One Night Standards

by Cathy Yardley

  “I don’t know,” Sophie admitted. It had been freeing enough just to think of quitting Diva Nation. She hadn’t formulated a plan from that point. “Finding a job, I imagine. Something else in the cosmetics industry…or maybe not. I don’t know.”

  “You might want to take a break,” her mother suggested. “With that ulcer, and all.”

  Sophie gave a short laugh. “I can buy a little time…a few months. But then, back to work.”

  “You know, if it weren’t for your strategy and planning, and hard work, I never would’ve been able to sell Diva Nation for as much as I did,” her mother said. “I want to give you some of the money from the sale.”

  Sophie shook her head. “That’s for your retirement.”

  “I bled them dry,” her mother said with a snort. “I made out better than I could’ve dreamed, and you know it. I’ve got plenty left over. You’ll take some of it, and I don’t want to hear any arguments.” She smiled weakly. “Let me pay off some of this guilt.”

  Sophie sighed. “All right, Mom. You win.”

  “So maybe you’ll take a vacation,” her mother said. “Maybe…start dating.”

  It was a big concession for her take-no-prisoners, business-is-everything mother. Sophie thought it was a good step forward. Still, the thought of dating made her chest ache. She didn’t want to date. She didn’t want to find someone.

  She’d already found Mark, and then she’d lost him. That was painful enough.

  “I’ll just take a break,” Sophie said. “Rest up.”

  “It will get better,” her mother whispered.

  Sophie nodded. “I know,” she said, even though she only knew it logically. Emotionally, she still felt like a wreck.

  “So, have you already given notice?”

  Sophie nodded. “I’ll be making the management-changeover announcement at the sales conference in San Antonio.” One year ago, she thought. At the same conference she’d met Mark.

  “I’m sure it’ll be a big event,” her mother said.

  “It will be memorable,” Sophie said. She certainly wouldn’t forget it.

  “MARK MCMANN?”

  Mark stood up, feeling acutely self-conscious. He wore a suit, but he appeared to be the only guy in the building to do so, and he felt a bit like a circus freak. He’d only seen one woman, who was wearing sweats, her hair in a ponytail. She had smiled at him. Everybody else there was a guy, all wearing jeans or khakis and T-shirts that sported various humorous slogans or TV-show pictures. There was a lot of Star Trek present, he noticed.

  He followed the guy who seemed to be acting as receptionist and jack-of-all-trades into the main “office” of the man he was interviewing with.

  “Mark! Good to see you!” The chief executive officer, Frank Stone, was wearing a pair of black jeans and a Sealab 2021 T-shirt. He also gave Mark’s suit a curious glance as he shook his hand. “Glad you could make it all the way out here to California to see us.”

  “Looked forward to it,” Mark said, and he meant it.

  “So. I’ve been reviewing your résumé. I have to say—it’s nothing like anybody else’s that has applied for the job here at Game Preserve.”

  Mark had expected not—considering his entire background was in beauty and cosmetics, and this was a new video-game start-up. “Well, it wouldn’t seem like it would translate, but I’ve got a lot of national distribution and brand experience.”

  “I can see that,” Frank said, and Mark felt gratified at the appreciative tone in the guy’s voice. “But tell me…we’re not going to be able to pay you as much as your old company did. Why do you want to work for us?”

  Mark thought about everything that had happened in the past twelve months. Meeting Sophie. Falling in love with Sophie. Losing Sophie. Losing the job at Trimera because of Sophie. In roughly that order.

  “I need a change,” Mark said, thinking understatement of the year. “I used to love video games as a kid and I’ve rediscovered them since then. Meanwhile, I’ve learned everything I needed to at my old job, and now I’m looking for a challenge.”

  “Well, we’ll definitely be that,” Frank said.

  The two of them talked shop for a while, and by the end of the interview, Mark felt as if he’d done the best he could—laid out what he thought Game Preserve’s strategy should be, the whole nine yards. Now, it was in their hands.

  Frank stood up, stretching, and Mark assumed that the interview was over, so he stood up, too, offering his hand again. But Frank laughed.

  “No, I’ll be taking you out to lunch, too, if you’re up for it. I won’t beat around the bush. I like you, and even though your background is completely wrong for us, I go with my gut on this sort of thing. But you’ll have to run the gamut if you’re going to work here.”

