by Louise Bay
I hadn’t thought Max was the sort to lie; he was too direct. But it was perfectly possible I’d just been taken in by his hard body and beautiful green eyes. Had I been seduced by his genius brain and passion for what he did? “Does it matter? He knows now. My father invited him to pitch.”
“And he said your father told him?”
I waved my hands. “No, he said he put two and two together, and then he asked for my help with the pitch.”
“And you don’t want to work for your father?”
“Not because of my last name.”
Grace nodded vigorously, alcohol clearly loosening her body parts. “I get that, but you are where you are. Max is saying he didn’t know. Are you going to cut your face off to spite your nose by quitting?”
“I definitely won’t be cutting my face off, or even my nose, but I do think I have to quit. It’s all too humiliating. Everyone’s going to know who my father is and why I got the job, and I can’t work with the man who fucked me to get ahead.”
“You’re thinking like a woman. You need to think like you have a penis.” She slapped her hand on the bar and the bartender jumped before setting down a cheese plate on the counter. “However you got this job, you need to prove you deserve it because you’re good at what you do, not because of your last name and not because you’re banging the boss.” She took a sip of her cocktail. “Men have been getting ahead using the old boy’s network for years. You have to take opportunities when you can get them. So not only can’t you quit, you need to go in there and tell Max that you should be working on your father’s pitch because of your name.”
She made no sense. “How would that help? That would only make everything worse.”
Grace set her glass down, her drink sloshing over the sides. “This, as they say,”—she threw her hands in the air—“is a win, win, win.”
I shook my head and checked the time on my phone. I should be getting home, job or no job to go to in the morning.
“Are you listening?” Grace asked.
I wasn’t, because she wasn’t making any sense, but I put my phone down and gave her my full attention.
“King & Associates does the kind of work you want to do, right?”
“Correct.” I nodded.
“And they’re good at it, right?”
Why were we recapping this?
“Correct again. Another and you’ll win a set of steak knives.”
“So, why would you leave a company like that?”
She interrupted me before I could speak. “You just need to shift.” She grabbed my barstool and pulled it toward her. “You need to shift your focus. King & Associates is the best place for underpinning capitalism, feeding corporate greed, and all the geeky stuff you do. Am I right?”
I rolled my eyes and took another sip of my drink.
“So stay there. And demand to work on the project. Because your dad is the best at what he does, so the person who lands that account is going to get huge kudos, right?”
“You get the steak knives, yes.”
“So play this smart by sticking around. And, while you’re at it, prove to your dad why he should have offered you a position in his company over his children who have penises.”
I set my empty glass down as I took in what she was saying. Was she on to something? “You’re saying I keep working at King & Associates?” Could I bear to keep working with Max?
“Yes, because however you got the job, you’re there. So make the most of your opportunity.”
“And demand to work on my father’s account?”
“As you’ll be a star if you land it, right? And you’re flipping the bird to your father at the same time. Like I said, it’s all win for you.” Grace indicated to the bartender that we wanted the check.
“Unless we lose the account.” That would be even more humiliating.
“When have you ever lost at anything you wanted?” she asked as she slipped off her stool and handed her black American Express card to the bartender.
“You didn’t need to pay,” I said.
“I didn’t. That was courtesy of my daddy.”
“Thank you, Mr. and Mrs. Park Avenue,” I called out. “You might be on to something about not quitting. This could be my opportunity to prove to my father that I can do more than stay at home and lunch for the rest of my life. I’ll show him that I’m worth more, and that he should have been begging for me to work for him and his stupid investment bank.”
I jumped off my chair. “Yes. That’s exactly what I’m going to do.” I grabbed Grace’s face in my hands and gave her a smack on the lips. “You’re a genius.”
*
Somehow between leaving the bar and getting back to my apartment building, all my patience had disappeared and the cocktails I’d consumed over the evening had convinced me it was a great idea to tell Max I would work on the JD Stanley account immediately.
“I’ll do it,” I said as Max opened his front door.
“Harper, hi.” He rubbed the heel of his hand over his eyes and yawned. “I wanted to speak to you earlier, but you ran off.”
What was I doing? Standing at my boss’s front door in the middle of the night, clearly a little drunk. Did I want to get fired? I stepped back until I hit the wall, but let my eyes trail down Max’s hard, naked torso and follow a trail of hair gathering at his belly button before disappearing beneath his pajama bottoms.
“I think you’d better come in,” he said, his voice gravelly and deep.
I shook my head in an exaggerated way and slipped my hands behind my back. He stepped toward me and pulled at my elbow. “I said come in.”
I lost my balance and toppled toward him. Reaching out to save myself, I pressed my palms on the hot, tight skin of Max’s chest. I pushed away, but he pulled me closer, spun us around, and walked us back into his apartment.
“You’re drunk,” he said as he pressed me up against the wall in his entry and kicked the door shut with his foot. His face was just an inch from mine. I wanted him closer.
“A little,” I confessed.
“Why did you run off? You’re not quitting, if that’s what you think,” he said as he dragged his nose against my jaw.
“Tell me when you knew,” I said, placing my hands on his bare shoulders.
