by Joyce Jordan
“Ms. Summers. How are you?” Ana was surprised he remembered her. She had been here only once and with the foot traffic in this building, she didn’t think he would remember half the people who worked here everyday. Besides she wasn’t wearing her glasses.
“Fine, thanks Jeff. How are you?” she greeted him back.
“Mr. Boyd asked me to give this card to you the next time you stopped by. It will take you straight to the penthouse. You are to keep it.”
“Ah. Okay.” This didn’t make sense, Jeff wouldn’t know why Gabe wanted to give her the card anyway, so she wouldn’t question him, she would question the man himself. But for now she needed to focus and not get derailed. Stepping into the elevator, Ana used the card and stepped out when the elevator dinged on the penthoue floor. As soon as she stepped off she locked eyes with Andrea who smiled at her.
“Ana,” she said rising to meet her.
“Andrea, sorry if I was rude to you, but it was nothing personal.”
“No need to apologize. You were not rude at all.”
“Is Gabe in?”
“Sure, let me tell him you are here.”
“No need,” Ana replied and quickly walked to the door before Andrea could alert him of her arrival. When she opened the door he was on the phone. Seeing her he quickly dismissed the person on the other end of the phone and stood to meet her.
“Ana.”
Raising her hand, she shook her head and said to him, “Stop right there. I need to say what I came to say and leave.”
“Okay, please take a seat.”
“No, it’s better if I stand since it won’t take long anyway.”
“Sounds serious. And you seem mad.”
Duh! What a genius, she thought. “It is. And I am.”
“In that case, let me give us some privacy.” Gabe retraced his steps and took a remote that turned the window wall separating his office from Andrea’s desk from clear to opaque.
“You wanted to see me?” he asked.
“Yes. You need to stop with the phone calls. Andrea calling me every few minutes doesn’t help. I can’t get much work done if I am having to battle with Andrea every so often.”
Seeing his mouth twitching Ana became more infuriated. “Gabe this is no laughing matter. You are having Andrea harrass me with phone calls. I thought we discussed this yesterday and came to an agreement already.”
“No, we actually didn’t come to any agreement at all. You didn’t give me a chance to make an argument to you about why it’s imperative that I secure your services. Business that is. And when I left my head was reeling with other things,” he said the last statemnt with a smile.
“Imperative?” she arched her brow.
“Yes, imperative,” he agreed and moved towards her.
“Stop,” she said and held her hand out.
“We shouldn’t be talking so far apart. We are practically shouting at each other. I would prefer it if we sat down,” Gabe said pointing to the sofa’s.
Not on your life! Ana wasn’t about to bamboozled by sitting that close to him. “Fine, why don’t you sit behind your desk and I will sit right there?” Ana agreed as she pointed to a chair facing his desk.
“No problem,” Gabe answered her and moved to pull a chair for her and waited for her to sit. When she didn’t move, he shook his head and moved away going behind his desk. “What are you afraid of Ana?” he asked as he pulled his chair back. It seemed like he was always asking her the same question everytime they were together.
“Nothing. Just taking precautions,” she answered and walked over. And without removing her coat she took the seat.
Gabe sat too and asked her, “Why are you refusing to work for me Ana?”
“How many of your empoyees have you slept with?”
“Excuse me?” he said as he arched his brow. “How is it of relevance?”
“Just answer the question.”
“None,” he responded.
“Why?”
“It’s messy.”
Smiling she pounced. “Ah. See that? This is why I can’t work for you and sleep with you. It’s messy and would be even worse when we break up.”
Lifting a finger. “One. We haven’t even started sleeping together. Yet.” A second finger went up. “Two. Technically you are not my employee. You would be a consultant. This job is a one time thing. Unless of course something else happens.” Lifting a third finger. “Three. We won’t be breaking up. At least not anytime soon.”
“That,” she paused a bit, “is all semantics.”
“Is that so?” he asked her.
“Yes,” she agreed with a nod.
“So you are saying if you work for me, then we cannot sleep together and vice versa.”
“I am glad you are catching on.” She looked at him, then smirked.
“Ana. You realise that we don’t discourage relationships within the company. I just prefer it that way. So really the two are not mutually exclusive.”
“Well you just said it was messy, so you never mix business with pleasure.”
“That was a personal preference which I can change at any time. And besides, with you I can make an exception.”
“Doesn’t matter. Zen Technologies doesn’t allow fraternizing with clients,” she answered smugly.
Throwing his head back, Gabe laughed whole-heartedly. “Zen Technologies is made of one person, who happens to be the owner, who can easily change that.”
“Nuh. If I did then I would have to sleep with all my clients.”
She saw Gabe tense then stand so suddenly that his chair fell back. Ana stood and went behind her chair.
He leaned over his desk as he said, “There will be no sleeping with other clients or anyone else for that matter. The only one you get to sleep with will be me. Me!” he stressed while pointing a finger in his chest. “Do we understand each other?”
“I never said I was going to sleep with my clients,” she said quietly surprised. Gosh!
“Do we understand each other?” he demanded of her.
