Engineering Her Racy Pleasure [Racy Nights 11] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting)

by Tara Rose

  But he didn’t mind that either. His face would hurt by the end of the day from smiling so much. He couldn’t wait to look into her big, beautiful eyes again.

  “No. It’s not okay.” Lee drained his travel mug. “My brain feels like Swiss cheese this morning.”

  Mason grinned. “So does mine, but I don’t give a shit. And don’t tell me you really do, either. I don’t believe it.”

  Lee chuckled and leaned back against the seat, closing his eyes. “You’re right. I don’t care. I haven’t felt this slap-happy since…well…for a long time.”

  Mason knew Lee hadn’t been this giddy or relaxed since he’d first met Andrea, but he wouldn’t voice that out loud. He only hoped this thing they’d started with Harper would turn out to be good for both of them, but especially for Lee. He deserved some happiness after all these years.

  “I still wish she’d spent the night.”

  “Me, too. I asked if she’d like to do something with us this weekend, so maybe she can stay over Friday night?”

  Lee opened his eyes. “What did she say?”

  “She said she would.”

  “So why do you sound so down about that? Did I miss something?”

  Mason shrugged. “Not down. Just tired.” He yawned, hoping it would fool Lee. Harper had said she’d love to spend time with them this weekend, but her words had almost sounded forced. Mason had been very tired, and he hadn’t had sex like that in a long time, so he’d chalked it up to the same brain fog Lee was complaining about this morning. But now, in the harsh light of early morning, he couldn’t pretend it had been his imagination.

  Harper had seemed distracted from the moment he’d crawled off the chaise and asked if she could stay. She said she would sleep better in her own bed, and then he’d offered to drive her home, hoping she was simply tired and that was the reason she didn’t want to stay.

  Her phone buzzed several times while they were driving, but she’d ignored it. He’d asked if she was going to check it, but she shook her head and faced the window, as if she was reluctant to let him see the expression on her face.

  “I’m too tired,” she’d said, but there was something off about her voice. This morning, he still couldn’t place what it had been. Old boyfriend calling? What else would produce such a reaction?

  Those thoughts made him want to protect her, but he had no idea what he’d be protecting her from. He only hoped he’d simply been overreacting last night from the combination of the best sex of his life and overtiredness, and that everything was okay with her.

  He was also hoping they’d have a chance to talk to her this morning before they all got too busy with work. Mason didn’t want to hurt her, and he knew Lee felt the same way. It was important she know how much last night had meant to both of them. Whatever was in the past was in the past, and he didn’t care about it. But if she was still involved with someone, they needed to know that, too.

  As he pulled onto Notus Parkway, it struck him how little they actually did know about her. What they’d done last night had been impulsive, and that wasn’t like either one of them. But he didn’t regret it. He only hoped it wouldn’t turn out to be a mistake. He really liked Harper and he knew Lee did, too. Mason hoped they’d have a chance to get to know her better, and that she wanted that as well.

  * * * *

  Harper was almost late for work, and since she was already stressed out by the things she’d found online after Mason had dropped her off, she freaked out even more as she sprinted to her desk, two minutes before her scheduled start time. It would take five minutes to boot up her computer, and that made her officially late. Granted, this wasn’t grade school, but it was only her second day. She didn’t want to give Maggie any reason to regret hiring her.

  She fixed her hair and makeup while she waited for the machine to do its thing, hoping no one walked past her cubicle and caught her doing it. She’d barely had time to shower and throw on clothes, and that was after two hours of sleep where Dennis chased her down dark tunnels in her dreams.

  “Good morning.” Maggie came around the corner and perched on Harper’s desk just as the computer finished booting up. “Glad to see you came back.”

  Harper forced a smile to her face as she keyed in her password. “Did you think I wouldn’t?”

  Maggie laughed loudly, and Harper relaxed a bit because of it. She had a loud laugh, but it wasn’t obnoxious. Rather, it made everyone around her want in on the joke.

