An Executive Decision

by Grace Marshall

  Dee blushed that lovely blush that Ellis took way more pleasure in than he had realised until just now. ‘Thanks, uncle. The next time I call, I promise I’ll bore you with way more information than you’ll ever want to hear.’

  ‘You could never bore me, my darling. But now I must go. I’m late for a meeting. I wish both of you the best of luck.’

  Dee reached across the coffee table and disconnected the BlackBerry.

  Ellis sat stunned, open-flied, shirt untucked, staring at his executive assistant. ‘Your uncle is the undersecretary for the Valderian Department of Natural Resources?’

  Dee sat holding the top of her dress over her breasts, still staring thoughtfully at her BlackBerry. ‘Well, he’s not really my uncle. He’s my father’s sometime lover.’

  ‘Your father’s gay?’

  She offered him a warm smile. ‘My father’s versatile, and he and Uncle Gustavo are kindred spirits. They had to keep their relationship pretty low-key, of course, but back then Uncle Gustavo was only a low-ranking civil servant, and no one paid much attention. It was easier for them then.’ Ellis watched while she booted her laptop, absently clasping the halter of the dress back behind her neck. ‘My visits to Paris to see my father were always best when Uncle Gustavo was there. I never had a real uncle. Both my parents are only children.’

  There were so many questions he wanted to ask her, so much he wanted to know about the mysterious young Deirdre running around Paris with her opera-singing father and his secret diplomatic lover. Suddenly he found himself wishing Beverly had gathered more information about Dee, so much more. She sat down next to him and plopped the computer on the coffee table where they both could see it. ‘I’ve been doing some research.’

  He zipped his fly and scooted closer so he could see the monitor, struggling to concentrate on something other than the scent of their blended sex which was all over her. ‘Good,’ he said. ‘I’ve got my lawyers on it, and I think we should give Wade a call, meet with him as soon as we get home. You OK to take an earlier flight?’

  ‘I’ve already made reservations for the first flight out.’

  He raised an eyebrow. ‘For both of us?’

  ‘I figured you’d think this was important enough to merit a quick return home. Besides you, only stayed on to placate Marston.’

  He ran a hand through his hair and shook his head. ‘Jesus, Dee, where have you been all my life?’ He leaned over and kissed her hard on the mouth, pulling away far more quickly than he wanted to, but knowing if he didn’t he’d have her again right there on the sofa, and that would have to wait. ‘OK, we’ve got a week, maybe two, to prevent a disaster. Let’s use it wisely. I’ll have room service bring up sandwiches and coffee. Lots of coffee.’

  ‘And some iced tea.’ She was already pulling up maps of the Valderian forest slated to be clear-cut.

  Several hours and a lively conference call with Wade in Portland later, Ellis took off his glasses and laid them on the coffee table. Then he raised his arms over his head and stretched, arching upward over the back of the sofa until his navel peeked from beneath his untucked shirt and the waistband of his trousers. At the sight of him doing something so ordinary, so unassuming, Dee’s stomach did the little clench it always did when she had been totally pulled in by the man’s genius only to be pulled back out again by the his animal physicality. They were still in their worse-for-the-wear party clothes, him rumpled and only partially buttoned, her barely concealed in silk that crinkled and clung and smelled of sex.

  ‘There’s not much more we can do here, Dee. Wade will have more for us in the possible techno-bribery department when we get back to Portland.’ He palmed her laptop shut, and his dark gaze was suddenly locked on her. ‘I need a shower, a long, hot, steamy one. Would you care to join me?’

  Everything in her felt somehow softened and warmed as he offered her his hand and helped her up from the sofa. When she stood, she felt the heated wetness of his semen from their earlier lovemaking against the inside of her thigh, and the smell of him aroused, him angry, him impatient, him brilliant hugged her like a second skin. She wasn’t so anxious to wash away that scent, but she was pretty sure washing wasn’t really what he had in mind, and that made her own scent thicken with anticipation. He led her to his bathroom, where he stripped out of his shirt and regulated the water in the big sandstone shower. She stood watching, still struggling to get her head around the idea that Ellison Thorne, the Ellison Thorne, who she had admired, practically worshipped from afar for so long, was flesh and blood and lust and passion and all of those things her fantasies were made of. All of those things had moved her, inspired her long before she knew him personally, but when he was like he was tonight, irritable, vulnerable, needy, human, smelling of their sex and about to shower in her arms, he moved her most of all.

