Theirs to Pleasure: a Reverse Harem Romance

by Stasia Black

  But then abruptly, she drops my hand and takes a step back.

  “Have you ever read Atlas Shrugged?” She starts walking briskly toward the Bentley.

  What the—? I jog to catch up with her. “What?”

  “Atlas Shrugged.” She looks over at me, eyebrows raised. “The famous novel by Ayn Rand. Who is John Galt? Objectivist philosophy? Ring any bells?”

  I feel like an idiot but I can only shake my head stupidly. “I think I might have heard of it? Maybe?”

  She smiles, gracious even though it’s obvious I have no fucking clue what she’s talking about. “I won’t go into the whole book but basically it’s the idea that you never really get something for nothing. Rand argues society falls apart when we pretend we’re altruistic. I mean, we can all put on the appearance of it, but the actual thing? No way. It doesn’t work out because people are selfish sons of bitches.”

  She breathes out and smiles up at the sky for a second before looking at where she’s going again. “It’s so freeing to just acknowledge that fact, you know. I’m selfish, you’re selfish, companies are selfish, governments are selfish. And that’s okay.” She talks with her hands, gesturing here and there. “Let’s all just say, okay, we’re each working in our own self-interest. Fine. Just put it out in the open. Life would be much more honest and transparent that way.”

  She arches an eyebrow at me—I swear her eyebrows are always in motion just like her hands are, jumping up and down. “So there is no staying for free at your place out of the goodness of your heart. There’s always a price.” She nods. “As there should be. Let’s be honest about it up front.”

  All right. Now I’m the one left speechless and blinking.

  But she’s not done. “I have a solution, though. I won’t stay for free. I’ll do a job. I’ll be your personal chef.”

  I feel my eyebrows rise this time. Well damn, if this woman isn’t just full of one surprise after another.

  In my line of work, I listen to a lot of people talk. And most of them are total fucking blowhards.

  In the whole past year, I could count on one hand the number of times people I know have brought up books they’ve read in casual conversation. Of those, most of them were bullshit books supposedly written by celebrities. Certainly none were reading deeply philosophical books. Scarlet really understands what the hell she’s talking about, too, enough to encapsulate the whole thing in a freaking paragraph.

  And then further shocking the hell out of me by refusing free shit from me? Every chick I’ve dated over the past decade has always been jonesing for me to take them shopping or to go by a jewelry store to buy them some little gift or other.

  “It’ll be mainly Italian,” Scarlet goes on, oblivious to the fact that she’s blowing my mind here, “since that’s all I know how to cook.” She glances down, the first hint of nerves I’ve seen but she quickly looks back up again. “You might be some world-famous chef,” she squares her shoulders, “but I can cook good, hearty meals.”

  “That way you won’t have to order in food for every meal.” From the slightest twist of her features, I can see her barely-disguised grimace at the thought of my excess.

  Christ, I want to laugh with her. I’ve become totally ridiculous, haven’t I? I don’t bother with that shrinky self-analysis bullshit but occasionally I wonder what the me from fifteen years ago would think if he could see the me of today. I imagine two thoughts would fight for dominance: what a douchey asshole and, underneath the scathing moral superiority, I’m going to be that, but do it much better than that fuck-wad.

  A decade and a half later? I’m just another fuck-wad in a suit.

  “For someone who spends almost two hundred dollars on his underwear,” Scarlet waves her hand down at the boxers she’s wearing, “a live-in chef isn’t that preposterous. That way it’s an even exchange. You get a chef at your beck and call. I get a place to stay and…” she casts around, eyes searching the air, “a hundred dollars a week for incidentals.”

  “Two hundred dollars a week and it’s a deal.” I reach out, grab her hand, and shake it firmly.

  Her blue eyes open wide, startled by my words or my touch, I can’t tell. I flash her a wide, toothy grin and then slide into the Bentley before she can say another word in argument.

  Chapter 4

  “Okay,” Scarlet says once she joins me in the car, “so let’s go grocery shopping before we go home.”

