“Izzi!” I blurted out. Like a fucking idiot. “What brings you back to Seattle?”
She hadn’t come back home during any of her summer breaks, and although I was pretty sure she’d been here for the holidays, or her parents had gone to see her, or something, I had never gotten around to seeing her. There was always some work to do, or schedules hadn’t lined up. I couldn’t believe it had been so long or that she’d undergone such a transformation.
Izzi gave me a blinding smile. Jesus Christ she was stunning. My mouth was drier than the Sahara. “I’m here to get a job working for you guys.”
Ahhh. So that would be why Garrett was arguing with her. It all made sense now.
2
Izzi
Oh God, John was as handsome as ever. I had to work hard not to shift in my seat or rub my thighs together, already shivering with need just at his presence. His dark, flashing eyes were still the same, as was his nearly-black hair. I could still remember what it had looked like coming out of the water at the beach six years ago, curly and loose in a way that it never was when he was around other people, having combed it into submission.
His dress shirt was just tight enough to show off his muscles. Fuck. He might have been forty-eight, but he could compete with men my age when it came to strength, I was sure. I wanted to rip his shirt open and have him pick me up, spreading my legs…
I snapped out of it. For fuck’s sake, Izzi, there was no way he’d be impressed with me and see me as a proper adult if I just sat there drooling over him. Especially since Dad was already convinced I wasn’t going to be a good fit at the company.
Which, frankly, was hypocritical of him. He and John had started GoodGreene in their garage, of all places, while they were struggling to get work because nobody felt they were experienced enough. If anyone should want to give a new person a chance it should be Dad. But I guess that kind of thing didn’t apply to his daughter. Ugh.
“I’ve been trying to tell her that I don’t think she’s cut out to be here,” Dad explained to John.
“And I’m trying to get it through Dad’s skull that I’m more than qualified,” I shot back. “Why do you think I’ve been studying marketing in San Francisco for the past four years? Hmm? So that I could just run around blowing Daddy’s money? I don’t think so. You’re far from old but you’re not going to be around forever, and I want to be that person that you can trust to run things around here. Besides, you could use some help building your brand.”
Dad scoffed and looked at John with a grin, as if expecting an ally in his humor. “Honey, we’re not doing too bad, I don’t know if the car I bought you for your sixteenth birthday and paying all of your college bills was a clue.”
“You got lucky, Dad.” Time to be frank. “You and John built something great, I’m not denying that, but the reason it was so successful was that you got in early with the tech boom. You built something that nobody else had thought up. But other people have thought it up now. Just look at Microsoft. It was the first, but Apple’s taken it over since then and who knows who else might, in time? Just because you’re there first doesn’t mean you’re going to stay on top. You haven’t updated your marketing strategy in years. You need an upgrade.”
Dad opened his mouth to argue, but to my surprise, John spoke up on my behalf. “She’s right, Garrett.”
Both Dad and I stared at him. I could feel my face heating up and I hoped I wasn’t blushing too hard. Of course, I was right. I knew that I was. I wouldn’t have bothered my dad with all of this and insisted that I needed to be hired and help if I wasn’t one hundred percent certain that I was correct here.
To hear John openly defend me, though, that I hadn’t expected. I hadn’t even known that John would be thinking along the same lines that I was.
“I’ve done the research myself,” John explained. “I would’ve brought it up sooner, but I wanted to be sure and I’ve been a bit distracted with Angelica lately. I apologize. But Izzi’s absolutely right. We can’t keep coasting just because we’re the only ones with the product. We have to make sure we’ll be head and shoulders above whatever shiny new version our competitors launch, and it’s only a matter of time until they do. We have to be ahead of that curve.”
He sent me a wink and my heart started beating so fast I was sure both John and Dad could hear it. This was another reason I wanted to work at the company. I cared about Dad and his legacy, and I didn’t want to see the company go under, but Dad also had enough money to set himself up for life. It wasn’t like he needed this company the way he once had. And with my degree and work experience from my summer internships, and Dad’s connections, I could’ve gotten a job just about anywhere I wanted.
No, the real draw, the secret draw that I would never admit to anyone, of this company wasn’t that my Dad ran it, but that John helped run it, too.
I’d debated with myself if this was a good choice. After all, going to work for the company run by your parent when you’re fresh out of college? Not a great look. I was sure people would claim I was just a Daddy’s girl who was riding on the coattails of more talented parents who had since handed me everything.
But those rumors didn’t matter if it meant I got to show myself to John. I had gotten summer internships to build up my work experience and resume, and they’d had the added bonus of making sure John didn’t see me. I’d known, from the moment I was sixteen and realized how much I wanted him, that he would never want me so long as he had in his mind the image of me as a child.
That’d meant I had to go away and come back, show him the new me, the adult me, and have him realize that I was a different person from the child he’d once known. I had to make ‘Izzi the Kid’ and ‘Izzi the Grown Woman’ two different people in his mind, or I was sure he would never be able to realize how great we’d be together.