“Stop jumping to conclusions.” She stared at him as if he had lost his mind.
“Ana! Don’t try my patience.”
“Yes I understand. Happy now?” God he was insufferable. He was practically climbing over his desk, just to get his point across. “It’s late, I have to leave.” She walked to the door, and rushed to the elevator. Luck was on her side and as soon as she hit the call button, it opened up and she jumped in and quickly hit the close button.
By the time Gabe reached her, he found the doors closing. “Fuck!” he said as he called the elevator back up.
Ana walked out of the elevator at a fast pace. She wasn’t sure if she had even managed to get her point across before he had been frothing at the mouth. Anyway, that was now behind her and she hoped she wouldn’t have any trouble getting home now. It was almost peek hour.
“Ms. Summers,” she heard someone calling her. Turning towards the voice she faced Gabe’s limo driver, John.
“John, is it?” she asked to confirm.
“Yes.”
“Mr. Boyd asked me to drive you home,” he told her opening the door.
“Oh, no. That’s fine.” She smiled a John. “I’m sure he wants to go somewhere soon. I’m just going to flag a cab,” she said while looking for a sign of a free taxi. She had meant to cross the street and catch the train, but quickly changed her mind when John had offered her a ride. The sooner she could get away, the sooner she would relax.
“He did say you would likely refuse.”
“He did, did he?” Ana cocked her head to the side trying to figure out what else he had told John..
“Yes,” John agreed.
“I guess he was right, because it is not necessary,” she replied with a smile.
“Ms. Summers. He also said if I didn’t take you home, I would be in trouble.”
“Trouble for what? It’s…” The ringing of her cellphone cut what she was about to say. “Hold on,”
she said to John while looking for her phone in her bag.
She didn’t recognize the number. Frowning, she answered, “Hello.”
“Ana, get in the car,” Gabe boomed over the phone.
What? Was he spying on her? “Who is this?” she asked trying to buy time.
He ignored her question. “It’s getting dark, I need John to drive you home.”
“And I told him that I can catch my own cab. And now I am telling you the same thing,” she replied angrily.
“Do you always have to argue with me?”
“I am not arguing with you. I am simply telling you that I can find my own transportation home.” Seeing a cab, she hailed it. “Besides, you may have asked him to kidnap me.” With that out of the way, she walked towards the cab and waved to John. “Please tell your boss….” Then she saw Gabe walking out, mad as hell. The guy had some serious ‘No’ issues. She quickly jumped in and told the driver to drive. Her heart was thumping loudly enough to be heard in the surrounding states, and she hoped the cab driver would step on it. Only when the cab pulled away did she settle down enough to give the driver her address.
He called back and she let it go to voice mail. He called several times more until she switched the damn phone off. She may have allowed him to walk all over her about the two of them having sex; but she would not accept the same when it came to her business. She had worked too hard to be where she was now.
Kelly was already at home when she got there. “Gabe called twice,” Kelly said by way of greeting. “He says you are not picking up your phone. I tried too and it went straight to voice mail.”
“I switched it off,” Ana replied.
“Why? Did you guys have a fight?” Kelly asked concerned.
“Sort of,” Ana hedged.
“What happened?”
“It’s a long story. But he had his assistant call several times today wanting to make an appointment for me to see him.”
“Okay, so you made the appointment?”
“Do you want to hear this or not?”
“Fine, fine, talk.”
“He is trying to get me to help him locate the person who hacked his network. He was here yesterday evening too. I told him I couldn’t accept because I have projects lined up that have deadlines.”
“He was here yesterday… Sorry, continue.”
“It’s probably best I start from the beginning,” Ana laughed as she moved to the sofa and sat down. Kelly followed and sat next to her. “So you know what happened Friday at his office, and at the club. Later when he dropped us off, he finger fucked me right there by the door. Don’t say anything,” Ana said when she saw Kelly about to interrupt. “Then on Saturday after dinner, he finger fucked me again and used his mouth too, in my bedroom, then left. Last night he asked me if I could help, and I declined citing my projects. The next thing I know he is attacking me and we are kissing each other like teenagers. And when I finally calm down, he is holding my torn thongs in his hand.”
“You had sex on the sofa!” Kelly exclaimed.
“Yes, no.”
“Well which is it?”
“He fucked me with his fingers and took me to my bedroom and fucked me with his mouth. The orgasms were out of this world. I got scared but he wouldn’t let me go and said he wanted an exclusive relationship with me. And…” the ringing of the home office phone broke in.
“That’s probably him,” Kelly said. “You should answer because he is not going to stop.”
“I can’t talk to him right now. Can you just tell him, I’m fine?” Ana said wearily.
“At some time, you will need to talk to him,” Kelly told her when she hung up with Gabe on the phone.
“I know, but that will be tomorrow evening. He said he was giving me two days to think about it. No actually, it was more like it’s already a done deal, but he said I needed to get used to the idea of him and me being an item. That one way or another, it was going to happen, so there was no sense fighting it.”
Kelly laughed. “I could have told you that,” she told her friend. “There is a tension between the two of you, even I saw it the first time he came here. I almost got burned that night we went to dinner. He couldn’t take his eyes off you.”
