“So he brings me out to this amazing fusion Chinese place downtown where he knows all the waiters and then the chef personally brings us a special entree that he designed for us on the spot! It was incredible! After the restaurant, he throws me in a cab and we bounce from club to club. Not those awful popped-collar ones but these clubs where there aren’t even signs out front. He just knew a whole string of them and brought me dancing all night. And my God, he could dance. I mean, really dance.” A smirk crossed Emily’s face. She finished her cheeseburger with one large bite and sat back in her chair.
“So you really liked him? What was his name again?”
“It was either Roger or Robert, not sure. Either way, he was way too into himself and status-obsessed. Like, he believed he was God’s gift to women. But I can’t deny that there were parts of him that I definitely liked,” Emily said, still chewing.
A man in his late twenties walked by us and nodded to her with a smile. She smiled and tossed her hair back gently. As he walked away, Emily turned back to me.
“Why don’t you go for any of the guys around here? Like that guy, Steven Draven. Handsome, successful, not a bad conversationalist either.”
“I take it you know this from first-hand experience?”
“Little ol’ me? No, I’ve never gone out with him. But Cathy from accounting went out on a couple dates with him and said she had a fantastic time. His dad owns a cabin in the Hamptons and even has a mini-yacht. I mean, come on! What is more perfect for a weekend of fun than that?”
“Well, maybe I’m not looking for random fun with these executive types. I don’t want to be some random weekend fling for these guys to brag about to each other. And if Cathy had such a fun time, what happened?” I asked, leveling my eyes playfully at her.
“Who knows? She got bored. He got bored. It doesn’t matter. And anyway, it doesn’t matter what these guys think of you. Who said you’re the weekend fling? You have some fun. They have some fun. It’s no attachments all around and no one gets hurt.”
Emily pointed to a group of five guys sitting together. “What about one of those guys? Maybe James?”
“First off, James is very nice. A sweetheart, really. But haven’t you noticed just how nice he dresses all the time. How meticulous he is with his ensembles? Have you ever talked to James at length? You’d probably find the two of you share a lot of the same...interests.”
“James is gay? Well, that explains why he doesn’t respond to me at all. How could any straight man resist this?” she asked, tossing her head back dramatically.
I laughed. “Okay there, Miss Irresistible. Who else could be my possible Casanova?”
“Dave Schuman.”
“Dave Schuman. The same Dave Schuman who is married with two beautiful daughters that he feels compelled to show to every single person who talks to him for more than two minutes?”
“Yes, but he never talks about his wife, now does he?” An evil smirk spread across her face. She winked and tried to suppress her giggles.
“Very funny. You’re terrible, you know that?”
“Oh, lighten up. What about Dennis Malick?”
“The gambling-addict whose wife left him last year after he bankrupted them in one all-out downward spiral of a weekend?”
“Yeah, but just imagine the time in Vegas he could show you!” Emily said.
I laughed with Emily. It felt good to be having lunch with her, talking about some of the men in the office. To be honest, anything beat moping at my computer desk brooding over my life. Each one of the men looked less appealing than the last, but just talking about dating someone was exciting. And who knows, maybe I would start seriously dating again.
Emily was right, it had been too long since my last date. I wasn’t about to lie down and be some “fun time” for some rich-boy, but maybe I could meet a guy worth dating. A good, nice guy.
“All right, so you’re too good for all of these guys, huh? What about Alexander Strauss? Would you be too good for him?” Emily asked.
“Come on! Really? You think I’d want to date that old gauntly looking creep? I just imagine his black eyes staring at me in an attempt to suck out my soul or something,” I said with disgust.
“What are you talking about?! Do you even know who I’m talking about?” She looked shocked.
She took out her phone, her fingers quickly working on the screen. Holding the screen so close to me it was practically touching my face, she let out a dramatic breath of disappointment.
“Does this look like some gauntly creep to you?”
