From Now On

by Louise Brooks

  “Rumor has it that she wants you to take over cataloguing the complaints that come in from the other floors.”

  Jo narrowed her eyes. “That’s something the secretaries have always traditionally handled.”

  “I know,” Sandy said, clearly speaking from her own experience doing just that.

  “I’ll take care of this,” Jo said, storming toward the door with such speed that she almost missed the look of surprise on Sandy’s face.

  Jo marched down the hall and knocked on Becca’s door and entered without waiting for a greeting. “You wanted to see me?” she asked as she paused in front of Becca’s desk.

  Becca’s eyebrows rose, but she made no comment on Jo’s suddenly confrontational attitude. Instead, she gestured for Jo to take a seat. When Jo remained standing, Becca shrugged. “I wanted to talk to you about the complaint system. I thought it would be ideal to restructure it, to have you go over each one individually and implement solutions where necessary.”

  “You do realize that ninety percent of the complaints we receive on a weekly basis are just jokes, right.”

  “Yes.”

  “So wouldn’t it be a waste of my time to go through them when the current system has been working quite well for years?”

  “I think this will be more efficient. That way anything important will not be overlooked.”

  “But what about the time it will take from my other duties?”

  Becca shifted in her chair. “If you can’t keep up, then I can easily reassign some of your duties. Beth would be more than happy to take up some of the slack.”

  “Beth’s a clerk.”

  “Well, it would come with a promotion, of course.”

  Jo nodded, understanding dawning. “You’re trying to replace me with your friends.”

  Becca clenched her jaw for a brief second, then smiled a cruel smile. “You are overstepping.”

  “So are you.” Jo turned to leave.

  “I haven’t dismissed you.”

  “Don’t bother, Becca. I no longer care what you have to say.”

  “I can have you fired.”

  “Go for it.”

  Jo was shaking as she walked back to her office, but it wasn’t from fear. It was elation. Jo had never felt so completely confident in her entire life. It gave her command to call Becca out the way she had. It suddenly didn’t matter if she lost her job, if she would have to start over somewhere else. She had put Becca in her place and that was worth everything it would cost her.

  Sandy caught Jo’s eye as she passed, a question in the subtle arch of her eyebrows. Jo smiled and winked. She expected Sandy to follow her into her office, but when she walked through the door, she was surprised to find Mark there.

  “Jo, I can’t tell you how sorry I am.”

  Jo pushed her door closed and leaned against it, her hands behind her back as she watched the way he watched her. Again her mind swirled with a million questions, but just like she no longer cared about her job security, she found herself unable to worry about what might happen a week, a month from now. All she wanted was for him to keep looking at her as he was doing right this minute.

  “Mark, you don’t—”

  “I do.” He walked to her, pressed his hand on the door just above her shoulder, trapping her between the door and his body. “I was caught by surprise yesterday. I knew Danielle was thinking about suing for custody, but I didn’t really think she would go through with it.”

  “So what does this mean?”

  “We go to court at the end of the month.”

  “Do you think she could win?”

  Mark’s expression tightened as he looked away for a minute, telling Jo all she needed to know. She lay a hand lightly on his chest and whispered, “I’m sorry.”

  He shook his head. “I’ve known this was coming. That’s why I couldn’t—” he grunted, emotions warring on his face. “I didn’t think getting involved with someone would be a good idea at this point. I was worried she might use it against me.”

  “Could she?”

  “Danielle is very vindictive. She can take the most innocent things and twist them around to suit her needs.”

  Jo’s hand dropped from where it had been. “Then I guess we shouldn’t—”

  Mark picked her hand up and pressed it back against his chest. “We shouldn’t let her dictate what we do.”

  “Mark—”

  “I like you, Jo. I like spending time with you. And I want to know where this is going to lead.”

  “But your kids—”

  “A judge gave me full custody once. I believe that it will happen again.”

  “But Mark, I can’t be the reason you lose your kids.”

  “You won’t be.” Mark ran his fingers into the soft curl of her hair before cupping her head in the palm of his hand. “I haven’t been good with trust over the past few years. I question everything and everyone around me.” He leaned close and brushed his lips against her ear. “But I have to learn that not everyone is out to hurt me. And if that means trusting that a judge will see the truth behind what Danielle is doing, then that’s what I have to do.”

  “But—”

  “Trust me, Jo.”

  She sighed as his lips found hers. Okay, she thought, just seconds before her ability to think disappeared, we’ll take this leap together.

  Chapter 20

  “Do you know how beautiful you are?”

  Jo tucked a piece of hair behind her ear. “Only how beautiful I feel when you look at me like that.”

  Mark smiled, reaching across the table to take her hand.

  It was their third date, if you counted the trip to the mechanic and the disastrous make out session on her couch as the first two. They slipped out of work early and spent the day walking around the city, talking about everything from politics to literature to modern art. Jo had never laughed quite as much as she had that day, and she was pretty sure Mark was not used to the easy grin that never quite left his handsome face all afternoon. Now they were having dinner at an intimate little Mexican restaurant.

  “I heard a rumor you had a date with someone else tonight,” Jo said.

