Sexual Integrity

by J. A. Dennam

  “I guess the difference lies in the employer, then. Yours sold out. Get over it.”

  A low gasp came from two booths away as Amy and Miranda eavesdropped. Get over it? This pretentious jerk couldn’t know what those three words had just earned him.

  Brooke ripped off her mental boxing gloves, ready to go at it bareknuckle style if necessary. “I believe your vice president feels threatened, Mr. Stevens.”

  Stevens was already watching his dinner companion over a loaded forkful of rice pilaf. “You think so?”

  “I’m inclined to ask what grade he’s in, but I’m in no mood to dodge spitballs next.”

  Ethan snickered into his plate.

  “Do you feel threatened, Mr. Wolf?” Stevens asked.

  “I decline to answer without a straw at my disposal,” Ethan retorted.

  It was a good thing there weren’t any straws around or Brooke would have poked them into his eyeballs. “And this is the man you want to give a corner office to?” she pointed out with disdain.

  To her surprise, Stevens laughed. Ethan Wolf also smiled, but it held a promise of something dangerous if she tried to take him on. Though he didn’t have the dark, smoldering looks of a movie star, he was certainly handsome enough. Add a little false charm and there was his advantage. But it seemed that Stevens was as dedicated to his employee as it was the other way around. Brooke—a mousy workaholic who couldn’t charm a seagull with a handful of breadcrumbs— didn’t stand a chance.

  Why even waste her time when it was obvious she was dealing with children? With her chin up, she pivoted to storm out, with or without her friends.

  “Ms. Monroe.”

  Her wet hair fanned out around the lapels of Miranda’s too-big jacket as she turned with attitude.

  With his fork, Stevens pushed the remaining kernels of seasoned rice toward the center of his plate. The clatter heightened her nerves until she realized he was deep in thought. “If Ethan agrees, I’ll let you compete for the position.”

  As she processed this, Ethan’s gaze shot up in surprise. “Why would I do that?”

  Stevens met it from across the table. “Because you love competition. This is perfect for you, especially right now.”

  Covert signals flew between the two men with quiet intensity. Brooke’s lips spread into a slow smile as the sense of victory surrounded her.

  Sure enough, Ethan let out a breath, sat back, and grabbed a napkin. “Alright, but as acting vice president, I get to add a stipulation to this so-called competition.”

  Stevens nodded once. “Let’s hear it.”

  “When Ms. Monroe loses to me, I want her to spend the remainder of her twelve-month employee agreement as my personal secretary.”

  “You already have a—”

  “I believe you mean administrative professional,” Brooke interrupted with a bright smile, earning Ethan’s extended gaze. “And I’ll agree to those terms as long as the corner office stays empty until it’s been won. We can each take a cubicle in the main work area.”

  Brooke knew she’d struck a cord when a riotous anger replaced Ethan’s carefree mood. The thought of him enjoying her leather reclining chair with its six-point massage made her boil. Watching him do it through the window of his private reception desk was worthy of a dramatic dive from the roof of their eight-story building.

  “Sounds fair,” Stevens said. “Since this isn’t exactly a conventional way of doing things, I assume a handshake will suffice in sealing the deal.”

  Brooke barely heard the man since she was returning Ethan’s death-ray glare. Did Stevens really expect her to believe that the man was willing to let her keep her office? He’d probably already spent time in her leather chair; studied the fishing boats as they unloaded their catches directly into the back doors of bayside seafood joints; watched the seagulls fly overhead while the pelicans bobbed on the waves below in competition for the same snack.

  Though she hadn’t accomplished everything she’d set out to do that afternoon, Brooke reveled in the glow of achievement. Once she was VP, she would have the power to get Amy and Miranda’s jobs back, as well as the other terminated employees she felt were worthy. To her, it was already a done deal.

  She cocked an eyebrow, meeting Ethan Wolf’s glare with equal fervor. Yes, this time she would welcome the storm that brewed ahead.

