by Cari Z
By seven-forty-five, I had organized all the paperclips by color— we had a surprising number of blue ones, they almost rivaled silver for color dominancy. I had reorganized my files, cleaned every flat surface I could find— wouldn’t the janitorial staff be surprised— and was now throwing Beau’s stress ball at the wall and trying to catch it on the rebound. I was three for thirty so far. Meh, I’d never been that great at sports, despite my size.
My phone beeped. I glanced at it— a text from Beau.
Where are you?
I frowned and typed:
At work. Why?
There was a significant pause, and then I read: A cab is on its way for you.
Why?
Just take it.
Uh-oh, terse. And he was sending a cab for me… right now? Right before his dinner? This didn’t bode well. What’s wrong? I asked.
We’ll discuss it later.
Oh, crap.
Sure enough, a cab pulled up outside of the office building five minutes later. I walked out to the driver’s window a little diffidently.
“You Eric Vollan?” the guy asked me.
“Yes.”
“Good. Hop in.”
I swallowed and got into the cab. “Where are we going?”
“Canlis.”
Of course. Because whatever I’d done required Beau to chew me out in person before heading in to dinner. Crap.
Beau was waiting outside the restaurant at ten past eight, looking more than a little flustered. I couldn’t see Aaron— maybe he’d gone inside already? I got out of the cab and winced when Beau did a double take at the sight of me. I could only imagine how bad I looked at this point, what with the way I’d been compulsively running my hands through my hair.
Beau paid the cabbie, then turned and looked at me. I wanted to sink into the pavement. “Hi?” I managed.
“I was surprised,” Beau said at last, “to get here and see Aaron Goldman, of all people, waiting for me. When he told me what you’d worked out, I was genuinely shocked.”
Shit. “You don’t like him?” I asked, my heart sinking. If that was so, I’d put Aaron in an incredibly embarrassing situation.
Beau shook his head. “He’s fine, but what shocked me was the fact that you somehow thought I’d want to see anyone other than you here tonight.”
What. “What?”
“Obviously that’s an assumption I shouldn’t have made, but I swear I thought this lead-up was your way, convoluted as it was, of declaring yourself,” Beau continued, sounding somewhere between frustrated and angry. “Not that you were going to foist me off onto one of your friends in an effort to keep me from—”
“No, no, there was no foisting!” I interjected. “Are you kidding me, no! I set you up with Aaron because I thought you guys would have a good time together, and he was interested and he’s, you know, closer to you in terms of education and professional success. I didn’t set you up with him because I wasn’t interested!” Well, there went that declaration, fantastic.
Beau shut his eyes and took a deep breath. When he opened them again, all of the anger and most of the frustration was gone from his face. What was left was the calm, matter-of-fact expression that got my engine revving instantly. “All right,” he said. “Clearly we’ve got a lot to work out, not the least of which is your abysmal sense of personal self-worth, but first things first. My parents have been sitting in there by themselves for the past half hour, which isn’t going to endear them to anyone, and you…” He looked at me and sighed, then took off his suit jacket. It was light and well-fitted, and just slightly broader than my own shoulders. “Wear this.”
“Wait, you want to introduce me to your parents?”
“You’re damn right, I do,” Beau said, a little of his southern drawl coming through. “Now put it on.”
I swung the jacket over my shoulders and fastened the single button. “This has to look so weird.”
“Not any weirder than you without it.”
“Hey—”
Beau moved in and cut off my indignant protest with a brief kiss, barely more than a brush of his lips against mine. To say it left me breathless would have been a gross understatement. My body felt like it was catching on fire from the mouth down, and Beau grinned. “Your face is almost the same color as your hair,” he murmured. “Relax. You handle every other part of my life just fine, you can handle this.”
“And you want me to,” I reiterated, just to make sure. “Tonight and everything… associated with it. You want me.”
“And nobody else,” Beau said, and then squared his shoulders. “All right, let’s get this pain in the ass over with.”
