It was sort of jarring. I'd always been a long term thinker. Never impulsive or reckless, but now, of course, I'd gone and fucked Sage.
As great as that was, it was just a reminder of all my other problems.
The fake fiancé thing.
The fact that she was soon going to be my step-sister.
The fact that it shouldn't matter, but it really, really did matter.
A knock on my office door broke me out of my ennui.
I looked up, expecting to see Lauren and her to bring me the next Rolodex of issues I had to deal with.
No. It was something that made me wish it was her though.
"Surprised you haven't moved into his office. Figure you'd be nipping at taking over for him."
Marissa.
It wasn't that I disliked her. Far from it. I thought she was a good woman for my father, and in general.
She was also a walking reminder that she was now Sage's mother. Usually when you meet your beloved's mother, you're looking at her to see how your future wife will shake out as age keeps up.
If Sage followed Marissa's aging path, fuck, she was going to be hot as hell for decades to come.
"The old man isn't retired yet. I'll take over his office when he gives it to me, not when he's on medical leave."
Marissa took a seat across from me, crossing her legs. She was nervous about something.
"You usually don't come to the office, Marissa," I said. "What's bothering you? Why the visit?"
"Charles was worried about you. Wanted me to come to visit and check up on you."
I laughed. "Can't stop being a father even when his heart is about to explode."
"He doesn't want to come back here with everything burned down is all."
"I can hold down the fort for quite some time. In fact, I would say he could even go and retire and the company would be fine."
"Never heard you be so power hungry, Case."
"Oh, no, I just want him to be able to take it easy. He shouldn't push himself so hard. He should savor his golden years with you." I smiled her way.
"That's lovely, Case. I guess that's what I'm really here for."
"I knew this was more than just a check on the kids thing."
She took a deep breath, and leaned on my desk. "The heart-attack scared the hell out of both of us. I was afraid of losing him, and even more so, he was afraid of something even more."
"The old man doesn't have a death wish so I'm guessing he enjoys living."
"Charles was terrified that he would pass without making me a part of his family proper. That he would leave the world without being able to tell the world about his love for me."
I sighed. That was what my father was. It was part of him being so fond of tradition. He never suspected that Marissa was only after his money. I never thought that either, and if she really were just about greed at this point, she deserved an academy award for her incredible acting performance.
"His brush with mortality has made him push forward our wedding date. We're booking a new venue and we want it to be as grand as it was before, but the old venue doesn't accept cancellations."
"Seems like a crappy business practice, but my father isn't one to worry about money with something like this."
"You and Sage haven't picked a date for your union yet. We want you to have our date. Most of the planning is done already, and it would save a big headache if..."
"Wait, what. Hold the phone here."
"Huh?" She looked surprise at my sudden protest.
"We did have a big awkward dinner about this, right? About her being my step-sister and all that?"
Marissa let out a long breath. "You and I both know that isn't what it is. You're both adults, and have not grown up together, lived together, and sure as hell don't share the same blood. At this stage in your life, it's something that is essentially in name only."
"So... you're telling me that you and Dad approve of Sage and I?"
"Our eyes were opened, Case. Life's too short to be dragging your feet and avoiding what makes you happy for stupid reasons."
"You do know that there are people out there who would make it an issue, right? Common sense has nothing to do with hysteria."
"Charles has a lot of faith in you to be smart about it, and figure something out. We're not making our own wedding super public, and I think if you kept you marrying Sage quiet, no one needs to know."
"I don't know. It seems like a big headache waiting to happen."
"Charles wants you to be happy. I want Sage to be happy. You're both smart, brilliant young people. You'll figure something out. I believe in both of you."
I should have been happy to have their blessing after everything that had happened. I mean, I wanted Sage.
Really fucking badly.
The burden of keeping it a secret though.
That felt like a time bomb waiting to explode.
"Have you told Sage?" I asked.
"I would have if she would talk to me. She's still afraid I hate her for standing me up for something she showed up to anyway. That girl gets so guilt-stricken sometimes."
"She cares about you. Deeply. Don't you ever doubt that."
"I just want her to be happy."
"She wants you to be happy."
"Well, I'm not going to be happy if she isn't happy."
"She isn't going to be happy if you're not happy." I grunted and shook my head. "We're going to go in circles at this rate. So I'll just call her and talk to her about this."
"Thank you, Case."
She got up and offered a hug. I accepted. No matter what happened, her love for my father was real, and she wanted to be as much as a step-mother could in this stage of our lives.
With the message delivered and me properly spied on, she took off and left me be.
I took a deep breath, picking up my phone. I hadn't really talked to Sage since that night. It wasn't that I didn't want her, or was taking what we did for granted, it was just a source of a whole lot of headaches and heartaches.
Getting three numbers in, I stopped. I'd caught up on everything here, and this was big enough news that it was something that should be talked about in person instead of a phone call, or worse, texting.