  He interrupted her ruminations by wiping his wet hand on the leg of his trousers, then turning to her, unhooking the halter top of her dress and cupping her breasts as it fell away. He settled a kiss on the press of each of her nipples before he eased the ruined silk down over her hips, lingering to cup the flare of her hips, the swell of her bottom. Finally, he knelt in front of her and carefully helped her out of the shoes she had forgotten to take off. So unlike her, she reflected, and he kissed her instep and moved to suckle her toes, causing her to squirm with ticklish pleasure and place a hand on his back to keep from losing her balance.

  When she was completely naked, he stood to inspect her, while absently opening his fly and sliding off his trousers and boxers to release the erection she knew would be waiting there. They laughed as he struggled with his own shoes, hands made clumsy by lust. When they were both naked, he scooped her into his arms and pulled her under the heavy pulse of the warm water. Then he knelt in front of her and began soaping her, beginning with her calves, then moving up her thighs. ‘First I’m going to wash you very thoroughly,’ he said, moving up to soap her pubic curls and working his way over her belly as though he’d never had a task that demanded quite so much of his attention. ‘Then, once you’re all clean and pink and shiny –’ he stood and held her gaze ‘– I’m going to get you all dirty and messy again.’

  He kissed her in a long, lingering tongue kiss, giving her time to contemplate his plans for her, then he carefully soaped her breasts, cupping and kneading and thumbing the nipples he wasn’t quite able to hide beneath the lather. Finally, he moved a hand around to soap and palm her ass cheeks, easing a thick finger in along the crevice between. He held her close while he lathered her butt, caressing and lingering and trailing fingers over the sensitive knot of her anus. In his embrace, the soap from her body slicked his chest and his erection, fat and heavily pressed against her belly. He pulled her still closer until she could feel the rapid rise and fall of his chest pressed to hers, then he slid a solicitous tongue into her mouth in unison with the soapy finger he eased, almost stealthily up into her tight back hole. And she sucked breath, nearly biting his tongue at the startling invasion that felt too personal to be shared, yet, as her anus relented to his insinuation, the rest of her responded in heavy, swollen ripples of need as he probed.

  He nipped her earlobe. ‘I want to explore all of you, Dee.’ He turned her into the spray and washed off her front, still probing her back hole with a middle finger, then once again he went down on his knees and pulled her to him, kissing down her belly, then working two fingers up into her slit to move in tandem against the one in her anus. Dee didn’t realise it at first, but his relentless stretch and pull and stroke in untried places had compelled her into a shallow squat, hands resting on Ellis’s shoulders, hips rotating around the efforts of his beautifully dextrous fingers, fucking them, riding them, squatting to get them deeper inside her. The pressure was such that with the rake of a sudden insistent thumb over her hardened clit, he catapulted her into her first orgasm. He didn’t wait for the aftershocks to ease, but instead he stood, pulled her to her feet, and lifted her onto him.

  She was heavy an
d wet and ready for him as he slid home, cupping her butt while she wrapped her legs around him and buried her face against his neck as she strained and clenched. And the orgasm she thought was ending built on itself instead with each deepening thrust of his cock.

  She hung on for dear life as he battered her, tightening the grip of her thighs around his waist with each shove and push. As he grew closer and closer to his release, he felt more and more like the hard sandstone on the walls of the shower, every muscle tense, every sinew stretched. Breathing became a distant memory as they thrashed and hammered against each other; the sounds coming from their throat became primal, instinctive, far removed from language and thought. When at last they came, the world exploded and Dee was certain she would die from the cataclysmic collision of so much powerful need. How had she not known that this part of her existed? How had she ever kept it quietly tucked away inside her? Had it really take Ellison Thorne to rouse the animal in her, to awaken parts of her even more powerful than her driven nature? There were no real thoughts, just urges and half-formed queries inside her overheated brain. As they collapsed onto the shower floor in the warm wet, engulfed in a cloud of steam, she wondered if maybe some of what she felt, some of the not quite formed thoughts, were Ellis’s, overflowing into the mix of chaos and lust and so many other feelings she hadn’t the brain left to dwell on.

