Hostile Takeover (20 page)

I’m going to fail sociology. The professor blames everything from cockroach infestation to pimples on corporate greed. I’ve explained to him that corporations are run by people, which means they’re as diverse and generous as whoever is managing them. I also pointed out that since individuals are the largest source of donations in the country, if they don’t have jobs, which corporations provide, they can’t donate. He said I was a corporate drone. He was probably sitting on his ass in his office when you guys were trucking in supplies to Gulfport, MS, after Katrina. Do you still make that industrial spray foam at the Costa Rican plant? I want to fill up his Prius like a cream horn.

Letter from Marcie, sophomore year

I’ll ship you a case of it. Remember to wear gloves and don’t leave fingerprints. And burn this letter. Morons like that don’t realize a good teacher teaches you how to think for yourself. Their job isn’t to impose their own agenda.

Ben’s reply

Chapter Seven

When Marcie walked past Janet’s desk, she could tell from her expression that the admin was surprised to see her. So he’d told Janet she wasn’t coming in.

“I don’t know how long I’ll be here,” she said. “I’m just checking on a few things.”

Janet gave her a handful of pink message slips. “He’s on a conference call right now in Matt’s office. They’ll probably be in there for an hour or so.”

Good. Maybe her stomach would move down from her throat and back into its proper area by then. All she’d been able to handle were those eggs. Jon had packed up the leftover toast, tucking it into a sandwich bag with a small jar of the jam. He’d suggested she eat some of that later. A nurturing Dom. He and Rachel were perfect for one another.

Marcie pulled out the document she’d been unable to finish yesterday and got to work. Her concentration was for shit, though, so she stopped to return some of the messages. She answered the calls on her feet because her ass still hurt enough to make sitting uncomfortable. But other symptoms concerned her more. Remembering the concern in Jon’s eyes as he held her, she wondered at it herself, how shaky she felt today. Her nerves were on high alert, her body vibrating like a hummingbird. She did carry a personal massager in her purse. Maybe she should take the edge off?

That vibrator stays in the nightstand drawer until I say otherwise.
She shivered deliciously at the memory, the look on his face as he issued the order. He kept switching between taking over all her decisions, and wanting to cut her loose. It gave her hope and drove her crazy at once.

Her intercom buzzed. Janet. “Yes?” Marcie asked.

“Mr. O’Callahan says to use the pillow on the top shelf of his closet.”

“Did you tell him I was here?”

“No, I did not.”

“Jon told him?”

“Mr. Forte isn’t in the meeting.” Janet’s tone suggested she would very quickly tire of twenty questions. Truth, the woman was kind of scary, so Marcie thanked her and clicked off. How had he known? Was he pissed? Had she messed things up?

“Stop it, Marcie,” she muttered. “Get a grip.”

Going into his office, she found the pillow on the top shelf. When she brought it down, she couldn’t help herself. She pressed it to her face, inhaling his scent. She imagined him using it, the long, powerful body stretched out on the office couch. He’d kick off his shoes, probably shrug out of his shirt, and then flop down, one arm casually hooked over his head, studying the ceiling as he ran through the details of whatever had kept him late enough to decide to sleep here.

Now she visualized herself curled against his body, her head propped into the valley created by that raised arm. Her fingers would play with the light mat of hair across his chest as she gazed up into that strong face. Those beautiful green eyes would shift to her, studying her from such a relaxed position. She imagined waking up together. They could pull all-nighters together, because of course she’d love to work as part of his staff, his investigator.

She wrapped her arms around the pillow, hugging it to her. Folding herself down on the couch, she rested on her hip so she didn’t aggravate her abused buttocks. Just a quick second to lie here, where he had been. He didn’t sleep long hours, she was sure. There was such incredible energy to him.

She remembered the way he’d played with the younger kids on the evenings or weekends when they all got together. He was tireless, wrestling with Nate, racing the girls on their bikes, hauling the younger ones around on his shoulders in the pool. Some of her most intense early masturbating fantasies had to do with the way his broad chest and shoulders looked with beads of water rolling down them. The way the sun played across the dark silken hair that arrowed down to his waist.

He wore those modest oversized shorts that most guys did for a swimsuit, but she preferred to imagine him in far more fitted swim trunks. Ones that would cling to his ass and groin like a second skin when he hefted himself easily out of the pool on strong arms, one of her siblings clinging to his back.

If he was lying behind her now, she’d feel the hard planes of his body, that impressive groin pressed up against her ass. He’d cup her breast, play with the piercing jewelry as he dozed and she got more aroused, until she was squirming against him, rubbing against his cock, waking him up on several levels. Of course he’d probably grumble at her for disturbing his rest, threaten to punish her. Push her down under the blanket so she had to service his morning erection. Maybe he’d let her use her hands, to cup his muscular ass, stroke the taut lines of his thighs.

Her lids were drooping. She really had slept poorly last night. She needed to get up, finish that work. Hold it all together, even though she was afraid everything was falling apart. She was just so tired… If she had a nap, she’d be better off. She wasn’t going to give up, even if she had to go through a hundred days like the last two. Which would technically be two hundred days…

* * * * *

“It’s going to be a pain in the ass.”

“Yeah, yeah, bitch, bitch. Stop being such a little girl about it. Think how much better production will be after the turnover.”

“We’ll lose about a million during the outage.”

“You could pull a million out of your ass right now. This will triple our investment in two years.”

Slowly, she surfaced. Where was… Oh holy hell, she’d fallen asleep on the couch, apparently some time ago, because Ben was back in his office. With at least Peter and Matt, the two who’d been arguing with him. Was Lucas in here? She froze, wondering if she should just keep her eyes shut and hope they hadn’t noticed her. Yeah, that was likely. From the direction of Peter’s voice, he was in the chair that faced the couch.