  I wave her away as I pull out of the parking lot. “Just tell me what you want and I’ll put in an order on the grocery app I use. It’ll be delivered within the hour.”

  I pull out into traffic and when it’s still silent several beats later, I glance over at Scarlet. She’s staring at me, open-mouthed.

  “What?”

  “Is an app going to choose the ripest tomato out of the bunch? The freshest basil leaves and best-looking parmesan to make pesto sauce from?” She sounds appalled. “Besides, I need to see what different brands there are. I need to see and touch and smell.” Her hands wave all over the place as she talks. “Half the time I don’t even know what I’m going to cook until I get to the store and find inspiration from smelling a clump of garlic or seeing the most perfectly shaped eggplant for Eggplant Parmesan.” Her words are passionate.

  “Okay, okay.” I raise my hands off the wheel for a brief moment to show my surrender. “You’ve convinced me. We’ll hit up a grocery store.”

  She makes a harrumphing noise like of course we will, as if there was any other possible option.

  I chuckle to myself. Damn adorable. I turn to her. “So why only Italian dishes?”

  She looks away out the passenger window. “I’d say it’s my specialty, but like I said earlier, it’s all I know how to cook.”

  “That’s what I meant.” I tilt my head sideways. “How come?”

  “Let’s just say it’s a family tradition.” Her shoulders straighten and her head swivels back to look at me. She smiles but it feels forced. “I hope you aren’t opposed to marinara sauce, garlic, and pasta, or we might have a problem with this little arrangement of ours.”

  “Not at all.” I quirk up one side of my mouth in a half-grin, wanting to bring back her genuine smile and wondering what made it disappear in the first place.

  So, her family’s Italian? Is that one more piece to the puzzle that is Scarlet? She doesn’t look especially Italian, not with that white-blonde hair and her fair skin. I would have guessed Scandinavian ancestry. Though she is certainly shapely around the hips and those luscious—

  Ahem.

  “I don’t mind Italian as long as you promise to teach me some of your family recipes.” I manage to pull my gaze back to the road. “And I can teach you how to cook some French cuisine sometime so you can add to your repertoire.”

  Her neck seems to go pink for a moment, the vein there pulsing wildly before she relaxes and smiles at me with that lush mouth of hers. “That would be nice.” Then her face goes stern. “But I want to feel like I’m earning my keep. No more special favors. Got it?”

  I hold up my hand in the Vulcan two-fingered V salute. “Scout’s honor.”

  She rolls her eyes. “That means live long and prosper.”

  I grin. Can’t sneak anything past this one.

  We stop at Trader Joe’s and when we get out of the car, Scarlet pauses. She looks at the building across the street. “Isn’t that building where your apartment is?”

  I don’t look over. “Yep.”

  I start walking toward the entrance of the grocery store.

  “And there’s a Safeway right there.” She points across the street to the store on the corner from my building. I don’t alter my pace.

  She hurries to catch up with me. “So you have two grocery stores literally right across the street from you. And you order in your groceries?” The last is a pointed question.

  I shrug and walk a little faster. I don’t want her to see that her questions affect me. And I certainly don’t want to give away the fa
ct that I picked my apartment out in part because of its proximity to these two grocery stores. There was another penthouse closer to the waterfront and it was across from a grocery store, too. But there was only one store. What if it decided to move locations? No, it was safer to move here where I had two across the street.

  Not that I want this bright, lovely creature knowing about any of the fucked up compulsions that I can’t seem to shake. No matter how much money I get, how secure I ought to feel, the memories of going without for so many years… Really, I give myself an internal shake, it’s just fucking ridiculous.

  I’m stacking up more years of having against the years of not having. You’d think eventually it would tip some sort of scales of balance and I’d start to forget. Over half my life now I haven’t had to worry about where my next meal will come from. But still, every time I walk into a goddamned grocery store and see the aisles and aisles of food—and not just food, but good, fresh, healthy food, it makes me want to bawl like a fucking baby and call my mother and tell her I’m sorry, I’m so, so sorry, no matter the hell she put me through, still it’s no excuse, I should have…

  My footsteps hesitate the closer we get to the entrance. Then my cellphone rings, jerking me out of my thoughts. Shit.