“Knew?” he asked as he began to kiss my neck.
“Who my father was.”
He pulled back and braced himself against the wall, his hands on either side of my head. “I swear to you, I found out today. I think Donna assumed there was a connection but she didn’t mention it to me until I got the phone call.” He paused and his eyes flickered over my face, as if he were trying to figure out whether I believed him. “Why didn’t you say anything?”
I dipped under his arms and walked across the entry. “I don’t speak to my father. I don’t have anything to do with him.” I fiddled with my thumbnail.
“Okay. Well you don’t have to work on the pitch. I just thought … JD Stanley is the only investment bank on Wall Street I’ve never done business with.”
“So,” I replied, and I glanced up.
“Well I can’t turn down the opportunity.”
“I don’t want you to turn it down.”
He raised his eyebrows.
“I want you to win that fucking account—and I’m going to help you.”
“What changed your mind?”
My eyes hit the floor. “It doesn’t matter. You got what you want.”
He took a step forward. “Tell me, Harper.” I knew I shouldn’t say anything more, but there was something in his tone that made it impossible not to comply.
I huffed out a breath. “He has a lot of kids, right?”
His eyes drifted over my face.
“I’m the only girl … and the only one he didn’t offer a job right out of college.”
“Because you’re a girl? Or because you don’t speak to each other?”
I let his questions drip into my brain. Did he have good relat
ionships with his other children?
Max held out his hand. “Come with me.”
All too easily, I slipped my palm into his, his fingers holding me tightly as he led me further down the corridor, deeper into his apartment. What was I doing? I didn’t like this man. I should go downstairs to my own apartment. “I’m sorry. It’s late. I shouldn’t be here.”
“Shhh. Let’s get you hydrated.”
He guided me to a barstool opposite a kitchen island in a huge room I hadn’t seen before. The other night I’d only caught the dusky outline of his bedroom and the entryway. I hadn’t appreciated the size of the place or how glamorous it was. Max either had incredible taste or he’d hired a great interior designer.
“Drink,” he said, setting a glass of water on the white marble counter in front of me.
I took a sip, suddenly much more sober than I’d been when I knocked on his door.
“More,” he growled. Jesus, he was so bossy. But I complied and gulped down a couple mouthfuls of water.
He rounded the counter and stood beside me, leaning on the marble. “Tell me about your dad. You think he didn’t hire you because—”
“Because I have boobs.”
He raised his eyebrows. “Really?”
“He offered me a big chunk of money.” I set my glass down. “It’s not that he denies my existence—he periodically asks me to dinner.”
“So you do speak to him?”
I really needed to leave. “Not since my youngest half brother started his job at JD Stanley the day of his twenty-second birthday. Three weeks after I graduated business school. But not really much before that either.”
Max pursed his lips.
“I thought maybe he was waiting for me to finish grad school, and of course I would have said no, but …”
Max’s fingers stroking my arm scattered my thoughts. “He gave us money, me and my mom, but what I wanted was a family.”
Max withdrew his hand.
“Sorry, I should stop talking.”
“I like to listen. You have a lot to say.” His voice was quiet and even, as if he were being sincere, as if he wasn’t talking to a drunk woman who thought he was an asshole.
I raised my eyebrows. “I’ve been drinking. I have more to say in the office, but you’re not so interested there.”
He cupped my face. “How wrong you are.”
His kisses were soft at first, and I closed my eyes, savoring each one.
“We can’t do this.” My mouth protested, but my hands slipped up his naked back, his warm muscles bunching under my touch. “I can’t—”
“I know,” he said. “If I’m going to go for the JD Stanley account, I can’t exactly be fucking the boss’s daughter.” As if his body hadn’t caught up with his brain, he pulled up my skirt. “But this ass, these legs. They’ve got me under some kind of spell.” He smoothed his hands over my hips and under my ass, slipping inside my panties, then pulled me off the stool and tight to his body.
“We’re going to be working together.” I wrapped my hands around his neck. “I don’t need my head full …” … of thoughts of you. I couldn’t say that. I didn’t want Max to think I wouldn’t be able to concentrate if we were in the office together, but frankly, it was going to be a big ask. “We should focus on the pitch.”
He nodded and captured my bottom lip between his teeth. Without thinking, I twisted my hips against his growing erection.
“If my dad suspected … I need to show him I’m excellent at my job, not that I got to work at King & Associates because I’m fucking the boss.”
“Focused,” he repeated. “No boss fucking.”
“I’m serious.” I pushed against his chest. “Stop thinking with your dick.”
“I’m serious, too, but you’re encouraging me.” He grinned. It was a shock because it happened so rarely. Just for a moment my heart stopped.
“Don’t grin at me, you asshole.” I tried to twist out of his arms, but he just held me closer.
“Just tonight. This is Vegas. We start with a fresh slate tomorrow morning. No fucking after tonight.”
“Vegas? Just for tonight?” I stared into his eyes, trying to see if he was telling the truth. Wondering if I wanted him to be. Yes. Tonight would be my last with Max King. Working on this account and showing my father what he had been missing wasn’t worth risking. Not even for the King of Wall Street.
