Crave Me: A Billionaire Boss Romance

by Amy Brent

  Juliette sat staring straight ahead and didn’t say a word. I could almost hear her teeth gnashing.

  I was sure Tanner’s behavior in the meeting would be the talk of Goldman when we got back and Juliette got the gossip mill started. She’d like nothing better than to see me kicked off the team even though I posed no threat to her. That was just Juliette’s way. She simply didn’t like other women. She was more of a male chauvinist that any man I’d ever met. If she had her way, she would be the only woman working at Goldman, if not the only woman on the planet.

  All I could do was shake my head and bite my tongue. I’d deal with Stan when the time came; which I knew would be soon.

  Tanner Wright’s smirking face flashed into my mind. I could hear the pop of electricity as our fingers touched. I could smell the faint hint of ozone in the air. He had won the Douchebag of the Century Award, hands down. I had never met anyone so cocky and full of himself.

  Fine, he was a hot billionaire with a big bulge in his pants, but did he have to pull me into his silly little game?

  I was completely innocent in all this. It would be remarkably unfair to kick me off the team just because of Tanner’s actions.

  Turned out, Stan felt otherwise. After he parked the car in the underground garage and the others were headed toward the bank of elevators, he asked me to hang back.

  “What was that all about back there?” he asked with an air of accusation to his tone.

  “I have no idea what that was, Stan,” I said, huffing at him. “Probably just another rich asshole jerking us around. Isn’t that the way this works? We’re management consultants. We get jerked around by rich assholes then bill them a thousand dollars an hour for it?”

  “It was more than that,” Stan said, rubbing his chin as he studied me with narrow eyes. “You’ve never met him before, have you?”

  “No, never.”

  “Never had any contact with him at all?”

  “None.”

  I knew where this was going. I’ve never been one to bite my tongue and I was too good at my job to fear losing it, so I spread out my hands and gave it to him straight.

  “Look, Stan, if you’re thinking about bouncing me off this project because Tanner Wright is a flirt, you can forget it. You need me on this team. Nobody knows the digital side of telecom like I do. I’m a consummate professional and you know it.”

  “I know you’re a professional, Candice,” Stan said with a sigh. “I’m just not so sure about Tanner Wright.”

  I didn’t even bother going up to the office. I knew Juliette was already up there telling anyone who would listen how I disrupted the meeting by flirting with Tanner Wright.

  She wouldn’t tell the whole story, of course.

  Her version would undoubtedly have me oohing and goohing at him with my tits hanging out.

  By Monday, I’d be fodder for the office gossip mill.

  I’d be branded as the junior consultant who almost killed a ten-million-dollar deal because she couldn’t resist flirting the bad boy billionaire.

  It would all be a lie, but it wouldn’t matter.

  The only saving grace was that it was after five on Friday afternoon, and most of the Goldman employees would already be headed for home.

  It was little solace.

  I caught a cab and made it home around six. I held it together as I rode the elevator up to my tenth-floor apartment. I hurried down the hall and unlocked my door.

  The moment I stepped inside and locked the door behind me, I fell to my knees and began to sob.

  The hard, crusty shell that I wrapped myself in every day to face the world was left cracked and broken outside my door.

  In here, all alone, it was just me, Candice Marie Carlson, the insecure farm girl from Nebraska who was doing her best to get ahead and hold it together in a cruel and unfair world.

  Candice Carlson, the girl who was sitting on the floor in the dark with her back against the door to keep the world outside.

  Candice Carlson, the girl who cried herself to sleep many nights because the emotional armor she wore to battle the demons of the world was so heavy that it squeezed the emotions out of her like a juice press.

  Candice Carlson, the girl who was hard as stone on the outside, but soft as marshmallow on the inside.

  I put my forearms on my knees and rest my head on my arms.

  I sat there and cried until I had no more tears to give.

  Candice

  It was amazing what a good cry does for the soul. It’s something men will never understand. The weight of the world can be bearing down on you like a Mac truck, but sit on the floor and sob like a baby for an hour and suddenly, all is right with the world.

