by Amy Hatvany
“That’s victim-blaming, honey,” I said, forcing myself to keep the lecture I wanted to give her short. “Lizzy doesn’t even realize what’s she’s doing, or why she’s doing it. You can’t blame her.”
Ella didn’t appear convinced, but I let it go, for the moment.
“Yes,” I told her now, the next morning. “I really have to tell Lacy what’s going on.”
“Tell Lacy what?” Tucker asked.
“That you stink!” Ella shot back.
Tucker gave a half-hearted kick in her direction, barely touching the side of her leg.
“Mom! He kicked me!”
“You’re not Ruby’s age, anymore,” I said. “Work it out.” The two of them bickered so much, unless there was the danger of bloodshed, I tended to stay out of it. I kissed both of them on top of their heads, and said I’d be home as soon as I could be that afternoon. Jake was already gone for the day, in Issaquah to meet with several candidates for positions at a new start-up firm that had hired him as a headhunter, taking Justine along with him to help train her. My plan was to meet with Lacy, fill her in, and then head to Andrew’s office for a quick, to-the-point discussion, and then head back to work.
I spent a little over an hour at the office, and then headed to meet Lacy right before eleven. I spotted her as I entered the coffee shop, standing at the counter, taking what looked like a tall, black, iced coffee from the barista. She turned and I waved, and then pointed to a table over by the window, where we both headed.
“Hi!” she said, brightly as she bounced up to the table, which I had reached, first. Once a cheerleader, always a cheerleader, I thought. Lacy was Japanese, with a sheet of long, black straight hair that she usually wore in ponytail for practices or competitions. Today, it was loose, hanging down to the middle of her back. She had a delicate, but also somewhat muscular build, and a booming voice that seemed more suited for a much larger person. While other coaches had to use megaphones to project what they said, Lacy simply spoke with her normal tenor.
“Good morning,” I said. We sat down, and I smiled. “Thanks for meeting with me on such short notice.”
“Of course!” she said. She glanced toward the counter. “Do you want some coffee?” She held up her cup. “This is my fifth one today!”
No kidding, I wanted to say, but managed not to. I liked Lacy. “I’m good,” I said.
“Is Ella okay?” she asked, crossing her short legs under the table. “Can she still go to dance camp?”
“Oh, she’s fine,” I said. “And yes, of course. We’re all paid up, ready to go in a few weeks.”
“Great.” Lacy looked relieved. “She is such an inspiration to our younger team members. You’re raising quite the leader.”
I smiled again, wider this time, feeling proud of my daughter. “Thank you. Are you sure you don’t mean bossy?” I laughed.
“Ha!” Lacy said. “Same thing. I love it!” She paused. “Is there something else going on with her I should be aware of?”
“Well, no, not with her.” I took a several minutes to explain to Lacy everything Ella had told me about the “ho” accounts on Instagram, including Lizzy’s. I showed her the few examples Ella had shown me, and I watched as Lacy’s cheery, pleasant expression faded away.
“This is totally unacceptable,” she said, her dark eyes flashing. “How can they possibly think this is okay?”
“That’s what I thought, too,” I said, frowning. “I’m concerned for them. For Lizzy, especially, to be honest. I don’t know if you know, but she has a bit of a reputation.”
“Oh, I know,” Lacy sighed. “I’ve talked with her about it several times, but it doesn’t seem to get through. It’s like she needs the attention, and she’s going to get it whatever form it takes. Even if it’s something like this.” She gestured toward my phone, which was still open to Lizzy’s inappropriate account.
“I felt strange bringing it up to Tiffany, directly,” I said. “I thought it might be better, coming from you.”
Lacy nodded, her lips pursed. “Definitely. I have no problem reaching out to her, or the other parents. They need to know.”
