Was he being genuine? Can you fake a kiss like that? He’s so good at it. I’ve never been kissed like that before. But then… he is a player.
“That was so hot even I need to fan myself,” Miranda comments, stepping out of the elevator behind me and to the right. “I didn’t want to interrupt so I just kept the door open until you were done.”
She smiles a fake smile with perfect white teeth and dark red hair to her jaw. Miranda is one of those naturally sexy women that doesn’t ever come into work looking less than desirable. But then it’s rumored that she has had affairs with at least two married men in the building. She likes the thrill of the taboo, or so Julia says. Not that I speak to Julia, she just likes to gossip to anybody she thinks is listening.
She’s as bad as Wayne who does errands for everybody on this floor and the one below. He’s a huge gossip. I try not to speak to him much. I don’t like people like that, they make me nervous. I don’t like getting suckered into drama and I don’t like talking badly of people, but I’m not brave enough to say anything like Pax did.
I should be. I should defend others, but I don’t have any power here. I’d just become their next target.
“Well done you, Pax is a catch,” she adds as she saunters past, hips swaying and heels clicking on the wooden floor.
My speaker buzzes, I almost daren’t put my earpiece in, but I do and I press the button to receive the call.
“Yes, Mr. C?”
“Thank you for coming back, Rose.”
“Glad to be here, Mr. C. Is the line secure now?”
“Definitely, I had it all recalibrated.”
Phew. “Good. Thank you for my flowers.”
“Does that mean you forgive me?” he asks boyishly, and I can just see the smile on his face despite the fact he’s not here.
I laugh quietly. “Not yet, but maybe one day.”
“I’ll just have to try harder.”
“Oh God, please no more huge bouquets.”
“You don’t like flowers?” His tone is humorous and not offended in the slightest.
I bite my lip, stifling my laugh. “They’re an offensive gift. I have nowhere to put them.”
“Right, because they don’t line up with anything.”
“Exactly. If you’re going to buy me something for any reason in future, I love stationary, notebooks… if you’re feeling really generous there’s the new MacBook…”
His laughter is booming at that remark. “I’ll bear that in mind. But on your salary, I think you can afford to buy yourself the new MacBook.”
“Definitely, but then I’d have to justify the expense to myself and I’m too rigid with my finances to ever let myself buy a new piece of tech when I have tech that works.”
“Rigid,” he murmurs, still laughing under his breath. “If I bought you a MacBook, would you forgive me?”
“It’d be an excellent start,” I jest, feeling a fluttering in my chest. “Do you want me to fetch you lunch today, Mr. C?”
“No, thank you, Rose. Why can’t you just call me Ezra? You did yesterday?”
“I did?”
“Yes, in your apartment.”
I wet my lips and rack my brain. “I was mad, I guess I got a bit personal there. I’m sorry.”
“I prefer it when you call me Ezra.”
“You don’t make anybody else call you Ezra. Why do you want me to?”
He pauses, likely thinking of a good answer. His reply is not what I’m expecting. “It just sounds… nice when you say it.”
I’ve said it maybe a handful of times in the past when he’s corrected me, or like yesterday when we had that heated discussion in my apartment.
How do I say no to that request?
He is my boss after all. I guess I just still don’t feel comfortable being so personal with him.
“Buy me a MacBook and I’ll think about it.”
When he laughs again that fluttering in my chest increases tenfold. It’s excitement and happiness that I’ve made him laugh. He has a nice laugh; I can admit that even while I’m still hurt by him.
“You’ve got a call coming through,” I say softly. “Later, Mr. C.”
“Ezra,” he corrects, and our line goes dead.
I answer the phone and put the man through, then sit back and look at my perfect desk.
Mr. C and I have never spoken like that over the speaker, phone, face to face or anything. Once upon a time I thought we might be becoming friends and I realized how wrong I was. Now he seems to be trying and it’s probably too late because I will never trust him again. He stabbed me in the back. How does one forgive that?
* * *
The past two days have been awkwardly pleasant, I’m glad they’re over and we’re on our way to Houston. People in the building have been so nice to me but I just don’t want the attention. They’ve been offering me compliments, stopping me to talk, disturbing my schedule, inviting me out for lunch and dinner.
It’s amazing, they’re amazing, but I’m just not very good with people. I’m awkward and jittery and after a while I start to irritate them.
Mr. C has been respectful and courteous, how he used to be but kinder now. He smiles more and speaks to me more like a friend would, cracking jokes and laughing at the things I say, enticing me into a conversation.
“Do you want to play snap?” he asks me, sitting on the seat opposite from where I’m reading a book on a plush, leather couch on the plane. This private jet is one of the most luxurious we’ve ever been on. Oh how the other half live.
Though I suppose I could be classed as the other half what with my lifestyle.
“Snap?”
“You don’t know what snap is?” he asks, raising his brows as his hands shuffle a deck of cards.
“I know what it is, I’m just not good at playing.” I cringe but also don’t want to turn him down. He’s bored and this is a three-hour flight.
“Snap is the easiest card game ever,” he tells me with a playful roll of his eyes. I watch him split the deck and sink onto my knees on the rug, the low table separating us. He smiles and does the same before laying down his first card.
