The Brooklyn Book Boyfriends

by Kayley Loring

  My first instinct is to grab her and take her up to the roof deck so I can do my best to get her relaxed. Fortunately, I remember who’s beside me. Unfortunately, I’m standing next to an idiot.

  “She wants me. I knew it,” he whispers out of the side of his mouth, as he pulls down the cuffs on his Tom Ford dress shirt.

  I almost want to laugh, but mostly I want to punch him in the head.

  When Aimee sees us together, those lips that I’ve come to know and love subtly form the words, “oh shit.”

  Keaton strides toward her. Hearing him say her name makes me want to punch him in the kidneys, but I hang back so he can’t see me shake my head at Aimee and mouth: “I haven’t told him yet.”

  She barely nods, signaling that she understands, and manages to gracefully hold her hand out to shake Keaton’s while he’s clearly moving in for a cheek kiss.

  “Aren’t you a sight for sore eyes on a Monday morning,” my Chief Fuckhead Officer says.

  “Hey there—both of you! Good to see you, great … good … great.”

  I think I can see all of her teeth. She sort of looks like she’s losing her mind.

  “You remember my buddy, Chase?” Keaton pats me on the shoulder and I want to punch him in the throat.

  “How’s it going?” I say, as I shake her moist hand. That hand did amazing things to me for hours. As soon as she yanks it away from me, I know that I probably should have woken her up to say goodbye before I left the hotel. That’s on me.

  “Let me guess,” Keaton says, as he puts his fucking arm around her shoulder. “You’ve had time to reconsider and you’ve decided you want to go with me to Wicked. You’re in luck—”

  She interrupts him, thank God, while stepping away from him. “Actually, I thought it would be a good idea for me to show up before Elaine Hoffman gets here, so I can tell you guys that I am going to be the project manager overseeing your transition to subscription services. It’s my specialty, and I have a great track record. She hired me on Friday, and that’s when she told me about this assignment.” She doesn’t make eye contact with me, as she holds her enormous shoulder bag in front of herself and covers her neck with one hand, subconsciously protecting her most vulnerable body parts. “I wasn’t sure if it was appropriate to call you on the weekend,” she says to Keaton.

  I’m not even aware of his reaction to this news.

  The way my brain blanks out now is nothing like when I came inside of her.

  I have no idea what’s going on right now. All I know is that the bandage that I was planning on ripping off for Keaton is staying exactly where it is, and Aimee just ripped apart my fucking heart.

  11

  Aimee

  The Mother of all Mondays has turned out to be one stressful ass ache of a motherfucker so far.

  I had nodded off in the wee small hours of the morning, still warm and damp from hot shower sex with Chase and woken up by myself in a dark room thinking it was still somewhere within the realm of nighttime. It wasn’t. It was just after eight o’clock. I called out to Chase, and when he didn’t answer, I started to panic. When I opened the curtains and read the note that he’d left me, I really panicked.

  Morning, angel.

  I didn’t want to wake you because you seem to be sound asleep, and you didn’t mention having any appointments today. The room is paid for. Order anything you want from room service and stay until noon if you’d like. I’ll tell them not to disturb you.

  Thank you for the night of my life.

  I will be in touch as soon as I get my phone back.

  I want to see you again tonight, and the next night, and the next.

  I have decided to tell Keaton about us. Sooner rather than later.

  See you soon.

  --Chase

  P.S. I’d say we burned everything down to the ground last night, wouldn’t you?

  I could not believe he left without waking me up first. I was going to tell him about my job when we woke up. It’s on me. I know that’s on me, but mother of balls, I did not want to lose our night together. It never would have occurred to me that he wouldn’t wake me up before leaving! Now I felt like I was going to lose that hot dog I’d eaten last night on the hotel room floor. I did not have time to order room service. I did not have time to shower again or charge my phone or deal with my chaotic hair. I barely had time to get dressed so I could run out the door and get a cab home to change clothes.