I picked up my jacket and wondered if she would be home. With Marissa never leaving my father's side, home was a good place to hide from her.
Going back to where I was when I took her. My cock twitched in anticipation.
Even I knew I needed to keep it in my pants sometimes though.
Sage
How did trophy wives manage themselves?
I knew I wasn't hired to just be a pretty face, but right now my job didn't really include any other duties.
So my life consisted of a whole lot of lazing about the house feeling bored as hell. I browsed the internet for a while, watched some TV.
I thought about my studies. I was so close to finishing, and thought about re-applying for yet another degree to distract me. But I eventually thought against it once I realized enrolling in a whole glut of classes when my future was so uncertain wasn't the wisest of ideas.
With nothing else to do, I started to clean.
This was absolutely insane because I was the messiest person on the planet and my mother would never stop nagging me to straighten up my room.
Boredom makes you do a lot of weird things sometimes.
A knock on my door, and I'm shaken from my haze of idly sweeping nothing.
Case.
"You got a moment to talk, Sage?"
I had all the moments in the world but the last thing I wanted to do was talk to him.
That would make me think and thinking is bad.
"Come on in," I said, completely unable to come up with a viable excuse to deny him.
He had a bit of spring in his step as he came in, stopping at the sofa and laying a hand on it. It reminded me of things we had done, and things I wanted to do again, no matter how much of a bad idea it was.
"Y
our mother stopped by the office."
"Hmm?"
"Dad's doing fine. Apparently they've picked out a date for us."
"They're sending us out on a date?"
"No. I meant for our wedding."
The color drained from my face. I hated being reminded of what I had signed on to do.
"A heart attack is serious and scared the shit out of both of them. They want to make sure their love is official sooner than later."
"Does your father think he's going to keel over before then?"
"No. By all accounts he'll make a full recovery, but near-death experiences do these things to you. They picked a closer date, and Marissa told me to take their reservations for their venue. Save us all a little money."
"You're millionaires. What do you care about a few thousand dollars wasted?"
"My father is cheap, and it seems your mother share the same value."
"And what's with all this anyway? I thought they were flipping out due to our impending bullshit legal but not blood relation?"
"They calmed down, I suppose. Said that if we make one another happy, we shouldn't let some judgment of society get in the way of it."
I just stared his way for a time. "You know it'd get out. You'd be called a sister-fucker in no time."
"By that point I won't care. I'll have you. I'll have the company. Why should I cry over some people not understanding nuance?"
'I'll have you.' The words echoed within. "This is all just a sham, though. This isn't real, Case. I'm sure being publicly known as 'sister-fucker' will help your future dating prospects."
He laughed, and shook his head of it. "You still don't believe, huh?"
"We're a lie, Case. Just because we gave into hormonal impulses doesn't mean we're soulmates."
The man approached me, taking my hands into his. "Why don't we let everything play out?"
"Let what play out? We have a plan. We should stick to it."
"We should play our future by ear, Sage. Do you think there was nothing to what we've done than hormones?"
"That's exactly what I'm saying." I pulled my hands away from him. Hand-holding was the gateway drug to kissing, and in turn, the gateway drug to wild sex on the sofa again. "I'm really second guessing all this, Case. Look at our parents. Look at how crazy they are for one another. They can't stand the idea of not being married, so they're rushing their wedding."
"Yeah? They've found one another. It's something special."
"That's exactly what I mean, Case. Their love is real. We're mocking them with what we have. We're liars. Maybe you're just power hungry, maybe I'm just greedy, but we can't pretend we're doing this because we love one another."
"Perhaps we're falling in love?"
"Or lying to ourselves that we're not lying."
Case moved quickly, no wasted movement. He was in front of me again, his hands on my cheeks. I loved his touch so, no matter how much I struggled to tell myself not to. "Sage, you can't tell me you don't feel anything after everything we've done."
"We barely know each other, Case. You can't even name something simple like my favorite food or something."
"We know each other where it counts. You know. Carnally."
"There's more to love than just sex."
"Sex contributes a hell of lot more than love than most people will admit." His hands dropped to my shoulders. "Why are you being so difficult about this?"
"Because. This isn't just us holding hands and making nice with our parents. This is marriage. This is pretending to be in love. You said it yourself, Case. They're rushing along because of their brush with mortality. What, are we going to have our fake marriage and then just lie to them more when they start asking about grandchildren?"
"Well we could just give them that." He gave me a seductive look.
A chill went down my spine, knowing what we had already done. "Yes. Lies. What a wonderful foundation to build a family off of. I can see nothing going wrong with any of that, Case."
"Glad you see my point."
"That was sarcasm, if I couldn't have made it more obvious."
He finally released me, thinking, likely trying to come up with the words that would truly convince me. "I'm going to say some sappy self-help stuff right now, but I actually truly mean it, Sage."