“And of course, if you somehow find out that Ella has an account, too, I’d want to know right away.” After my daughter had shown me the accounts of the offending girls last night, I’d done a search for several iterations of “Ella_the_Ho” moniker on Instagram, in case she’d been lying to me about not participating in this behavior, but luckily, found nothing. Still, it was possible she was doing it under a different name to protect herself from getting caught, and to keep me from finding out. I trusted my daughter, as much as I could trust any sixteen-year-old, but I knew it wasn’t out of the realm of possibility that she would hide this from me.
“I don’t think Ella would do it,” Lacy said. “But yes, if I find out she did, you’ll be the first to know.”
“Thanks,” I said. “She’s afraid the other girls will be mad at her for turning them in.”
“They won’t know it was her,” Lacy said. “I’ll say I got an anonymous tip, and confront the team as a whole. I want to give the girls a chance to come forward and be honest with me. I’m big on teaching them to take ownership.”
“And if no one comes forward?” I asked. I couldn’t imagine any of the girls wanting to admit to their coach what they were doing online, knowing that it would mean their parents would be told.
“Then I’ll confront the ones you showed me, personally, and squeeze it out of them.” She lifted her arms off the table and turned her hands into fists. “Can you text me the girls’ names that you’re aware of have the accounts, so I can take screen shots as evidence? I’ll take it from there.”
“Sure,” I said. “And thanks, again.”
“Thank you for filling me in,” Lacy said. “Trust me, we’re going to be having some frank discussions about self-esteem, and the dangers of social media.”
Lacy and I parted ways at eleven-thirty, and I headed to Andrew’s office. I was dreading what I had to say to him, especially since he’d admitted that he’d had a crush on me in the past. Even though he proclaimed he was only interested in casual sex, I worried I might hurt his feelings. All the more reason why I shouldn’t have been messing around with someone I knew, let alone allowing him the kind of access to my mind that I’d only ever given my husband. I’d also realized that I’d let myself make eye contact with him when he was inside me and he told me to—again, something I’d only ever done with Jake, something that took our intimacy to a much deeper level than I’d ever shared with anyone else. I felt so guilty for letting that happen; thinking about it on the drive over to see him, I was more resolute than ever to make it clear that was never going to happen again.
I parked in the building’s underground garage a few minutes before noon, not wanting to get there early and seem too eager. I’d dressed conservatively, in a fitted lavender high-necked sheath dress, drawing my curls into a tight bun at the base of my neck with a few wisps hanging around my face, and threw on a pair of black patent flats.
I rode the elevator to the seventeenth floor, and told the exquisitely beautiful, ebony-skinned young receptionist at his front desk that Andrew was expecting me. “Can I bring you something to drink?” she asked. The multitude of her long, thin braids shifted as she tilted her head. “Coffee, water, or an energy shot?”
I squinted at her. “Energy shot?”
She nodded. “It has the same amount of caffeine as five cups of coffee. Andrew insists we keep the kitchen stocked with it at all times. I drink, like, three a day.”
“Wow,” I said, smiling. “I’d better pass.” Is speed-balling caffeine a thing for people in their twenties? I wondered, as I thought about Lacy’s confession of her fifth coffee, earlier. Maybe I should tell her about this energy shot; she’d get the same pay off and not have to pee as often.
The receptionist gave me an indulgent look that I interpreted to mean, “Of course you’ll pass, old woman,” and then pushed a
button on her phone, telling Andrew that I’d arrived.
While I waited, I looked around the small reception area at the multiple matted and framed clippings from newspapers and online journals touting Lightning Design’s rapid rise to the top. “Andrew Rochester Rocks the Tech World!” one headline exclaimed, and again, I felt myself wondering how he had gone from chubby bartender to industry mogul. I’d been so caught up in the whirlwind of our verbal foreplay, and then later, blissful afterglow, I’d forgotten to ask.
I was about to take a seat on one of the plush leather chairs when Andrew approached me. “Jessica,” he said, warmly. His low voice immediately set off a spark of excitement in my body. “Come on back.” He wore dark jeans and an expensive-looking, slim-fit periwinkle sweater. His black-framed glasses made him seem smarter and sexier than I knew he already was.