Part of that would, of course, be impressing him and showing him that I wasn’t just a pretty face. Going to college had only cemented my desire to be with an older man. God, the assholes I’d run into and had to put up with in my time there… I wasn’t looking for a boy to parent and be the maid for and do all of his emotional labor for and basically train like a puppy into being a decent partner. I wanted a man who already had it figured out, who knew how to be a good partner, who knew what he wanted and would be good to me, for me, without making me have to teach him how to treat a woman.
I would have to show him how smart and capable I was so that he would see I was a great partner for him. That I wasn’t just a pretty face but someone he could see himself with for years to come.
I hoped my plan worked, but it was hard to tell what John was feeling. He was the quiet behind-the-scenes man to Dad’s boisterous extrovert, and it was hard to tell just from his face what his thoughts were. He had this perpetual look of firm confidence, which, honestly, was still hot even after not seeing him for years.
Dad looked back and forth between John and me, frowning a little, like he hadn’t expected to be ganged up on and was feeling a bit betrayed but was also amused about it.
“All right,” Dad said slowly, like he was thinking it through. “It’s clear to me you have the same sales bug that I do, Izzi. God knows the marketing world has changed since I first was getting us investors.”
He looked over at John. “I’m her dad, I’m not sure if I’m the best one to conduct this interview then. Why don’t you take her to your office and interview her for the job and see if she’ll fit in at the marketing department.”
I grinned at him. “Does this mean you’re giving me a chance?”
I didn’t want to tease Dad too much or I would look like I was still just his kid instead of a legitimate employee, but I couldn’t resist just a little.
Dad rolled his eyes, but I could see him trying to keep a straight face and not smile. “Off with you, then. And don’t go easy on her, John. Treat her just like any other potential employee.”
I wanted John to treat me not like just any other employee, but I di
dn’t want him to treat me like his best friend’s daughter, either. I had something much different in mind.
John gave me a small smirk and I shivered again. God he was handsome. He needed to stop smirking at me like that or I wasn’t going to be responsible for my actions.
“Right this way. I’ll take good care of her, Garrett, and we’ll see if she’s truly a right fit.”
I tried to keep my heart rate down. I was about to be alone with John, after years of wanting and not getting to see him.
I just hoped I wouldn’t make a fool of myself.
3
John
I couldn’t believe how much Izzi had grown. I couldn’t even associate her with the girl I had once known. The two didn’t seem to match up in my head.
And she was a determined one, too. Izzi had a competitive spirit, always had, and so I’d thought she’d want to get far away from her father when it came to her career. A lot of rich kids were content to just take a cushy job at their parents’ company. But Izzi was the type where I’d thought she’d want to get away and establish herself outside of her father’s shadow.
I supposed she had a point, though, in mentioning that her father would need a successor at some point. We were only in our forties and so neither of us had given much thought to handing the company over yet. But it was something we would have to consider and usually, by the time you wanted to consider something like that, you were too late and scrambling. Better to have Izzi installed at the company already for that time in a few decades when Garrett was ready to retire.
“All right.” I led her to my office, closed the door, and gestured for her to sit down.
Fuck, that pencil skirt was just short enough to reveal her legs and I was… finding my pants a bit tight.
I adjusted myself discreetly. I hadn’t been this attracted to a woman in years. Not since Laura.
Jesus Christ. Izzi wasn’t some random person that I had met. She was the daughter of my best friend. I couldn’t be having these feelings about her. The age difference between us was bad enough, more than two decades, but the fact that she was Garrett’s kid made it even worse. I couldn’t afford to be so attracted to her.
“So.” I held out my hand. “You have a resume?”
“Of course.” Izzi handed me her resume and I looked it over.
“You’ve got four internships under your belt. Nice.”
“I made sure to work with different companies each time, so I got a myriad of experiences,” Izzi explained. “I didn’t want to tie myself down to just one type of company. As you can see, I focused heavily on marketing experience, since with all due respect to you and the other owner of the company, you guys have kind of been sitting on your laurels all these years and haven’t updated your strategy.”
“You’re rather bold in your assessment,” I pointed out. I wanted to be tough but fair on her, although I really appreciated her confidence.
“Why would I be coming here if I didn’t find anything to improve?” Izzi shot back. “I don’t want to have a cushy job where I just do as I’m told all the time for a company where everything is going well. I don’t want to be one of those people who’s working for a company that is successful but keeps pushing for more and more just for the sake of it. I want to really improve something and make a difference. I’m a fixer that way.”
I had to admit, I was impressed by her attitude. Most people did want a job that was ‘cushy’. They wanted to get a job at a company that was already successful so that they didn’t have to do much. They got the prestige of being chosen for such a place without having to work overtime or go above and beyond in order to make the company stand out, because the company already did.
“And you think that the company has things in need of fixing.”
“So do you, you just said as much to your business partner.” Izzi fixed me with a smile that made my cock swell a little with heat.