  While I was in the cab I tried calling Chase every single minute, but it went straight to voicemail every time. I knew full well that if he tells Keaton about us before I show up for our meeting it will be a nightmare and I’ll probably be fired right out of the gate.

  Roxy was home, already dressed and ready to go to work. I didn’t even have the time or words to explain to her what the problem was, and I didn’t have to. She took one look at me, nodded once, and said, “Well, at least you got laid. Don’t worry, I can cover rent next month.” Then she tossed a bagel at me while I was running out the door.

  Now I’m standing here in front of the man I rejected last week and the man I fellated in the shower last night, and neither of them have anything to say to me after being informed of my new position as their project manager. I finally manage to look at Chase, and it feels like someone is dumping ice water on me. His jaw is clenched, his fists are clenched, his whole body is just clenched. If looks could kill, I’d be a dead woman. But it really kills me to see him struggling to comprehend this while maintaining his composure. I didn’t want to have to tell him like this.

  It’s a good thing that he hasn’t told Keaton about us yet, but when it comes to me and Chase, I can see that I am screwed. And not in the way that I want to be.

  Fine.

  If he’s going to prioritize his buddy and his company over me and the night we just had together, then he should understand why I am going to prioritize my new job and my indignance over his not waking me up over his anger toward me about not telling him sooner.

  Just as Keaton is about to open his smirky mouth and say something that I’m fairly sure will be along the lines of: “Well, I guess it’s fate, then,” I hear Elaine Hoffman’s voice behind me.

  “Oh good, we’re all here,” she says.

  It’s still ten minutes before our meeting was supposed to start.

  I clear my throat and turn to her. “Elaine, hi! You’re early too, I see.”

  “My dad always used to say, ‘If you’re not ten minutes early, you’re ten minutes late.’ Of course, one day when he’d left for work ten minutes early, he got hit by a truck that was running late for a delivery. I still haven’t figured out what the meaning of that story is, but there you go.”

  Keaton barks out a laugh, and then realizes that she’s dead serious.

  “Oh my God, Elaine, I’m so sorry.” I touch her arm.

  “It was years ago, and he was a dick. But we’re all here, so let’s rock and roll!”

  “We’ll sit down in the conference room over here,” Chase mutters.

  Elaine gives me the once-over. “Must have been windier in your neighborhood than mine this morning.”

  I try to pat my hair down but there is no hiding the bedhead. I look like I’ve been shagged six ways from Sunday, and I totally was. “I air-dried,” I shrug.

  “Everything good here?” she whispers, as we follow Chase and Keaton to the conference room.

  “All good. How are you?”

  She rolls her eyes. “Oh, you know. Monday’s the new Friday. Work is my salvation.”

  “Mine too. I think.”

  I hope.

  I’ve got my usual introductory spiel for executives down pat. Elaine is really only here as a formality.

  Once we’re in the conference room, Keaton offers us food and drink from the impressive spread that’s set up on a console table along the wall, and Chase goes off “to grab Greg.”

  I take advantage of his absence to gather my wits about me and will myself to ignore the fact that I
can still feel him everywhere—all over and inside of me.

  I’m a pro.

  I’ve got an MBA.

  I got this.

  I’ll just power through this meeting, impress everyone so much that it becomes crystal clear to them that only a moron would fire me, and I will continue to do my job.

  Chase brings in a very handsome Asian man, who has the most beautiful complexion I have ever seen on an adult male human.

  “I’m Greg Lee, CTO,” he says. “Really good to meet you.”

  “I’m Aimee Gilpin, hello.” We shake hands, and while he greets Elaine, I stare at his face like I weirdo.

  He smiles at me. “You’re thinking I have nice skin, aren’t you?”

  “It’s not just nice, it’s beautiful!”

  “My fiancée is an aesthetician. She has a YouTube channel and she’s always experimenting with facials on me.”