  Or at least as right as it could get at that moment.

  Throw in a microwave pizza, a pint of mint chocolate chip Haagen-Dazs, and half a bottle of chardonnay, and suddenly the world is a beautiful place.

  At least the world inside my apartment.

  I was more than a little drunk as I ran myself a hot bath and prepared to soak for an hour or two. As the tub filled with steaming hot water, I lit several candles and turned off the lights. The aroma of cinnamon and wildflowers wafted on the air.

  I closed and locked the bathroom door. Call me weird, but I can’t take a bath or a shower with the door open. Guess I’ve seen too many movies about silly girls who take showers when murderers were lurking around.

  I know, I’m a psychiatrist’s wet dream. Oh well.

  I set my iPhone on the counter and told Siri to play some Van Morrison to set the mood. I stripped off the sweats that I’d changed into after my crying jag in the foyer, and stood naked in front of the mirror to put up my hair.

  As I bundled my long hair into a bun and pinned it to the top of my head, I let my eyes take stock of the woman in the mirror. It was something that I did at the end of every day.

  Did the day add a new line or wrinkle?

  Are my boobs sagging?

  Do I have stretch marks on my stomach?

  Again, a psychiatrist would have a field day with me.

  I was tall for a girl at five-eight, and curvy for my height.

  I inherited my mom’s big boobs and round hips. My boobs hung off my chest like two large melons that had never been squeezed. My areolas contrasted darkly against the milky whiteness of my breasts. I kept my blond pubes trimmed short.

  I took a deep breath as I brought my hands down from my hair to cup my breasts. I brushed a finger over my nipples and they responded immediately, growing hard at my touch.

  I closed my eyes. Suddenly, in my mind, Tanner Wright was standing behind me with his hands resting softly on my hips. His sudden appearance startled me for a moment, but my mind told me to just relax and let the fantasy flow.

  I could feel Tanner’s fingers digging gently into my hips. I felt his thumbs at the small of my back, gently massaging the dimples above my ass.

  I rolled my head to the side and moaned as he pressed his lips to my shoulder. He nibbled his way up my neck and to my ear. He took my earlobe between his teeth and bit down just enough to hurt in the most wonderful way.

  I could feel his hot breath in my ear.

  His tongue followed his breath.

  He licked the rim of my ear and darted his tongue inside. A shudder went through me as I could feel the hot juices pooling between my legs.

  Tanner’s hands came around to cup my tits. He squeezed the nipples between his fingers. He moaned in my ear.

  I felt his cock pressing into my back; long, hard, wet from his juices. He slid his cock up and down my back. I could feel his balls rubbing against my ass.

  I braced my hands on the sink and wiggled my ass into him. He slid his cock up and down through the crack in my ass. His hands slid down from my breasts and met at my clit. He rolled my clit between his thumbs. I could feel the orgasm building from deep within my body, like a match that would soon start a raging fire.

  Tanner continued sliding his cock against me a
s his hands worked my pussy. He slid his fingers across my folds to lubricate them, then teased my opening.

  “Fuck me, Tanner,” I heard myself moan. “Take my cherry. Make it yours forever.”

  I pushed my ass toward him and leaned the top half of my body forward, offering my pussy to him. I felt his hands on my hips again as he positioned himself behind me. I felt the head of his cock pressing into my hole. I held my breath in anticipation. He slid in just the head and paused for a moment. I felt my pussy spreading to accommodate him.

  There was no virgin pain as he dug his fingers into my hips and slid himself fully inside of me. I stood on my tiptoes to give him the perfect angle. He started sliding his cock in and out, in and out. My big boobs swayed beneath me with every thrust.

  “Oh… my… god…”

  My words were carried on gusts of hot breath.

  “Faster… harder… more…”

  Tanner was hammering into me now. My tits swayed. I moaned and called his name as the orgasm hit.