It certainly did not. My heartbeat quickened. The portrait on Emily’s phone showed a man with beautiful, piercing blue eyes that seemed to stare out at me through the screen, not in an attempt to suck out my soul but to melt it. My attraction was immediate in a way that I had never experienced before. His faced showed little emotion; a slight smile that exuded a professionalism necessary to his stature in the company, nothing more. His hair framed his sharp features that commanded my attention. An internal struggle was already developing inside of me. He was beautiful, like a god.
As if in defiance of me, my eyes would not look away from Emily’s screen. I fought against telling Emily that he was unlike anything I’ve ever seen. I did not want to reveal how I really felt.
“He’s probably some arrogant prick,” I blurted out loudly. “Inherited daddy’s company and thinks he’s better than the entire world that was handed to him on a silver plate.”
I looked up. At first, I thought Emily had completely lost interest in me. The phone slowly descended as her arm fell. She was ghost-white. Her mouth hung open ever so slightly.
She made no sound. A rush of panic struck at my heart immediately. It began beating so fast that I feared it might explode in my chest. Emily’s eyes were looking at something behind me. Fighting every impulse to stand up and run away, I slowly looked behind me.
Mr. Strauss stood before me, a group of men silently waiting behind him. My mouth ran dry. Not a single word came to my lips to save me. I could only stare, hoping that I at least looked composed. An amused expression adorned his face as he scanned me up and down. Slowly.
Standing so close, I could feel heat radiating from him as though he were the sun on a warm summer’s day. An impulse to stand up and grab him shot through my mind like a bullet tearing through its intended target. The photograph on the phone was nothing in comparison to the man in person. His tall stature loomed over me for what seemed like years. A perfectly tailored suit did not hide his perfectly proportioned physique that a tiny cell-phone could only hint at. If God had animated a Greek statue and covered it in a suit that cost more than I made in a month, it was standing before me now.
My heart skipped a beat painfully in my chest as I realized he was bending down towards my face. Oh my God, is he going to kiss me? I almost closed my eyes in anticipation. Every muscle in my body tensed. Every breath was a struggle to steal from the air. Time itself slowed to a crawl.
His blue eyes grew larger in my own. With every closing inch, I wished more and more that he would swallow me whole, wash away the world with his eyes and drink me like the sea. Every beat of my heart rang out in the silence of the cafeteria, a steady beat of the moment before I knew he would embrace me.
At the last moment, he broke from the path towards my waiting mouth and his lips hung agonizingly close to my ear.
“Four p.m. My office,” he whispered. With that, he turned and led the group out of the cafeteria in silence.
I turned back to Emily slowly. Her mouth still hung open. Neither of us spoke as we rose to leave the cafeteria.
***
Sitting back down at my desk, I tried to look at some spreadsheets before realizing that I had no idea what I had just read. The shock of what had just happened to me was wearing off, giving way to a piercing anxiety over my job. Why would the CEO want to see me if for no other reason than to fire me for the rude comments I made in the cafeteria? Couldn’t he have my sup
ervisor fire me and save himself the trouble? Worse, what if he was so offended that he wished to tell me in person that I was now blacklisted from the corporate world altogether? My professional life would be destroyed. How far was Strauss’s reach?
My mind raced. There were so many questions with no reassuring answers. Yet through the fear, my mind returned to those blue eyes, to the strength of his chin touching my soft skin. Every thought of my destroyed future was dominated by the thought of him.
I imagined my fingers caressing the taut skin on his arms, tracing the veins up the forearm to his rigid bicep. His warm breath is on my neck as his hand slides down the small of my back. The smell of his skin intoxicates me as my eyes remain closed. I taste his lips as I stifle a cry for something more, something indescribable yet so close to me.