  Mark straightened up. “I have no problem with that. I’m just looking for a chance.”

  Frank’s eyes glinted, and Mark suddenly wondered what the hell he had agreed to. Frank opened his office door, motioning for Mark to follow. “Okay, guys!” Frank yelled down the corridor. “We’ve got a candidate!”

  With that, a wide range of men came pouring out of cubicles and headed for a large lounge-looking area. Mark swallowed nervously, wondering if this was some sort of arcane ritual akin to hazing. And he’d thought that the cosmetics industry was rough.

  They were staring at him like a sacrificial lamb, and Mark refused to blink.

  “Okay,” Frank said, crossing his arms. “Five minutes. Let ’im have it.”

  Before Mark could react to that sweeping statement, he was peppered with questions.

  “Where do you buy most of your video games?”

  “What’s the best game you’ve bought in the past year?”

  “What do you own?”

  His head spun as the voices came yelling out at him, like a squalling mob. He took a deep breath. “Y’ all done?” he asked easily.

  They went quiet, expectant.

  One more deep breath, and then he marked everyone who’d asked him a question. “I get my games anywhere I’m in town, usually at a game store because the clerks know what I’m talking about, sometimes online if I have the time,” he said to a stocky guy with thick glasses. “I own an Xbox, a PS2, a Game Boy, my PDA’s equipped, and I’ve got some stuff on my PC at home,” he said to a thin, tall Asian man, who grinned in response. “And the best game I’ve bought in the past year is Halo 2…and I’d challenge anybody in here to try and take me on it, after the hours I’ve logged.”

  “We’ll take you up on that!” a short kid with a backward baseball cap said, and the rest of them laughed.

  Mark let out a quick huff. He’d survived the lion’s den. Frank looked puffed up with pride.

  “Why don’t we go to lunch,” he said with a broad grin, “and discuss some particulars. Like salary, and benefits.”

  Mark nodded to the assorted guys, who nodded back in return. “Welcome to the team,” the Asian guy said with a smile.

  Mark felt his spine straighten. Part of the team. One of the guys.

  Sophie had believed in him…and here he was, striking out on his own. This wasn’t about his looks, or his charm. This was finally what it meant to make it on his own, on his brains and his abilities.

  He smiled as he followed Frank out the door, onto the street.

  As he’d told his brother, he just wanted to prove to himself that he could handle it. It had taken longer than he’d thought to find a situation that suited him—six months of searching, and getting rid of his stuff in New York, simplifying his life. He’d briefly taken a job at Marion & Co., insisting that he not work on anything related to Diva Nation, but even that near proximity had been too much. Besides that—Mrs. Marion had shown him how he didn’t want to do business.

  “I thought you had better business instincts than that, Mark,” she’d said when he’d finally given in and quit.

  He’d made the right choice. He didn’t know how Sophie was managing, caught between the Scyll
a and Charybdis of Marion & Co. and Trimera. But from everything he’d been able to find out, things were going spectacularly well for her. Diva Nation was splashed across the pages of every trade magazine he read, and all of his contacts said that Trimera was set to make millions upon millions thanks to their investment in the boutique company. It looked like Mark’s instincts had been dead-on, after all. And Sophie was the brains behind the success. He imagined that must have bothered Simone, who’d taken a job with one of their competitors not long after. Roger had been promoted as a result, so he had to be happy.

  Mark wondered if Sophie was happy.

  “So now that your life’s in order,” his brother said, when Mark called to tell him the good news, “what are you going to do about the girl?”

  Mark wondered about that, too. “It’s been a long while. I’m sure she’s moved on.”

  “In other words, you’re chickening out.”

  “I am not chickening out,” Mark snapped. “I…she’s probably really ticked at me for not calling, even if she is interested, which she probably isn’t.”

  “You’re the one who had to figure stuff out,” Jeff said. “I get the feeling she’ll understand. And even if she doesn’t…”

  “I know. I have to try.” Mark chuckled bitterly. “Man. I’ve done sales pitches and job interviews and multimillion-dollar deals, and just calling her has me more nervous than anything I’ve ever done.”