I go after, perfectly lining up my seven of diamonds with his five of clubs.
He puts a queen of clubs down and I reach over to neaten it. He looks up at me, his brow quirked, his lips twitching with a secret smile, but he doesn’t ask me what I’m doing. He knows me well enough by now to know I’m not great with things being out of line.
I put my own card down again, it’s a five of diamonds, then he puts his down and I notice how he purposely puts it at an angle. I try to resist, I really do try, but I quickly adjust it and then feel the curved corner of a card hit me on the head.
“Did you just…?”
“Yep,” he replies, grinning from ear to ear. “Every time you do that, I’m going to throw something at you.”
I gape at him, fighting the urge to laugh and cry. “But… I can’t…”
“Live a little, let them be wonky.” He pushes his card back to an angle.
I grit my teeth, fingers twitching, knees bouncing. Then I adjust it. I can’t resist.
Another card hits my eyebrow and he holds his hands out, poise and ready to slide another at me.
“I told you I wouldn’t be good at playing,” I say, pouting at him.
“You’re doing great. Keep going.”
I narrow my eyes on him and throw my next card down. He laughs and another of his cards hits me on the face when I neaten the entire pile and make it perfectly parallel with all sides of the low table.
“Stoooooop,” I whine, giggling and then I throw my own cards at him, the entirety of my hand.
He throws his at me too, laughing his ass off when I start picking them up and he keeps knocking them out of my hands.
“Leave them, let them be messy for a while,” he instructs kindly, holding my hands together over the table. “Just talk to me. Ignore them.”
Does he not know how tortu
rous this is? Being covered in cards and surrounded by them too. It’s torture.
“Tell me what your plans are for the weekend.” He keeps my wrists together in a tight grip, giving me a gentle shake when I look around at the mess we created.
“I don’t know…”
“Really? Rumor has it you’re going on a date with Pax this weekend,” he says warily and my heart stops. “Rumor has it you were caught making out with him like a teenager outside my office.”
I open and close my mouth. “I… I mean… yeah, we’re going out I guess.”
“Drinks?” the stewardess asks politely, greeting us and smiling at the mess and the fact he still has my hands pinned between us.
“This isn’t weird and like kinky or anything,” I say to her, motioning to my bound hands. She stifles her smile as I continue, “I have OCD and he won’t let me clean.”
“Oh… shall I?”
“No,” he cuts in, grinning at me smugly. “We’re good. But please fetch us the whiskey. I could use a drink.”
She nods happily and goes back the way she came.
I’m now less aware of the mess and more aware of the hands squeezing my wrists. Visions of him lifting them over my head and….
Nope. Not going there with that one. It has just been such a long time.
He breaks me out of my thoughts by asking cautiously, “Are you going to sleep with him?”
My eyes swing up to his and I almost choke on my words. “That’s a really personal question.”
“We’re both adults here, it’s just sex, we can talk about it.”
“You’re… you’re my boss,” I remind him, blinking like he’s crazy. “This is awkward.”
“Probably.” He doesn’t seem phased by anything I said. “I just want to warn you that he’s a dog. He has slept with more women than we have in the building.” He rubs my wrists softly with his thumbs and holds my gaze. “Just stay safe and guard your heart.”
I try to pull away but he holds tight. “Thank you for the advice but I’m not about to sleep with him on the first date…” That’s a lie, I might but he doesn’t need to know about that.
“Five-date rule?”
“No… oh my God. Do we have to talk about this?” I mutter, embarrassed.
“No, of course not, but I’m interested. I haven’t been on a date for years like you youngens.”
I roll my eyes. “You’re hardly old.”
“No, but I am married.” His ring shines in the orange glow of the interior lights.
A bottle of whiskey and two glass are brought over, both have ice in them. She pours us a finger’s worth in each, and Mr. C allows me use of my hands to actually take a sip. It’s great whiskey, it doesn’t burn my throat too harshly, but I still ask for lemon soda to mix it with. She brings me a cold can and I drain my drink all too quickly after adding that.
Mr. C pours me another and himself.
“What’s acceptable now?”
“Sorry?”
“I mean in the dating scene. What’s acceptable? How many dates before the big finale?”
I laugh through my nose and relish the warming feel of the whiskey as it enters my system. I drink some more before answering, “I don’t know, maybe three dates? I don’t date so this is all new territory for me too.”
“You’ve never dated?”
I shake my head. “I’ve dated, just not for a really long time. Since my freshman year of university.”
“You haven’t been on a date in five years? Has nobody asked?” He looks perplexed.
“People have asked but that date didn’t exactly go very well…” I sip more of my drink as my cheeks heat.
“Was he a jerk?”
“No, no… quite the opposite. He was lovely. Very kind and attentive.”
“But?”
I laugh nervously and drink more. He refills my glass and adds more soda. “It’s embarrassing.”
“I’m not judging.”
“Aren’t you?” I retort and he winces, feeling my dig. “Sorry. That was unnecessary.”
