Alexia knew she was inviting trouble, but when afterhours became more than just business, she started battling with her growing feelings for this younger woman. Will the passion between them be enough to defy her father and confess her dirty little secret?
*****
Seeing my father heading in my direction, I groaned and searched for one of the hot waitresses passing by, to snag another glass of champagne. The stuff wasn’t of the good quality which was typical of my father. Despite us having money more than he knew what to do with it, he didn’t believe in wasting the expensive stuff on the general public. Now if this had been a private party with his trusted friends and contacts, he would have bought top shelf liquor.
I located a pretty blonde who wasn’t too far from my side. She was dressed like the other waitress. Short red skirt, a pristine white top and heels. She smiled at me as I approached her, just an innocent smile which had been on her face all evening. Still that smile reminded me that I hadn’t been with a woman in a long time.
“Thank you,” I told her with a smile of my own, as she passed me the glass of champagne. Our fingers touched and I would have wanted to trail mine over her slender neck. Except I wasn’t too much of the pursuer. I always liked being pursued. At least it had been that way when I was in college where I’d been away from my overbearing father. Away from his rigid beliefs systems and free to live my life the way I wanted.
If he knew what was in my thoughts about the waitress, he would have had an apoplexy. I turned to regard him as the waitress sauntered away to continue her duties. If I wasn’t chicken shit, I would have slipped her my number or something. I’d discovered in college that even a girl who considered herself to be heterosexual was up for the experience of sleeping with another woman.
I figured the same could be for more mature women who were out of college too, although I couldn’t say for sure. Since I graduated summa cum laude from Wharton three years ago, I hadn’t been with a woman. There had been one man involved in the equation but that had been an experiment that had gone horribly wrong and reminded me that I couldn’t hide who I was forever.
Frowning, I flirted with the idea of admitting to my father that he would never have a son-in-law but I knew that would be inviting an argument that I didn’t want. My dad was controlling and had been that way. He was to my mom but she never defied him. She never quite got over my brother’s death and most of her time was spent in a world of medication-induced stupor. In other words, she was addicted to the counter drugs and had in fact just recently returned home from being to a therapy farm. Of course everyone thought she had been with the family in the Caribbean.
God forbid anyone find out my mother was basically a drug addict. My father would have an apoplexy. I partly blamed him for enabling her and not taking a more rigorous stance to ensure she stayed sober. She, been almost in a lucid state was perfect for him to control her and make her decisions for her.
The way he was trying to make the decision for me to get married.
“Alexis!” he announced, embracing me and I tried not to stiffen in his arms. “Where have you been all night?”
“Hello dad,” I returned, wincing a little when he slapped my back. “I’ve been around. I don’t see mom, anywhere. Isn’t she with you?”
He fanned off my question. “She’s fine, just feeling a little bit under the weather.
In other words, she was back to abusing her medications again.
“Maybe she could come stay with me for a while,” I suggested to dad. “The change of environment may be good for her.”
“Your mother is right where she belongs,” he insisted. “Besides, with the company, what time could you devote to ensure she is okay?”
His words came off bitter and I wished I could be anywhere but there. Granddad had passed over the company to me two years ago before his death, something my father still held against him even though he was dead. Not that he had wished his father dead, but dad had his eyes set on granddad’s company to merge into a conglomerate with his. That he’d left me the billion-dollar company had irked my father when the will was read and still made him nasty about it today.
“I’ll make the time,” he stated simply. “Family is fine. What I’m concerned about is business. I heard you lost the McCain account.”
“I didn’t lose it,” I refuted. “I simply discontinued their contract.”
“Everybody knows they haul in big profits,” he argued on a scoff.
“Using Ponzi schemes,” I fired back. “I’ve questions about their ethics.”
“Ethics,” he said in scorn. “My father made a big mistake giving you that company. I’m sure he’s rolling in his grave.”
“Actually, I’m following granddad’s wish to cut services with them,” I informed him and saw the color stain his cheeks.
“Where’s your date for the evening?” he asked, changing the subject.
I glanced around the room for my best friend Paul and found him chatting with another man. Of all the times to flirt with a man, Paul had to choose now. Of course to others, it seemed as though he was having a regular conversation.
“He’s over there by the bust of that Greek statue,” I answered, feeling pleased with myself. I’d dragged Paul to come with me, knowing one of the areas of my life where my dad I always made a potshot was my love life or lack of it.
My dad was archaic and believed a woman’s greatest achievement was in serving her husband. Not trying to break through the corporate glass ceiling.
“Will he be the one to stick around?” he asked me, almost in a mocking tone. Sometimes his comments left me thinking he had figured out I was a lesbian and dared me to confess the same to him. I would never live it down if he found out. My life would be a living hell and having gone all through my childhood being made to feel inferior to my brother who had later died, I didn’t want to invite the torture of my father’s ire.
“I don’t suppose this will lead to marriage and grandbabies for me, will it?” he taunted me. “Is marriage in your plans at all?”