Alexander Strauss. His torso is shaped by hours of pain and sweat, leading up to a chest that breathes with mine, moves with mine, leads mine to feel that which it has never known it had yearned for. His skin is soft, stretched over muscle forged into stone. My hands would slide up his legs, slowing as they reach the summit of him. I know that as I wrap my hands around him, his expression will not alter. He will remain perfect in his composure.
I will stand before him naked, without restraint or inhibition. His arms will wrap around me, bringing me close to him. Letting him inside of me, my breath would become his, his breath mine. We would be one. In his perfection, I would know perfection, and we would lie under a sun that hung in a sky as blue as his eyes.
An entire future wasted by a single, stupid comment that I had only said to save face with a friend.
I sat at my desk, lost in thoughts of Alexander Strauss. More than anything, I wanted him. An uncomfortable longing nestled itself between my legs, crying out for my undivided attention. Thoughts of my destructive comment only furthered my lust for him. If not for my crass comments, would he have stopped in the cafeteria to acknowledge me? Would I have had the opportunity to be so close to him to catch the faint hint of his cologne?
The clock on my desk sat before me like a hangman’s noose. As the minutes sped into hours, I tried to calm myself down. Yet as the hour of our meeting grew nearer, I could not decide just how I felt. I covetously looked up pictures of the CEO, drinking them like drops of water from an emptying canteen under a lethal desert sky. With every new picture, I checked my surroundings to make sure my actions went unnoticed. My heartbeat steadied, but my longing only increased. With every picture I looked at, the sense that I was looking at something secret, something private, intensified.
An alarm cut through my silence. It was time.
Chapter Two
I silenced the alarm. The clock read three-thirty. I wanted to be right on time and I had no idea where Strauss’s office was, let alone what part of the building it was even in. Strauss hadn’t told me where to go. It would mean I would have to ask my boss.
When I stood up to leave my tiny cubicle, I noticed almost everyone in the office was staring at me. The looks on their faces were anything but reassuring. They were watching a woman on death row walk to the electric chair. I walked by them all, holding my head up high in defiance of the panic that flowed through my veins. I was a picture of perfect calm, as though I was completely at peace with what was going to happen to me.
In my supervisor’s office, his face was glued to a computer screen. I politely interrupted him.
“Mr. Grander, where may I find Mr. Strauss’s office,” I asked.
I could feel every pair of eyes trying to penetrate the walls of his office. Every pair of ears attuned to our discussion like a cat’s ears to the scurry of mice.
“His office is on the top floor. Actually, it is the top floor, but you’ll need a security escort to get there, Samantha. I’ll call them up for you.” My sweet boss, Brian Grander, tried to sound calm and collected, consoling, even. He must have known the death that awaited me on the top floor of the building.
A security guard came right away, as though he was waiting for me the entire time. I felt my face redden against my every wish as he walked me to the elevator. If I was imagining every person in the office staring at me before, I definitely wasn’t now. Even people unaware that I had been personally summoned by the CEO to his office were now very aware that a security guard was walking me to the elevator. It was an unusual sight. I tried to seem chipper, excited even. Really, I just felt sick to my stomach.
We entered the crowded elevator, once more stealing all the attention. The guard entered a number on a keypad below the buttons on the panel that I had never really noticed before. As we climbed higher in the building, the elevator cleared out. We had reached the top floor, or so I thought, when the guard entered yet another number on the keypad and the doors closed. I felt the sensation of us climbing again. The elevator doors opened and I walked out.
I was in a relatively small office with a gorgeous wooden desk before me. A woman in her early fifties, a woman you could tell was once incredibly beautiful, and aged gracefully, looked up from behind the desk. Next to her desk, two doors loomed large—the main entrance to his office. I heard the elevator doors close behind me and when I turned around, the security guard was gone.
“Samantha Dubois, I presume?” asked the receptionist.
“Yes, I’m Samantha. Alexander Strauss told me to come to his office at four p.m.,” I replied, trying to keep my voice steady. A large metal clock, artfully tasteful, hung on the wall behind the receptionist’s desk. It was four p.m. exactly. I felt a little reprieve of relief. I was on time.
