Lovers and Takers (13 page)

“That’s just semantics, Aubrey.”

“No, it’s not semantics,” Aubrey said, amazed that Druce didn’t realize it too.
 
“The Cambridge campaign is a no go until they clean that shit up.
 
My father would have my head on a platter if I let something that dishonest leave my desk approved.”

And with that kind of lame-ass decision-making at the top it’s no wonder we’re in trouble
, Druce thought about saying, but his desk intercom buzzed before he could verbalize any displeasure.
 
He was tired of these junior executives constantly making an end run-around him to run and tell Aubrey every time he made a decision in Aubrey’s absence.

He pressed the intercom button.
 
“What is it, Florence?” he asked with a frown.

“
Troy
 
Brackston
is here to see you, sir.”

Druce looked at Aubrey.
  
“I’m done,” Aubrey said, rising to his feet.

“Send him in, Flo,” Druce said, and then stood up too.
 

“Get back with me on Cambridge,” Aubrey said.

“Yes, sir,” Druce said.

“And I still need that report on all cost overruns, Druce,” Aubrey said as the office door opened.
 
“I need it by COB today.”

Today
, Druce wanted to scream.
 
Are you out of your fucking mind
?
 
But he only smiled.
 
Especially now that Troy had come.
 
“I’ll get on it,” he said, looking beyond Aubrey at the Adonis that had just entered his office.
 
Aubrey looked back too, and when he saw Troy he remembered him.
 
Very young, very good looking, very eager to please.
 
Troy Brackston, Aubrey thought, was a young man who made sure everybody remembered him.
 
He was so pretty, with his jet black skin and big bright smile, that it was hard to forget him.

“Hello, Mr. Varnadore,” Troy said with that bright smile as Aubrey made his way toward the exit.

“How are you?” Aubrey asked.

“I’m wonderful!
 
Very kind of you to ask.”

“Later, Druce,” Aubrey said and headed out.
 
When he glanced back, Druce’s full attention had already shifted to his guest, and he was grinning from ear to ear.

And within minutes of Aubrey’s departure, after Troy turned in the desk reports he had to submit, Druce smiled.

“Lock the door,” he said.

Troy smiled, too, although he was dreading this encounter.
 
But he did what he had to do.
 
When he arrived behind Druce’s desk, he assumed the position.

Druce was so anxious to get his dick inside of Troy that he didn’t even bother to unbuckle his pants.
 
He simply zipped them down and pulled it out.
 

Troy’s pants were down to his knees as he leaned over, both hands flat on the desk, and endured the humiliation once again.
 
He wished Aubrey Varnadore was interested, because there was a man more to his taste.
 
But every time he tried to hold any kind of conversation with Aubrey, he’d smile and acknowledge him, but he’d keep walking as if he didn’t have time for the likes of him.
 
Which gave him no choice but to suck up to trailer park trash like Druce.

And he pounded Troy like a man who didn’t care.
 
He pounded him so hard, with no prepping whatsoever, that Troy’s small body was ramming against the desk with each hard pounce.
 

Troy wanted to scream.
 
He wanted to scream for him to hurry the fuck up so he can go on with his day.
 
He hated this shit!
 
He hated it with a passion!
 
But Druce was notorious for wanting it sometimes three, four times a day, and apparently today would be no exception.

And he took forever, pounding and pounding and whispering all of his sickening sex talk in Troy’s ear.
 
And Troy took it.
 
He endured the pain and humiliation and took it.
 
Until the knob of the locked office door could be heard turning.
 
And then someone was unlocking the door.

Druce quickly snatched out, his pre-cum slinging out too, and he whipped his still erect manhood back into his pants. He moved with a desperate swiftness toward the opening door.
 
Troy, with absolutely no time to do anything else, quickly sat in the chair behind the desk, his pants still around his
ankles,
his ass still stinging from Druce’s pounding.

It was Pam, peering in first and then, on seeing Druce coming toward her, grinning and coming on in.
 
“There you are!” she said in her usual cheerfulness.

“Hey, babe,” Druce said, kissing her grandly as soon as he reached her, and then zipping his fly with one hand as he did.
 
Troy considered standing and pulling up his pants, but he couldn’t.
 
Pam’s eyes were opened as Druce kissed her, and they were staring unblinkingly at him.

“You’re a sight for the sore eye, girl,” Druce said when he finished kissing her.
 
“But I was in a serious meeting, babe.
 
That’s why the door was locked.”

“But I have a key,” Pam said with a smile, showing the key.

Druce was amazed by that.
 
How did that bitch get a key to his office?
 
But he didn’t show his irritation.
 
“So how are you?
 
What brings you here?”

 
“Who is that?” she wanted to know, motioning toward Troy.

Druce turned around, hoping Troy had enough sense to get himself together.
 
He was surprised to see him seated behind his desk.
 
“That’s one of my assistants,” he said, knowing he had to think up something fast.
 
“I’ve ordered him to sit behind that desk and keep trying to reach a certain client of ours.
 
A client that his incompetence caused us to lose.
 
But in the meantime,” Druce said, putting his arm around her shoulder and steering her toward the exit, “what you say to me and you getting out of here?
 
