by Christa Wick
None of that explained the look on his face.
Stepping in front of Dylan, I spoke to Alexa -- anything to redirect his attention. "Assuming the boys don't need me, I should be able to get you settled in your room after we greet Austin and his guest."
She nodded and a second later, the elevator doors opened and we were greeted by Mr. Long's booming voice. Relief washed over me. Not even Dylan Kehoe would act up around the oil baron. He respected the man and knew he had to behave if he wanted to keep Austin's respect -- and his potential involvement in the overseas expansion of the club.
Everything returned to some facsimile of normal, all three men joking with one another for a few minutes before I was tasked with escorting Austin's guest to his suite and getting Alexa settled in.
I almost whooped with joy as I left my two bosses behind.
Once I had Miss Banks situated, I treated myself to a few minutes of gossiping with Alexa, the last remnants of the tense plane ride and arrival fading from my bones -- until I tripped over my tongue and made her think for a few seconds that I might be into the lifestyle.
Me -- poster girl for the Miss Vanilla Society of Wallflowers.
Not that I hadn't fantasized about it. How could I not? As far as I could tell, Dylan never had "straight" sex. Inserting him into one of my fantasies meant I had to picture myself on my knees or blindfolded or wincing from a flogger as the tails snapped sharply against my generous backside.
I had researched it, too. Rather, I had tried. My cheeks had heated so badly reading the few lines that appeared with each site in the search results that I couldn't bring myself to click through. I had barely scraped up the temerity to click on the Razor Dolls site -- which was how Jake had found Alexa and the reason why I would be the one to blame if everything went south with them.
I just hoped that my bad luck and fruitless pursuit of one Kehoe brother didn't rub off on the lovely redhead.
********************
The scent of the gladioli Fritz had put in the room greeted me as I opened the door. I frowned, annoyed that he and my boss were about to obliterate all the positive memories I had attached to the flower. Somehow, I was going to have to find a way to change things -- without resorting to my pseudo-big-brother Jake to save me.
I moved past the suite's small work area with its desk, printer and fax and into the sleeping area. Seeing a stack of white boxes on the bed, I froze in my tracks. I looked from the boxes to the vase of flowers on the dresser.
"These better not be from Fritz, too," I growled as I placed my computer bag on the floor and jerked the closest box from the bed.
Finding no tag on the outside, I opened the box -- and almost fainted.
A corset in blue satin nestled against tissue paper. The crotch of matching panties peeked from beneath the corset's hem. I rifled through the tissue looking for a card or anything that would indicate who had sent the boxes to me. I no longer thought it was Fritz because I recognized the outfit. Century Club was rolling out its new line of lingerie in stages, just like any other fashion company would. The sweeter looking corset was scheduled for winter -- the color itself labeled Winter Blue. No way would Fritz have access to a sample.
Opening the next box, Autumn Red greeted me -- a supple leather one piece that I knew had a slit at the bottom. Feeling faint, I sat on the bed as I search for a card. This couldn't be Dylan. He hadn't even bothered looking at the gift he gave me when I wore it in his office -- hadn't acknowledged my thanks, either.
Would Jake do this? Was this my anniversary present from him?
Opening the third box I found the sheer Spring Green baby doll but no damn card!
"You must be summer," I said as I reached for the last box, my heart beating as hard and fast as it had during the scene in the lobby.
The outfit inside blew me away. A gold lace peignoir, it was the crowning piece of the summer collection and came with a price tag of over ten thousand dollars.
This one also came with a card!
Carefully, I unpinned the note and opened it.
The blue reminded me of your eyes, the green of your innocence, the red of your passion in protecting your friends and the gold of your heart. Thank you for putting up with me and my brothers (especially Dylan).
Love, Riona
Tears landed on the card to stain it. I pressed the paper to my chest and daubed my eyes with my free hand. Still crying, I fumbled with my bag to find my phone and punched in the speed dial code for her number.
It went to voicemail. Trying to sound like I wasn't sobbing as hard as I was, I thanked her then hung up before I completely lost it and started blubbering. After a few minutes, I managed to get up and get to work. I still had so much to do before the show started -- and twice as much before I would be able to crash for the night.
A few hours later, I bundled everything up and took the elevator to the third floor. The member access area of Century Club occupied two-thirds of the level, with the other third devoted to the club's security and office area. I had firm orders from Dylan to restrict my activities to that third.
Like Riona, I wasn't allowed inside the club I had helped renovate -- not now that it was open for business. Fine by me. I probably would have burst into nervous giggles in the outer reception area. I certainly would have been red-faced by the time I reached the bar.
I got that Dylan didn't want me embarrassing the company with my naiveté -- or my drab looks and fluffy body. Probably more so now that Jake had settled on Alexa. Add me in and there was a danger the whole place would get a reputation as Fat Girl Central.
Settling into my work area, I opened my laptop and tried to ignore Dylan as he watched the monitors. He moved in and out of the room before the scheduled time of Jake and Alexa's performance. Usually, he left when someone he wanted to hook had just arrived. There were quite a few targets. All of them were filthy rich, of course. Few of them had recognizable faces -- plastic surgeons, bankers, barons of one industry or another. I only knew who they were because I had photos of them in my files.