  “I’m... cumming… oh… my… god…”

  I squeezed my eyes tightly together and sucked in a long breath as I came. Tanner’s cock plunged in and out of me until I begged him to stop. I felt his touch drift away from my body like a warm passing wind.

  I opened my eyes and looked in the mirror, which was fogged up from the steaming water that was about to overflow the tub.

  I blinked back to reality and gazed down at myself.

  My left hand was clutching my breast. My breast was red from the hard rubbing and squeezing. My nipple stood on end, a dark crimson thimble in a sea of white.

  I was standing with my knees bent.

  The fingers of my right hand were buried inside my cunt.

  My hand was drenched to the wrist from the orgasm I’d given myself.

  I let my fingers slide out of me and braced my palms on the counter.

  I took in a long, deep breath, then let it out slowly.

  It all seemed so real that I turned to look around the bathroom, as if I’d find Tanner standing there.

  Sadly, I was alone.

  I turned off the water and lowered myself into the steaming tub.

  I closed my eyes and smiled as the hot water engulfed me.

  I picked up the bar of soap from the edge of the tub and rubbed it between my legs as the fantasy began to replay in my mind.

  This time I was a spectator rather than a participant.

  You know how they say that if you lose the use of one of your senses, it makes the other senses heighten?

  Like, if you lose your sense of sight, your senses of smell and hearing and taste and touch grow stronger?

  The same was true when you were a virgin.

  When you’d never had a real man inside you, your imagination intensified until it became as vivid as the real thing.

  Thank God.

  Sigh…

  Tanner

  Monday morning, 7:45 AM.

  I noted the time because Henry was supposed to pick me up for our trip to Tucson with the Goldman team around eight-thirty. I had my assistant pack a bag over the weekend and it was sitting next to the front door, ready to go.

  That was my motto: always be prepared.

  Or have an assistant prepare it for you.

  I had time to kill, so I fixed a cup of coffee using the twenty-thousand-dollar brewing machine Henry had convinced me to buy during a business trip to Italy a few years back.

  It was supposedly the best coffee brewing system on the planet. The coffee beans the system also supposedly brewed the best cup of coffee on the planet. I think the beans were imported from the deepest jungles of Columbia and had been shit through a tiger’s ass or some such nonsense.

  I didn’t get the big deal. The coffee it brewed was mediocre at best. It had the consistency and the smell of burnt ink. It certainly was not a twenty-thousand-dollar cup of coffee. The hundred dollar Keurig in my office made better coffee.

  Henry said I had the palette of a caveman.

  What-the-fuck-ever, dude.

  I knew a shitty cup of coffee when I tasted it.

  I kept meaning to buy a Starbucks franchise and install it downstairs off the lobby (I own this building and live in the penthouse), but I kept forgetting to call Starbucks CEO Howard Schulz to make the deal.

  I picked up my iPhone and spoke into it.

  “Siri, remind me to put a Starbucks in the lobby downstairs.”

  Siri confirmed my brilliance and I set the phone aside.

  I set the mug of steaming coffee on the kitchen table and fired up my laptop. I logged into Facebook and tapped my fingers on the keys.

  I ignored the 1,835 notifications and 2,018 messages that flashed at the top of the screen.

  The truth is, I hate fucking Facebook and only use it to dig up dirt about people I might be doing business with.

  Or people that simply fascinated me.

  People like Candice Carlson.

  I was constantly amazed at some of the things people posted on Facebook. They just put it out there for all the world to see, without any concern of consequences.

  Hey look, here’s a shot of you getting shit-faced drunk at a bachelor party.

  Hey look, here’s a shot of you in the bathroom with a naked hooker from the party.

  Hey look, here’s you getting a lap dance from said hooker.

  Oh look, look, look! Here’s a picture of you doing a line of some white powder that looks an awful lot like coke off the hooker’s tit!

  Ah, finally, the coup de grace… here’s a picture of you passed out drunk in the hotel room naked and covered in magic marker.

  Oh look, someone drew a happy face on the head of your dick.