  This is good. This is exactly the kind of casual friendly energy I need to start out this meeting. I ask him who his fiancée is, because Roxy and I have spent hours watching YouTube tutorials on how to be exceptionally gorgeous, and it turns out I know exactly who she is. He lets me touch his face and Elaine and I giggle because he’s so nice and cool, and then Chase grumbles about how we should probably get on with the meeting.

  He dresses for work exactly as he does when he’s at a bar at night, which is not at all disappointing, but it’s starting to look like CEO Chase might be an asshole. At least to me. At least for now. And a tiny rebellious part of me might be a tiny bit turned on by that.

  On with the show.

  I have my standard PowerPoint presentation ready on my laptop, and since there are only four other people at the table, I don’t have to fuss with hooking it up to a projector or a monitor. I launch into my speech about what I’ve studied, where I’ve worked, which companies I’ve worked for during their transitions to a subscription-based model. I show them graphs and pie charts and conversion rates, give them a rundown of the best ways to offset initial existing customer resistance to the new format.

  I make eye contact with Greg Lee seventy percent of the time. I will be working closely with him, since he is the CTO, and much of the transition involves new software and interfaces. Also, he’s engaged and I don’t have to worry about him either trying to date me or trying to murder me with his eyes.

  When I do finally look over at Chase, though, I can see that his body language has softened.

  Not in the way that it was last night—although his body wasn’t exactly soft for much of the time last night.

  But Business Consultant Aimee is winning over CEO Chase.

  This might just work out for us, after all.

  I trip up over a sentence when all of a sudden, my brain presents me with the image of his head between my legs. But I recover.

  As soon as I notice the corner of his mouth tugging upwards, I look away from him. He knows what I was thinking just now and he’s loving that it got to me. Jerk.

  I’m pretty sure no one else will be suspicious as to why he and I are both grinning all of a sudden.

  Before I know it, my presentation has come to a conclusion, and the key executives of SnapLegal-NYC are thanking me and saying that they look forward to working with me. Well, Greg Lee is, anyway.

  Elaine tells me to stop by to see her in the afternoon because my office and new business cards will be ready, and then she rushes off to her next meeting. Greg saunters off to join a conference call, leaving me with Chase and Keaton and only a fraction of the devastating awkwardness I was feeling before the meeting.

  They lead me out of the conference room and Chase asks a diminutive spitfire of a young lady named Nora to give me a tour of the office, show me to my temporary desk, and introduce me to everyone. Nora doesn’t agree to do what the CEO says, she just looks at Keaton and awaits further instruction.

  “Yeah, do that,” Keaton says to Nora. “Chase and I are gonna have a little talk about something totally unrelated in his office. Great job, Aimee. See you in a bit.”

  Chase doesn’t look me in the eyes, but I do catch him glancing at my bare legs and four inch heels.

  They go off to what I assume is Chase’s office. I feel good about this. I’m feeling good about everything. The SnapLegal offices are awesome and they’re in a great building. This space is bright and open, but with enclosed offices and meeting rooms and probably a break room, along the perimeter. You can pretty much see where everyone is and what they’re doing, but there’s also privacy to be had if necessary. I’d say there are maybe thirteen people here, which is a good number for a company that’s just under two years old.

  “Aimee Gilpin?” Nora smirks. “The Aimee Gilpin who received a two hundred-dollar flower arrangement at The Mercer Group a few weeks ago?”

  Well, shit. Of course. Keaton’s assistant sent the flowers. Keaton’s assistant knows that he was trying to woo me and probably thinks I slept with him to get this job or something.

  “One and the same, yes. Unfortunately, my position there was terminated. But thank you so much for the flowers. They were so gorgeous. You have excellent taste.” I consider my next words very carefully, lower my voice and say: “I hope it’s not weird that I never went out with Keaton. He’s such a great guy, but obviously it turns out it’s a good thing that we never got involved.” I try to play the girl-talk card, get her on my side, figure out if she’s in love with her boss or not.