  Chapter Twenty-six

  There was only time to clean up, dress, and pack before they had to leave for JFK. Dee’s mind was abuzz with all of their planning and scheming of possible ways to thwart Jamison’s efforts. She made it a point not to think about the amazing sex that had happened between her and Ellis. Thinking about it took her mind in places it shouldn’t go, places she was sure weren’t included in the Executive Sex Clause. Yet when she and Ellis settled into their seats on the plane, she was asleep before their flight took off.

  As soon as they were in the air, Ellis undid his seatbelt and leaned over Dee, effectively blocking her in her seat. ‘You’re a slut, Dee Henning, fucking me to get what you want, a regular filthy slut. Everyone knows it. Marston knows it, Wade knows it, Stacie knows it. Tell me, did you fuck Jason Daniels to get the Trouvères deal? I bet you did.’

  Several of the other passengers were eavesdropping, covering their mouths in shock, scandalised at what they were overhearing. Even the flight attendants stopped what they were doing and listened, arms folded across their crisp tailored jackets, shaking their heads in disgust.

  He ran his hand up under her skirt and, though she tried to push him away, he shoved fingers into her panties, then tisk-tisked. ‘Always wet and ready, aren’t you?’

  To her horror, she was wet, and she couldn’t keep herself from moving against the probing of his fingers. To make matters worse, she found herself suddenly cupping and tugging at her breast through the silk of her blouse.

  ‘What a slut,’ she heard one of the passengers whisper to another.

  ‘But I’m not! I didn’t! You’re the only one,’ she gasped, trying desperately to calm herself, to push him away, but no matter how hard she tried, she just kept riding his fingers harder and harder.

  ‘Of course you are,’ he said. ‘And a slut who’ll fuck her boss will fuck anything if it’ll get her what she wants.’ He undid his trousers and released his cock. ‘You’ll do anything for a promotion, won’t you, Dee?’ He pulled her roughly to the edge of the seat and shoved her skirt up. ‘Oh, I’ll take it if you’re offering, who wouldn’t? And I am a busy man, after all.’ He pushed into her and began to thrust.

  ‘Of course he will,’ another passenger agreed. ‘Who wouldn’t if it’s offered? I would, wouldn’t you?’

  ‘Sure, if the slut’s offering,’ someone else said.

  Ellis finished and shoved off her. ‘I’m done with her,’ he said, zipping himself back into his trousers. ‘Anyone else wants a go, help yourself. I’ve got business to take care of. I have to find a new executive assistant, someone who’s more interested in work than spreading her legs.’

  ‘What about the Executive Sex Clause?’ Dee gasped.

  Ellis gave her a sour chuckle. ‘Oh Dee, are you really so naïve that you couldn’t figure out the Executive Sex Clause was just a joke?’

  Dee awoke with a start, shoving her way up from under the airline blanket. Her heart felt like it would burst her chest and a cold sweat bathed her forehead. She covered her mouth to hold back the whimper of relief. A dream. Damn it, it was just a dream.’

  Next to her, Ellis slept with his glasses slipping down the bridge of his nose and his laptop screensaver showing off the wonders of the universe. It was only a dream, she reassured herself again. Nobody knew like she did just how neurotic she was, and her dreams often reflected it, taking her into bizarre, uncomfortable places. Still, it wasn’t a nice dream, and she really didn’t want to go back to sleep and risk part two. She booted her laptop and summoned the attendant, who brought her some iced tea. One of the pleasures of first class was that she could actually get someone to brew her real iced tea. There was plenty of work to do, and for the briefest moment she felt guilty for the time she and Ellis had spent making love. Making love; could she really even call it that when it was only a part of her job? Ellis said nothing had happened between him and Stacie, but so what if it had? It was none of her business. It was his private life, and whatever he did in his private life was private. It was a hard thing to think about, so she buried herself in the files her uncle had emailed her. It was mostly basic information on natural resources and environmental law, or the total lack thereof in Valderia. The world of business, no matter how messy and fucked-up, was always a much safer place to be than inside her neurotic, runaway train of a mind.