  “Is that right?” Mark ran his finger over the back of her fingers, tracing them over and over in the dim light, sending delicious shiver after shiver down her spine. “With who?”

  “Kathleen.”

  Mark looked up and laughed. “Who told you that?”

  Jo shrugged, not really willing to admit it was just gossip circulating around the office.

  He shook his head, his concentration returning to her hand.

  “There’s rumors that you’ve been spending a lot of time in her office.”

  He looked up. “Are you the jealous type?”

  Jo shrugged. “Should I be?”

  Mark lifted her hand and kissed her palm lightly. “I don’t know. Jealous can be something of an aphrodisiac.”

  Jo laughed. “I’ll have to remember that,” she said when she finally caught her breath.

  “Can I tell you a secret?” Mark asked.

  “Sure.”

  He was quiet a minute, again studying her hand. Finally he looked up. “Kathleen is planning on starting a new program. A lot of employees have been complaining about the lack of quality childcare in the immediate area around BerCo and she is thinking about going to the CEO with a plan to start and run an employee daycare.”

  Jo bit her nail, thinking of all the obstacles such a plan would face. “She shot that idea down last November when I suggested it.”

  “I know, she told me. But now she thinks that it might be a feasible idea.”

  “This from a company that won’t even upgrade the computer systems.”

  Mark shrugged. “Maybe if it has enough support, and the right plan, it might actually work.”

  Jo couldn’t help but agree. “But what does that have to do with all the time you’ve spent in her office?”

  “I was there to work on her computer. But she k
new I had kids and wanted to hear a few suggestions. I have to say, I’m quite talkative when it comes to my kids.”

  “I’m sure you are. Did you give her any good ideas?”

  “A few.” Mark ran his hand up her palm, up her wrist. “But somehow I can’t think of a single one right now.”

  Jo captured his hand before he could touch her again, again causing a rush of sensation throughout her body. “Maybe it’s time you take me home.”

  Mark licked his bottom lip and flicked his eyebrows suggestively. “Yes, ma’am.”

  They were kissing before he could get the door open. When the lock finally gave, they nearly fell. At the last second, he grabbed her up in his arms and used the momentum to turn them and slam the door closed, trapping her between his body and the door. Jo wrapped her legs around his waist and buried her fingers in his hair, bringing his mouth so tight against hers that she could feel the impression of her teeth pressing themselves into the tender flesh of her lip.

  He ripped her blouse, but she couldn’t think clearly enough to care, even though it was one of her favorites. Instead, she was lost in the sensation of his lips on her throat and further, down between her breasts, and still much lower. Her head was spinning as he wrestled with her bra, undressing her as quickly as his fingers could move. She pulled at his shirt, untucking it from his jeans, and yanking at the buttons until enough of them came free to slip the shirt over his head. The feel of his naked chest against hers was beyond description, again turning every nerve in her body into one great erotic button ready to go off at the lightest stimulation.

  When he pulled away, she wanted to scream, to protest like a child having a temper tantrum. But his hands never really left her. He cupped her face, kissed her eyelids, the tip of her nose, drew her bottom lip between his teeth.

  “Where’s the bedroom?” he asked quietly.

  Jo hesitated a moment, waiting for logic to return. That easy smile of his returned, making her knees grow weak. “I don’t want to do this here, Jo. I want to take my time. I want to make it last. Do you understand?”

  “It’s there,” she said, pointing to an open doorway just visible in the short hallway behind the couch.

  Mark lifted her easily into his arms, his lips grazing her temple, and carried her into her room. His breath caught in his throat when he saw her bed, a massive king size four poster she had bought on a whim years ago. Visible just beyond the gauzy curtains she had draped around each post were white silk sheets, an indulgence she’d granted herself after Emily told her about her engagement to Ryan.

  “My God, I think I’m in love,” Mark sighed as he laid her in luxury.

  Jo couldn’t bear to let him go, even a few feet. She grabbed his arm and pulled him down beside her. Mark rolled onto his side, propping his head on his arm, and let his eyes slowly move over her. Starting with her hair, he slowly took in her long, dark tresses, her creamy chocolate eyes, her slightly upturned nose. He slid a finger over her nose and let it fall into the subtle dip above her lip. He traced the outside of her upper lip and pressed his finger to her full, lower lip, replacing it briefly with his lips as his finger continued over her chin and down her throat, coming to rest in the hallow just above the junction of her collar bones.

  His tongue followed the path his finger had begun, sliding down her throat in a dozen different places, forcing her to arch her back and moan with complete abandon. His lips moved to the spot where the swell of her breasts began, but instead of sliding down toward the aching need of her nipples, he moved first right, then left, leaving a trail of tiny kisses along the tender skin of her chest, her sides. Then he picked up the path in the center of the valley between her breasts, moving so slowly she could feel every little puff of his breath.

  As he continued his journey down her body, Jo wrapped her fingers in the silk of her sheets, a scream never far from her lips. She had never known pleasure until she met him. Every touch, every whisper, every breath pushed her further over an edge she had never even known existed. Jo opened herself to Mark in a way she never would have imagined doing for anyone else, allowing him access to that inner most place that a woman holds most sacred. She allowed him to use his fingers, his tongue, to drive her to the brink of sanity and bring her back again, until she could no longer wait for that connection that she knew would bring them to an irreversible moment of completion.