  “Well, after that ‘welcome to the department’ lunch I was afraid you might not.” They’d gone to a restaurant in the nearby town of Lafayette that two coworkers in her department loved. Harper hadn’t cared for the food, and it was only afterwards she’d learned that most of the people who worked at Notus thought the food was only one step up from road kill. She’d thought it was about the same as the food at Nan’s Place.

  “Oh, I recovered.” She turned to face Maggie. “Thank you again for this opportunity. I promise I’m going to do a great job for you.”

  “I don’t doubt it. In fact, I have a special project I’d like you to work on. This is right up your alley.”

  “I’m intrigued.”

  “There’s a local online firm called Giolanna Design Solutions. Three good friends of my brothers started it last summer. Gina Santori, Olivia Kelly, and Annalise Kerr.”

  Harper kept her features as neutral as possible, but she had of course heard two of those names last night from Lee and Mason. “What do they do?”

  “They design websites and do PR. Annalise has a marketing background, Gina used to be head of IT for Racy, and Olivia is close to finishing a degree in design concepts. They’re doing well. Very well. Annalise approached me several weeks ago about putting together basic marketing concepts for a series of free online workshops for the public. I checked with corporate, and they said as long as we kept it general and didn’t offer up any trade secrets, they thought it would be a fantastic way to get our name out there, as well as show we’re helping a local company.”

  “That sounds like a lot of fun. And great PR for Notus.”

  “Exactly. I’d like you to be the liaison for this, and help those three put together the content of the workshops. It would give you a chance to get to know the people in Racy, and you’d become familiar more quickly with our own marketing campaigns. What do you say? You up for the challenge?”

  Harper’s smile was genuine this time. “I sure am. Thank you.”

  Maggie stood. “I knew you would be. I’ll e-mail you the details later this morning, and you can get in touch with Annalise at your convenience. Just CC me on all your e-mails to her so I’m kept in the loop.”

  “Okay. Thanks again.”

  Maggie smiled again, nodded, and left the area. Just like that, she had been offered a sweet project on which she’d be working closely with two submissives in Racy. Three, if Annalise was also one. Things had certainly gone well her first two days here. If only she didn’t have the pall of those e-mails and Facebook posts hanging over her head.

  She answered several e-mails and started work on another group project she’d been assigned to yesterday, and then once everyone else had said good morning and made small talk, she finally took out her phone. She would never risk logging into her personal e-mail on her work station, but she could check it and Facebook on her phone privately.

  Her hands shook as she swiped and clicked the screen. Nothing new. “Thank you,” she whispered. But what she’d found last night had been bad. Worse than she’d believed possible from Dennis. What was she going to do? Who could she talk to?

  Harper had saved them all, and as she glanced around to make sure no one was walking past, she went into the folder and read them again. The way her stomach contracted was no less painful this morning than it had been last night.

  You got me fired, you fat bitch. Don’t think I don’t know that. I won’t let you get away with it. I know you’re in Racy, and I know you work for Notus now.

  You th
ink you can hide from me in hick town Racy, Indiana? I know where you are, and I know you work for Notus now. I wonder if your new boss would like to know what you did in empty offices at Tray Industries?

  Don’t get too comfy cozy in Podunk Indiana, Harper. It won’t be long before everyone at Notus figures out you’re a fat slut and will hump anyone for a quickie in a conference room.

  “Hey, you interested in a shopping trip this weekend?”

  Harper nearly dropped her phone as she whirled around to face Ginger Amato, one of the other four marketing specialists on Maggie’s team. Ginger had talked Harper’s ear off yesterday at lunch, giving her so much gossip about the residents of Racy that Harper hadn’t absorbed half of it. “What?”