"What, do I need to believe in myself or something?"
"No. Just take it one day at a time."
"I can't ignore that a future is coming and that future isn't something I want right now."
"Take it easy. Face this one day at a time. Yeah, I'm not saying don't pretend the future doesn't exist. Our agreement is six months. It's barely been two weeks. If you're already this anxious, I'm going to start worrying about you having a heart attack, Sage."
"I... I just think we should call the whole thing off."
He gripped the back of my shoulders and started to give me a shoulder massage. After saying something like that, I shouldn't have been so receptive to his touch. "Don't. Stick with it. Please."
"How much longer do you think I can go on lying like this, Case? To a man who had a brush with death, and a woman who almost became a widow before even getting married."
"One day at a time." He took a deep breath. "I know this is tough. How about I meet you in the middle? Give this time to simmer. We have a good excuse as we ever would to do so."
"That's great, looking for lying opportunities in tragedy."
"Calm down. Really. Let's 'have a fight'. We say we're both stressed out. Me? I'm running the company. Dad's recovering. I have a lot on my plate. And you?"
It took me a moment. "Well, I guess I can go look for something to do and say that's stressing me out? Finding a job?" I still had one. Technically. Just maybe something else would give me the confidence to end this whole charade.
Even though I knew I wasn't sticking around for money alone.
"You do that. You need something to occupy yourself outside this relationship. Real talk here, I looked in the window to see if you were home before knocking, and were you just sweeping the same spot over and over again?"
"Um... I really wanted to make sure it was clean."
"Yeah, you're going a little insane overthinking this."
"Calling a girl crazy is a quick way to end a relationship."
"This is about preventing you from going crazy. Good mental hygiene is important."
"Fine." I didn't want to verbally admit that he was right. Maybe a real job would help me focus on something else, or worse comes to worse, be so terrible that lying to my mother becomes a pretty sweet deal.
"Relax. One day at a time. I'm repeating it for a reason, you know." He kept his shoulder massage going, and really? He was good at it.
Even with that though, the heat of his breath against my ear gave me a clear warning that his lips were lurking closer and closer to mine.
We were in the same position as last time. We could have fucked one another's brains out without any restraint again.
Maybe add another coin into nature's grandchildren producing slot machine.
I cringed at where my mind went, and the strange metaphors it created.
"With everything that's going on," he whispered, "I can't help but think you're the one thing that's undoubtedly true for me. I can't just let you go, Sage. I've never felt more right about a person."
I spun in his arms, his arms dropping down to my hips.
There was nothing stopping me from indulging this man to the absolute fullest.
Nothing stopping me except for me.
I pushed him away. "We can't. Not again. What ever happened to professionalism?" Like I gave a damn about that, and as if we hadn't passed that line eons ago.
He stepped back. "Fine. If that's what you want."
Case headed toward my door, dusting himself off of the minor wrinkles that his short time in my home produced. "I'm off to go visit my father then. I'm sure he wants to see me, and get a direct update that everything is okay. I'll tell him that we're having
a bit of a spat so we don't know if we can agree to their date."
"Fine, fine. Just, go."
"Well I love you too."
I raised an eyebrow, and he quickly left as soon as he said those words.
Wait, what?
Was that just a throwaway dose of sarcasm? It should have been, but he knows that's a sort of taboo and loaded word to use in our situation.
The fake fiancé situation.
Where we're faking love.
Damn, he was right. I needed a job to stop overthinking everything more than anything else.
Case
Well I needed to learn how to watch my mouth.
It wasn't the time to be joking about love. Not with the situation we were in now.
Standing tall, I rode the hospital elevator all the way up. A man with my Dad's money could get the poshest hospital possible, and at first I was sort of confused why such a thing existed. I then remembered that if there's a market for it, someone would provide.
I was planning the scene all out in my head. What I would tell him. I didn't want to break his heart. It had to seem minor.
Marissa had already returned to my father's side, and she smiled as I came into the room.
"Hey, old man," I let out with a smile. Rushing over to give him a bit of a hug.
As much as you could with someone with a bunch of pads and stuff attached to them.
"Good to see you, Case."
The things attached to him made me raise an eyebrow. "I thought everything was going good? Why are you still hooked up to so much stuff?"
"They just want to be absolutely sure," Marissa said. "Especially when Charles said he wasn't going to slow down for a little while yet."
"Are you that afraid of me burning down the company?"
"No, no. Not that," Dad was quick to push himself up. "I just want to go out of the company on my terms. When I pass it on..."
Marissa shot a concerned glance his way. "Honey, could you use other terms?"
"When my successor takes over, I want them to have something that will flourish for countless years to come. Almost foolproof and impossible to fail."
"That little faith in me, huh?"
He shook his head. "Case, son, it has nothing to do with your competence. You know who runs the company isn't strictly my decision, correct?"
Corporate Assets Page 8