I followed him down a long hallway, past a large area filled with desks, occupied by at least fifty young men and women who didn’t look much older than Ella and her friends. They were all hunched over their keyboards, wearing headphones and staring at their enormous computer screens with glazed-over eyes. We entered Andrew’s office, and as he shut the enormous wooden door behind us, I quickly took in the floor-to-ceilings windows that looked out over the rest of Bellevue, along with his huge glass-topped desk and multiple computer screens that rested upon it.
“Please, sit,” he said, gesturing toward the two overstuffed brown leather couches that sat in a far corner of the room. “I assume Jayla offered you something to drink.”
“She offered me a shot of something that would give me a heart attack,” I said. My voice shook a bit, and I coughed, not wanting to seem nervous. But my insides squirmed as he smiled at me, remembering what that mouth was capable of doing.
He laughed, and we both took a seat, opposite each other, a small table in between us.
“You’re quite the mogul, it seems,” I said.
“Well, I don’t know about that,” he said. “I do okay. We have four floors in this building, and another location in near Lake Union. I’m thinking about building something bigger outside of the city limits, a new headquarters, so people won’t have to commute as far or deal with traffic.” He tilted his head. “Maybe you can help me find the right property.”
I made a non-committal noise. The last thing I needed was to find a reason to spend more time with Andrew. “How did you go from bartender to all of this?” I made a sweeping gesture, in the general direction of the work area we’d just made our way through.
He shrugged. “I’ve always been into computers, even in high school. I had a two year degree in basic programming when I was bartending, not really doing anything with it, because I preferred fucking around, eating pizza and playing video games with my friends to holding down a nine-to-five job. But after you left the restaurant, I told myself something needed to change if I was ever going to land a girl like you, so I decided to go back to school and get my Master’s in Digital Solutions Development.”
“You’re joking,” I said.
“I’m not,” he said, and the look on his face told me he was telling the truth. “I did have a crush on you, Jessica. And when you left, well, I started fiddling around, building websites for my friends, and then word of mouth started to spread, so I hired a few employees, even as I was finishing up school. I also put the nightly pizzas down and started going to the gym.” He grinned, and again, I saw the shadow of the sweet boy I’d known. “When I made enough money, I hired a stylist, took some dancing lessons, and that’s when I met my ex-girlfriend. We were together for quite a while.” He gave me a long, hungry look. “But she honestly didn’t hold a candle to you.”
“I doubt that,” I said, dropping my gaze to the floor. It was flattering to know that he had thought about me all of those years, but also made me feel a little uncomfortable. Does he still have feelings for me, now? How could he, after it had been so long? He doesn’t even know me. But then again, what were the odds of the two of us meeting again, especially in the way that we had? Didn’t it mean something—that we had a story that required an ending?
“You don’t give yourself enough credit,” Andrew said.
“So, if all of that is true, when we met for coffee that first day, did you recognize me right away?” I gave him a stern look. “Be honest.”
“You got me.” He held his hands up in mock surrender and then dropped them back to his lap. “I didn’t know it was you when I responded to your profile, but as soon as I saw you in person, I knew it was you.”
“But you pretended you didn’t.” I felt an uncomfortable pit form in my stomach, knowing that he was capable of that brief deception. And that I hadn’t picked up on it; I was usually a better read of people than that.
“I wanted to see if you recognized me, considering I look so different,” he said. “My vanity got the better of me. Forgive me?” He gave me the same charming smile that made my heart flutter when I’d been in his bed.
“It’s fine.” None of this mattered, anyway. I was here to tell him we wouldn’t be seeing each other again.
“So,” he said. “You’re having regrets?” He leaned forward to rest his elbows on his knees, linking his long fingers together, loosely.
“Not exactly,” I said, feeling my cheeks warm as I looked at him again. “I mean, we had an amazing time.”
“We did.” His dark eyes remained fixed on mine, and I tried not to look away.
“I’m struggling with not being totally honest with my husband.” I took in a breath, and released it, hoping to steady my rapidly stuttering pulse. “I know you and your girlfriend didn’t tell each other everything, but he and I always have. That’s why this has worked for us. We don’t have any secrets. That’s our most important rule.”