Not that she was willing to admit it, but Ana had felt it too. This was something foreign and Ana needed time to think about it logically, but that option had already been taken out of her hands. Maybe she should enjoy the ride like Kelly had said. Sometimes you cannot protect yourself from the outside world, which is the real world for most people, but for Ana her world was just books and computers. Relationships cannot be programmed, cannot be tied into software or hardware. But it’s not like she had never had relationships before, just nothing as intense as what she felt with Gabe. She was just learning that this time, nothing was predictable anymore. Not with Gabe intending to follow through in one more day. Her life as she knew it, had just shifted on its course, and she had no idea how to bring it back to the original course, short of him losing interest in her. But then one can only hope.
“What are we having for dinner?” Ana asked wanting to put the day’s events behind her.
“You declined a good meal, so now you can have some left overs with me.”
“Nothing wrong with leftovers,” Ana said standing up. “Let me shower then I will make a salad to go with that.”
After her shower, Ana made a salad and both girls ate in front of the television, watching a re-run of some reality show. When Kelly went to bed, Ana switched on her phone and her screen said she had twenty missed calls, five voice messages and two text messages. The first message, Gabe had been livid. She was shaking just listening to it. The second, he was a little bit calmer, but still pissed at her. The third, forth and fifth were as bad, but in each he was a little calmer than the previous ones. The text messages were relatively calm.
She sent a text saying, ‘Hi. I’m sorry.’ Maybe she had been a little bit childish.
‘u r ok’ he responded.
‘yes’
‘I’m really mad at u.’
‘I know. I’m sorry.’
‘Ok, baby. Gnight. 24 hours’
With that, Ana knew she had managed to avert a disaster. He probably would have come knocking if she hadn’t reached out to him. She wouldn’t put it past him.
Not able to sleep, Ana went to her office and did some work. She, after all had lost hours fighting with Gabe in his office earlier. After a couple of hours she realized that work wasn’t helping her keep thoughts of Gabe to the side, so Ana decided to put work aside. The mistakes that she had been making over the past few minutes told her that her mind was elsewhere and it was better to quit before she messed everything up and had to re-write her codes.
As quietly as possible, so as not to wake Kelly, Ana chanelled her frustrations into housework. She cleaned the apartment from top to bottom. A good thing they didn’t have carpet otherwise she would have had a problem with vacuuming. She swept the apartment and moped the hardwood floors cleaner than they had ever been. Next she tackled her laundry, and decided to do Kelly’s too. With the long night ahead of her, she took to cooking. She made different dishes and froze them. By the time she was done, she was tired and slept through the night, her dreams, however, were of Gabe.
Seven
The next morning she woke up just before her alarm went off. She was hot and dripping with sweat, which her sheets were a witness to.
“Jeez, you would think I had never had sex before,” she said loudly to herself as she removed the wet sheets from the bed and threw them in the washer. “Not with him, you haven’t,” she muttered back to herself. “Unless if you count oral, then yes.”
After taking a quick shower, she went to the kitchen to make coffee while she waited for Kelly to get dressed. They left together, Kelly going to work, and Ana going to the gym. Three times in less than a week. That must be some record she didn’t even know of, but was aiming to break nonetheless. She told Kelly that she would
see her later that evening before she left for Gabe’s place. She spent an hour and a half at the gym and when she got home she was feeling a little bit better. She had managed to relieve some stress with the bike she had spent the hour on, then the thirty minutes on the treadmill. Her thighs were in pain and now all she needed was a long bubble bath to soothe her sore muscles.
∞∞∞
As soon as she sat down to work, Ana received a letter marked ‘urgent’, delivered by messenger. The envelope held no distinguishing marks for her to tell who it was from. It was just a plain envelope which she realised was the messenger company’s packaging. None of her clients had hinted to her that they would be sending her anything, and usually correspondence was done via her mailbox and the mailcenter called her if there were any urgent packages. After signing for the letter, she quickly opened it, and the first thing she noticed was the Boyd logo on the smaller envelope inside and also on the letterhead.
Hadn’t they just agreed just last night for that matter that there would be no busines relationship? Reading the letter Ana realised that like yesterday’s calls he was still trying to hire her and wanted to meet with her so they could come to an agreement of when she could start. The letter went on to state that due to Sullivan & Sullivan’s rave reviews, Boyd Industries was willing to pay any amount to make sure they contracted the best company and person for the job, and since the issue at hand was of a time sensitive nature, the President and CEO, Mr. Gabriel Boyd, would like to meet Ms. Ana Summers of Zen Technologies, before the end of the day.
Ana had to give him credit, the man didn’t stop at anything. And since this was a business matter, the no contact clause didn’t hold in this situation. Ana had to smile at that. The man knew how to twist himself around like a pretzel until he found a loop hole. Thinking back he had been quick to agree to her ‘no contact’ condition. He should have been a lawyer. Ana smiled as she continued reading the letter. Once the issue at hand was resolved, Boyd Indiustries would like to sign a long term agreement with Zen Technologies.