Other faces I knew from television and print media, including one disgraced ex-governor who had decided to let it all hang out -- his wife on one arm and their boy toy on his other side.
When Jake and Alexa finally arrived, Dylan returned to the office and stayed there for the entire performance, his attention fixed mostly on certain faces within the audience. I just hoped for the wife's sake that the boy toy enjoyed swinging in both directions.
Thankfully, Dylan kept the sound off. I wanted to die as it was from the brief flashes of Jake and Alexa on the monitor. If I had to hear them -- particularly in the presence of the one man I had been crushing on the last two years -- I really would have died on the spot.
"Did you give Miss Banks the material Austin asked for?"
I glanced at Dylan as he watched Austin's face on the monitor. The oil baron only paid the barest attention to what was happening on stage. The rest of his attention was riveted on the woman he claimed was his "legal counsel." So it was Dylan watching Austin watch Miss Banks.
Not exactly sexy times.
"Yes," I answered. "Everything he asked for and a devoted concierge for his stay."
Knowing Dylan couldn't be bothered to spare me any attention beyond my having answered his question, I stared at him for a few long minutes. He had his hand up to his mouth. The knuckle of his index finger rested against his bottom lip. His thumb scraped the underside of the same lip. It was his "deep concentration" position. One of three, actually.
My examination moved lower. The way he sat, his chair turned toward the monitors, I had a full view of his side from head to toe. He had removed his dress jacket, but not his tie. Inside the shoes, his toes pressed against the floor while his heels rested against the top of the casing for two of the chair's caster wheels. His legs were lightly spread, his pelvis tilting a little forward.
I dragged my attention from the hard bulge of his erection up to the monitor he had fixed on
.
Uhm...yeah, don't need to see that!
Jake was inserting something into Alexa, her whole body straining upward. As awkward as it was knowing my boss was less than ten feet from me with a giant hard-on, a small part of me was relieved that he could find the moment sexy despite all the things he undoubtedly felt were wrong with Alexa's body.
Seeing his hand drop from his mouth to the armrest, I quickly returned to looking at my laptop. Realizing I hadn't touched my keyboard the entire time I had watched Dylan, my cheeks started to burn from more than Jake and Alexa's performance.
Play it cool, Dekker -- he never pays attention to you, so he doesn't know you stopped working to look at him.
"Are the binders ready?"
I glanced to find him glaring at me. I swiveled my chair and nodded at the stack of leather portfolios against the wall.
"It should be safe for you to take them to the reception area now," he said, his attention moving back to the monitors. "No one will see you."
Right -- because who the hell would invest in a global sex club or even consider the hundred thousand dollar annual membership if they saw my fat ass out there?
Biting at my bottom lip so I wouldn't explode with tears or anger, I lifted the first stack of binders and carried it out to the reception area. Special attendants had been brought in for the night. Male and female, they were there to serve drinks and wait on the targets hand and foot -- literally. All of them had been instructed in submissive positions by Jake and were traveling to each opening.
Trying not to look at their over-exposed bodies, I had the attendants help me disperse the binders to all of the sitting areas. Finished with the task, I darted into the women's restroom to hide the evidence of my tears before returning to the office.
Opening the door, I heard Dylan chuckle. He glanced up at me, his grin growing wider. "Austin is in the bag."
I resisted looking at the monitors. In retrieving the other two stacks of binders, I had already caught a glimpse of what was going on among members of the audience. I didn't want to catch sight of Austin and his guest engaged in who the hell knew what. It would be hard enough to speak to Alexa and Jake after tonight, at least for a few days. And Miss Banks looked like she could be as prickly as a cactus if something got her back up.
I was pretty certain knowing I had watched her doing something to Austin or allowing him to do something to her, some sixty other guests around them, would be one of the things she found irksome.
"What's this one's name?" Dylan asked, tapping at one of the monitors.
I looked, expecting to find him pointing to one of the audience members, but it was an attendant in the reception area. She had wavy hair almost as long and definitely as red as Alexa's, but she was maybe a size ten, so curvy without being fluffy.
"Adriana," I answered. My chest tightened at his inquiry. Dylan had just spent the last thirty minutes watching his brother sexually dominating Alexa and now he was asking the name of a woman who could have been her skinnier, slightly older sister trained in submission.
And all I got from him, all I would ever get from him, was indifference.
"Good. If I need any paperwork from the office, I'll use her to fetch it from you." Standing, he donned his dress jacket and tucked a pen in the interior pocket. "Her coloring will remind the prospective investors of the performance -- make it easier to get them to sign."
Heading for the door, he stopped and snapped his fingers in my direction. I looked up, sucking in a huge breath as I did. I wanted to let it out with a scream but held it deep inside me instead.
"We should have a lot of little Alexas for the opening events," he said. "Send an email reminder to me and Jake."
I gave a tight nod, my lungs holding on hard to the frustrated scream that wanted to burst from me.
As soon as he left, I opened my mail program and sent the requested reminder. Then I opened what I liked to think of as my "promo-whore" folder -- documentation of all the work I'd done on the clubs and why I should be given the L.A. project.