  “I said, are you interested in a shopping trip this weekend? We go up to Chicago Friday night and stay over on Saturday to shop all day, then we catch a show or just a movie if nothing is playing that we can get tickets to. Katie is going.” Katie Joyce was Ginger’s best friend and another marketing specialist on the team. “And so are Roseann and Carolyn. Roseann works in the executive offices and Carolyn is a dispatcher for the line techs.”

  “Great…oh…I can’t go.” Lee and Mason had asked her to spend the weekend with them.

  “Really? Why not?”

  Ginger looked so disappointed that Harper felt guilty. She’d just started here. Getting to know her coworkers was important, too, but she’d already told Lee and Mason she would be with them. “I have a date,” she whispered. It wasn’t a lie.

  Her eyes grew big and she perched on the desk, just as Maggie had done earlier. “Spill.”

  “I can’t. At least not yet.”

  Ginger’s expression grew conspiratorial and she lowered her voice. “So he works here, then.”

  She nodded.

  “Oh my God…you just started. That’s totally not fair. I hate you now. Come on. One hint. Which floor?”

  “Five.”

  “Ooh… the geek squad. Well done.”

  Harper laughed. “Um, thanks?”

  “No, no, that’s not what I meant. They’re all married to their work, though. Just to warn you.”

  “I’ll consider myself warned.”

  Ginger stood. “Okay. Well, have fun, and I expect deets Monday morning.”

  “Sure thing.”

  This is the way it should be. Gossiping with girlfriends and going on shopping trips. Not checking your phone to see if yet more threatening e-mails and nasty Facebook posts showed up in the past hour, and being evasive about who you’re spending time with.

  Harper put her head in her hands. What had she done? She’d had sex with two men she barely knew, and after two months of complete silence, Dennis was harassing her online with a vengeance. How had he found out she’d moved to Racy and now worked for Notus? Who could possibly have told him?

  She’d left Michigan two months ago and hadn’t spoken to anyone from Tray since then. Her only friends had worked there, and they could hardly be called friends. More like casual acquaintances with whom she’d worked and gone to lunch occasionally. She’d moved back home with her parents in Ohio before coming here, and only they and a couple of old friends from school knew the whole story.

  But Dennis didn’t know her parents or her old friends. They’d never progressed to that stage of their relationship. And even if he had found her parents or her friends from Ohio, they’d never tell him where she was or who she now worked for. They’d tell him to go fuck himself.

  Her former supervisor didn’t know where she was, so that was out. The only thing HR at Tray Industries would have been allowed to tell Notus was that she had worked there and what dates. How the hell had he found out?

  And what was she doing with Lee and Mason? They worked here. Granted, they weren’t supervisors, and clearly there were no rules—official or unspoken—against employees dating each other as long as one wasn’t working directly for the other, but she didn’t know the culture here yet. What if this was frowned on, even behind the scenes, because of their lifestyle? What if things went south, like they had with Dennis, and she lost this job?

  She couldn’t go through that again. She simply couldn’t. She’d been lucky to find this, but there were only so many places she could go. Maybe it was better to end things now with them, before it got away from her? And especially now that Dennis had figured out where she was. The last thing she wanted to do was involve Lee and Mason in this mess. They hadn’t done anything to deserve that.

  Memories from last night overwhelmed her as she pictured telling them she’d made a mistake, and couldn’t keep seeing them. “Shit,” she whispered. She didn’t want that. She didn’t want to stop seeing them. Last night had been the most fun she’d ever had. If she could have handpicked two perfect men, she couldn’t have done a better job. They were both everything she’d ever fantasized about.

  It wasn’t fair. She was trying so hard to put the past behind her and make a new start. Why couldn’t she simply do that? But part of doing that was to stop repeating old behaviors. Their jobs might be jeopardized because of their involvement with her. The right thing to do was to end this now, before anyone got hurt.

  Chapter Six

  Harper worked for half an hour on her group project, but her thoughts wouldn’t stay focused. She actually jumped when a PM came across from Mason.

  Good morning. Free for lunch? Lee and I promise no bad food today.