We can go to lunch, maybe stop by my place?”

“Oh,” Pam said.
 
“That sounds fabulous actually.”

“Good,” Druce said.
 
“I’ll stop off at the executive restroom and then we’ll be good to go.”

Pam moved to Druce’s pull.
 
She looked back at Troy, however, at who was perhaps the prettiest boy she’d ever seen, as they left.

SIX

Six days later and you could hear a pin drop in the second floor office inside the Wingate Law Center.
 
Roni was seated behind her desk, and Griff Armstrong was seated in front of it.
 
And for the longest time neither one of them knew what to say.

Until Griff finally exhaled.
 
“We’ve got to consider
laying
off more staff.
 
And, yes, that includes investigators, Roni.
 
Because if we lose another sponsor, another big one like McCormick, then we all might as well pack our bags and go home.”

“We’ve already cut back on staff, Griff.
 
If we lay off any more investigators how are we going to work these cases?
 
We’ve got to keep our boots on the ground.”

“I agree with you, but McCormick has pulled out.
 
That changes everything.
 
Their foundation was providing fifteen percent of our revenue stream.
 
Fifteen percent, Roni!
 
We can’t lose fifteen percent of anything and expect to come out of it unscathed.
 
This is a devastating blow.”

Roni leaned forward, her elbows on the desk.
 
“I’ll talk to our remaining donors,” she said, “to make sure they stay on board.”

“Charm them, Roni.
 
You’re good at it.”

“Yeah, right.
 
Me charming a bunch of fat, jowly guys, all of which are trying to get in my panties.”

Griff laughed.
 
“Not all of them are fat, come on.”

“You know what I mean.”

“We’ve got to do something.
 
We can’t take another hit.”

“I agree.
 
I couldn’t agree with you more, Griff.
 
But that doesn’t make it any easier.”

Griff nodded.
 
“Amen,” he said.

Roni’s cell phone, seated on her desk, began to ring.
 
She quickly answered it
,
 
hoping
it was McCormick changing their mind.

“Veronica Wingate.”

There was a pause.
 
“Hello, Veronica.”

It was Jake.
 
It was the man she had been trying not to think about since he left her shower, and her home, nearly a week ago.
 
Especially after he hadn’t bothered to so much as phone her since that time.
 

“Hello,” she said.

“Hi,” Jake replied, his voice attempting to sound upbeat.
 
“Did I catch you in the middle of something?”

“Other than work you mean?”

Jake laughed.
 
“I won’t keep you then.”
 
But then there was another pause.
 
“I can move some things around if you care to have dinner with me tonight.”

Yeah, Roni thought, she knew what kind of dinner he wanted to have.
 
But the crazy thing about it was that she wouldn’t mind having that kind of dinner herself.
 
She probably needed that kind of dinner.
 
Especially the way he prepared it.
 

But she couldn’t do it.
 
She didn’t like the after burn.
 
She didn’t like the way she felt when day after day after day, she wanted him to phone, and he didn’t.

 
“Can’t tonight,” she said.

Griff smiled.
 
“Is it a man?” he mouthed.
 
Roni nodded her head.

“You can’t?” he said, a slight twinge of surprise in his voice.
 

“I can’t,” Roni repeated.

There was hesitation on Jake’s part, as if he didn’t expect a
no
.
 
“Okay,” he said.
 
“Well.
 
Well.
 
You take care of yourself.”

That was it?
 
No pushback at all?
 
Roni wasn’t exactly surprised, but she was just a wee bit disappointed.
 
“You too,” she said.
 

“Sure,” Jake said, and quickly hung up.

She hesitated, her phone still in her hand, and then tossed it back onto her desk.

“Who was that?” Griff asked.

Roni was still working out the implications of the call herself.
 
He sounded almost upset with her refusal to just drop everything and go have sex with him.
 
Men
, she thought.

“Who was that?” Griff asked again.

“Jake,” she said.

“And who is Jake?”

Roni suddenly felt oddly vulnerable, and she hated the feeling.
 
That guy wasn’t phoning her because he wanted to get to know her better, and she wasn’t about to have any such illusions.
 
“Jake is,” she started, and then decided to just tell the truth.
 
“Jake is some guy trying to get some.”

“To get some,” Griff asked perceptively, “or to get some more?”

At first Roni was startled by his comeback, especially by the accuracy of it.
 
And then she smiled, and raised her eyebrows.
 
Griff laughed.

In his office on the top floor of the Varnadore Corporate headquarters building, Jake was anything but lively.
 
He swerved his executive chair toward his wall-sized window and looked out at the Miami skyline.
 
He couldn’t explain why he even bothered to call the woman to begin with.
 
It had been a week and he hadn’t phoned her.
 

He hadn’t phoned mainly because he wasn’t in the country.
 
He has just returned today from Eastern Europe, where negotiations there had his schedule packed from early morning to late night.
 
But even in Europe he thought about her often.
 
And as soon as he got back in town, he felt a need to phone her.
 
He felt a mighty need to phone her.
 
And then to break down and do it, and to have her turn him down, again, was just too much.
 
Who did she think she was dealing with, he wanted to
know.
 
Who did she think she was to do him this way?