“Who knows?” I replied noncommittally, tension mounting in my body. I was waiting for him to bring up my sexual preference, wondering if he had the guts to bring it out in the open.
“But then again, you’ve never really been the type to attract a man,” he said hurtfully. “A man usually goes for something more…you know.”
I did know what he meant. Even if I weren’t into girls, I would be no beauty queen to attract a man’s attention. At five eight, I was tall for a woman, skinny and flat-chested. Well, not totally flat-chested but not much was there besides two small bumps. The only thing I probably had going for me was that my ass wasn’t completely flat like the rest of me. With my mop of unruly red curls, freckles and my mouth being too wide, I was never anybody’s first choice. Including his. He’d always preferred my brother and never failed to make this known even after Thomas died.
“I didn’t want to say anything,” I heard the lie on my lips but couldn’t seem to stop myself, “but Paul and I have discussed it and we’re actually going to get married.”
*****
“You did what!”
I winced at Paul’s booming voice and wished I could disappear into the floor of the restaurant where we were having lunch. At his outburst, several of the other diners sitting in our area cast us black looks.
“Not so loud,” I hissed at him. “If I wanted the whole restaurant to know what we were discussing, I would have used a microphone.”
“You did what!” he repeated in a much softer voice. “What the hell were you thinking?”
“You don’t know my father, Paul,” I said on a groan. “He would make the Pope admit to being a woman.”
His lips twitched in the beginnings of a smile before he regained his composure. “I knew something was up when you called me wanting to have a spur of the moment lunch at Luigi’s,” he stated, glaring at me. “I just didn’t have any idea it would be a marriage proposal.”
“You know most people wouldn’t mind marrying a billionaire,” I told him.
“Except when they are both gay,” he pointed out.
“So what?” I asked him. “I mean, you can have your relationships and I don’t care and I can too, without being under scrutiny from my father.”
“Why don’t you tell him?” he suggested. “You know that’s the reason we hooked up as friends in the first place. To help each other to adjust to finally accepting our sexuality. My folks know.”
“And remember how they reacted at first?” I reminded him. “Now picture my dad being five times that.”
“But they got over it!”
“My dad won’t get over it.” I reached across the table to cover his hand with my own. No one who looked at Paul would think he was gay. And the funny thing about it was that as tall, big and handsome as he was with muscles a man would die for and a woman drool over, he was a bottom. I knew because we talked about this kind of stuff since we first met in an online support group for people struggling to accept their sexuality and share it with their families. After talking together for a year, we had finally decided since we lived in the same city to meet. Our supportive friendship was solid since.
“We can always divorce if either of us want that,” I told him. “I know you’re not interested in marriage and I don’t think I am either. So, what have to lose if we tie the knot? We’ve a great friendship and you always go with me to most of our functions. Come on, you get to marry a billionaire.”
He rolled his eyes at me. “What’s the perks to being married to a billionaire again?”
“Remember you’ve been seeking funding to open your own fashion line?” The minute I dropped the bait, I got his attention. Paul was a fashion designer who had the dream of creating his own line but didn’t have the collateral needed to secure the kind of loan to get his business off the ground.
“You’ll fund me?” he asked for clarity.
I nodded. “I was going to fund you anyway if you couldn’t come up with the money otherwise.”
He gave me a hopeless look. “You realize you shouldn’t have told me that, if you want to use it as leverage, right?”
“It doesn’t matter because I’m not trying to manipulate you,” I said with a shrug. “I want to be upfront with you. Really what harm will it be?”
“Okay, dammit I can’t believe I am agreeing to this,” he groaned. “But really, what’s there to lose?”
I smiled at him in relief. “You mean it? You’ll actually do it?”
“Yes, but I’ll think more about it,” he stated, “cause I must be losing my mind to be agreeing to this hair-brained idea of yours.”
“Well, just make up your mind before June twenty-fourth,” I said on a wince.
He stared at me suspiciously. “What’s happening on the twenty-fourth?”
“Our wedding,” I squeaked.
He glared at me. “You know one of these days you’re going to realize you take some serious liberties sometimes.”
*****
This is the wrong file!” I snapped. “Don’t you know the difference between Bryan and Bryant.” I stressed the ‘t’ to enunciate the difference as I slapped the file onto my new Secretary’s desk. My new temp, Gloria who was filling in for Samantha who was on maternity leave.
Usually very patient, I was at the end of my tether and having a bad morning. Hell, I had been having a bad week and the days were getting worse as my wedding date approached. The niggling doubts had me all keyed up as I wondered if I was doing the right thing marrying Paul. It had all seemed so perfect when I came up with the plan. The answer to all my problems but with just a few weeks to go, I was having wedding jitters. It wasn’t everyday a lesbian married a gay man because she was too much of a coward to stand up to her chauvinistic father.
Unfortunately, this also meant that anyone who worked in close vicinity to me, was in danger of my acerbic tongue.