“Not at all, I’d say I deserved it.” He downs his second drink in one gulp and this time I pour him another. We share a smile. “So… tell me… what happened? Did you fart? Did you vomit on his shoes?”
“I wish.” I rub my eyes under my glasses with the tips of my fingers and let my head flop back onto the sofa. “Iblurtdownmber.”
“What?” he laughs, not catching my confession.
“I blurted out a number,” I cry, louder this time but he still looks confused. “When he finished, I said one hundred and fifty-three.”
“What?”
“It was my first time. I was nervous… so I counted, and I got up to a hundred and fifty-three and he thought I was… mocking him.”
He presses his lips together.
“It’s okay, you can laugh. I do. Every time I consider ever having sex again,” I groan and to his credit, he doesn’t laugh… not very loud anyway. “So, I don’t do sex.”
“Pax is probably going to expect sex eventually.”
“I know but… he’s more skilled, so I figured that when the time comes, I probably won’t have a head clear enough to count, and even if I do, there’s hope he’ll last longer than three minutes and won’t be offended when I shout out his number.”
He slaps his hand to his mouth, unable to contain it, and then he roars with laughter and I pick up the cards from the floor just so I can throw them at him again.
I can’t believe I told him that. I’ve only ever told Laurie that.
“You’re hilarious,” he says after a moment, finally calming himself. “And so adorable. You have no idea.”
“That’s an ego boost if I ever heard one, Ezra,” I retort, rolling my eyes and throwing more cards at him.
“See?” he asks, wagging his brows. “Was that so hard?”
“Calling you Ezra or ignoring the cards?”
“Both.” His arrogance as he sips his drink is comical and obviously in jest, but it still grates on me.
I glare at him, still twitching with the need to pick up the cards but surprised I forgot about them at all for a little while there. That’s not something I can ever say has happened before. “Don’t be smug. It makes you ugly.”
He spits his drink back into his glass and starts to choke while laughing.
“This is already the best trip we’ve ever had together.”
I start to pick up the cards, but he yanks them from my hand and hands me my drink instead.
“Leave them.”
“Until when?”
“Until you physically can’t cope anymore.”
I only last half an hour, but I’ve never been so proud of myself.
Chapter Nine
He gives the best gifts. So thoughtful.
We ate dinner together last night and drank wine which didn’t exactly mix well with the whiskey we’d already consumed. By eleven PM we were both swaying on the spot, laughing and joking like we did that night he showed up on my birthday. It was an amazing night and I worried for a moment that he’d go back to his old self again, but he hasn’t.
This morning we ate breakfast together, both of us nursing hangovers. I asked him to never speak a word to anybody about the number thing and he promised he wouldn’t but then he started asking me what number I reckon I’d say about random men in the restaurant. That was fun. He’d point and I’d reply with whatever number entered my mind. Some poor guy with a huge Afro got the number seven.
We headed to WhyTech, strolled around doing our jobs, speaking to people and taking a mountain of paperwork to get through. I knew it was going to be a long night the second I saw the mountain to be done.
Here we are at midnight after a super long day, sitting in his room on his huge bed, not an uncommon place for us to work from time to time. He’s resting back against the headboard, legs crossed at the ankles, I’m sitting at the end of the bed cross-legged. Both hungry, both exhausted, both looking through r
eceipt after receipt, adding up things to get the total for the year because something isn’t quite right. I can see it’s stressing Mr. C out, so I don’t talk, I just work.
“There’s definitely a lot of money missing that’s unaccounted for,” I whisper when we get to the end less than two hours later and he’s scratching the shadow of stubble on his chin.
“This is…” He blows out a harsh breath. “FUCK!” He kicks the files off the bed, and they flutter around the room.
“Feel better?” I ask, yawning loudly.
He shakes his head as I move around the room, picking up the scattered paper. I almost fall when a pillow hits me in the side of the head.
I look at him, glaring. “Are you for real?”
“What did I say?”
I throw the pillow back and sit back on the end of the bed. “You’re an ass.”
“I’m trying to help you.”
“I know,” I murmur, rubbing my eyes and lying back on the bed, almost forgetting this isn’t my room, it’s his. “What are you going to do?”
“Launch an investigation into the company branch. There’s nothing else I can do without going around and pointing fingers. This kind of money missing is a jail sentence.”
My stomach grumbles and then his responds. We share a laugh in this dire moment.
“Room service has finished for the night,” he comments, patting his stomach which has absolutely no fat on it whatsoever. I’ve heard he has a six-pack, but I’ve never seen it. I’ve never been interested enough to try. “Shall we see if we can order pizza?”
I shake my head. “I’m so tired. I just want to go to sleep.” My eyes drift close in agreement. “Sorry this didn’t have a happy ending.”
“What? You in my hotel room?” he jokes and my cheeks heat at the thought of me and him in his bed… Nope. Definitely not going there in my thoughts. “Kidding.”
“I know. I’m just too tired to laugh.” I sit up and rub my eyes, then sigh, stand, and stretch. “We should clean this up or I won’t be able to sleep.”
“You were about to sleep then just fine,” he comments wryly, and we start picking up the scattered papers.
Becoming His Mistress Page 6