  “Maybe you should see her face-to-face,” Jeff suggested. “You’re always better in person, if I remember correctly.”

  Mark thought about it. “The trade mags did say she had some big announcement or something at the next conference.”

  “Where’s that?”

  Mark consulted the magazine he had on his coffee table, then grinned slowly. “Well, I’ll be damned. San Antonio.”

  “Sounds like you’ve been there.”

  Mark grinned. “We’ve both been there,” he said. “And I think that luck is finally going my way.”

  SOPHIE SAT IN HER HOTEL ROOM in San Antonio, looking out into the night sky. She felt free, and curiously empty. She could still remember every word she’d spoken at the press conference in the main ballroom that afternoon.

  “I would like to thank Marion & Co. for the wonderful opportunity they presented by choosing the Diva Nation line of cosmetics as their house brand,” she’d opened. “I would also like to thank Trimera for the exciting working partnership they offered. I know that the companies will work beautifully together in years to come. I also would like to thank everyone involved for their support. From now on, I know that Diva Nation is in good hands. That’s why I’m taking this opportunity to step down from my position as director of marketing and sales for Diva Nation.”

  There had been some shock over that, but all in all, they weren’t interested in her. They were interested in the products. Sophie could go back to her own life now, such as it was. That was, she could actually have a life now.

  She was looking forward to the chance.

  It would have been nice to share this moment with someone, she realized absently as she sipped at a diet soda and put her feet up on the bed. Her mother and sister had volunteered to accompany her, but she’d turned them down. Lydia was now busy with her own graphic-design firm thanks to the exposure she got from designing the packaging and ads for Diva Nation’s launch. Her mother, on the other hand, was finally letting things go and settling into retirement. After years of working and struggling, relaxation was coming hard to her, but Sophie had to be thankful she was trying. Sophie didn’t want to ruin that progress by putting her in close proximity with Trimera execs again. So here she was, alone at what was definitely a huge turning point in her life.

  I wonder what Mark’s doing.

  She wondered that at least ten times a day, so she wasn’t surprised when the thought appeared, unbidden. Now she had time for a social life, one that included dating—and sex. There wouldn’t be business between them anymore, she thought. Still, she didn’t know if there were still hard feelings on his part.

  You knew it wouldn’t be simple, she reminded herself for the billionth time. She had thought that they could manage, and for a while they had, but inevitably it had blown up in their faces.

  The question was…was the damage irreparable?

  She closed her eyes. She now had money to breathe, to take time off. She would have energy, once she’d slept for about a week. She still wasn’t quite sure what had imploded with Mark, to cause him to cut off all contact. Part of her was still angry at the course he’d taken. Part of her was furious that he hadn’t even tried to contact her once. But a big part of her still loved him, and missed him. That part was willing to invest the time and energy to find him, and try to get back what they’d lost. The worst that could happen would be him saying no, and turning away from her. She hadn’t come this far in her business by letting every No stand in her way, she thought with a tired smile.

  There was a knock on her door. She didn’t want to deal with a restaurant full of industry insiders, so she’d ordered room service. She got the door and her mouth fell open.

  “This steak for you?”

  It was Mark, standing there with the room-service cart. He wasn’t the polished, business Mark that she was used to seeing. He was wearing a T-shirt and jeans, and looked scruffy, casual and utterly delicious. She nodded dumbly, watching as he rolled in her dinner. She let the door shut. “I can’t believe you’re here,” she finally said. “I was just thinking about you.”

  He grinned, the same sweet, irrepressible grin she remembered. Her heart tugged in response. “I always think about you,” he replied.

  She crossed her arms. Don’t let him in that easily. “You could have fooled me,” she said lightly, “considering I haven’t heard from you since that day in New York. Six months ago.”

  He kept his eyes on her, sitting on the bed. “I am sorry about that. I needed to get my head on right, sort out what I was doing with my life.”

  “And you couldn’t have told me that?” She felt tears start to well up in her eyes, and she blinked hard to prevent them. She just wanted the air clear. She wasn’t about to lose her composure and be reduced to jelly at his feet…at least, not before they’d talked.

  “I didn’t know how to tell you,” he said, and his tone sounded miserable. “I was angry with you initially. Really, I was more angry with myself. I felt like a failure. I thought everybody around me saw me as a failure, and I wasn’t bouncing back from that.”

