by Lucy Lambert
I opened my fist and looked again at the pins. It was a kiss, nothing more. And it wouldn’t happen again. Ward was probably busy with another model by now anyway. Someone more suited to him. Basically, someone who was the opposite of me.
I pushed down on the pedal for the little metal trashcan I kept in the bathroom and tilted my palm over it until the pins fell down into the plastic bag.
***
I was cautiously optimistic when I sat down at my desk the next day. Trish wasn’t there to badger me. There weren’t any intimidating emails from anyone with the ability to fire me.
And also nothing from Vaughn Ward. No news was good news, right? I congratulated myself, figuring that I got to him.
Now I could concentrate on the work. Last night while getting the kids ready for bed (I let them use my bed and I took the couch) I’d had an idea. I brought up one of the magazine stills.
Then Anne showed up. “Hey!” She gave me an expectant smile.
“Hi,” I said.
“So…?” Anne said, looking around my cubicle. She ran one finger along the false wall, tracing over my calendar as she walked around my desk to see what I was doing.
“I’m trying to think if I should change the wording a little,” I said.
Anne leaned over my chair and squinted at the ad. She nodded approvingly at the layout, which was her work.
“You know what? I don’t think you’ve ever been interested in more than the artwork before. What are you looking for?” I asked.
“You had another meeting with Vaughn Ward last night…”
“Yeah?”
“Just the two of you, alone in his house. Vaughn Ward, the 17th sexiest person alive, and you, alone.”
Yeah, and I can still feel the prickle of his stubble on my lips, I thought, but I wasn’t going to tell her that. “So, what?”
“So, details, of course! Come on, you can kiss and tell with me!” Anne said, grabbing the back of my chair and giving it a little bit of a shake.
“Who said anything about kissing?” I said, my throat tightening. “It was a business meeting. A consultation.”
Anne went still behind me. I could sense the inner workings of her mind, trying to figure out what my tone meant. “Was there kissing?”
“There was coffee. He made me coffee. A latte, actually,” I said. It had been a good one, too. I thought about how I’d remarked to him how surprised I was he could do that sort of thing himself. And then how he said he liked surprising me.
“He made it himself? Like with his own hands?”
“Yes, Anne, he ground the beans between his fists and used his own inherent hotness to steam the milk.”
“You know what I mean!” she said, giving my shoulder a playful swat. We both laughed. I knew I should tell her that I needed to work (because I wanted this over with as quickly as possible) but it felt good to gab a bit.
“Yeah, sorry. Yes, he made it himself, he didn’t order it or anything. I just can’t figure him out,” I said, turning a bit in my chair so that I didn’t have to crane my neck all the way around to look at her.
“Do you want him to kiss you?” Anne asked.
“What sort of question is that?”
“An honest one.”
“No,” I said. “I don’t. He’s just another flirt who thinks he can get any woman he wants. He just happens to be incredibly wealthy and handsome, too.”
“Is he ever!” Anne started gushing. She actually clasped her hands to her chest. She walked back around to the front of my desk and stared dreamily up at the tiles in the drop ceiling, as though Ward’s angelic face might deign to look down on her.
“Have you been doing more research on him?” I said, wondering how much time she’d spent last night going through gossip sites and Google image searches.
“So much research!” she said, unabashed. “That man is so hot! I’d eat him up. Every last bite. And then I’d ask for seconds.”
“You’re adorable,” I said, smiling. Although there was also this tiny flair of some feeling inside my chest. It took me a second to recognize it. Jealousy. The kind that made me want to tell Anne to knock it off.
“If it were me instead of you last night, oh, Quinn, you don’t even want me to get started…”
“Get started on what?”
We both jerked at the unexpected interruption. Vaughn Ward stood beside my corner cubicle, one arm resting casually along the top of the false wall. He wore a nice grey blazer with a white shirt on underneath. No tie. The top button was undone.
When Anne saw who it was, she actually said, “Eep!” her eyes going wide and her cheeks warming up enough to glow.
“Mr. Ward!” I said, standing up. I felt the immediate need to tidy my desk, even though it was already pretty clean. I also felt the need to reach up and touch my hair to make sure my bun was still in place. I resisted both urges.
“Quinn,” he said, then he turned his eyes to Anne, “…and Quinn’s friend.”
Even under the harsh and unforgiving fluorescent lights of the office Ward looked good. That definitely wasn’t fair.
My heart started pounding again. Yes, I thought, he’s good looking. It’s okay to think that. Just don’t act on it. But my body wanted to act on it so badly. I put it all down to physical desire.
Poor Anne looked like she might melt into a puddle if something didn’t happen soon.
Ward had given Anne a cursory glance, but all his attention was now on me. The beginnings of one of his crooked smiles tugged at one corner of his mouth.
Probably thinking about that kiss last night. What a huge mistake that was! Except I couldn’t help thinking about that kiss, too.
“Mr. Ward,” I started again. “What are you doing here?”
“I was doing some thinking last night, and I thought that we need to have more of these meetings. Email’s such a poor substitute for face-to-face interaction. Don’t you agree?” Ward said, addressing his question to Anne.
