly fit.
It was the second of December, and their floor looked just as clinically clean and sparse as usual. No decoration had been, or would be, allowed in his sight; she was pretty sure she’d heard him growl when she suggested getting a little tree for the entryway the previous day. Which admittedly, had been amusing - and also expected.
“Ms. Stone, I’ve just gone over my schedule and I see next to no appointments in three weeks.”
Piper stared at him opened mouthed, half waiting for the punchline.
As he visibly hadn’t paid attention to the calendar, she informed him, “I haven’t scheduled anything from the twenty-six of December to the first of January, sir. We’re on holidays.”
It wasn’t often that the deep amber eyes bore into hers, but they did now. She had to admit, she squirmed a little. Dammit, even recalling that she had seen him naked, and covered in white powder twenty years prior, when he’d caught chicken pox, didn’t work. The man was king in the intimidating department.
He didn’t remember her from their childhood; and why should he? She was five years his junior – at twelve and seven,
their age gap might as well have been a century.
“Last time I checked, Ms. Stone, I was the CEO of this firm – not you. And I’m not aware that either of us have requested a holiday for that week.”
Her mouth hanged open, and closed again.
He was right; she hadn’t requested it, because her old department, and the rest of the company, to her knowledge, had been entirely closed from Christmas to the end of the year.
“It’s Christmas,” she breathed out weakly, her tone begging.
She couldn’t leave Maya with some babysitter that week. She just couldn’t. It was already the first year she’d spend without her father, dammit.
“And any holidays need to be requested and approved by your direct superior a month before, Ms. Stone. Which means I will see you every single day, except for the weekends, from the twenty-seventh, until your next arranged leave,” he said, his lips baring teeth that looked too white and pointy right then.
Before she had the chance to come up with a suitable answer, he was gone.
Perhaps she could mix and match. Scrooge McFuck had a nice ring to it.
Bennet
Bennet’s soundless sleep was interrupted by his alarm at six thirty; he immediately rolled over and got to his feet. Some people loved to stay in bed, holding on to their dreams just a little longer. Ben didn’t need to; he lived them out every day.
Or so he told himself.
Leaving the warm, exquisite, naked body of his girlfriend under the covers of his California King bed, he went to his en-suite, and entered the massive shower that could easily fit a cheerleading squad. He would know; he’d done it in his wild days, post-Miriam.
He immediately switched gears, dismissing all thoughts of his ex, like he did every time his mind went back to the break-up he still didn’t understand.
They’d been perfect together; they’d made sense. If she hadn’t walked away, he would have put a ring on her finger by now, he was certain of it.
It didn’t matter. He had Jennifer now, and they worked just fine. The woman could have been a supermodel, or an actress, but she’d opted to use her brains rather than her body, and she was a journalist. He’d traded in for a better model, that was all.
Although he was pretty certain he’d convinced himself, he arrived at the office in a foul mood. Damn Miriam.
He didn’t think of her very often – it had been five years since she'd left him – but when he did, shaking the annoyance was no easy feat.
He was over it; he didn’t want her back in any case. The problem was that he still didn't understand it, and his analytical mind demanded an explanation; closure perhaps. And if that made him sound like a girl, so be it.
“You’d better have Reginald’s answer ready,” was the growl he used to greet his annoyingly perfect personal assistant.
She was always on time, she always wore the right thing, remembered peoples’ names, and more infuriatingly, she always sent him that smile. The one that said, “I’m going to pour arsenic all over your damn bagel someday, but in the meantime, you pay the bills.” So professional he couldn’t fault it, yet fake as fuck; they both knew it. He’d seen her real smile often enough; she bestowed it upon delivery boys, other assistants, various executives - basically, anyone but him.
Ben wished he could have found a real flaw, a reason to fire her, but he knew a mere excuse wouldn’t have worked – not when his father had stepped in and made him employ her in the first place.
That had been a hard pill to swallow: the reminder that while he was CEO of McFinnley Investments, his dad still held a majority share and a seat on the board of directors that rarely intervened. Worse, yet: it rankled him to admit that his father had been right.
He hadn’t wanted her because she was a society girl, one of those whose actual job consisted of finding the right husband and having the right nails, the right hairstyle. One look at her last name brought back memories of her in her debutante attire, and that had been it, as far as he was concerned; he'd been ready to send her packing, but Arthur McFinnley pulled strings, forced his hand, and now he was saddled with the best damn assistant he’d ever had. Chosen by his dad.
See? Annoying.
“He emailed last night, sir,” she replied evenly, like he hadn’t just jumped at her throat for something that had nothing to do with her.