  “Are you ready?” he asked, his lips pressed against her ear.

  “Please,” she whispered.

  “I want you, Jo,” he told her. “I have never wanted anyone as much as I want you.”

  And then…and then it was as though she had always been half of a whole and she had suddenly been reunited with the best part of her. It wasn’t just a physical connection, not just an act of pleasure. It was a joining that could never be undone.

  Chapter 21

  Mark was gone when she woke. She could still smell his scent in her sheets, on her skin. Could still feel the burning tingle on her skin everywhere he touched her in the long night. They made love so many times, she couldn’t separate each joining from the ones before or after. But each had brought her so much pleasure that her mind still spun with the enormity of it.

  A single rose and a folded piece of paper laid on her bedside table. Jo waited before picking it up, not quite ready to let go of the magic that still lingered. She closed her eyes and relived her favorite moments in her mind. The sound of his voice, the words of desire he whispered in the darkness, the feel of his touch, the taste of his kiss.

  She felt like a child after the first taste of ice cream; a teen after the first taste of independence. She felt like a newborn experiencing everything for the first time.

  The ringing of her cell phone pulled her out of her own little world with a jolt. She sat up and looked around the room, vaguely curious where her satchel was. It couldn’t be far, she remembered dumping it in here before rushing out the door again with Mark. Before their walk through downtown, before their long conversations about nothing and everything. Before dinner and the return to her apartment. Before her old world shattered and her new one was born.

  Jo laughed at nothing just because it was the only way she could express the happiness that threatened to consume everything inside of her.

  If this was how Emily felt when she was with Ryan, then Jo knew she should apologize for every bad thought she had ever had against them.

  She really hoped this was how Emily felt.

  Jo finally spotted her satchel, but the phone had long since stopped ringing. She pulled it out and checked the call log and saw that it was Emily who had called. Four times in the last two hours.

  Jo sighed, aware she should call her back, but not quite ready to embrace that much of reality. Instead, she sat on the side of her bed and picked up Mark’s note. “Had to get the kids from their grandparents,” it read. “Have them the rest of the weekend. But will call tonight. Mark.” Jo pressed the note to her chest and smiled.

  In the shower a while later, Jo’s mind wandered from one thing to another. She wondered if she would have a job on Monday after walking out on Becca and then leaving without notifying anyone. Then she wondered why Emily had called. She wondered too about Mark’s note, about his children and their relationship with Danielle’s parents. She wanted to know what kind of daycare they attended, and that thought brought her back to the plan Mark had mentioned Kathleen had discussed with him.

  Jo had fielded multiple complaints brought to her attention by the secretaries over the years about the lack of trustworthy daycare in the area. One single mother had told her that the only daycare center she could find was one that charged almost half her monthly salary and refused to keep the kids after five despite the fact that it took her forty minutes to get there from the office. Another told her that her husband’s company offered a stipend for daycare, but it didn’t cover any of the daycares near their house or her office and her husband worked the night shift, so it made little sense to put the kids in
a daycare near his work.

  Jo had worked up a reasonable plan for an in-house daycare facility at BerCo last fall, but Kathleen had turned it down without even looking at it. Jo found herself wondering how Kathleen would respond if she showed it to her now. It had been humiliating to have the plan shut down via email. How would it feel to have it happen face to face?

  Jo wanted to find out.

  Jo drove to the office to search for the daycare plan in her files. She thought if she tweaked it a little, maybe she could show it to Kathleen on Monday. But when she got off the elevator, she was surprised to see a light on in Kathleen’s office. After searching her files and updating a couple of figures in the original plan, Jo thought she would take a chance. She stood in the doorway of her office for a moment, the same place she normally froze when it came to any kind of confrontation. But this time she didn’t even stop to run her fingers through her hair.

  Her heart pounded in her chest as she paused outside Kathleen’s office. It crossed her mind that she could turn and walk away now and Kathleen would never know she was there. Instead, she tapped on the door frame.

  Kathleen, dressed casually in jeans and a white cashmere sweater, looked up in surprise from her desk. “Jo,” she said somewhat breathlessly. “What are you doing here?”

  “I was wondering if I could talk to you for a minute.”

  “Sure.” Kathleen waved Jo to a seat in front of her desk. As Jo perched on the edge of the chair, smoothing a wet palm over her pant leg, Kathleen sat back and studied her. “I heard what happened between you and Becca yesterday.”

  Jo nodded slowly, chewing on the inside of her cheek for a minute. “I was going to come talk to you about that after it happened, but I got sidetracked.”

  “Yes, I was surprised to hear you had left early.”

  “I’m sorry, Kathleen,” Jo said. “It was very unprofessional—”

  “Not at all. It’s nice to see you being spontaneous for once.”

  Kathleen laughed when Jo looked sharply at her, surprised to hear such a thing from her rigid boss. “You think you’re the first person to fall in love, but you aren’t. It’s happened to the best of us,” Kathleen said, reaching across the desk to show Jo a picture of her with a very handsome white-haired man.