The hostess was kind enough not to give me a second glance as she led us to the table, but the same couldn’t be said for Mr. and Mrs. Lester Montgomery. “Pinned like a bug” might have been an appropriate description, or “being set on fire by a magnifying glass on a hot summer day.” Either way, Beau’s father’s frown deepened, and his mother, if she could have moved her face, would undoubtedly have been scowling. Beau kissed his mother’s cheek, we sat and before any introductions could be made, she was off and running.
“Well.” The Arctic was probably warmer than Mrs. Montgomery’s voice. “I must say, this time you’ve outdone yourself, Beaudan. It isn’t enough that you break my heart anew every year, you aren’t even trying to pretend to be with someone any longer, are you?” Her tone turned a little tremulous, like she adjusted a dial in her throat. “All I ever wanted was for you to be happy, to do your duty to your family and continue the Montgomery name, and all you can do is throw my hopes and dreams back in my face!”
“Mother—”
“No, no, don’t try to excuse your role in this sad situation. How dare you bring such a person here to dinner with us tonight? Do you delight in mocking me?”
“Mother—”
“I honestly think sometimes it would be better if we just never saw each other at all!”
“Mrs. Montgomery,” I tried, but she wouldn’t even look at me. So I went with something more drastic. I took Beau’s hand in mine, brought it to my lips and kissed it. Then I set our joined hands on the table, and looked her straight in her widened eyes. “This isn’t a trick,” I said gently. “I promise. I’ve just had a very rough day, plus car trouble,” in that I hadn’t gotten to drive my own car here, “and the only thing that’s kept me going has been the thought of meeting Beau’s family tonight.” Also not a lie, even if it hadn’t been me that I’d been thinking about them meeting. “I sincerely apologize for my appearance, but I didn’t want to make you wait any longer than absolutely necessary in order to go home and change.” I reached my free hand across the table. “I’m Eric Vollan.”
“Oh.” A bit nonplussed, she allowed me to touch her fingertips, and then I shook Mr. Montgomery’s hand. His grip was too hard, but I had the feeling that was more out of habit than extreme distaste. At least, I hoped so.
“Well.” We paused long enough for Beau to order wine and starters— apparently, he knew what his parents liked— and then Mrs. Montgomery came back to me. “How long have you and my son known each other?”
“A little over two years,” I said, still not letting go of Beau’s hand. His thumb stroked softly across my knuckles, and I had to force myself not to dwell on it. “We met at work.”
“Naturally,” his mother sighed. “He works far too much.”
“The price of success,” I agreed with a smile. “He’s the best lawyer the firm has, they keep him busy.”
“Eric,” Beau began, but I cut him off.
“Don’t even try to tell me you’re not, who’s the one they send out to do damage control when everyone else is running around like chickens with their heads cut off? You.”
“You should take more credit for your successes,” his father added. He had a deep voice, a lot like Beau’s, but much rougher. It was the first thing he’d said all night.
“And what is it that you do at the firm, Eric?�
� his mother asked.
“I’m a personal assistant.”
“Executive assistant,” Beau corrected. “He works directly for Peter Bowman, who owns the firm.”
Oh I do, do I? I looked sidelong at Beau and he smiled at me, daring me to change the story.
“Not a lawyer,” his father groused, but his mother fluttered her hand at her husband dismissively.
“Oh, Lester, not everyone has to be a banker or a lawyer,” she said. Both her husband and her son’s eyes widened with shock. I smiled. I was in now.
Over the course of dinner and two bottles of wine, I was grilled on everything from my family history, to my interactions with Beau, to my feelings about children. Beau grimaced but I jumped on that one, all ready with my phone to pull up a picture of Carrie. “She’s precious, isn’t she?” I asked, completely rhetorically because that much preciousness had to be obvious to everyone. “Her mother is a friend of ours— we’re going to her birthday party tomorrow.”
“Oh, damn,” Beau said suddenly. “I forgot to buy a present.”
