Rylie Duncan was as different from Caroline as night from day. Caroline had been dainty and petite. Rylie was tall, coming close to his six-foot-two eye level in those fuck-me high heels she’d been wearing the last time he saw her. Caroline used Southern charm to further her agenda for the homeless women’s charity she ran. Rylie simply walked in and took charge, no matter what setting she found herself in.
He’d heard her speak at a couple of county board meetings they both attended to pitch their respective companies for the contract to build the new county complex. The first time he met her, Rylie stuck out her hand and shook his with a firm grip that told him she’d spent her career surrounded by men. She gave him the same kind of cool once-over that he’d given so many women over the years, but she might as well have been wearing a sign that read ‘Look but don’t touch.’
He asked Suzanne, the wife of his best friend Mark, about Rylie shortly after their first meeting.
“Ah’ve heard about her, but ah don’t really know her, sugar. They say she’s smart as a whip, but all her brains couldn’t get her a husband—or even so much as a steady boyfriend.” Suzanne lowered her voice a little. “She comes across pretty tough… wasn’t raised with the good manners of us Georgia girls, bless her heart.”
Neill had lived in Atlanta long enough to recognize that all-purpose phrase that Southern women sometimes used to make even their most mean-spirited remark sound like it was being delivered in the spirit of Christian charity. Apparently Rylie had made the same tough choice he did to forgo personal relationships and focus on her career.
Back then, the last thing he needed in his life was the kind of all-consuming challenge he’d be taking on if he tried to bend a self-assured woman like Rylie to his will. So he ignored the stirring in his cock every time he saw those long legs that ended in a very shapely, spankable ass striding down the corridor in front of him at City Hall. But now that the house was empty and the new contract was in the bag, there would be no conflict with his duties as a parent or his responsibilities to the company if he decided to mix a little business with a lot of pleasure outside the office.
He sat back in his chair with a smile, closed his eyes, and planned his next moves with the same intense focus he brought to negotiating a huge business deal around the conference table. Neill Sullivan was definitely looking forward to this evening’s meeting.
* * *
Rylie rolled over and squinted at the clock, eyes still half-shut. Good, it was only 5:15. She could sleep for another half hour before jumping in the shower and dressing for work. She closed her eyes—then opened them with a gasp. All the horrible events of the morning flooded back into her mind. There was no job waiting for her. It was 5:15 P.M… and she was due at Neill Sullivan’s office at six.
Cursing, she stripped off her clothes and dashed into the bathroom. Showering and doing her makeup in record time, she pulled on her favorite lace bra and panties and reached for one of her power suits—severe black jacket and matching black skirt paired with a red silk blouse to lend her some much-needed confidence. Slipping her feet into a custom-made pair of black suede Manolos that had set her back the equivalent of a month’s rent on her Buckhead apartment, she grabbed her purse and headed for the door.
Fortunately traffic was streaming in the opposite direction at this time of day and she was able to make it back downtown in half an hour. Still, her watch read 6:10 by the time she found a parking space and stepped off the elevator into the Sullivan and Sons suite of offices.
A pleasant-looking woman in her mid-fifties met her at the door. Wearing a conservative beige skirt and blouse, she was nothing like the hot babe Rylie would have imagined a rich single guy like Sullivan would choose as his personal assistant.
“Ms. Duncan, Mr. Sullivan is waiting for you. Let me show you to his office.”
The woman opened the door to a spacious room paneled in dark walnut. The first thing Rylie saw was a floor-to-ceiling wall of glass, with a view of the city skyline against the setting sun and a light show from the stream of cars heading out of town that would choke I-75 for at least another hour. A deep voice coming from a dark corner of the room interrupted her thoughts.
“Thank you, Jean. I appreciate your staying late tonight.” He moved closer as he spoke, coming out from the shadows. “Why don’t you take some extra time off in the morning to make up for what will certainly be a longer commute than normal for you this evening? Come in around noon.”
“Thank you, sir. Can I get either of you anything before I leave? Coffee, a soda?”
Neill never gave Rylie a chance to respond. “No, thanks, Jean. I have everything under control.”
She smiled fondly at him, like a favorite aunt indulging a young boy asserting his independence. “I’m sure you do,” she replied with a meaningful glance at Rylie. Closing the door softly behind her, she left them alone.
“You’re late.” His tone was flat and he still hadn’t even looked her way.
“Rush hour traffic.” She responded in kind, without bothering to apologize.
“I would have thought that as a professional, you would factor that in when you decided what time to leave.” He turned to face her, finally. “I do not tolerate lateness. It’s rude and disrespectful. But we will deal with that issue later.”
Sullivan was wearing a pale blue dress shirt, a tie the color of Bordeaux, and charcoal gray slacks. His dark hair was mussed, as though he’d been running his hands through it. A navy blazer tossed over one of the chairs flanking a round glass table on the far side of the room told Rylie he’d been going over the stack of blueprints piled there.