  2

  DRIVING AT NIGHT WAS THE PITS IN SOUTHERN Florida. Ethan turned on his windshield wipers and cleared the condensation that impeded his view. The humidity was stifling for a northerner born and raised in South Dakota. How in the world did people breathe down here?

  He squinted and tried to look past the thick, twisting Banyan trees rising from just about every manicured lawn he passed. The average-sized home in this neck of the woods must have five thousand square feet of living space at the least. And though Ethan enjoyed the view of lit up beachfront mansions, the sound of Brooke Monroe’s snotty little voice continued to plague him.

  The fucking nerve of some people. When he’d agreed to upend his whole life and move to southwest Florida to help run Ken’s new division, it wasn’t supposed to come with risk. Not that he feared losing to Brooke…the woman was a train wreck who dressed as if she’d raided her mother’s closet, not to mention a native who’d allowed herself to get caught in the only ninety-second downpour of the day…wow.

  His body jerked with a laugh. Even her pretty friends appeared embarrassed to claim her as their only representative. He remembered her stringy hair and dripping skirt, and those gigantic green eyes that never lost their primness behind her wire frames. She had fucking fangs for Christ’s sake, venom-tipped, pointy little canines gnashing at him while he struggled to enjoy his first taste of fresh seafood in ages.

  Well, she could take her judgment and shove it up her watertight ass. He’d worked hard all his life, earned every right to run this new office. He also understood how the world worked—never rode mommy and daddy’s coattails to the point of complete, sheltered ignorance. Hell, would she even be able to function without them?

  Why she bothered him so badly was what bothered him most. It wasn’t because she’d seemed to judge him at first sight. If she wasn’t interested in him, fine. But to dismiss his not-so-subtle hint for her company with a comment about strays was downright bitchy. She was the one who was all wet and disheveled. For some odd reason, that had stirred his interest in her even more than when he’d seen her picture on a shelf in her corner office.

  Not anymore. What he’d dismissed as shallow had been nothing more than a raging hatred for someone she had deemed to be the enemy. Considering her position, it was something he could sympathize with…if she hadn’t pushed every sensitive button he had to push.

  And that was why she bothered him so much. He’d lost his cool, said some things he shouldn’t have, demonstrated the same lack of tact she had. Not one single pair of beguiling green eyes was worth that, no matter how long he’d gone without sex.

  Not that he should have nurtured any sort of attraction for a fellow coworker, something that was largely frowned on by his boss.

  When Ethan awoke from his reverie, he found himself in a completely different part of town—east of the city where flat, barren stretches of road disappeared into the night, and intersections and streetlamps were few and far between. When visiting Naples before, he’d found himself in these parts once or twice and had taken advantage of their reputation as a problem area for law enforcement.

  The threat of a hefty fine and a suspended driver’s license was much greater in Florida than where he’d come from, but the need to drive beckoned more.

  Just one more time.

  He rolled up to the last stoplight for miles. Since nothing and no one was around, he stopped at the green and waited. Seconds later, someone pulled up to the crossing in a purple, modified Supra with tinted windows.

  A little rev here, a bigger rev there. Ethan crawled through the lit intersection and waited. Sure enough, the Supra turned and follo
wed. When it caught up, Ethan rolled down the window.

  “You can’t be serious, man,” the other driver shouted as the sultry air pushed around them.

  Ethan grinned. “Is that thing even legal?”

  “Does it matter?”

  Asking questions wasn’t smart, especially with a stranger, but no one would believe he was a cop anyway. Not in his ride. “It may.”

  The guy jerked his chin. “That’s a Miata, dickhead. There’s a reason we don’t see many of those on the scene.”

  Ethan shot forward a few yards to make a point. Shut up and try me. The Supra caught up and its driver laughed through the darkened window. “It’s your funeral, friend. On three?”

  They both stopped and squared up—one vehicle high in street cred, the other with a much different reputation in cool. But Ethan knew that his Miata had a bit more than just sex appeal. He and his brother-in-law had spent countless dollars and hours rebuilding his 2008 MX5 into the lone Super20 concept car that Mazda had reintroduced at SEMA in 2011. All it took was a few simple modifications, from the Cosworth engine, the widened wheelbase, racing beat header and exhaust, down to the custom yellow paint scheme. Her black fender flares and side skirts made her an edgier MX5 with a street-tough style. Ethan didn’t care that she was slower than most on the straights. Since he had no business behind the wheel of a legit racer, his souped-up Mazda was more of a consolation prize than anything else.