  I had found all those wonderful images when digging into the background of a guy who wanted to be my Chief Financial Officer at a salary of four-hundred-grand a year.

  I just went to his Facebook page, hit Photos, and bam!

  I took great joy in showing him what I had found, then asking, “So, you want me to let you manage my company’s financials? Seriously? Uh, I don’t think so. Thank you, drive through.”

  Okay, granted, I put the poor guy through hours and hours of grueling interviews before I sprang the Facebook pics and told him to fuck off. But hey, a guy’s gotta have a little fun. Right?

  I typed in Candice Carlson’s name into the search bar and sipped the shitty coffee as I waited for her profile to pop up. I wondered what embarrassing moments or tantalizing tidbits I would find on her page.

  And like magic, there was Candice Carlson’s life in full living color for all the world to see.

  “Okay, Candice Carlson,” I said with a grin. “Let’s see what deep dark secrets I can surmise from your lovely profile.”

  I clicked to enlarge her profile picture and was disappointed to find that it was a standard bullshit company portrait, probably the pulled from her bio on the Goldman website.

  “Shit,” I said as I clicked to close the enlarged image. “Come on, Candice. Don’t let me down.”

  I went back to her profile page and clicked on the “About Candice” link. Standard stuff: twenty-five, Harvard MBA grad, hometown Ottumwa, Nebraska, population who gives a shit.

  “Single is good,” I said, noting her relationship status.

  I clicked on her Photos, hoping to find a drunk party pic or two or three. Or Candice at the beach in a string bikini with her tits hanging out.

  Woo-hoo! Wouldn’t that be a fucking awesome way to start the day! A hot bikini shot of Candice that I could rub one out to before leaving the penthouse.

  “Shit,” I said again as her photos loaded on the screen. “So much for whacking off to Candice’s tits.”

  There’s Candice at a business event.

  There’s Candice at a fundraiser.

  There’s Candice at a formal dinner.

  There’s Candice with a group of sorority sisters.

  There’s Candice in her cap and gown.

  “Son of a b
itch,” I said with a sigh. I pushed the computer away in disgust and picked up the coffee cup. “Are you really that fucking boring, Candice Carlson? You couldn’t give me one decent tit pick to start my day?”

  My iPhone buzzed with a text message from Henry. He was downstairs with the car. Crap. My quest to learn more about Candice Carlson would have to wait.

  I stared at her utterly boring profile picture for a moment.

  I closed the laptop and shook my head.

  Candice Carlson needed a little excitement in her life.

  And fortunately for her, I was just the guy to give it to her.

  Tanner

  I handed the driver my suitcase so he could stow it in the trunk, then climbed into the back of the limo to sit next to Henry, who grunted at me and continued fiddling with his phone.

  “Bad manners to use your phone at the table, my son,” I said, shaking my head at him.

  “Sorry, just shooting an email off to Stan Roberts at Goldman confirming our flight time for today.” He tucked the phone inside his Armani jacket and directed his full attention to me.

  “So, how was your weekend?” he asked.

  “Fine,” I said with a shrug. “I didn’t do much. Just flew out to Vegas to look at the Ferrari I bought.”

  “Did you drive it back?”

  I snorted at him. “You don’t actually drive a car like that Henry. I had them load it onto a climate-controlled car hauler I borrowed from Earnhardt for transport back to Chicago. It should arrive in a day or two.”

  A look of judgment came to his eye. “How much did you end up spending? On a car?”

  I waved a hand at him, as if the question smelled bad, but not as bad as my answer. “I spent more than I should have, but not as much as I would have.”

  “Tanner, how much?”

  I blew out a long sigh. “Twenty-eight-point-seven mill for the car and another ten-percent in auction fees,” I said, shrugging off the number like it was pocket change, because that’s what it was to me. He scowled at me. “Okay, so it went a little over estimate. It’s not a big deal. In five years, it will double in value.”

  “I hope you’re right,” he said, shaking his head.

  “I’m always right.”

  “Are you?”