“Get me the correct file ASAP, please,” I ordered, trying to go for a softer tone because the woman looked about ready to burst into tears. I kept forgetting she wasn’t like Samantha and the bullshit Samantha had put up with from me, had this woman cowering. Her quivering attitude just made it worse for me to appreciate her as my secretary. Once Samantha had even told me ‘screw you’ and I’d taken it. It was just a part of the great bond we had working together. She never took offence and I didn’t either. Working with each other, I’d found it was much better when we were able to be honest with our words so there was no awkwardness around each other after.
“Yes, Miss. Deloitte,” Gloria said and got to her feet.
I didn’t bother to remind her I had sent her to call me Alexia. I stalked into my office, slamming the door shut. Where the hell was that intern from Colbert Business College anyway? She should have reported at eight today or so HR had said although it was closer to noon. At least when the intern arrived, she could work with Gloria as it would probably take the two of them to do the same amount of work and with Samantha’s quality.
I was back at my desk, typing up an important budget report that I needed for this evening’s meeting. I heard a knock on my door.
“Enter!” I bellowed without looking up..
The door opened and closed and as I backspaced an incorrectly spelt word, I realized Gloria was just standing there instead of handing me the file.
“Well don’t just stand there all day!” I said in annoyance. “You’ve been keeping me waiting.”
“Hmm. Not long enough.”
At the unfamiliar voice, I snapped my gaze up from the computer and my mouth went dry. The husky, sexy feminine voice which was on a lower tone than the usual higher pitch, belonged to a beautiful woman with caramel complexion. I could tell she was young, probably just at the legal drinking age but her almond-shaped eyes, those dark brown chocolate pools spoke of experience. The tight curls of her black hair which she wore loose, stretched to just below her shoulder and was highlighted with burgundy.
She was a couple inches below my height and my eyes ran over her curves, marking everything mentally with a smiley face. Her mustard-colored shirt outlined her full, round breasts. Her shirt was tucked into a dark skirt which ended just below her knees. It was decent enough except the material clung to the voluptuous curves of her hips. With her small waist, the flare of her hips was even further emphasized. She wore black tinted panty hose and high heels which meant she was actually a lot shorter than me then.
Although her whole package was like a hit in the solar plexus, there were two things about her that drew my attention and excited me. One was the circular ring between her nostrils and the other was the rainbow tattoo on her left leg.
“Who are you?” I blurted out, hoping my face was not as flushed as my insides felt. It was a long time since I’d looked at a woman and all in one thought had her stripped, trying to imagine what she looked like without clothes.
“Who do you want me to be?” she asked, with a grin that produced the most gorgeous set of dimples in her cheeks. She was openly flirting with me. She knew she was hot and to my utter disadvantage, figured I wanted to strip her clothes off her and spread her on my desk and bury my face between her skirts. It wasn’t hard to tell how I was feeling considering I was a second away from releasing a drool.
“I’m sorry,” she apologized and sobered, sauntering over to my table and sticking out her right hand. “I’m Kim Cockett. Your intern. I’m sorry I am late but I had an emergency.”
I took her hand to form a handshake but it changed into more. I never knew before that hands touching could be such an erotic experience. The softness of her skin against mine electrified me.
“Alexia,” I announced. “I’m Alexia Deloitte.”
“Miss. Deloitte, your Secretary asked me to hand this to you.”
Reluctantly, I let her hand go, to accept the file. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.”
She still had that little smirk on her face as
though she knew something I didn’t. I reluctantly reminded myself that I was unlikely to be her type. She was gorgeous and I wasn’t. More the pity because I was fantasizing about her lips, how they would feel against mine.
“You’ll be working with my secretary,” I told her, withdrawing to my CEO persona. For once, I wished I was beautiful enough to land a girl like this. But that was impossible. And anyway, wasn’t I about to get married?
*****
“Good job on the report, Gloria,” I praised as I walked by her station. Her face which had taken on an apprehensive look when I’d stepped out of my office, was now visibly relaxed and she even managed a smile. She was a good-looking brunette in her early thirties. I smiled back at her, waiting for some sort of attraction, waiting for my body to tell me what I was feeling for my intern was simply because I missed having sex with a woman. Any woman. But that wasn’t the case. I had no interest nor attraction towards Gloria.
“Thanks, Miss. Deloitte,” she answered.
I frowned to find the work station set up beside hers empty. Where the hell was that girl? I’d acted as though I hadn’t seen her sneaking in late over the past few days but this was getting to be too much. She was almost never on time for work at eight and sometimes arrived even two hours late, mumbling she had an emergency. Of course every time I opened my mouth to chastise her for being less than professional, seeing her pouty lips and her feigned regret, I lost my steam and simply nodded.
This girl had me ass backward and belly-up. I was consciously aware of her being around even when she wasn’t in my office. And she always found some silly reasons for being in my office. She wanted to borrow an eraser, or the sharpener on my desk. I knew it was all an excuse to enter my office because she could have asked all those things of Gloria outside. I knew it and she knew it, which begged for the question, why she was trying to make me never forget that she was around?
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