“Sit down.” He pointed to a single wooden chair standing alone in front of the huge mahogany desk. Rylie sat. He took his place in the high-backed leather armchair on the other side of the desk. Taking off a pair of dark-framed reading glasses, he folded them and carefully placed them off to one side next to a brass lamp. The desktop was empty, except for a cell phone sitting alone on the bare surface. When he saw her glance at it and then quickly look away, he simply stared at her for a moment, still not speaking. She felt like a recalcitrant schoolgirl summoned to the principal’s office.
He picked up the phone, dialed his voicemail account, and hit the speaker button. Rylie flinched when her strident voice filled the room.
“Sullivan, you asshole, this is R. L. Duncan. Are you there? It figures. You’re probably out somewhere boozing it up with the county commissioners, now that you’re their new darling. Tell me, how many of them did you have to blow in the men’s room at City Hall to get that contract? You’ll need a few stiff drinks to get that taste out of your mouth…” There was a pause, then her voice went on, words slurred. “Thass gotta be how you did it. You sure didn’ build in enough money to buy them all off like those crooks that I work for at Zenith Construction always did.
“Maybe you promised the mayor that slut of his would get laid by a hard one for a change. I’m sure you volunteered to do that task yourself. I heard he likes to watch, now that he can’t get it up anymore. The little blue pill doesn’t work very well when it’s washed down with his mid-afternoon fifth of vodka. But be careful. He’s already whored her out to lots of other willing cocks. You might catch something nasty.”
A longer pause, then the sound of a bottle clinking against a glass. “Well, Mr. Neill Sullivan, I just called to say congratulations… and fuck the whole lot of you. You deserve each other. By the way, Billy Joe Reynolds, the head of the building department, spends a month every winter as a guest in Judson’s Miami Beach getaway. I hope you can offer him something equally as good next year. He’ll expect it—or you’ll start getting notices that your project is due for extra inspections. I hope you realize you won’t pass them unless you pay up, you dumb son of a bitch. You may have won the bid from that stupid bunch of rednecks who think they’re running the show now, but you’re still at the mercy of every dickhead who has any power in this county.”
Rylie closed her e
yes as the drunken ranting played on. She’d listed half a dozen more local politicians by name along with two major law firms in town that she claimed they were in bed with. If Sullivan shared this voicemail with any of them, her chance of getting another job in her field in this town would be zero.
When the tape ended, Sullivan clicked off his phone and set it to the side next to his reading glasses. He leaned forward slightly across the desk and raised his eyebrows.
Rylie swallowed. “Mr. Sullivan, I’m deeply sorry for…”
He interrupted her. “I thought the image of me giving blowjobs to the county commissioners on my knees in the men’s room of City Hall was especially creative on your part. As for the mayor’s slut—well, I’ve already had her and she’s not that good. He’d have to pay me to fuck her again.”
She stared at him, speechless.
“No, I didn’t,” he said drily. “But if any of what you said about the others is true, you won’t get hired by another firm in this town. Not when word gets out that you know their secrets and you’ll spill them whenever you get pissed and then knock back a few too many drinks.”
“Mr. Sullivan, you’re right. What I did was stupid. I don’t handle my liquor very well. I should never have allowed myself to get so drunk that I lost my temper and made such inappropriate remarks.”
“Inappropriate remarks? That’s what I love about attorneys. You can reframe the worst behavior, the biggest crime, and make it sound like nothing more than a minor lapse in judgment. ‘My client didn’t really mean to kill his wife, your honor. He just used an inappropriate amount of tension when he was strangling her to make her quit nagging.’”
“Point taken. They were more than just inappropriate remarks. What I said about you was petty and mean-spirited and I sincerely apologize.”
“What about the things you said about all the other people on that tape?”
Rylie bristled. “I agree that it was stupid of me to go off on that tirade. But I will never apologize for telling the truth. Not to anyone. And the things I said about the others were the truth. I hope you’ll accept my apology as it relates to you and erase that tape.”
“Erase the tape? Oh, I don’t think so. Not just yet. First, I’d like to discuss a business proposition with you.”
Here it comes, Rylie thought. He’s going to say fuck me or I’ll make that tape public.
“I’d like you to come to work for me—as head of my legal department.”
Rylie’s mouth dropped open.
“Our in-house attorney is ready to retire. He came on board when my father started the firm and he’s done a great job for us. But now that we have our next few years of work already in the bag, he feels like he’s done his part for this company and he’s ready to spend time with his family and enjoy life a little. I have a position open here—and I’d like you to fill it.”
She was already shaking her head from side to side. Working for Neill Sullivan would be a big mistake. They were both headstrong people and the spark of sexual attraction she felt for him only added an extra problem that she’d have to face on a daily basis.
“Before you reject my offer, let me finish explaining the details of it. I’m suggesting a six-month trial period. During that time, here in the office you would be the head legal counsel for Sullivan and Sons, with all the authority to represent our firm, negotiate contracts, and give me your frank opinion on what actions to take. I doubt you’d have a problem fulfilling that last requirement. However, I work from my home office after hours, and I also need a personal assistant… someone to do everything from filing to typing letters and making sure the coffeepot is full. Along with your duties here in town, I’d expect you to come to my home for two hours each evening and do whatever I need during those six months.”