  Back in Portland, the two went straight to the Pneuma Building. After an hour of catch-up with their secretaries, Ellis and Dee headed to the Dungeon where Wade was waiting for them. In his Boudoir, as they all called his inner sanctum. With a couple clicks of a keyboard, he had figures, maps, lists of ecologically sensitive species, and just about every factoid imaginable on Valderia, including all of the information Dee had uploaded to him from her uncle. At his touch, it could be pulled up onto a flat screen of almost cinema dimensions. All they lacked to complete the viewing experience was popcorn.

  Wade gave Dee half a hug and a hard slap on the back that nearly knocked her off her feet. That was about as sentimental and affectionate as he ever got. ‘I hear you tore Marston a new one.’ His eyes shone with enthusiasm and he seemed suddenly more like a college student than one of the most brilliant minds in the US. ‘That would have almost been worth putting on a tux to see. Ellis.’ He gave his friend a nod, then motioned them to sit. Dee was still amazed at just how fast news travelled through the Pneuma grapevine. But then again, Wade had eyes on the world that would have shocked most people if they’d known. Plus, his best friend was the CEO of Pneuma Inc. Even though they worked in the same building, they didn’t see each other often, but they talked and texted. She’d read an article once, back in her hero-worship days, that had compared Thorne, Crittenden, and Neumann to three parts of the same brain working to make Pneuma Inc. the progressively stunning organisation it was. She wondered if she could ever hope to function as that third part of the Pneuma brain. So far, her track record was spotty at best.

  One of the possible strategies Wade had been looking into concerning the Valderian crisis was technology and information swaps that could serve as bribes or at least deal-sweeteners to prolong the red tape and extend the time before the first tree was cut. There was no such thing as a real done deal when working with the natural resources of a country with such an unstable government. Anything could be nationalised and any foreign entity could be kicked out at the drop of a hat no matter how much they had paid. It was a testament to how desperate Marston was that he was willing to risk it. And Jamison was the king of third-world, underhanded deals. Though Valderia was open for foreign business, as it were, the risk was still there. It happened all the time. There
was no doubt that Jamison had done more than his fair share of bribing and hand-greasing to make the deal as secure as possible, and he had very deep pockets. Jamison Holdings was about money changing hands to make more money. It didn’t create. It didn’t invent. That was what Pneuma had over it in spades, though Pneuma was technically a much smaller company.

  ‘The money for the forestry rights will only pad the bank accounts of people in high places,’ Wade said, as if they needed reminding. He flipped through images of some of the amazing Pneuma technology that might interest the Valderians. There was everything from state-of-the-art low-impact farming technology, not yet even marketed in the States, to water purification systems, to eco-friendly desalination plants. It would have made for fascinating viewing under different circumstances.

  ‘I’m sorry to say it, but it’s really very unlikely the powers-that-be in Valderia are going to scrap serious cash in their bank accounts for technology that could actually help the Valderian people,’ Wade said.

  ‘Didn’t think they would,’ Ellis replied. ‘I just want all the facts in front of me so I’ll know what I’ve got to work with.’

  ‘They’re not hiring Valderians to do the clear-cut,’ Dee said. ‘I’d pretty much bet on that. It’s the way Jamison operates. Valderia is poor, but its neighbours are poorer, several having survived recent civil wars. He’ll hire the cheapest labour he can find. Then he’ll have them shipped in to live in tents and squalor on location, and there won’t be anything anyone can do about it.’

  Ellis and Wade nodded their agreement, but seemed surprised she would know such information. ‘The man was trying to hire someone to round up a cheap labour force in some other shady deal when I had my run-in with him at Jasper and McDowell,’ she clarified. Then she added, ‘Does Marston know this?’