  He might lose tonight, but he’d win by tapping into his inner bat-out-of-hell, a release he hadn’t enjoyed for more than a year.

  They’d stopped beyond the amber glow of the last streetlamp. With nothing but their dashboard lights to see each other by, they waited in the dark, keeping a constant eye out for anything that looked like law enforcement. Engines revved. While he counted, Supra gave him a look of surprised approval.

  On three, tires squealed. Ethan shot forward from second gear and made it to fourth at 60 mph. The car beside him screamed along with air whooshing through the open window, floating forward and back in a bid to outrun. Ethan’s blood raced too as the centerline blinked faster and faster in his headlights. When they broke 100 mph, the roadside blurred. His eardrums whirred with a good kind of pain. The next stoplight grew larger in the distance, a small sign of life in the middle of a desolate place.

  They hit 110 miles per hour and Ethan edged forward. Either the Supra wasn’t so super, or the guy behind the wheel knew something Ethan didn’t. In a street race, cops usually pursued the car in front.

  “Shit.” He eased off the accelerator, letting the Supra shoot forward. Just then, red and blue lights lit up the night.

  It was a sight no driver wanted to see, but for someone like him, it could be a devastating blot on an otherwise-clean record. He made an executive decision and held his breath. While the Supra blasted through the intersection, Ethan yanked on the parking brake and cut a hard right. The Mazda drifted through the turn as if it had wings. When the world straightened again, he watched in his rearview mirror as the cop tag-along chose which one of them to pursue.

  The police car’s siren pulsed loudly behind him and then faded as it went after the Supra. Ethan sat back and gripped the wheel with a resounding whoop of victory.

  When he pulled onto his street a half-hour later, he realized he’d just spent a good forty-five minutes without Brooke Monroe even entering his head. For most of the drive home, he wondered if he should push his luck somewhere else, or if the Supra’s driver managed to outrun his tail.

  Ethan wheeled into the driveway of his lavish condominium, vowing to keep his latest escapade a secret. His neurosurgeon would fly down from South Dakota and make him write “I will die next time I break my skull” one hundred times with a piece of chalk on the pavement of whatever road he was caught on.

  With his heart rate back to normal, he parked in the underground garage and rode the elevator up to the fourth floor. When the doors parted, his phone rang. He answered with a smile as he sifted through the keys on his key ring. “I was just thinking about you.”

  His twin sister’s voice immediately took on an apprehensive tone. “Dare I ask what you were thinking about?”

  “How much I’m going to miss my part-time job.”

  “What part-time—oh, you mean your excuse to torture yourself.”

  Though Ethan helped run the motorsport track that belonged to his sister and brother-in-law, it was more out of an innate need to feed his addiction rather than to earn a paycheck, even if it would only be as a spectator from now on.

  “Ethan, I’ve watched you contemplate the risks far too long. You are physically impaired, and sneaking onto the track at night when no one is looking will only lead to disaster one day.”

  “I only dipped my toe. I didn’t even make it into fifth gear.”

  “No excuses. This move is the best thing for everyone, especially for me. I nearly lost you. You can’t put me through that again.”

  “I won’t,” he grumbled. Besides, the only thing around was that public drag strip in Immokalee, and until he settled into his new life, scheduled races weren’t in the cards. Spontaneity was all he could fit in for now. And tonight’s race would have begun and ended a whole different way if he’d been behind the wheel of his M3 turbo, may it rest in peace, or pieces rather.

  At least he’d managed to survive the wreck that had taken his beloved BMW and left him nearly blind in one eye and with a slight vertigo problem. After months of healing, both physically and mentally, Ethan had decided to take his doctor’s orders to heart. Find another addiction, whatever it was.