“I did it for you, it should have been dropped off at your house by FedEx today, and it’s from both of us,” I informed him. “You’re welcome.”
“Well,” his mother— or Elizabeth, as she’d invited me to call her— said a moment later. “I have to admit I had my doubts, but there’s no way you could possibly pretend all of this. For the first time in more years than I care to count, I feel like I have a sliver of hope in my soul again.”
“Don’t be so dramatic, Lizzie,” her husband said.
“It’s not drama!” she insisted. “It’s honesty! You might not be the sort of partner I always envisioned for my son,” she told me, “but you love him, and you’ve got a good heart. That has to count for something.”
“It certainly does,” Beau said dryly. “Mother, it’s getting late. Don’t you have a meeting with the garden society in the morning?”
“Yes, I suppose I do. It’s been lovely to meet you, Eric,” she extended her hand to me and smiled, and for the first time that night, I was able to see the resemblance between her fine, frozen features and Beau.
“You as well,” I replied. “I look forward to seeing you again, Elizabeth.”
Lester didn’t say anything, but he did pay for the meal on their way out, which was nice considering it had to cost in the several hundreds of dollars range. I sat back in my chair, bolted what was left in my wine glass, and then looked at Beau.
“Holy shit.”
“You’re telling me,” he said. “That’s the best dinner I’ve had with them in years. Imagine that, but without the effort to make conversation with you and a lot more expounding on my faults.”
“Your parents have some screwed-up priorities.” A little cautiously, I reached out and took his hand again. Beau twined our fingers together, making me smile. “So, I’m working for Papa Bowman now?”
“If we want to be able to have an open relationship, yes,” Beau said. He looked at me, and I could see heat and hunger in his bright eyes. “Which I certainly want. Two years you’ve been working with me, and I thought you might feel something, but I couldn’t take the first step. Not given my position as your boss.”
“I never wanted to be one of those… clichés,” I admitted. “Office worker falls for powerful, handsome boss, cue whips and chains and gold digger status.”
“No one would ever accuse you of being a gold digger,” Beau told me. “Not with your frustrating inability to accept gifts.”
“I told you, the Super Bowl tickets were just a bribe—”
“And correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t think whips and chains are really your thing,” Beau continued. His eyes smoldered, and I felt my heart jump in my chest. “Are they?”
“N-not really,” I managed. “I mean, I can be convinced, but honestly I’ve mostly thought about…”
“What?” Beau asked. He lifted our joined hands to his mouth and pressed his lips to the soft underside of my wrist, just grazing the skin with his teeth.
“Desk,” I whispered. “Your office, your desk. I see you sitting there all the time and it just— it’s dumb, but it gets me going. That and when you tell me what to do, and when you wear your glasses, and I’m just going to shut up now before I freak you out any more.”
“You’d have to try a lot harder to freak me out,” Beau promised me. “That said, there’s no way we’re getting into anything at the office. Fraternization aside, I don’t need those sorts of associations with the place I work, it would be too distracting.” He stood up and pulled me with him. “I do have a home office, however.”
“You want to take me home?”
“It’s a first step,” Beau said. We left the restaurant and walked over to where his car was parked. The gunmetal blue BMW coupe was an older model, no distracting new car smell, and I’d ridden in it a few times before. There was really no reason for it to work on me like an aphrodisiac, but from the second my butt hit the leather seat and Beau closed the door behind me, I was hard. It was as if all the tensions over the past few days, capped by tonight’s surprisingly successful dinner, had fallen away and left me weightless and carefree.
Beau looked over at me as he started the car and laughed. “You look way too happy.”
“There’s no such thing,” I said, scooting the seat back so I could stretch out my long legs. That put my lap on prominent display, and it was gratifying to see his gaze linger there for longer than it should have.
“Eyes on the road,” I reminded him as I rubbed the heel of my hand against my crotch. Oh man, that felt good. I wondered how Beau felt about getting a show.