She’s just being playful because she knows you, I admonished myself. This was horrible, to be having such sexual thoughts not only about a woman so much younger than I was, but a woman I’d seen grow up. Just because I was having wildly inappropriate thoughts didn’t mean that Izzi was and I had to remember that. It was all in my head.
“And how many people will you meet who have the same passion and honesty that I do?” Izzi pointed out. “I have nothing to lose by being honest. It’s not like Dad will disown me. I can give you guys the opinions and thoughts that most of your other employees might not dare to because you’re intimidating.”
“I’m intimidating?”
“Oh c’mon, like you’re unaware you have that broody alpha thing going on,” Izzi said with a smile and a wave of her hand.
Alpha, huh? A desire rose in me to show her just how alpha I could be with her. To see if she’d like it if I got firm and confident with her, taking that sass and turning it into whimpered words of pleasure…
God damn it man! I wanted to smack myself. I wasn’t in college anymore, I was a grown man with a kid who was becoming a teenager, I was far too old for this kind of nonsense. I knew how to think with my head and not with my dick, for fuck’s sake.
“But I’m not intimidated,” Izzi went on. “I know you’re a sweetheart under all of that. And you want someone who’s going to be honest with you guys. I seriously see a problem coming up ahead for you with your marketing strategies and you want to get ahead of that—if you start working on it when it’s already a problem, then you’re too late and you’ve missed your best chance. You want to deal with this before it becomes an issue.”
“You’re great at selling yourself,” I pointed out. “But how do I know that there really is an issue and you’re not just trying to make me paranoid and think there’s a problem so that I hire you?”
“Fair enough.” Izzi pulled a file out of her purse and handed it to me. “I know this is where I want to work and so I did the trouble of making a little projection of how you’re looking. As you can see, I’ve pointed out your weak spots in marketing and public perception compared to your potential competitors.”
I flipped through the papers in the file briefly. This was comprehensive, for sure. It wasn’t quite as detailed a report as I would expect from one of my marketing team, but then, Izzi wasn’t giving an in-depth report, she was just highlighting an issue so that she could then dive deeper into it, if she was hired.
“Good work.” I put the file down and looked at her resume. “Impressive credentials. And you’re in luck, our marketing department is only staffed by two people right now.”
“You guys really like to keep it small, huh?” Izzi was teasing me again. She really had to stop doing that or I wasn’t going to be able to keep my thoughts clean. Fuck.
“There’s nothing small about us,” I replied before I could stop myself.
Izzi grinned and I wanted to bang my head against the desk. For crying out loud, I could not be flirting with my best friend’s daughter!
“However,” I went on, determinedly ignoring my double entendre, “We’ve tried to keep this company as close as possible. We don’t want to blow out of proportion the way other start-ups have and lose what made us great and special because we expanded too far and too quickly. We want to keep things in the family in the truest sense of the term, not in the sense of those big companies that are technically family-owned but that just means that the same five siblings get all the company’s profits, and they don’t take care of their workers. We want to hire only the best and to treat them right and keep this all in-house instead of outsourcing or blowing through dozens of people when we can do the job better with just a few people who are given the support and time to do things properly.”
Izzi nodded. “I’d love to be a part of that team. You will need to expand in some ways, I get that you and Dad are more traditional, but we need to inject some new blood into this place. But we can discuss that later.”
The temptation to say something about her assuming more control than she had,
and teaching her a lesson, was strong—but also far too flirtatious. I bit my tongue. “We’ve been planning to release an updated, premium version of our product, and I’ve been worried about the increased competition. I don’t want us to fall flat after the launch.
“It would be hard work and it’s unusual to put a brand-new person in charge of such a project, but I think that you’re the best one for the job with your fresh outlook. You want a chance to help us be new and relevant? Here it is. You can help out the marketing department on our campaign for the product.”
Izzi beamed at me like I’d given her the best birthday present ever. “Oh my God, thank you!”
She launched herself out of her chair and ran around the desk to hug me. “Thank you, I knew you’d give me a chance!”
She smelled unbelievably good, like jasmine, and having her body pressed completely up against mine was—fuck. I could feel myself getting hard and I gently pulled away from the hug. “I’ll talk it over with your father. I understand he might want to keep family and business separated but I think you’ll be good for the company.”
“I hope that I can prove your faith in me to be valid,” Izzi said, and then a determined look came into her eyes. “I will prove your faith in me to be valid.”
“I’m sure you will.”
Izzi grinned at me and hurried out of the room, probably to go and tell people the good news. I knew I’d have a tough talk with Garrett about this—it would probably be best if I supervised Izzi rather than Garrett so that there wouldn’t be any issues with him being her father and her boss at the same time.
Although, I wasn’t sure I would be all that much better if I couldn’t keep my thoughts on the clean side while I was around her. I had promised myself that I would never marry again after Laura. I’d been so fucking in love with her I hadn’t even been able to fathom the idea that someday I might move on. And here I was drooling over some other woman, and not only that but the worst possible woman in the world for me to drool over.
Daddy's Best Friend (Forbidden Temptations) Page 2