He smoothed a hand over my pussy, then pushed his fingers into my folds. “Just tonight,” he whispered.
I lost strength in my knees and stumbled.
“See what a single touch does to you? See the power I have over your body?” He removed his fingers and disappointment caught my breath. I didn’t have to answer. “You came here to get fucked, and I’m not going to disappoint you.” He bent and lifted me over his shoulder.
“I came to tell you I’d work on the account!” I yelled at his back as I kicked my legs.
“You came to get fucked.”
Well, maybe he was right about that. Except sober I’d never have risked colliding with one of his other lovers.
“Vegas,” he muttered again. “Just for one more night.”
He tipped me onto his bed, my ass bouncing on the mattress, and he grabbed my leg and pulled me toward him. “If I only get to have you for one more night, I need a memory of that pretty mouth of yours wrapped around my cock.”
I sat up, my feet dangling over the edge of the bed, and he stepped between my legs, cupping my head in his hand.
“You can’t just demand a blow job.”
He raised one eyebrow as if to disagree.
I shook my head and pulled down the sides of his pajamas until they hit his ankles. His cock sprang out, hard and thick.
“It seems to be working.”
I wanted to have him in my mouth, could feel myself grow wet between my thighs at the thought of his cock between my lips. But I’d clearly made it too easy for him, and I couldn’t have that.
I leaned back onto the mattress, opening my legs so my skirt bunched around my hips, then reached into my underwear. Wanting him in no doubt as to what I was doing, I hitched one leg up onto the bed to improve his view and pushed my hands deeper, finding my opening.
“Really?” he asked as he fisted his cock, dragging his hand upward.
“Ask me nicely.”
He chuckled, shook his head, and let go of his erection. His energy shifted and he leaned over, stripping me of my clothes. First my skirt, then my panties. Next he fiddled with the buttons of my blouse. He glanced at me, and it was my time to raise my eyebrow at him. “Finding that difficult?” I asked.
Without taking his eyes off me, he ripped my shirt apart. Fuck, that was silk and I’d only worn it three times. “You asshole!”
“Whatever,” he replied, reaching behind me and unhooking my bra. “If I only have tonight, I need to see these,” he said, staring at my chest as he palmed my skin and pulled at my nipples. My back arched into his touch. He was so forceful, so single-minded about sex—just as he was about everything else. To have that focus concentrated on my body was almost too much to bear.
His hands left my breasts and he dragged his palm down across my stomach until his fingers found my clit. I groaned as his thumb circled and pressed, pulling out my pleasure, inch by inch. His fingers stroked at my folds, and I threw my hands over my head, needing him to send me over the edge.
“Max,” I whispered, opening my legs wider, inviting more of him.
“You’re desperate for me. My hand is covered in you.”
I groaned at his dirty mouth. But he was right. I was desperate for him.
“Look at me,” he growled.
I opened my eyes. He wore the same look when he was concentrating at work—as if nothing was going to stop him from getting what he wanted.
He stilled and removed his hand, standing up straight. “I want my cock in your mouth. Please.” His voice was thick with lust.
He’d been getting me worked u
p to get his dick sucked? He played dirty.
“Now,” he added.
I paused while I thought about my next move. Was I going to give in to him? The thing was, it wasn’t giving in if it was what I wanted. And I did want to have him in my mouth, to make him feel even half of what he made me feel.
I moved to sit on the edge of the bed. Opening my thighs, I tapped the mattress just in front of my pussy. I cocked my head. “You trust me not to bite?”
He chuckled. “Nope. But that just adds to the fun.”
I trailed my nails up his outer thigh, and he tipped his head back on a muffled gasp.
His cock was thick and stood to attention against his stomach. I flickered my gaze from his erection to his eyes, wondering how I was going to handle him. He brushed his thumb over my cheekbone, and I gave him a small smile as I leaned forward, the flat of my tongue connecting with the base of his dick. I dragged it up his shaft.
“Jesus,” he called out.
I swirled my tongue around his head and took just the tip of him in my mouth. I wouldn’t be able to take him deep—he was too big. I circled my hand around his base, gripping him tight. I couldn’t stop myself from letting out a moan from the memory of him inside me, filling me. My nipples pebbled, and he must have been watching because he caught them between his thumbs and forefingers and squeezed and pulled, setting off sharp circuits of pleasure from my breasts to my belly button and then lower to my clit.
I took him deeper, my jaw as wide as it would go.
“Yes, like that. That’s how I’ve imagined you.”
I circled again, then took him deeper this time. He groaned, whispering about my mouth and my tongue. His fingers threaded into my hair. Not pushing, not directing, it was as if he just wanted to touch me, to be further connected to me. I pulled back, allowing my teeth to graze his shaft just slightly.
“You’re wicked,” he growled and I pumped his cock with both hands while sucking on his crown. “But it’s not enough.” He lifted my chin and I released my hands. I was more than certain I was giving him a great blow job. What was his problem?
“Open your legs,” he said. Reaching across to his nightstand, he grabbed a condom, sheathing his cock in seconds. “Wider,” he barked, pushing apart my thighs. “I’m going so deep, you’re going to forget what day of the week it is.”