He reclined, then, spreading his long arms along the back of the couch. “Did you go home and tell him what we did together?”
“Yes, but—” I began, but he cut me off.
“Did he like hearing about it? Did it make him want to fuck you?”
I nodded, then, trying to ignore the ache growing between my thighs. This wasn’t supposed to be happening. I’d come there to call things off.
“He bent me over the kitchen counter,” I said, in a still voice.
“I bet he didn’t even wait to take your clothes off,” Andrew eyes hadn’t left my face. He was reading me, looking for every muscle that twitched. Gauging my reactions to what he said. It felt like I had nowhere to hide.
“He didn’t,” I said, unable to resist being drawn in by what he was saying. His words pin-balled around inside my head, electrifying every synapse I had.
We were silent a moment, the air in the room thick with desire.
“Here’s what I think,” he finally said. “I think you’re a little unnerved by how much you liked fucking me. I think you’re used to being the one in control of everything and now you’re afraid that I might take some of that control away.”
“I’m not afraid.” I lifted my chin the slightest bit, and pulled my shoulders back.
“Prove it.” He stood up, took a few steps, and then sat down next to me. He leaned in and put his lips right up against my ear. “Fuck me right now. Here in my office.”
I held completely still. This was not why I came. This was crazy. And despite that, I turned my head and kissed him anyway.
His hands reached behind my head and pulled at the clip that held up my hair, allowing it to cascade down. His phone rang on his desk, but he ignored it . He tickled the insides of my thighs as he pushed up my dress.
“Is the door locked?” I asked, breathlessly.
“Do you really care?” he replied, and moved his mouth down my neck to my collarbone, nipping at my skin.
“Someone could come in,” I said, closing my eyes as waves of pleasure blasted through me. What I was doing was wrong. But I couldn’t stop. I didn’t want to.
“They won’t,” he assured me, but then he got up and turned the latch above the d
oorknob. “Better?”
“Yes.” I stood up, too, and he came back over to me.
“This is what you want, isn’t it?” he said, sliding his hands over my hips. “You came here dressed in your sensible business-best, wearing your hair up, thinking that would keep me from wanting to fuck you?” He chuckled under his breath. “What did I tell you on Saturday? I want the real Jessica. Not the shiny, made-up version you’ve given to other men. You came here thinking you were going to end things with me and instead, you’re going to let me fuck you.”
I sucked in a breath through my teeth, his words affecting me in a way I couldn’t deny. My head was spinning. My body was crying out for his touch. I knew better than to let this keep going, but I felt powerless.
He squeezed the ample flesh of my ass and pulled me against him. He kissed me, again, our tongues teasing, and I reached for his waist and tried to unzip his jeans. His right hand shot up and grabbed me by the hair, yanking it hard enough to bring tears to my eyes.
“Stop trying to control me,” he said, sharply. “I know it’s what you’re used to. I know most men crumple and submit in the presence of a powerful woman, but I don’t. I see who you are, Jessica. And I know exactly what you need.”
He turned me around, then, both of his hands roaming up and down the front of my body, squeezing my breasts as he walked me over to his desk. We were high enough up and far enough away from any other buildings that no one could see us, and there weren’t any internal windows looking into his office. No one would know.
“Tell me the filthiest thing you’ve ever done,” he instructed as he bent me over his desk and shimmied up my dress. “Or want to do, but haven’t. Something you’ve never told anyone else.”
I pressed my lips together, and pushed my hips back against him, yearning to be fucked, but instead, he slapped my bare ass with his open palm. It burned like a thousand bee stings piercing my skin, but was oddly exciting, too. Before I realized what I was doing, I told him what he wanted to hear. Something even Jake didn’t know. “A roomful of men,” I said, through gritted teeth. “In line, stroking their hard cocks, waiting to fuck me.” I’d never spoken those words out loud; I’d never opened myself up that far.