She opened her mouth to respond, but he went on. “Another thing. It’s clear to me that you’ve picked up several bad habits along the way in your life. One is drinking to excess. If you come to work for me, you lay off the booze—completely. It’s clear you can’t handle it. The other issue is your temper. I’ve seen you lose your edge several times in meetings when someone gets under your skin with a rude comment or makes a stupid remark about something you’ve just proposed. Instead of dealing with the idiot coolly and calmly, you’ve snapped, responded just as rudely, and given up some of your power.
“While you’re working for me, you will curb your temper. I think you have a great deal of potential and I plan to impose the kind of discipline that will help you gain control over your destructive impulses in the future.
“One last caveat. When you’re in my home, you’ll do as you’re told, with no arguments or complaints. I require complete obedience. Anything less will earn you an immediate spanking, delivered on your bare bottom.” He finished speaking and there was dead silence.
Rylie met his gaze and then started laughing. At first it was a little giggle, but before long she was holding her sides, tears running down her cheeks as she howled.
“Oh, God, for a minute there you had me,” she replied, once she had composed herself. “I deserved that. Bare-ass spanking! I guess I did act like a bratty little kid, making those calls. Point taken. Now, as for your job offer…”
Sullivan wasn’t laughing. If anything, his voice became even colder. “I wasn’t joking, Ms. Duncan. There will be no job here at Sullivan and Sons unless you also agree to accept the position of personal assistant at my home, abiding by the rules and restrictions I just went through, as well as agreeing to accept the consequences I laid out.”
“You can’t expect me to agree to something so barbaric, so sexist. You’d be breaking so many laws I can’t even begin to count them,” she snapped back.
“I won’t be paying you for the personal assistant position, so there’s no job-related violation. And as far as I know, there’s no law that prohibits you from consenting to abide by a certain standard of behavior when you’re in another person’s home during your personal time.”
“Apparently I don’t owe you much of an apology after all,” she retorted. “What I said about you last night was true—you are an asshole.” Rylie stood. “This meeting is over.”
Sullivan never moved. “I have a good friend who is a reporter for the business section of the Atlanta Journal,” he said. “I spoke to Tom earlier today and told him I might have a story for him—allegations of corruption among the highest public officials in the county, all on tape. You chose to leave the message on my voicemail, so you can’t claim I was taping your comments without your knowledge. The voicemail is my personal property. I can share it with anyone I choose. And if I do, you’re through in this town. You can rest assured you’ll be dragged into court along with everyone else from Zenith Construction. If you really have documents that show those overcharges to the taxpayers and kickbacks to the officials, doesn’t that mean you’re now an accessory after the fact, since you didn’t turn them in right away?”
Rylie sank back down in her chair. She knew in her heart that everything she’d said was true. She’d gone over the figures, seen the original invoices, overheard bits of conversation from the board members, and drew the obvious conclusions. But Rylie was an attorney. Hearsay and theories did not add up to hard evidence in court. If an investigation ensued, she’d be the one hung out to dry. With her word alone against all those powerful men, her claims would be dismissed as nothing more than the drunken tirade of a vindictive woman who got fired for blowing a big business deal.
“Mr. Sullivan—Neill—can we be reasonable? I know what I said was true, but I don’t have documents that would hold up in court. My reputation will be ruined. I’ll never get another job in Atlanta. I’ll end up having to move to some hick town and start over, fighting to get nasty divorce cases from pissed-off first wives whose rich husbands are dumping them.
“I’d be happy to represent your firm on any terms you choose,” she went on. Rylie realized that she was practically pleading now, sounding as desperate as she felt.
“If you don’t want me as full-time legal counsel, I’ll work for you any time on an as-needed basis. And I’ll give you a hell of a good rate. If you’ll just erase that tape…”
Sullivan was shaking his head. “I’m afraid you’re not getting off that easy, Ms. Duncan. You’re somewhat of a loose cannon. If I erase the tape, what’s to stop you from leaving here, getting drunk again, and making even more false accusations about me to someone else? You’ve already called me a dick-sucker and implied that I’d whore myself out to get a contract.”
“You have every right to be angry, Mr. Sullivan. But I’m begging you—please erase that voicemail. What I did, what I said—that’s just not like me.”
Sullivan sat back with a little smile. “On that, we agree. See, I knew you were a good negotiator. You’ve managed to find common ground already. I don’t think the mean-spirited drunk on that tape is the real you. But if you continue to allow your hot temper to dictate your words and hit the bottle every time you’re under stress, it will eventually become the real you. I’m giving you a chance, Rylie. A chance to allow the warm, funny, smart, and capable woman I believe is inside you to come out and shine. I’m going to help you—by paddling your backside every time you step out of line until you’re able to give up those self-defeating behaviors.”
Rylie bowed her head, shoulders sagging, as though admitting defeat. Then she shot to her feet and grabbed his cell phone from the corner of the desk while striking out with the edge of her other palm. The move was designed to surprise him, not to do serious damage. But Sullivan moved just as quickly, wrapping his fingers around the hand with the cell phone while deflecting her blow with an upraised forearm.
He squeezed his fingers together around her hand and Rylie winced.
Bared and Tamed Page 2