  “Kennedy?” Scarlet calls my name and I get the feeling it isn’t for the first time. My phone rings again. Saved by the goddamned bell. I grab my phone out of my pocket, glance at the number, and click answer as I put it to my ear. It’s Xander, Chandelier’s club manager.

  “What’s up, Xan?” I ask breezily, smiling over at Scarlet and signaling with my index finger that I’ll be just a second.

  “Look man, I know you texted earlier and said you might not be in tonight,” Xander’s voice comes over the line. He sounds anxious. “But Yang’s guys are here and they say he wants to talk to you. Tonight.”

  I turn and take several steps away from Scarlet. I lower my voice to a growl but don’t let my smile drop an inch. “Well, you tell that bastard that he doesn’t get to summon me like a little lapdog.”

  Xander makes a choked noise down the line. “I can’t say that.” His voice drops to a whisper. These guys seem so juiced up, they could probably snap my neck with their pinky finger if I just look at them wrong. It wouldn’t even make them sweat.”

  Well now Xander’s just pissing me off. Did he think managing a club as big a deal as Chandelier was just going to be a cakewalk?

  “What did you think I meant when I told you taking this job meant being able to handle a little trouble now and then?” I snap. “The whole reason I pay you such a generous salary is so that I don’t have to be there each night handling each single fucking headache. You gonna shit yourself the first time you have to deal with Yang’s guys? When I was nineteen, I was wheeling and dealing with fuckers way scarier than whatever meatheads Yang sent over. Figure it out and don’t make me regret hiring you.”

  I turn back to Scarlet and smile, speaking louder. “Besides, I have dinner plans tonight I can’t break. Talk later.”

  I hang up before Xander can respond. Scarlet looks startled at my words but then a slow smile blooms, as if in spite of herself.

  Yang will have to be dealt with, no doubt about it. Sooner rather than later. But not tonight.

  I take in the windswept hair of the beautiful girl in front of me.

  Not tonight.

  * * *

  I suspect that Scarlet might be a good cook as soon as we get inside the grocery store. There’s just something about the way she handles produce. She squeezes the tomatoes to test for ripeness. She lingers over the cheese section and sniffs each block with a thoughtful expression on her face as if she’s committing each scent to memory. She has a chef’s way of browsing about her. And damn if she doesn’t prove it as soon as we get home. We carry the groceries into the kitchen and almost immediately, mouthwatering smells begin wafting up to my office.

  That’s right, my office. Because, and this is so tragic it borders on sinful, she won’t let me stay in the kitchen while she cooks. I’m relegated upstairs while she works.

  And fuck, it smells good. Did I say that already?

  I look back at my monitor and groan. I’ve barely made a dent in the memos from Stella and the other emails that have stacked up while I ignored my phone all day in favor of spending time with Scarlet. But now here they all are, waiting to remind me that there are no days off when you’re trying to be a fucking business mogul.

  Every goddamn day. If it’s not supply issues at one of my restaurants, it’s dealing with training new staff at the club. It’s harder than you’d think to train good people who can be vigilant to recognize the usual suspects who try to use Chandelier as a depot for selling drugs.

  I have a deal with Yang to keep that kind of thing out of my club—since we’re in Nob Hill, Chinatown is where most of it would be coming from. I’m sure Yang’s got his dealers nearby but as long as they aren’t in my club or in the block around it, he and I are square.

  Although…with his panties in a twist about me not letting him in on the new deal, who the fuck knows what he’ll do to retaliate.

  I scrub both my hands down my face. Speaking of the new deal… I minimize my email and open up the documents about the property.

  The Sutler Hotel.

  I breathe out, taking in every inch of the nineteen-floor beauty. Built in nineteen-twenty-nine at the height of art nouveau design right before the Great Depression, she has great bones and beautiful historic flourishes everywhere you look.