If I had needed more proof that I should get the hell out of the Chicago office, especially as Dylan's assistant, the man had just given it to me in multitudes. Staying in Chicago, I would keep cockblocking myself with thoughts of Dylan. And he would keep stepping on my heart without ever knowing what he was doing.
Sending a print command for the files I'd just opened, I moved to Dylan's desk and watched the monitors. Adriana came in a few times, smiling sweetly while she bounced around the air conditioned room and rubbed at her arms from the sudden temperature difference between the reception area and office.
The last time she came in, she didn't need any papers. Dylan had sent her inform me I was no longer need for the night.
I gathered my things slowly, collated the papers I would need to convince Dylan I deserved the L.A. location and then...
Then I made the biggest mistake of my life.
I dropped my laptop off in my room and took the elevator to the VIP suites. Nodding at the bodyguard Jake had requested for Alexa while he helped Dylan secure the targets, I swiped my security card and entered Dylan's room to wait.
Eventually, he would have to return.
I would be waiting for him, me and my folder.
I was getting Los Angeles -- or else.
********************
Exhausted, I fell asleep, waking once I heard the slide and beep from Dylan's security card. Groggy, I straightened in my seat and tugged at where my skirt had started to ride up my thighs.
Dylan's voice tickled my ears as the door swung open.
"Baby, you have no idea how much I need this."
The words confused me until my tired eyes finally focused.
Dylan wasn't talking to me. He had brought a woman back to his room, a type I knew well but hadn't been expecting that night because he saved such bookings for long after the business portion of a trip was over. This one was a brunette, a little fuller than usual, maybe even a size six. Still smaller than I could ever hope to accomplish.
He turned to kiss her, neither of them realizing yet that I was sitting just a few feet away. I tried to get my tongue working so I could make my apology and escape before I had to see his lips touch hers. But I had lost the capacity for speech. Even though I was there to press my case on Los Angeles and not some stupid attempt to seduce my boss, my face hurt with unshed tears and humiliation.
"You didn't tell me this was a couple's arrangement," the brunette said, her hand coming up to his chest to stop the incoming kiss. "That's dou--"
She hesitated, her gaze sharply studying me for a second before she arched one snarky brow and changed her rate. "Triple considering the size."
"Baby, what are you--" Turning, Dylan stopped mid-sentence as he finally saw me. His face purpled and I braced myself for a screaming session. He'd never yelled at me before, his reprimands always came wrapped in silence. But that face told me he was about to unleash a deafening roar.
I winced, my body tightening. My lips trembled and my eyes stung with the need to cry. I shouldn't have used my card to get into the room. It was too late to undo the mistake. I just hoped I could get out of there without making an even bigger fool of myself.
Instead of screaming at me, Dylan spun toward the woman and pointed at the hall.
"Leave," he said, his voice a cold bucket of ice. A pout shaped her lips and she placed one slender hand on the hip she had canted in Dylan's direction. He shook his head, his face beginning to purple again. "You don't argue with me, not unless you want blocked from serving anyone else at this hotel."
She turned with a huff, the hand leaving her hip to pierce the air next to her head with an extended middle finger.
The door slammed and Dylan glared at me.
"I wanted to talk about Los Angeles," I stuttered then remembered that I had admonished myself to be bold. He already was pissed, so I had no reason not to push forward. "You're giving me the L.A. project."
"No," he
said, prowling toward me. "Absolutely not and you won't be attending any more openings. You're nothing more than a distraction at them."
"That's not true!" I wagged my finger at him.
He captured my wrist and held it, his gaze cutting into me as he loomed over my body. Knowing I couldn't win the argument sitting down, I tried to stand. His palm landed lightly on the center of my chest. I believe he meant to push me back into a sitting position, but his expression changed.
"What the fuck are you wearing?"
My mouth dropped open. As much as I wanted to pretend like I didn't understand his question, I knew what he meant. Touching my chest, he had felt the hard top line of the corset.
My lips rolled together in a moment's indecision and then I shoved his hand away. "A gift from Riona, if you must know."
His hand dipped to the bottom of my blouse, lifting the hem just high enough to see a flash of the corset.
"Take it off, now."
I started to laugh, thinking he was joking despite the tightly delivered command. His face told me he was dead serious.
"I can't," I started before my own anger kicked in. "I won't. What has gotten into you Dylan Kehoe?"
"Take it off or I will," he growled. "That isn't the type of outfit you should be wearing."
He moved to make good on his threat. I retreated, darting to the side, tears in my eyes as I reached up under my blouse to separate the hooks.
"You're not getting the panties, you jackass." Finished, I tossed it at him then folded my arms across my chest since there was nothing but cold air between my breasts and the thin georgette blouse. "And have fun explaining to your sister why you confiscated her gift."
"Don't worry." He dropped the corset like it was covered in manure. "I'll be having a long talk with Riona about this."
His gaze hooked for a second on my arms shielding my breasts before they dropped to my hips. Lowering his voice, he took a step closer. His breath swirled warm against my lips as he spoke.
"And you will be turning over the panties and anything else she sent you."