“No.”
“Hmm? No what?” I’d barely fondled the zipper yet.
“No, you don’t get to touch yourself in my car.”
“Why not?” It wasn’t a whine, it wasn’t. My voice was too deep to whine. It was more of a… whoan. Or something. I couldn’t think.
“Three reasons. One, I don’t want to get into an accident trying to keep my eyes on you. Two, if I got into an accident, or if we were pulled over for indecent exposure, the mood killing would be the least of our problems. Three,” and here it was, the tone I loved, that I could barely wait for even though I knew I wasn’t going to like what he had to say, “for the rest of the night, that’s mine. Don’t touch it.”
Fuck. “Or what?” I asked thickly.
“Or else I’m not going to fuck you over my desk tonight, that’s what.”
My hands couldn’t have flown off my lap faster than if they’d had wings. “Got it. No touching.” Even though I ached, even though I honestly could have wiggled my hips the wrong way and gotten a little more delectable pressure, thus following the letter of the law but not the spirit. Everything in me, from the way my heart pounded, to the surge of blood through my veins that left my ears feeling a little fuzzy, hammered home that I wanted to do this Beau’s way.
“Perfect,” Beau said. He sounded a little hoarse, and a furtive look told me that I wasn’t alone in feeling restricted right now. Then I realized I didn’t have to be furtive, and looked openly. “We’re very close to my house,” he added after a moment, squirming a little in his seat. I licked my lips and grinned at him.
“That’s good. How do you feel about blowjobs in cars that aren’t moving?”
“Christ Almighty,” Beau swore. For most people it wouldn’t have been swearing, but I knew him better than that, and he didn’t tend to invoke the Lord lightly. I smirked and settled back into my seat.
“Is that a yes?”
“No,” he replied, and then a beat later said, “At least, not tonight.”
Right, because tonight, desk, fucking… all very good things, but despite my height I was pretty flexible, and I was sure if I twisted the right way I could— “Not both?”
“I’m over forty,” Beau said. “Like it or not, that does entail some limitations.”
“I bet we could get around them.”
�
�Later, Eric.”
“There’s Viagra, there’s tantric sex— my mom could write a book about tantric sex, and oh, shit.” I covered my face with my hand and groaned. “I can’t fucking believe I just brought my mom into this conversation. Talk about killing the mood.” Sure enough, my cock started to soften under the pervasive image of my mother and any kind of sex. “Damn it.”
“I’m sure we can get it back,” Beau said. “Once the car is parked.”
Sure enough, we barely made it through the front door before Beau had me pressed against the wall, one hand gripping the back of my neck while the other one framed my face, holding me steady as we kissed. Kissed, sucked face, devoured each other— kissing was a sweet word, but it didn’t really encompass the urgency in our movements, the way I couldn’t keep my hands from spanning his back, broad and warm and strong, so strong. I didn’t get together with a lot of guys who were bigger than me, but Beau was. He held me firm, rocked against me like he couldn’t stand not to be touching me with every part of his body, and I knew that this was the closest I’d ever come to absolute bliss.
And we weren’t even out of our clothes yet.
“Office,” I said between deep, sucking kisses on his collarbone. I knew I couldn’t leave hickeys above the collar, but below seemed to be fair game. “Where’s it?”
“First door on the left,” he said distractedly. “Across from the bathroom.”
“I want to go to there.” Beau raised his head and looked at me blankly. “No? Seriously? Tina Fey, ‘30 Rock,’ nothing?”
“You can educate me on popular culture later this weekend,” Beau said with a frustrated little growl. “If,” he added a bit more cautiously, “you want to stay.”
“Do you want me to stay?”
Beau rolled his eyes. “I’m feelin’ you up in my foyer, talking about having sex with you in my office after both of us endured a dinner with my parents, Eric. I don’t think any of that points to something other than serious for us. I want you to stay. Rihanna,” he added before I could say anything.