“He’s expecting you. You may go in.” And with that, her attention to me was severed completely. Her eyes lowered and it was though I ceased to be in the room.
I walked to the doors and stood before them. They opened for me as though I had mentally commanded them to do so. Alexander Strauss stood there, having opened the door. He ushered me in.
As I walked in, I brushed by his arm briefly. A surge of electricity moved through me and every hair on my body stood on end. Immediately that longing between my legs returned, demanding that the tension be released from my body. We were so close in that moment that I could turn and grab him. I pushed back the thought of embracing him and walked in the office.
I regained my composure, but only for a moment before I felt myself lost in wonder immediately. The office was massive. The floors were a sleek stone that I could only guess was some sort of marble. A panorama of windows showed the entire city landscape. A sun that had just begun to enter its descent hung above the other buildings in the city. We were looking down on almost every single other building. Before me was a sleek black conference desk that seemed to stretch for miles. Luxurious office chairs that each looked more expensive than my entire college tuition were tucked under the desk, waiting to be sit upon by powerful executives, investors, and shareholders.
I looked around, taking in the office, trying to let its entirety settle in my eyes. It was sparsely furnished, deliberately so. A few paintings, all abstract, hung against the walls. There were no plants. Everything was sleek and smooth—clean, precise, without flare but with an edge that screamed authority and intelligence. Various leather chairs and a few couches were strewn about to give certain areas of the office a casual relaxed feeling, although too perfectly arranged to suggest that they were there by chance.
Every piece had its place. The energy flowed between them magnificently. The entire office was art in and of itself. Yet the heart of the office was clearly the desk. Every arrangement in the office pointed towards the desk in some way. All things flowed to the desk. Wherever you were in the room, you were never the center. The center was the desk, and standing before the heart of the office was Alexander Strauss, leaning back against the desk casually, his legs crossed before him.
“Hello Samantha, thank you for coming,” he said, his voice neutral.
“You’re welcome. Your office is...it’s incredible,” I said, immediately regretting it. It was a stupid thing to say
. I blushed and a pang of panic hit my chest.
“Please, sit.” He extended his arm to a chair that was only a few feet away from him—almost too close for how huge the office was. I sat down, thanking him politely. I consciously kept my eyes on his face—they wanted to crawl down to where his legs met, to where his legs pushed up a bulge in his pants.
He pushed himself off the desk and in a brief moment, a small scent of his cologne found its way to my nose delicately. It was a scent I’ve never smelled before, a scent that I could imagine drowning in with ecstasy.
He walked around his desk and sat behind it, his eyes never leaving mine.
“Samantha Dubois. Twenty-three years old. Employed by Strauss Engines as a clerical assistant for the past three months. Temporary status.” His voice slowed slightly when he said “temporary status”, the emphasis subtle but clear. Another slice of terror threatened my composure but I remained unshaken outwardly. “You’ve held numerous temp jobs. Why?”
“It was the only work that I could find. I’ve been hoping to work my way up the corporate ladder. Build my success over time with hard work.”
“A very noble idea indeed. The American Dream personified,” he said. I tried to detect whether I could hear sarcasm in his voice and I decided that he was being genuine. “It must have been hard, with your parents and all.”
I choked a little bit at the mention of my parents and tried to hide it. How did he know about their bitter divorce? “Yes, I suppose it was,” I said. It was all I could think to say. There was no change on his face.
“Tell me, what do you know about me?” he asked. Every word flowed out of his mouth like lyrics in a song, yet his voice never wavered or gave any sign of inflection. I watched his lips part in slow motion and wanted them on me—everywhere on me.
“I really don’t know much about you, to be honest. Only some office rumors and what you can read on the internet. I hadn’t even seen a picture of you until today,” I said.
“Extrapolate on the rumors for me. Tell me what you think they really point to.”
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