  She’s also falling apart. She went on the market after a voting measure to raze her to the ground in order to convert the space into a luxury condo high-rise was struck down. The Sutler’s historic significance, including the famous downstairs restaurant, the Solomon Room, saved her from the chopping block. I’m putting thirty million dollars of my own capital into this thing, almost all of my liquid assets. No risk, no reward, right? The Sutler’s a hundred-and-eighty-five-foot-tall monstrosity, and I want her.

  I’m going to have her.

  If I can solidify the real estate group of investors that I’m trying to form. And come up with all fifty million dollars plus fifteen more to renovate. Plus, I have to get the cash together and make the offer before anyone else snaps it up.

  Completely doable.

  Right. As long as I deal with the Chinese, find at least two more investors that I trust, and manage not to fuck up everything else I’ve got going on in the meantime. I scrub my hands down my face again.

  A soft knock at my door has me sitting up straighter in my chair.

  Scarlet’s head peeks around my door. “Dinner is ready.” More and more wisps of white-blonde hair have escaped her braid and with the hallway light behind her, it looks like she has a fucking halo.

  “Kennedy?”

  “What?”

  Her eyebrows furrow. “I asked if you’d like me to bring your meal in here so you can eat while you work.”

  Okay, so I might have spaced out there for a second just taking her in. But she’s just so fucking beautiful. All the stress and worry I felt moments before she walked in completely evaporate as soon as I see her. She makes everything…better. How does she do that?

  Then I blink and her words finally register. “No food in here,” I say sharply.

  She takes a step back into the hallway. “I’ll get it set up in the dining room, then.”

  “No, Christ, I’m sorry.” I run a hand harshly through my hair. “I didn’t mean to sound short with you,” I say. “I’ll eat in the dining room. It’s just been a long week. Also, I hoped you’d be joining me for dinner.”

  Her face drops to look at the floor. “I’m tired and want to head to my room.” She looks like she’s about to leave but then pauses and turns back to me, face slightly flushed. Then she seems to set her jaw with what looks like determination. “Again, I want it clear. I’m performing a service in exchange for staying here.” Her eyes are guarded, her stance tense. “Nothing
more, nothing less.”

  I hold my hands up. “Hey, we’re cool. We already covered this at the thrift store. I got the message.” I’m referring both to our Ayn Rand conversation about our deal for her to be my cook and the other…issue. We made clear on both sides that neither of us thinks of her as a…woman for hire. Fuck, I can’t even think of her in relation to the women out on the sidewalks at night in Haight-Ashbury or in the Tenderloin District without my blood boiling.

  “Good.” Her eyes go hard. “Because I plan on sleeping with the biggest kitchen knife I can find and I’ll chop your dick off if you suddenly show up in my room tonight. Got it?”

  I choke a little but nod vigorously. “Totally. Yes. I never would have done that, but absolutely. I got ya.”

  “Good.” She nods too and her posture relaxes a little.

  I might be taking my life in my hands, but I still go for it. “Now that we’ve cleared that up, will you please dine with me? No expectations,” I hurry to add. “Just two people sharing a meal.” She has no idea what a big step this is for me. I hate eating in front of people, but I’ll take any excuse I can for more time with her.

  My voice or demeanor must tip her off that something’s unusual because she pauses on the brink of saying something and just stands there, gaze locked on mine. It’s only maybe a few seconds, but it feels longer. Like she’s really looking at me. Into me. Searching for something.

  I have no idea what for or if she finds it or not. She blinks and then steps back.

  “Not tonight,” she says, looking away. “I’m going to turn in early. Besides, didn’t someone call you before we went in the grocery store? You could go to meet with them after all.”

  I frown as she turns away. What’s going on in that beautiful head of hers? “It was nothing.” I wave a hand dismissively. “Just a nuisance at the club my manager can take care of.”

  She shrugs. “Well, I’ll set your food on the dining room table. Come soon or it’ll get cold.” She pauses one last time. “What time would you like breakfast?” She’s keeping her eyes slightly averted like a servant might. She’s such an enigma, sending shifting open and closed signals one moment to the next.