Pretty Little Mess

by Rhodes, Carmel

  She straddles me, taking my face between her hands. “No rules. We still have to keep it a secret, obviously, especially now with everything going on in the news, and you still aren’t allowed at Woody’s, otherwise all bets are off. You can fuck me as much as you’d like.”

  “Is that so?” I grin palming her ass.

  “Uh-huh.” She nods, shimmying down my body, her mouth hovering over my dick.

  Ellie can be a little tornado when she wants. Whirling into my life and toppling over my carefully manicured existence, replacing it with emojis, trips to Brooklyn, and takeout. Many men would crumble at her feet, but I’m an Anderson. I like the storm. I thrive there. It’s something I forgot today while I let myself fall victim to self-pity. But my girl does that thing she’s done since she stunk up the elevator on that first day. She made me believe that anything was possible with a little luck and a fuck ton of grit.

  She also sucks my dick like a porn star and makes me come like a freight train. Maybe this relationshipy won’t be so bad after all.

  The commute from Max’s apartment is decidedly less smelly than the one from Brooklyn. Or maybe it’s the bark and vanilla bodywash clinging to my skin that makes it better. Either way, I could get used to this. To waking up in Max’s arms. To hot showers. To being on my knees in hot showers. To the feel of his hands tangling in my hair. To the briny taste of him on my tongue. To arguing over his shitty taste in overpriced hair products.

  I bury my nose in my peacoat and inhale again as I look over my shoulder to the man at the back of the train car. He’s sitting statue still, one Armani-clad leg lifted over the other, his Italian leather loafers buffed and shining in the hazy light of the train. He looks like art, David come to life, and for whatever reason, he’s here with me.

  When I told him me showing up to work in his town car wouldn’t be the best idea, he insisted on coming with me. The gentle sway of the train grounds me in a way that’s needed after a night at Max’s penthouse. This is my reality. Dirty subway cars and working class. I’d like to hold on to that Ellie for as long as possible. She’s kind and funny and caring. I’ve seen what wealth like Max has can do to a person’s heart. I’ve also seen what losing it can do to their mind. I’m not interested in either. I just want him.

  My phone rings. I pull it from my bag and smile at the kaleidoscope image of my dad. I push my headphones into my ears and drag my finger over the cracked screen. “Hey, Daddy.”

  Max grunts from the back of the train and a new text pops up.

  P3: You’d better be talking to the man responsible for half of your DNA.

  I roll my eyes and flip him off over my shoulder. “How are things going at that big fancy job of yours?” My dad’s gruff voice says from the other end.

  “It’s good.” The train glides to a stop and a few passengers shuffle on.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes, why wouldn’t it be?”

  Wood and vanilla surround me as Max slips into the seat. I arch my brow at him. He waves his hand around the quickly filling car in response, before returning his attention to the Wall Street Journal.

  “It’s all over the news, El Bell. No one there has ever been inappropriate with you, have they?”

  “Define inappropriate,” I tease, looking at Max.

  “Don’t joke like that, Ellie. I’m being serious.” I can picture his bushy brows pinching as he speaks. The same face he makes when he’s lecturing me and Erin. You can take the man out of the military, but you can’t take the military out of the man.

  “I know, Daddy, I’m sorry.” Max turns the page of his paper with a little too much force, and I shake my head and mouth, he’s my fucking dad, what do you want me to call him?

  “What’s his first name?” he mouths back, and I cackle and hit him in the arm.

  “Just be careful, baby girl. Those Wall Street types think they own the world. Remember what happened to Erin.”

  “I know.” We don’t talk about why Erin works at Woody’s and not the Michelin star restaurant she got hired for right out of culinary school. She’s only just starting to get back to her old self, and if she wants to pretend like it never happened, I’ll pretend with her. “Anyway,” I say shaking off the sad memories, “I’m almost to work, but I’ll call you tonight and we can really catch up.”

  “Okay, baby girl. I love you.”

  “I love you too, Daddy.”

  I hit end, then rub away the little shard of glass from my finger. Max bends one corner of his paper down and pins me with his blue eyes. “What do I have to do to get you to call me that?”