“Uh, yeah. Face-to-face,” Anne said. I don’t think she had blinked since Ward showed up.
Knew it, I thought, there was no way I was getting off that easy.
I gave him a polite smile. “Perhaps you’re right. However, right now I’m actually in the middle of something and I don’t really have the time…”
He shook his head, “Oh, not right now. I was thinking tonight. You found my place once, I’m sure you can do it again. And no is unacceptable.”
I bristled. What sort of bravado was this? Didn’t he know I wasn’t interested? Hadn’t I made that clear?
Except I knew that I hadn’t. I’d said one thing and done another. Told him I had no interest in him and then folded like a pair of deuces when he kissed me.
I didn’t want to answer him right away, and I saw an out in Anne. “Mr. Ward, you liked the layouts and the artwork in those roughs I showed you, right?”
He nodded. “They were great. Just what I was looking for.”
I smiled again, then motioned to Anne. “This is Anne. Anne Snyder. She did those layouts. I think Anne already knows who you are.”
“Excellent work, Miss Snyder,” Ward said, offering her his hand. She looked down at it, her eyes wide enough that I could see the whites.
The thing that really got to me was how casually Ward acted. He saw nothing strange in Anne’s behavior around him. To him, I figured, it must be normal. This was just how women acted around him.
She put her trembling hand in his and he gave it two pumps.
I crossed my arms, feeling somewhat more immune to his charms. Although that little spark of jealous refused to be extinguished.
“Anne, don’t you have those new layouts you need to finish?” I said.
“…Layouts?” Anne said, the English language failing her.
“Yes, layouts. Artwork. Those things you like creating so much? Shouldn’t you get back to them?”
“Yes. Work. Artwork,” Anne said. With some hesitation she walked away. I wondered if ma
ybe she just went around a corner and watched us from there. So long as she was too far away to hear anything we said I didn’t care.
Good, she’s gone. I thought. But then something else occurred to me. It was unusual for Anne to come to my desk. It wasn’t so strange to see Trish wandering around, avoiding work.
Trish, who wanted to steal this account from me. Trish, who was hotter than me and willing to use that fact to get ahead.
I took a look around, but didn’t spot her. That didn’t mean anything, though. She could appear whenever she wanted. I had to get Ward out of here before that happened.
“Is there a problem?” Ward asked.
I lowered my voice. My heart pounded in my ears. “Yes, there’s a problem. You shouldn’t be here.”
“I’ve hired your firm to handle advertising for me. You are the person at this firm in charge of my account. There’s no reason for me to not be here. Besides, maybe I just wanted to see you again.”
“I told you already that that’s not a good idea. For either of us. I don’t want this,” I said. I put my hands on my desk and leaned closer to him to make sure he could hear me, to make sure he could see I meant it.
“No. I don’t believe that and I don’t think you do, either. What are you so afraid of?”
That spark of jealousy in my chest burst into a sudden gout of hot anger. “I’m not afraid of anything. Especially not you…” I caught something out of the corner of my eye. I thought it was Trish at first, but it wasn’t. “What’s it going to take to get you out of here so that I can do my job?”
“It’s going to take you admitting that we have something here, between us. And you coming by my place again tonight.”
My kneejerk reaction was to tell him there was nothing between us, and for him to get out of here before I called security. Except that there was something between us, even though I resisted it.
And besides, I figured this time I’d be ready. No getting disarmed by his charm again.
Then I heard Trish’s voice. I could pick it out of the general clamor of the office by its me, me, me tone. And it sounded like she was headed this way.
“Fine,” I said.
“I knew it,” he replied.
Trish laughed at something, the sound grating down my spine. And she was definitely closer than before. I didn’t know what her reaction to seeing Ward might be, only that I wouldn’t like it.
Strangely, I was less worried about her trying to steal the account and more about what effects her inescapable flirting might have on him.
“Can I get back to work?” I said, giving my monitor a pointed look.
“I look forward to seeing what you’ve come up with later.” He looked at me, and I realized that he was admiring me again.
I couldn’t help the heat that rushed to my cheeks. The heat that made those freckles I hated stand out even more than they already did.
Before I could ask him to go again, he broke off the look and walked away.
Trish came around the corner then. She stopped when she saw me standing rather than sitting at my desk. She followed my line of sight, catching Ward’s back before he disappeared around the bend to get to the elevators.
“Who was that?” she said.
“Who?” I said. I was distracted with trying to control myself.
She sneered, “The hot guy who you were staring at.”
“Him? I… uh… A new intern, I think. And I wasn’t staring!” I said, miffed at her accusation.
She wore a tight blazer that pressed her cleavage together and her perfume followed her around in a cloud.
She sniffed. “Don’t play that game with me. You had those big, hungry puppy dog eyes. A little desperate, if you ask me.”
“I wasn’t asking you. And I wasn’t staring,” I said, forcing my legs to unlock so that I could sit down. I was relieved far more than I should have been that she hadn’t seen Ward. But now I wanted her to leave.