If Reginald Sanders had dragged his feet, there was nothing that Piper could have done at eight thirty on a Monday morning, and it wouldn’t have been her fault – he knew that she’d sent him an urgent reminder, as she’d made sure to copy him on it.
Damn perfect robot.
That was when he should have said something along the line of thank you, or well done, or even a belated good morning.
“Right. Get some coffee going, then.”
Yes, he was an ass. But she got paid plenty to make it worth it, as her wardrobe showed.
The woman was always wrapped in professional well cut clothes, showing just the right amount of skin and curves. He and his credit card had accompanied Miriam on enough shopping trips to know that those garbs cost a fortune. Then again, mommy and daddy probably helped Piper Stone.
She was the daughter of one of his father’s best friends, something they’d never discussed. He remembered enough about Fredrick Stone to have zero doubt that he spoiled his little princess rotten.
That was why he preferred the likes of Jennifer. At least, she hadn’t been born with a proverbial silver spoon in her mouth. She’d worked her way up, and joined the society out of her own merits. He told the little voice whispering that he had purposely looked for the very opposite of Miriam to shut up and go to hell. So what if he had? It worked, that was all that mattered.
Miriam had taken everything in her life for granted, him included. Jennifer knew better.
“Yes, sir,” Piper Stone said, with a secret smile that just infuriated him.
He wasn't in the mood for dealing with it right then.
“And when you're done, you can start filing the paperwork in the archives."
Now, it was his turn to grin, remembering the state of the handwritten piles of crap left in the room next to his office. No one ever went in there, for fear of getting lost, or swallowed up whole.
When Piper first started working for him, she taken the grand tour of his floor, and he would never forget her expression when she'd walked in the damp, stuffy room left by his father's personal assistant. Gemma had been good at her job, he didn't doubt it, but not unlike his father, she'd been old-fashioned, and it showed.
As he’d shadowed his dad for close to a decade before taking the reins of the company, his own staff had gathered and filed the information he needed online. The pile of junk in that room was useless, in all probability, but somewhere at the back of his mind, he just refused to throw away anything before checking it. He had intended to take on the job sometime, when business needs permitted. Asking Piper to do it had never been the plan, but the woman was sassing him. She’d all but begged for a suitable punishment.
“The archives," she repeated, her voice breaking a little bit.
Bennett should have thanked her; all thoughts of Miriam disappeared, obliterated by a mixture of irritation, reluctant admiration, and perhaps a little bit of lust.
Miriam, Jennifer, his father - they all faded in the background, because nobody got under his skin as much as his assistant.
“The archives,” he repeated, feeling his lips baring his teeth. “You can go on lunch after you're finished.”
Piper
She was going to resign. Okay, she thought that to herself at least once a week but today, she sincerely had enough. She had cramps, bad ones, and any male not affected by that kind of monthly torture should have offered chocolate on tap and massages – instead, McFuck was acting like the gigantic ass he was. For no reason. She hadn't done anything wrong, but she knew him by now; he had been pissed off before he'd even stepped into the building.
He was a nice specimen to loo
k at, with his annoyingly gorgeous face, his deep, intense amber eyes and his kissable lips, but right then, all of those attributes only served to infuriate her more. How unfair that so many blessings had been showered over a complete and utter jerk.
The archives. She couldn't believe he’d really asked her to take care of that dump. It smelled. It smelled bad. Like a rat had died in there.
One hour and twenty minutes later, she realized that one had. But before consenting to expire, the creature thought necessary to poo and pee just about everywhere. Piper had to go throw up twice.
“Ms. Stone,” she heard, just when she'd be ready to collapse on a pile of disgusting boxes. “I will be gone for the next two hours. Take your break now. Bring me a coffee at four.”
Piper almost felt grateful, before remembering who her boss was. McFuck wasn't doing her any favors, he was the reason she was stuck doing this dreadful job in the first place. She also knew he’d changed his mind and let her have a break only because he hated leaving her on his floor unsupervised; he didn't trust her. Why should he anyway? He had never done anything to deserve her trust - the only reason why she would never do anything against the company was his father, not him. He had no idea how much respect and affection she had for his dad, and she liked it that way. Knowing him, he’d just imagine something insalubrious if he ever heard of his father helping her out.
“You're good down there?”
She turned to find him leaning on the door frame, visibly amused, as she knelt there, ass in the air, grabbing disgusting pieces of paper that hadn't been relevant for at least a decade.
God, how she hated him. She’d never felt anything stronger - the red-hot passion was taking the best of her; staying in place was so hard her hands were shaking. She wanted to pick up one of the bags of excrement flavored junk and throw it at him. Get right in front of him and slap his infuriating grin. And damn her, but she could also imagine grabbing him by the collar and pulling his lips to hers.
