by HELEN HARDT
“No time. Thanks so much, and again… I’m sor—”
“Stop apologizing, Skye. You’re not sorry you barged in here, and we both know it.”
Her lips curve into a smile that lights up her warm eyes. She kisses me on the cheek. “Bye, Braden.”
After she leaves, my hand wanders to the cheek she kissed.
Odd. It was sweet and chaste. I’m not getting hard from it.
Yet in a way, it means more to me than the fuck we just shared.
…
I spend most of the afternoon in meetings with Ben. Since I returned from New York early, he asked me to sit in, and I was glad to do so. It put my focus back where it should be—on work.
Instead of Skye Manning.
By five, I’m back in my own office. I breathe in. The scent of lust and sex is still thick in the air. Could be my imagination, but whatever it is conjures up images of Skye, her back against my window while I’m frantically pumping into her.
Absently, I pick up my phone and pull up Instagram.
Front and center is a new post from Skye. She looks beautiful and vivacious. She’s laughing about something, and her lips have never looked sexier. In a photo, that is. They’re much sexier in person.
Love my Susanne Cherry Russet lip stain. It’s my go-to for every occasion. Perfect for a casual afternoon! @susannecosmetics #sponsored #lips #lipgloss #kissproof #youknowyouwantsome @beantheredonethat
She works quickly. Clearly she signed the contract electronically and has already begun posting. Pride wells in me. Sure, Instagramming is far from her true calling, but it will get her noticed as someone other than Addie’s assistant.
And if I have it my way, she’ll be able to quit her current job. The farther away she is from Addison Ames, the better.
Already, she has a ton of comments.
Gorgeous on you! #orderingnow Love the color!
You look so happy!
Totally getting this for my wife.
I scroll through several more until one catches my eye.
@realaddisonames #fuckyou
Angry prickles crawl up my spine.
In an instant, another comment blares at me, pulsing along with my heartbeat.
@realaddisonames #youllneverbeme
I scoff aloud. She got that right. Skye Manning is already eons above Addison Ames in dignity, intelligence, and honesty.
Addison Ames should hope to be Skye Manning.
Of course, she’s too narcissistic to ever see the irony.
I’m tempted to intervene, but when I refresh my feed, the offending comments have disappeared. Skye obviously saw them and deleted them without responding. The woman has class.
And so do I.
I won’t intervene. I never do.
Except that one time when I was in a pissy mood and that damned coffee post got to me.
I can hardly regret that, though, even though it was impulsive and immature.
It led me to Skye.
I can’t resist leaving Skye a comment of my own.
@bradenblackinc You’re gorgeous. See you tonight.
I attend to a few more emails, including one from Dimitri about the meeting with Foster McCain tomorrow. As he suspected, McCain only wants to deal with me. Dimitri will try to smooth things over. If he can’t, he’ll call me tonight.
I sigh. This isn’t unexpected. But until I hear otherwise, I’m going to enjoy my evening with Skye. I head out of the office by six. Normally I go to the gym after work, but tonight, I’m heading to Skye’s. We didn’t make any formal plans, but my comment made it clear I want to see her.
She’ll be home by the time I get there.
I take the elevator down, stride through the lobby, and find Christopher waiting.
“The gym?” he says.
“Skye’s place,” I tell him.
“You got it.”
A half hour later, after braving rush-hour traffic, we arrive.
“You want me to wait?” Christopher asks.
“Yes, please.” I exit the vehicle and walk into Skye’s building.
When I reach her door, I knock.
No response.
I knock harder.
Again, no response.
Odd. Did she have to work late?
I text her.
Where are you?
Esteban’s. Having a drink with Tessa.
I’m at your place. Why aren’t you here?
Nothing for a minute. Then the little dots begin to move.
Because I’m at Esteban’s having a drink with Tessa.
The fuck? That prickly anger seizes my neck and squeezes. She knew I wanted to see her tonight. If she didn’t want to see me, she should have let me know.
Then again, we didn’t make any actual plans. Is it possible she didn’t see my comment? No, she saw it. She had to. This is her first sponsored post. She’s no doubt monitoring the comments with an eagle eye.
She should have known I’d be coming by.
I can stew about it and get angrier, which in turn will make her angry when I confront her, or I can simply go see her.
I choose the grown-up route.
Be there in fifteen.
I head back down and get in the car. “Looks like we’re going to Esteban’s,” I tell Christopher.
Once we arrive, I stroll in, excitement at seeing Skye making me feel a lot younger than I am. It’s wild, how she affects me. I mumble to the hostess that I’m meeting a friend who’s already here and whisk past without waiting for her reply, nearly bumping into Tessa Logan.
“Oh! Hi, Braden,” she says. “Skye said you’d be joining her.”
“Are you leaving?” I ask.
“Yeah, I just came in for a drink. I left Skye some money for the bill.”
“I’ll take care of it. She’ll return your money.”
“You don’t have—”
“I insist,” I say quickly. “Please excuse me.”