  “What?” I ask, confusion wrinkling my brow. “Daddy?” He nods. “Get some decent hair products, then we can talk.” A grin finds his lips and we ride the rest of the way to work in comfortable silence.

  Max has his driver meet him outside of the train station and I walk the few blocks to the Anderson Building. He’s in his office by the time I get there. He and Jalen are huddled around his computer, spouting off ideas on how to “spin” the current shit-storm. I hit my knuckles on the wood twice and lift his coffee. “Sir?”

  “Bring it here,” Max grunts, barely acknowledging me. I scamper across the floor and hand him his coffee. Taking a sip, he points to the screen, opening his mouth to speak but is cut off by Jalen’s barking laughter. “What?” we ask in unison.

  “You guys are conspicuous as fuck.” Jalen rubs a hand through his beard, his pearly white teeth on full display behind his plush lips.

  “I brought in his coffee and he basically ignored me,” I say a little more harshly than intended. Max shoots me a look, his thumb trailing up the back of my calf, sending a chill down my spine.

  “You smell like Tom Ford, and you’re wearing Gucci,” Jay counters.

  “That’s because I didn’t have anything else, and Max’s ass went full-on Pretty Woman and had the concierge buy me stuff. Do you see this hair?” I run my hands through my messy ponytail. Curls spiral this way and that way, barely contained by the elastic I thankfully found buried in the bottom of my purse. “All that money spent, and he didn’t get anything with shea butter. All this man has in his bathroom is a two-in-one shampoo conditioner.”

  “A two-in-one?” Jalen asks, disbelief written all over his perfectly symmetrical face.

  “What’s wrong with a two in one?” Max runs a self-conscious hand through his hair, which somehow is lush and shiny despite the shitty shampoo-conditioner bastard that lives in his shower.

  “You’re fucking a black girl with natural hair now, she needs at least three different kinds of conditioner.” Jalen stands, pressing his palms into Max’s desk. His melted chocolate eyes narrow in on Max’s blue, and he says, “And for the love of God get some silk sheets.”

  “Thank you.” I perk up. “I knew I picked the wrong wolf.”

  Max looks at his best friend, then grunts, “Get out of my office and shut the fucking door.” Jalen holds his hands up in mock surrender, then mouths, call me in my direction. Max throws his pen. “OUT.”

  “So unprofessional.” Jay grins. “Want me to lock it?”

  “No.”

  “Yes.”

  Max and I say at the same time.

  “Conspicuous as fuck.” Jalen chuckles then locks the door behind him.

  “The wrong wolf, huh?” P-Three arches a brow as he sips on his coffee.

  I take it from him and steal a drink, then settle into his lap. The warmth from the cup, and from his body heat radiates through me. “No, Daddy,” I tease, pressing my lips to his.

  It makes him smile and I feel his cock twitch under my ass, which makes me smile. “There’s a mandatory HR meeting this morning,” he says clicking into the email.

  I read it while Max’s hand slides up my shirt and he palms my breast.

  “This is the opposite of what we should be doing right now, you know that don’t you?” I say pointing to the screen.

  “I know.” His other hand moves between my legs and he tug
s at the delicate nylon, tearing a hole in the fancy undergarment he had his building’s concierge buy for me.

  “Max,” I groan as he rubs my clit through the gash he just created. “I liked these.”

  “I’ll buy you a hundred more if you let me rip them off you,” he whispers against my ear. Heat and want flood my core. I can feel his lips twitch on my neck. “You like that, baby?” I ask, his fingers hooking into my panties to move them aside. Stop this, Ellie. Grinding on your boss’s hand is definitely against company policy, my subconscious chides, but I can barely hear her through the lust-filled haze. I can barely register my own name, then Max sinks two fingers inside my warm, pink center, the heel of his palm pressed against my clit.

  He pumps in and out, hooking his fingers so they graze against my G-spot. “That’s a good girl. Get it nice and wet so you can take Daddy’s dick.” The obscene noises my pussy makes, the dirty words he whispers, the fact that bitch Lynn and the rest of the twenty-ninth floor are just outside the door, send my body higher and higher. I’m pulsating with the need to come. It sears my veins. White-hot destruction coated in sin. A need so desperate my thighs shake. My breasts feel like boulders, so heavy and sensitive that even the gentle silk blouse feels cumbersome. I want Max to rip it off me too. I want him to throw me over his desk and drive into me from behind. I want him hard and fast and feral.