She’d fallen asleep like a sleepy, trusting child, her nose nestled in his pillow, arms wrapped around it like she’d wrap them around him, never wanting to let him go. God, she was like a Taylor Swift song, probably
not
the picture of mature woman at the moment. If they were looking at her, they’d know she was awake, because she was turning the color of a tomato.

The hell with it. She opened her eyes. Peter was actually standing, leaning on the wall behind the chair, all that restless energy too out front to be contained for long in a chair. Though he’d retired from the National Guard to be here for Dana, he still looked like he should be carrying an assault rifle, ready to lead a unit into a firefight. He was built like a muscular tank, and to the delight of every woman who met him, he was the one K&A man who usually wore khakis or dress jeans and form-fitting heavy weight tees that emphasized that physique. Since he oversaw a lot of the plant operations, the casual look was more appropriate for him.

Matt was as intimidating and riveting as ever in his dark suit, polished shoes. He was in what Marcie privately called his raptor pose. Though he appeared relaxed, ankle on the opposite knee, hands loose on the chair arms, there was something about the position of his head, the focus of the dark eyes, that suggested he was about to swoop down five hundred feet and pluck a hapless field mouse out of a dense meadow.

Ben had his chair pushed back with one foot against the edge of the desk. He was tapping a pen against the arm. None of them were looking toward her, but they all realized she was here. They hadn’t woken her. It was as if her being in Ben’s office made her part of his other belongings. She wondered how Lucas would feel about that. Had he already been here? Seen her?

“I have something else to handle now,” Ben said, tilting his head in her direction. “Are we done?”

“Yeah. Hey, don’t forget next Friday’s benefit.” Peter pushed off the wall. “Black tie. Stale finger foods, open checkbook. The girls are really looking forward to it.”

Today was Thursday. Were they anticipating him being gone for the next seven days, such that Peter was mentioning it now? She held her tongue, though cold dread filled her stomach. Had she known him well enough to anticipate his escape out of town?

Then Peter gave him a grin. “It will take you that long to get some unlucky woman to agree to be your date.”

“I’ll ask your wife,” Ben said dryly. “You know she’ll choose me.”

“Yeah. Keep it up, I’ll wrap your oversized appendage around your throat and choke you with it.”

“Don’t you wish yours was long enough to do that?”

“Gentlemen,” Matt warned in a mild voice. She knew he was a stickler about talking crude around women, at least in normal conversation. The others followed the same code, though she’d always noticed Ben strayed outside the lines more than the rest.

Through Cass, she knew he’d lived on the streets as a kid. Maybe that was why he slipped in the manners department more often, though she’d never seen Ben treat the K&A women with anything but the greatest respect. That street experience probably contributed to his versatility as a lawyer, but he’d have made a good investigator as well, because he could easily adopt different personas. He’d delighted her siblings with his command of accents. Cajun, Irish, Midwestern, New England. What she found interesting was how the accents would show up unconsciously when his moods changed, as if the situation called forth that particular personality.

When Matt rose and he and Peter headed toward the door, neither of them looked toward her, even though she pushed up on one elbow. Same situation as at Jon’s. She was Ben’s, a submissive waiting on a Master’s attention, and therefore not to be acknowledged by the other Doms in the room unless it was part of the plan. Given her immediate reaction to that thought, a nap hadn’t helped settle her as much as she expected.

“Remember what we talked about.”

Jon
was
in the room, standing by the door. He was addressing Ben, holding his gaze. Ben inclined his head, his mouth tight. “I’ll handle it the way I see fit.”

“Just be sure you handle it.”

Okay, she’d never heard Jon with that edge. Ben registered the challenge, eyes turning into shards of glass. “I said I would. Back off.”

Jon nodded, his blue eyes just as cool. Then he turned, pulling the door closed after him.

She wasn’t sure what to say. She was pretty sure that had to do with her, but she didn’t know what corner of the sheet to grasp to straighten it out. Surely Jon wouldn’t have told Ben what they talked about? Yes, of course he would. From her tea-party eavesdropping, she knew it caused Cass, Dana, Savannah and Rachel various levels of frustration. The well-being of their women came first, over and above issues of privacy, and all of the guys were hugely overprotective.

The Knights of the Board Room was what they’d been dubbed by a columnist, years ago, and though the guys would roll their eyes if anyone brought it up, it fit. It was as much about their old-fashioned code of chivalry as it was about their behavior in business and charitable circles.

Ben turned his chair then. She couldn’t read his countenance, but he rose, came to the couch, dropped to his heels next to it. His gaze covered her face, the open neck of the pink blouse, following the lines of her body down to the tailored skirt. As his gaze came back to hers, she was warmer all over, and more flustered.

“I told you not to come here today. Why did you?”

“Because you told me I had twenty strikes coming, and you only gave me eleven. So I still owe you nine.”

His lips tugged, a sexy half-smile, but as he studied her, the smile thinned. “That was what you meant by unfinished work.”

She nodded. “That, and that last document I didn’t complete.”

Ben sighed. He put his hand on her hip, and before she could anticipate him, he’d slid those capable fingers to her right buttock, cupping it firmly. When she flinched, his eyes darkened. “I’m a sadist, Marcie,” he said softly. “But not that kind.” His touch eased and he stroked her curves, giving her body another glance. “You have no idea what you look like, sleeping on my couch, your neckline showing that lace edge of your bra, your killer legs curved up. All this beautiful hair.” His other hand threaded through it, cupping her face. “Come on, get up. I’m taking you out for a beignet.”

“Café du Monde?” Her expression brightened. She loved the view of Jackson Square, the artists, the musicians and impromptu performances.