  He’d added a winking emoticon, and Harper blinked back tears as she read it. Clearly these two wanted a relationship with her. It hadn’t been a one-time thing, which only made this worse. They were true gentlemen, just as they’d assured her they were.

  “This is a disaster,” she whispered. She wasn’t successful in holding back the tears. They stung her eyes as she sent him a text message from her phone, asking if there was someplace she could talk in private with him and Lee, as soon as possible. The only way to do this was to get it over with. Like ripping off a Band-Aid. Prolonging it would only add to her misery and theirs.

  It took about fifteen minutes, but she received a return text, asking her to come to the sixth-floor break room. Harper wasn’t sure who worked on six, but she figured those two knew, and they wouldn’t send her to a place where they’d be overheard. At least she hoped they wouldn’t.

  That’s exactly what had driven the nail into Dennis’s coffin at Tray. He’d become sloppy. He stopped caring who saw them and heard them. She’d never let that happen again.

  She locked her computer and rose, trying to stop crying as she made her way to the stairwell. It wasn’t only the loss of Lee and Mason. It was everything she’d found online, and the fear of realizing that Dennis had found her. She was overwhelmed and didn’t know how to fix it, or who to turn to.

  She found the sixth-floor break room easily enough, but didn’t like being on the floor because no one was working on it. It barely looked finished. Sheets of plastic still draped chairs and desks, and the blinds had only been hung over half the windows. Offices had been constructed, but there were no doors yet.

  The break room was empty except for a refrigerator, the cabinets, a table with chairs, and the sink. A capped-off water line marked where the ice machine would go, and someone had written “pop machine” and “snack machine” in red spray paint on the floor, against the far wall.

  She heard footsteps and voices exchanging easy banter, and her heart began to race. Could she do this? She didn’t want to.

  “There she is.” Lee smiled as he came into view around the corner, and all Harper’s earlier resolve to end this melted when she looked into his warm brown eyes. He pulled her into a quick embrace and then kissed her cheek. “If I kiss your mouth we’re going to have to find someplace more private than this.”

  She pulled out of his arms, and nearly started crying again at the look of surprised hurt on his face. “What’s wrong?”

  “I…I have to talk to you both.”

  Lee stroked her arm. “Okay. What is it?
”

  Mason was next to her now, and he stroked her other arm. “Just tell us. Whatever it is, we’ll deal with it.”

  “You two are simply wonderful.” How was she going to do this? Every luscious, decadent second of last night came flooding back, and she had to bite back a moan.

  Mason’s grin sent her over the edge. “Thank you. So are you. But what’s going on? You look…what’s the word? Conflicted.”

  Harper took a seat because she knew if she didn’t, her knees would give out. “I can’t see you two.”

  Mason and Lee both took seats across from her, straddling their chairs and leaning over the backs in nearly identical gestures. “Does this have something to do with the way your phone was blowing up on the way home last night?”

  Mason’s voice was soft, but it held a hard edge she hadn’t heard yet. She stared into his emerald green eyes, trying to make sense of what he’d just said. “You saw that?”

  “Well, I heard it, but yes. What’s going on?”

  Lee cut his gaze sharply between the two. Obviously Mason hadn’t said anything to him about the way her phone had been buzzing.

  “It’s nothing. I’ll handle it.”

  The two watched her, and then Lee covered her hands with his and Harper drew strength from their warmth, remembering his touch from last night. “Hey, if there’s a problem, let us help.”

  “I’ll deal with it. I don’t want you two involved.”

  Mason raised his brows. “This is none of our business and I get that.” He brushed a finger across her face. “But you’ve been crying, or close to it. So whatever it is has you very upset. I wish you’d tell us. At the very least, even if there truly is nothing we can do to help, you’ll get it out. Sometimes that makes a big difference.”

  If only it were that easy. She sighed as Lee gave her hands a squeeze. She had to tell them something. It was only fair. “It’s an issue from my past. I’ll take care of it.”