  She snorts. “Yeah, whatever. He’s a horndog. Let’s just say you weren’t the only girl I had flowers sent to this past few weeks. But yours were the second-most expensive … I’m not sure where they were planning on putting you. There’s a free desk over on Chase’s side and there’s one right here by Keaton and me.”

  “It’s usually good for me to be within earshot of the CEO,” I find myself blurting out.

  “Uh huh.” Nora smirks again. “That makes sense.”

  I can’t tell if Nora is going to be an ally or an enemy, but I definitely need to stay on her good side. Find out her favorite coffee place and bring her a latte and a croissant tomorrow.

  As she leads the way toward the staff that she’s going to introduce me to, I can’t help glancing over at Chase’s office. The dividing wall is tempered glass, frosted to about five feet up from the ground so that you can’t see him when he’s seated. All I see is Keaton pacing around, gesticulating, and rubbing his forehead.

  Well, shit.

  I suppose there is a chance that they are actually discussing a totally unrelated matter, but it’s more likely that Roxy will indeed have to pay next month’s rent.

  12

  Chase

  Keaton is pacing back and forth in front of my desk and I want to kill him. It is so messed up that I have to manage his response to this situation, when I need to be dealing with my own. If Aimee weren’t so fucking awesome when she gave that little presentation, I would have tried to find a way to get out of our contract with Elaine. But she rocked it. I have a whole new level of attraction to her. And I can’t do a fucking thing about it for now.

  “Fuuuuuck … she’s hot. She looks hotter today than before she shot me down. Am I crazy?”

  “Yes.”

  “Yes I’m crazy or yes she does look hotter than she did before she shot me down?”

  “It’s not an either-or situation.”

  “She definitely looks hotter now than she did before I slept with Quinn. That’s not good. Maybe Aimee showing up here is a sign that I should keep trying with her, right? I mean what are the chances? This is the fucking universe telling me that she’s the one I should be with. That I shouldn’t give up.”

  I think the fucking universe might be telling me it’s time I knock some sense into my best friend and CFO, but fuck the universe. It’s not doing me any favors today, that’s all I know.

  “You need to lower your voice and watch your fucking mouth around the office.”

  “What’s up your ass?”

  “What’s up you
rs? Did it not go well in the Hamptons?”

  “I mean … It went well. First times and all that. Quinn’s gorgeous and hot. Right? When my dad found out I was going to the Hamptons with her he actually said, ‘good for you.’ You know how many times he’s said that to me? Twice. Once when I sold that lot in Queens for a million-dollar profit and once when he found out I’m dating Quinn Parker.”

  “Then keep it going with Quinn.”

  Even while he’s nodding his head, he says, “Shit. What if I made a mistake?”

  “Can you be a fucking CFO for five minutes and focus on the matter at hand?”

  “That’s all I’m focusing on! How do you not have even the slightest bit of empathy for me in this scenario?”

  “Trust me, I can empathize with you. I just don’t have any sympathy for you.”

  “We need to get out of this contract.”

  “Don’t be such a selfish asshole—think about the optics. Think about what that would do to Aimee if her boss finds out you don’t want to work with her—she’d probably get fired on her first day. Did you not pay attention to a word she said in that meeting? She knows her shit and we don’t have time to find another consultant for this. We have to stick to our schedule. She’s only going to be working in our office for one month. Just nut up and pull it together. It’ll be over before we know it.”

  “You’re right. You’re right. This way I can feel things out with her here while I decide if things are working out with Quinn.”

  I don’t know if I’m literally turning red and if steam is actually shooting out of my ears right now, but it sure as fuck feels like it.

  “Yeah. I’m too tired to get up and punch you in the head right now. You will feel no one out at work. You had your shot with Aimee and she turned you down. You’ve moved on. Remember? Jesus. What is wrong with you?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t get any sleep all weekend.”