I don’t mean to be rude, but all I can think of is getting to Skye. I arrive at the table and find Skye counting bills and looking over the check.
I sit down at the table and take the check from her. “I’ve got it.”
“You don’t have to. They left money.”
“I saw Tessa on the way out,” I say. “I told her you’d be returning her money.”
“What about Betsy’s money?”
“Who’s Betsy?”
“Betsy… Huh. I don’t know her last name. Anyway, she owns the Bark Boutique where I got Sasha’s gift basket.”
Right. That Betsy. The one who has history with Addie. Was Skye pressing Betsy for information about Addie and me?
I don’t know how much Betsy knows, but I won’t worry about that at the moment.
“You can return her money, too,” I say.
“That’s generous of you, but you don’t have to—”
“I know I don’t have to, Skye. I want to. This is pennies to me.”
She smiles. “Okay, then. I’ll let you, because I’m now officially unemployed.”
Damn. Those comments from Addie on Skye’s post siren back into my mind. I’ll bet Addie fired Skye.
Good riddance.
I shake my head. “Why am I not surprised?”
“I don’t know. I still have no idea what went on between you and Addison.”
Yeah, she was definitely asking Betsy about us, and now I know Betsy knows little to nothing. I throw a credit card on top of the bill. “Nice try. Still not going there.”
The server arrives and grabs the bill and credit card. “Can I get you anything, Mr. Black?”
“Yes, a Wild Turkey, one ice cube, and a menu please. Ms. Manning and I will be dining.”
“You want to eat here?” she asks.
/>
“Why not?”
“It’s not exactly fine dining.”
“So? You seem to forget I come from South Boston. I grew up on beans and stew.”
“Boston baked beans?” she asks, smiling.
“One and the same.”
“No chains like this when I was growing up, but we had some great little mom-and-pop restaurants in the nearby small towns. Not fine dining, but delicious food where everyone knew everyone else. We had this amazing Mexican restaurant run by a couple who’d emigrated twenty years previously. The best Mexican food ever. The stuff here can’t compare.”
“Esteban’s is yuppy Mexican food,” I say. “But it’s still decent.”
“True.”
The server returns with the menus. She glances over hers.
“Eat hearty, Skye,” I say. “You’re going to burn a lot of calories tonight.”
Chapter Forty-Four
As soon as we enter my penthouse, I attack her next to the elevator, kissing her hard and deep.
Then my phone buzzes.
Fuck.
Probably Dimitri, which means I’m going to New York. Fuck.
I break the kiss.
“Ignore it,” she whispers.
So tempting.
“I can’t. I’m sorry. I’m expecting an important call.”
“At nine thirty?”
I don’t answer, just pull my phone out. “Black,” I say, walking toward the living room.
Skye follows me, but a few seconds later, I walk away from her and into my office, closing the door. I don’t need her distracting me right now.
“So…?”
“No dice,” Dimitri says. “I did my best. I answered every fucking question he had with as much knowledge as anyone could possibly possess, but he’s one of those sticklers who thinks his shit don’t stink. He won’t talk to anyone but the big boss.”
“It’s okay, Dimitri. Thanks for trying.”
“If it’s any consolation, everyone else is good with going through me. Foster McCain’s the only problem.”
“Don’t worry about it. This is the first time McCain’s even agreed to a meeting. I should have stayed in New York.”
The truth of my own words hits me like an anvil to the head.
I should have stayed in New York. I knew how important this meeting was, and I also knew McCain might be a problem.
But I let my personal life interfere with business.
I made the wrong choice, though I can’t quite bring myself to regret it.
“Sorry,” Dimitri says. “Here I’ve been buzzing in your ear for more responsibility, and you give me what I want, but I can’t get this deal done.”
“It’s okay. You deserve the responsibility, Dimitri. Don’t worry about McCain. I’ll be at the meeting tomorrow.”
“It’s at eight a.m.,” he says.
“I know. I’ll be there.”
Now, to tell Skye. I shove the phone into my pants pocket and leave the office but then make a detour to my bedroom. I head to the mahogany wardrobe, open it, and then pull open one of the drawers.
I grab a silver chain and smile.
I’m getting hard just thinking about what this will do to Skye. I adjust my groin and then walk back out to the living area where I find Skye sitting on the sofa.
“I’m sorry,” I say. “I have to fly back to New York.”
“Right now?”
“Yeah. I shouldn’t have left early. My bad.”
“Oh.” She frowns, and for a moment, I imagine giving my entire fortune never to see her looking sad again.
God, I need to get a grip.
I stalk toward her. “I seem to make questionable decisions because of you, Skye.”
She says nothing. Just shivers.
“I want you to think about something while I’m gone.”
She shivers. “What?”
I push the silver chain into her hands. “About wearing this to the gala on Saturday.”
She wraps it around her neck and secures it like a lariat necklace. “All right. It will go nicely with the black dress.”
I laugh. One of those serious laughs that just erupts before I can stop it.