  “Just promise me you won’t do anything stupid on the streets,” Harper pleaded. “You know how Florida is.”

  The sound of sirens rushing through an intersection still reverberated through his head. “Yes, and you also know my car won’t give these guys so much as a woody.”

  “That’s not a promise.”

  What he’d already done that night was definitely stupid, especially allowing the Supra to take the left lane where he couldn’t see him as well. If he planned to become a full-timer in this city, he’d need to keep it down. Focus on settling in, bury himself in work, and hope it was enough to keep his restless spirit in check.

  “Are you settled in?” Harper asked.

  “Almost.” Once inside the spacious condo, Ethan plunked the keys down on the granite-topped bar on his way into the living room. “I took the guest room. Adrianna’s is a little too pink for me.”

  Harper chortled a laugh. “And she was so looking forward to sharing her princess boudoir with her favorite uncle.”

  “I’m her only uncle.”

  “Oh right.” As if she were surprised by the well-known fact. “And what a sport you are for filling in as her only aunt too.”

  The razzing he took for allowing his four-year-old niece to make spriggy ponytails all over his head had not died down apparently. In fact, his scalp still tingled with the painful memory since he’d lost nearly half his hair one root at a time pulling out the entangled rubber bands. Ethan ran a hand through it as he crossed over to the sliding glass doors. The terrace called to him even at night. “When are you coming down?”

  “Adrianna and I will be there in a few days for a visit. But if you mean for the winter, Grant is planning to shut down the track in late October.”

  “That’s at least five weeks. I should have my own place by then.” As Ethan leaned against the railing, warm salt air enveloped him. For some reason, it wasn’t stifling up there. He supposed the privacy had a lot to do with that.

  Twinkling lights reflected off the Venetian Bay to his right. Small waves lapped over the white sugary beach to his left. The luxurious peace of this city was reserved only for the rich since no middle-class resident could afford it. Savoring the lap of luxury, Ethan breathed deeply, took it all in, and let himself relax. Hurricane Brooke with her path of destruction was no longer on the forefront, replaced by the memory of screaming engines and the sound of his
sister’s voice.

  STOMACH LURCHING WITH NERVES, BROOKE leaned against the back of the elevator as it began its climb to the eighth floor. She closed her eyes, clutched the handle of her briefcase, and effectively bolstered her courage against the enormous changes taking place in her life. It was Monday, her first day under a new employer.

  God almighty, what had her father done? Brooke ran down the list of what must have occurred since the day she left for vacation.

  No…before she left for vacation. The man who had sired her— whom she would now refer to as Stanley—had been busy making plans without her. Then he had guilted her into a seven-day hiatus she never wanted, all so that he could execute his scheme in secret to avoid the inevitable confrontation. Since when had her father become a coward? Since when had he become a liar?

  “Your grandmother wants you in Dallas by Saturday afternoon,” he had said. “This may be your last chance to see her alive.”

  Bullshit. As soon as she’d entered Thorncliff Retirement Center’s lobby with a bouquet in her hand and tears in her eyes, the seventy-eight-year-old spud dragged her all the way down to Galveston for a full week of art galleries, theater, nude swimming, and enough dirty martinis to pickle a whale, all while Brooke watched from under a wide-brimmed hat and five layers of sunscreen.

  It turned out that Nana Louise had a bucket list. Who better to chauffer her around than a granddaughter with “no fella to take the starch out of her britches?” That was code for how could you have let a fiancé slip out of your fingers?

  Unfortunately, when they returned to Thorncliff, her parents were waiting with bright smiles that reeked of something wrong.

  That was the day her world fell apart—the day her parents broke the news that Monroe Graphics was no longer theirs to run.

  The elevator dinged out the sixth floor. Brooke snapped to attention and checked her hair for fly-aways. All was good. It was at least dry this time, pulled back in a low ponytail, perfect and professional. So were her clothes: a beige pencil skirt that reached below the knee and a white buttoned blouse that was closed up to her throat. This time she wore heels so that if or when she ran into Ethan Wolf, he wouldn’t have the chance to look down at her again.