  “That’s it, baby girl. Soak Daddy’s fingers, just like that,” he grunts, pumping in and out hard and fast. He brings his other hand around and pinches my clit, sending me over the edge. I come so hard moisture squirts from my core and my arms give out. I collapse in a heap over his desk. Max chuckles softly behind me. “You little perv.”

  “Fuck. You,” I pant.

  “You ruined my slacks,” he notes, rubbing small circles into the mess between my thighs.

  “I’ve never done that before.”

  “Hmm,” he hums against my shoulder, “I like that way more than I should.”

  Three quick raps on the door startle us. I jump from Max’s lap, noting the wet spot darkening his gray slacks. “Ellie?” Winston calls from the other side of the door. “Max?”

  “Coming,” I yell, pushing my skirt back down my legs to cover the evidence of my orgasm, and jog to answer him. “Hey,” I huff, swinging the door open. My legs feel like Jello and I’m sure I look like I’ve been hit by the orgasm train, but fake it till you make it.

  “Hey,” he says, slowly. His nostrils flare as he sniffs the air around me. Air that most likely smells like my pussy.

  “What, Wiener?” Max drawls from behind his desk. He looks like the picture of professionalism, and I look like a prostitute. Somehow, I’d Pretty Woman’d backward.

  “There’s that meeting. I thought we could walk down together?”

  “Oh, right.” The don’t fuck your boss at work meeting. “Yeah, sounds good? You need anything before I go, boss?” I throw over my shoulder. Max scowls and waves us off like he couldn’t care less.

  Shame burns my cheeks with each step. My panties are drenched and there’s a hole in my stockings to match the hole in my judgment. That was stupid and reckless, and now my new friend is looking at me like I’m no better than Lynn.

  “Hey,” I say, choking back tears. “I’m going to run to the restroom. Save me a seat.”

  Winston sighs. “Sure, and, Ellie…”

  “Yeah?”

  “Be careful, okay.”

  “I’m just going to pee.” I force a smile, but I’m powerless to the tears pooling in the corners of my eyes. “Not much to look out for in the ladies’ room.”

  “I know he’s attractive and powerful and has more money than God, and I know that’s sexy, but he isn’t a good man, and it’s true what they say. The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.”

  “I’m not that girl, Winston,” I lie. We both know it, but that’s my life these days. White lies and blissful ignorance. How fucked up is that? I’d rather be blissfully ignorant to Max’s true intentions than burst my delusional little bubble where I win the prince and live happily ever after. “I’m just gonna go pee,” I repeat, then turn and walk away as the tears begin to slide down my cheeks.

  To: Max Anderson, Anderson Capital

  From: Ellie Chase, Executive Assistant to Max Anderson

  Subject: Leaving for the day

  Dear Mr. Anderson,

  I’m heading home for the day. If you need anything, I’ll be available on my cell, otherwise, I’ll see you in the morning.

  Thanks,

  Ellie.

  I hit send on the email then power down my computer. My reflection stares back at me from the black screen. Same round eyes, same wide nose, same plush lips, yet I don’t recognize myself. In the span of a day I’d somehow lost Ellie. All that remained was a greasy-souled prostitute in designer clothes.

  The judgment in Winston’s eyes after he nearly caught me and Max this morning tore at something inside me. That coupled with the HR meeting that was basically a forty-five-minute lecture on why I shouldn’t be banging my boss, left me feeling like a mysterious puddle of subway juice. Max is my boyfriend…kind of…I think. But he’s also my boss and that’s a distinction I need to be better about making. Not only to keep my job but to keep my sanity.

  “Hey, you ready?” Megan asks knocking on my desk. Her sweet voice instantly lifts my spirits. She’s like coffee and Vogue and Cali sunshine all wrapped up into one bubbly package. Everything a girl needs to be happy. If only she had a penis, all my problems would disappear.