She smiles. “What’s so funny?”
“It’s not a necklace.”
She reddens and then removes it from her neck and holds it out to me. “What is it, then?”
“Those things on each end are nipple clamps, Skye.”
Her jaw drops as she examines the baubles on each end. They resemble tiny clothespins with a screw-on device like old-fashioned clip-on earrings.
I’ve been imagining Skye in nipple clamps since I first noticed her amazing tits.
“I control how tight the clamp is,” I say. “And when I give the chain between them a good yank… Well, you can imagine.”
She hands the chain back to me and clears her throat. “I’ll…think about it.”
I lower my eyelids slightly, my whole body heating. “Think about it a lot, Skye.”
She nods.
“I’m sorry about tonight. Christopher will drive you home.”
“When will you be back?”
“Saturday afternoon, as originally planned. I’ll pick you up at your place for the gala at six p.m. sharp. I’ll bring the chain and put it on for you.”
She nods. “Braden?”
“Yes?”
“I… I’ll miss you.”
Her words warm me and go straight to my cock. I smile. “I’ll miss you, too, Skye. More than you know.”
Chapter Forty-Five
I text Ben, and he meets me at the airport at one a.m. If Foster McCain wants to meet with me, Ben and I will go together. The big guns.
After we reach cruising altitude for our short flight, Ben and I each have a bourbon.
“You shouldn’t have left Manhattan, bro,” he says to me.
“Tell me something I don’t know.” I take a sip, let the smokiness sit on my tongue, and imagine Skye’s pussy juice instead of the alcohol in my mouth.
“Think you’re ready to admit it?”
I swallow. “That I shouldn’t have left New York? I think I just did.”
“Not that.” Ben takes a sip and swallows. “That you’re falling for this woman.”
“I don’t fall for women, Ben.”
“That’s called denial, bro.” He takes another sip. “You know, there’s a lot better bourbons out there than this stuff.”
“It’s hardly rotgut.”
“Did I say it was? The Blacks can afford the best. Why do you love this stuff so much?”
“Because it’s damned good.”
“I’ll give you the flavor, but it’s a little harsh going down.”
“It reminds me of those days on the construction site when we were in our early twenties. How we worked our asses off and had a Wild Turkey at Clem’s after a long day.”
“Except for that one day,” Ben says, “when we went to a certain party.”
“For fuck’s sake. Why do you insist on bringing that up? You know I don’t talk about it.”
“I know. But I talked to Apple again tonight.”
“Seriously? Is she your new girlfriend? The yin to your yang or whatever?’
“What?”
“Isn’t she into all that Zen shit?”
“Some, I guess. She’s definitely not your typical hotel heiress. But that’s not why I brought her up. She only called to tell me Addie had fired Skye.”
I take another sip. “I figured as much.”
“Skye told you?”
“Not in those words. She just said she was now unemployed. She’s getting some outside work, but Skye isn’t the type to leave a sure thing until she’s got another steady income.”
“Addie’s really pissed off about some cosmetics deal.”
I nod. “I know. Skye’s better off away from Addie and her toxicity.” Addie’s comments on Skye’s post race back into my mind. Just thinking about them gets anger rustling through me.
“I won’t argue with you there,” Ben says. “You ever going to level with her? About Addie?”
“Why should I? It’s in the past.”
“Yeah, but it’s got a lot to—”
“Stop right there,” I say, using my best big-brother voice. It still works sometimes, believe it or not. “I don’t talk about it. I don’t think about it. Some things are better left buried. We worked hard to make sure it would never surface.”
“We did.”
“So I don’t need you spouting off about honesty and trust and all that other bullshit. Skye and I aren’t in a relationship, so those things have no bearing. Case closed.”
The big-brother voice works.
Ben drops it.
But all I can think about during the rest of the flight are my own words.
Skye and I aren’t in a relationship.
They’re certainly true, as far as she knows. I made it clear we could date but there would be no relationship.
In my heart, though?
I want more than Skye’s control.
I want more than Skye’s submission.
I want more than Skye’s humor, brilliance, and beauty.
I want more than Skye’s energy.
I want her love.
…
I got all of an hour of shut-eye before the meeting with Foster McCain, a surly Irishman who actually came to us eight years ago offering to take our initial products into Europe. At that time we had better offers, so we declined, but McCain got a deal with three companies in China to manufacture knockoffs of our goggles, Black, Inc.’s flagship product. We sued—nearly depleting our coffers—and won, but at that point, McCain had made a shit ton of money in bitcoin and didn’t care anyway. Now he’s the Warren Buffet of the UK, and he’s started his own Berkshire Hathaway competitor, McCain Global.
In short, I don’t like him.
Neither does Ben.
Neither does Dimitri.
But we like his money. After we won our lawsuit, McCain took the high road and got out of the knockoff business. He used his bitcoin fortune for good instead of evil, and now McCain Global owns some prime property in the UK that we want to get our hands on. We’re willing to pay top dollar, but we need to get it yesterday.