  “I didn’t think you were a failure,” Sophie pointed out.

  He stood up, moved next to her, and his arms reached for her tentatively, stroking her shoulders. The instinct was great to let him fold her into his arms, but she held back, keeping her gaze intent on his. “I know,” he finally said. “You always believed in me. But until I believed in myself, you couldn’t believe in me enough for both of us. Does that make sense?”

  “No,” she said, her voice trembling slightly.

  “I needed to prove something to myself,” he said. “I wanted to know I could make it on my own.”

  “You would have made it on your own,” she answered. “But you didn’t have to be alone. I would’ve been supportive.”

  “I know that now,” he said. “Believe me, for someone who was trying to prove how smart he was, I can be amazingly stupid.”

  She laughed. She couldn’t help it. He smiled, and she felt her defenses start to crumble.

  “Now I know I can make it on my own…but I don’t want to,” he pleaded. “I don’t want to spend any more time away from you. I just got a job, one I really like, in San Diego. I know you’re in Los Angeles. I don’t mind commuting.”

  “Haven’t you heard? I’m currently between jobs,” she said. “So I don’t have to stay in L.A.” In fact, she realized, it might be good to put some distance between her and her family. For that matter, it’d be good to start fresh in a new city. The thought made her smile more.

&nb
sp; “I saw the press conference,” he said, stroking her arms. She gave in, leaning toward him. He hugged her tightly. “I know how hard you worked. Everyone knows that the success was thanks to you and they’re all dying to snap you up. You could name your price and your terms. You can get anything you want.”

  “Right now, all I want is you.”

  She hadn’t meant to say that. Not yet. But his hug turned fierce, and he leaned down, kissing her with abandon. She gave in, hunger driving her to run her fingers through his hair and kiss him as though she hadn’t in a hundred years. That was certainly what it felt like. The familiar feel of him made yearning shoot through her like nothing else.

  “Can you forgive me?” he said after tearing himself away. He kissed her jaw, her throat, the sweet spot behind her earlobe. “Can we fix everything?”

  “I forgave you the minute you walked in with my dinner,” she said with a shaky laugh, and his answering chuckle warmed her right down to her toes. “I know. I shouldn’t make it that easy on you, but I love you. And I’ve missed you. I thought you’d broken my heart.”

  “I will spend the rest of my life,” he said solemnly, all humor erased from his voice, “making it up to you.”

  “You’d better.” She felt heat start to seep through her, starting in her chest and radiating out. “In fact, starting now would be perfect.”

  His wicked smile of response was enough to set her nerve endings tingling. “What about your dinner?” he asked, his tone mock innocent.

  “What dinner?”

  He laughed out loud. “Well, I can think of something more appealing.”

  With that, he tugged her over to the bed. Her fingers flew to the buttons on her blouse as he tugged off his T-shirt and shucked his jeans and boxers. She tore her sleeve in her haste, causing him to laugh again. By the time she stripped out of her skirt and underwear, all laughter had ceased. They stared at each other for a moment.

  “I didn’t think I’d ever get the chance to do this again,” she breathed.

  “It feels like the first time,” he said. Then slowly, reverently, he reached for her, softly caressing her shoulder, smoothing his fingertips down her side and hip, reaching between her legs and touching ever so gently between her curls. She gasped, her hips arching for more intimate contact. His eyes went dark with passion. She grabbed one of the condoms he’d tossed on the bed when he’d taken off his jeans. After ripping it open with shaking hands, she smoothed it on slowly over his rock-hard erection, the heat of him warming her palm as she rolled it. He groaned, his hips bucking in response. They inched slowly next to each other, warming each other with the slide of naked skin over naked skin. It did feel like the first time, she marveled. He kissed her collarbone as she rubbed her breasts over his chest, feeling his cock poke against her belly. Her leg trailed over his, her thighs heating and her flesh going damp with desire. She reached down and positioned him between her legs, her breathing going uneven. He cupped one breast as his hips angled slightly, dipping himself into her. She gasped slightly, from the overwhelming sensation of his fingers on her nipple and his cock penetrating her slowly. “Mark,” she said, her last coherent thought before pleasure slammed through her, rendering her giddy.