  “Yeah, I needed to send Mr. Anderson an email telling him I’m heading out,” I explain, kicking off the fancy shoes Max bought me and dropping them into my drawer. They hit the bottom with a hollow thud that reverberates through my body, deep down into the most secret parts of me. The parts where Max and I are a couple, and his money and my lack thereof doesn’t matter. The parts where his imported leather and my ten-dollar bodega flats fit together like a puzzle. A complicated mosaic of jagged pieces that despite their differences were made for each other.

  “How do you like it? Working for Mr. Anderson?” Megan asks.

  I snort, despite myself, shrugging into my coat and heave my bag over a shoulder. “Working for Mr. Anderson is a thankless job, one better suited for Dexter than me, but the perks aren’t bad.”

  “Yeah.” She nods her agreement. “The cafeteria and gym are enough to keep me happy.”

  Technically, I was referring to the nine-inch cock I sit on most nights, but Megan from HR doesn’t need to know that. “He and Mr. Thomas have been upstairs since this morning, so today wasn’t so bad.”

  I grin a lopsided grin, then add, “But usually he exists in the land between pissed off or entitled.”

  “I bet, especially since everything with his father.”

  I bite my lip to keep from spilling my guts to the woman who has been like a sister to me since I moved to New York. “Anyway, enough about work. It’s girls’ night. Let’s get wasted!” Megan and I link arms, and she forces me onto the elevator. My phone buzzes in my pocket, but I don’t bother to check. I need a night away from the storm that is Preston Maxwell Anderson III.

  A few hours later we’re dressed in casual clothes, watching the Knicks play the Heat. “I needed this.” Megan tips her beer to her lips. “Work has been a total zoo since the stuff about Mr. Anderson Senior came out.”

  “No,” I shout over the roar of the bar. “No P-Two, no P-Three, no work stuff at all. The only reason we are even at Woody’s is because Erin’s working, and I can’t afford drinks that aren’t free,” I slur. Maybe I shouldn’t have had that last shot. Hell, who am I kidding, I shouldn’t have had the last three. My lips are numb, and my inhibitions are lower than my morals.

  Erin bounces over with six shot glasses perched on top of a circular tray. She beams at us, her smile a little too wide to be genuine. Especially on game night with a packed bar. “What’s with the serial killer smile?” I ask gesturing to all the crazy happe
ning on her face.

  “I’m miserable, but I don’t want him to know that.” She points her thumb to the other end of the bar and Luca scowls in our direction. “He’s all pissy because of the other night.” I assume she means the night Max, Jalen, and Rosie came to Brooklyn. Jalen stayed at the bar while Max and I had make-up sex on the couch. My thighs clench involuntarily thinking about Max and sex with Max and the things he can make my body feel.

  The alcohol already hard at work, numbs the shame of the day. My fingers flex with the urge to check my phone and see what Max is up to, but I resist and refocus on the conversation with my best friends.

  “Luca wasn’t happy about the six-three god with the million-dollar smile following you around all night?”

  “Nothing happened! He kept me company while I worked. We talked about sports and food and you and—” I snap my eyes to my sister, mentally telling her to shut the fuck up and she seems to get the message. “Anyway. I told him nothing happened, but he said that wasn’t what it looked like. Then I told him if he wasn’t secure enough in our relationship for me to have male friends then maybe we shouldn’t be together.”

  “And what did he say?” Megan asks lifting a shot from the tray. Erin and I follow suit. We clink glasses then knock them back.

  Once the lingering burn subsides, Erin continues. “He agreed, so I called him on his bluff. Now he’s mad at me for breaking up with him.”

  “Well, who was the other guy?” Megan asks.

  Erin looks to me and I shake my head no. “Just some rich prick who’s friends with Ellie’s man.”

  Jalen was right, we are conspicuous as fuck and if we don’t get a handle on it soon, we’ll both be out of work. The difference is, P-Three will be okay, but I’ll have to become a stripper in order to make rent, and I don’t have the hand-eye coordination for pole dancing.

  Megan turns in her stool and eyes me. “Why haven’t I heard about him? We eat lunch together almost every day.”