She leaned against my cubicle at the same spot where Ward had been moments earlier. She looked down the hall where he went.
“Well, what I saw of the back looked pretty good. Tell me, sweetie, is the front of the same caliber?”
I shrugged, staring pointedly at my monitor.
“If it is, I look forward to seeing this intern around more often. I think there’s a few things I could get him to help me with.”
I knew she was just trying to get a rise out of me. I didn’t have to look at her to know that she smirked at me.
“It’s a free country,” I said, “Now, do you mind?”
Trish shook her head and then strutted away. I didn’t know if she did mind, but I knew that I did.
Chapter 11
VAUGHN
I had wondered if Quinn might leave her hair down. She had put it up, though. I walked out to my car, parked on the street.
I couldn’t shake the image of her standing in the third floor of my brownstone with her hair free around her shoulders.
I sat down and cranked the engine, the Audi firing up with a satisfying purr.
It was a nice car. The kind of car people expected someone like me to drive, so I did. I did a lot of things because I figured people expected them of me.
Part of me wondered if I should just leave well enough alone. I recognized how close this felt to the other times a woman caught my interest. And by that I meant caught it for more than a one night go.
They always started the same. This intense, almost inexplicable attraction. From there it varied. The relationship could last just a few weeks, or even months. I guess it depended on how long it took things to get serious.
And when they got serious I got out. And I was usually the one to end it, either by action (like telling Stacey it was nice when she said she loved me) or otherwise.
A woman in a grey Camry honked at me and flashed her lights. She wanted the spot. I waved at her and pulled away from the curb.
“She’s different, though,” I said. Quinn was different. None of the other women I’d felt like this about had held out like this. In fact, most of them started like that cute Anne girl Quinn worked with.
Does that mean that maybe things might work out differently? I wondered, turning the volume down on the stereo to stop whatever mindless radio chatter spat out at me from the speakers.
Because, to tell the truth, I was getting tired of myself. I used the women to try and escape for however long I could. Whether it was just a single night, a weekend on the French Riviera, or for the few months it took for the papers to start to speculate about my true relationship status. However long it could last, I used them.
My cell started ringing so I thumbed the button on my steering wheel to answer it. Bluetooth had to be one of my favorite things, right after a beautiful body.
“Vaughn?”
“That’s me. Who is this?”
“You mean you don’t remember?” the woman said, she sounded miffed. I had to admit, her voice did seem familiar, and she did have my number.
“Jog my memory,” I said, coming up to a stop light a bit fast. I hit the breaks and the car halted almost right away.
“We met at that movie party…” she started.
I cut her off, “Oh yeah. Jasmine, right?” I remembered her now. She was an up-and-comer in Hollywood. The party was for some big, special-effects laden blockbuster. You know the kind. The one you watch once at the theater, are entertained by, and then can’t remember a week later?
Jasmine and I had hit it off at the bar right away. And from there it ended where it always did, with her in my bed. Though I wasn’t quite sure why I’d given her my number.
Come to think of it, that popcorn movie thing worked pretty well as a metaphor for my night with Jasmine. It had been good while it was happening, but now it faded away into the background with all the others.
She had been my attempt to put Quinn out of my mind. Because I knew if I could stop it now, it would save us both a lot of trouble. However, I have to say I thought
more about what it might have been like to spend the night with Quinn.
And that just made me want her more.
“Are you free tonight?” Jasmine said, “There’s another party I know about. And I have a friend or two coming that I think would love to meet you. And they’d be down for anything.”
“Sorry, I’ve got plans,” I said.
“What?” Jasmine said, surprised. I was a bit surprised, myself. That wasn’t the type of thing I usually turned down.
“It was fun, Jasmine. But do me a favor and delete this number from your phone.”
“I knew you were an asshole,” she said, her shock turning to anger. She ended the call.
It wasn’t the first time a woman had called me that, or something like that. Not even the first time they’d said they’d known all along. Yet she, and all the others, had gone along with it anyway.
I knew they found something hot and arousing about that. They liked a man who didn’t give a damn, a man who’d use them and lose them. Because the thing was, they were using me, too. It was one of those vicious cycles.
I decided to put an end to that while I was in Boston. No more random hookups, no matter how much I wanted it, or how much they wanted it. Because I knew they wouldn’t satisfy like they used to.
I knew Quinn was the sort of girl who didn’t like that. I knew that was one of the reasons she resisted her attraction to me; she knew what kind of guy I was. I wasn’t good enough for her and we both knew it.
And I wanted to be.
So when I pulled up in front of my brownstone, I deleted Jasmine’s number from my phone, as well as several texts and emails telling me about various parties and get-togethers where I might fall into another trap.
I thumbed the button on my fob and the Audi chirped behind me. Now, how to spend the rest of the day? It wasn’t even lunch yet, and Quinn wouldn’t be over for hours.
Maybe a nice dinner? I thought. I enjoyed cooking, and Quinn had been surprised when I did something easy like use a machine to make her a latte. What would she do if she found I could do up some chicken cordon bleu, or maybe some fresh Maine lobster?