Now, Please (11 page)

“What about my computer? And should I give the credit card to you or Brenda?”

He shook his head in small jerks. “The computer will be needed in your next position. Keep that with you. And keep the credit card, in case you need something.”

“I won’t need anything, Hunter. You gave me a job. I’m all set.”

His arms flexed. His gaze hit mine, powerful and intense. “Keep it. You’ll need a new place to live, maybe new furniture—”

“I’ll just leave it with Brenda.” I stood and turned for the door.

“Olivia.”

I paused, glancing back. Fire lit his eyes and his jaw clenched. He stared, not saying anything.

“Is that it for today?” I asked. “This is the exit interview, I take it…”

To his continued silence, I turned and walked from the room. I tidied up my desk, took the last of my personal items, left the credit card on Brenda’s desk, and cried as I made my way home.

I
jumped
when my phone rang. I’d been sitting in my room, staring at the wall. Normal people would probably have been staring out the window, but really, what was the difference? I wasn’t seeing anything anyway.

I held my phone up so I could see the screen, expecting it to be Kimberly. I’d filled her in on what had happened with Hunter shortly after my last day, needing to purge, and now she called daily, sometimes more, to check up on me. I got the impression she was worried that I would haul myself to the Golden Gate Bridge and do a swan dive off it.

A shock ran through me at seeing Bruce’s name on my phone, having a hard time replacing the misery of love gone wrong. I knew he had my number, but he’d never called it before. He always emailed me with questions. For him to call me at all, let alone on a Saturday, was definitely odd. Or an emergency.

I swiped the phone before holding it to my ear. “Hello?”

“Livy, hi. It’s Bruce.”

“Oh hey—”

“Listen, I hear you’re changing jobs. What’s up?”

A laugh died in the back of my throat. The man was nothing if not bold and a little pushy. Pain rushed in to cover the delight, as I remembered how alike he and Hunter were when it came to focus and work ethic. They’d probably be an excellent team. Better than Hunter and I were.

Hand shaking, I swallowed down a sob. After a deep breath, I said, “I’m going to do something a little more up my alley, I think.”

“He said you’d be in the IT department. That right?”

“Yeah. Yes. Yup.” What was this, a lesson on how many ways to give an affirmation?

“That’s not totally in your wheelhouse. Sure you’d be any happier there than as an admin?”

“I—”

“Because listen, I’ve been thinking. We’re on to something. I really think we’ve created some magic. If we pull this app off how I think we will, it’s going to lead to dollars. If we put that money back into our product, like Hunter suggested, and use that momentum, I’d bet we have the makings of a great business here, Livy.”

I resumed my stare at the wall. I didn’t want to think of business, because that made me think about Hunter. And
that
lead to thoughts on who he got to replace me. He might’ve had someone right at that moment, bent over his desk, giving herself to his pleasure. She’d have a contract, and new clothes, and Hunter’s time.

I heaved a sigh as tears filled my eyes. “I thought you wanted to get out of business.”

“I’ll need
something
to do. My wife can’t possibly want me hanging around the whole time. If we just keep it small, I think it would be a fine day job.”

“That’s probably what you said about the last startup. And look how that turned out…”

I heard a bark of laughter. “Yes, but I know what I’m doing this time. Mostly. Still, I’ll have you. You’re a rock of sense.”

I huffed.

“I really think we can do this, Olivia.”

I wiped a tear off my cheek. “I’m just the helper. I don’t know much about business.”

The line was silent for a moment. When Bruce spoke again, his tone was softened. “Look, Livy…I don’t know what went wrong, but I do know that removing yourself totally from the situation might be best. I’ll beat whatever Hunter is paying you. I have faith that we’ll make money once this gets going. You’d be great on my team. We work well together, our ideas are tight, and our programming is top-notch. Together we can make magic. I really believe that.”

I shook my head miserably, but I couldn’t help believing in his conviction. Not only that, but his words rang true. We
were
a great team. We
did
create some great stuff when we put our heads together. And I’d finally be able to do what I loved. Just not with the man I was growing to love.

“I don’t know, Bruce. I need some time to think about it.” I leaned back against my headboard. “For now, I’ll still work on the notes and help out. I just don’t know that I’m ready to be a partner.”

“I’m having a contract drawn up—you already
are
a partner, Livy. You need to get paid for what you’re helping with. I’ll have my secretary send it over. This would just be formalized.”

I groaned. “Not more contracts!”

“Listen, I have to go. I’m supposed to be in a meeting. But think about it, okay? You love this work—don’t try to tell me you don’t. And with the buyout, your salary will be secure. There’s no reason to say no.”

“I’ll think about it.”

“Think hard. Okay, see ya.”

The line went dead. I pulled the phone away from my head, making sure the call had ended, before dropping my hand to the bed.

There was a reason to say no. I’d be officially separating myself from Hunter. Right now I was moving away, yes, but I would still be in the same company. I’d still get emails from the CEO’s office. I could still easily chat with Brenda in a work capacity. And yes, I would still have the opportunity to see Hunter, however remote. In his company, I was still within his circle of influence, no matter how removed. If I left, I’d be tearing myself away for real. For good. That would be the end.

I shuddered in a sob. It felt like my heart was clawing out through my chest.

I should leave Hunter’s company. I should leave Hunter.

My phone rang again. This time it was Kimberly. I silenced it and heaved myself off the bed. In a fog, I left my phone behind and made my way out of my apartment and down to the street. I walked to the bus stop and boarded the next bus, out of spite.

I couldn’t deny that I wanted to work for Bruce. His project was as fun as it was rewarding. Writing the code, and then watching what it created, sparked my happy sensors. I felt at home with it in a way that I never felt I belonged in the admin role.

I belonged in that job the same way I belonged with Hunter.

I wiped another tear from my face as I stared out of the bus window. The woman next to me hawked a loogie and spat it into a paper bag. That action wasn’t as revolting to me as leaving Hunter for good.

“I’m in a fix,” I muttered at the window.

I was surrounded by people, but none of them even turned my way. They ignored me chatting to myself, just like they ignored the woman spitting into a bag. Welcome to public transportation in San Francisco.

If I took Bruce’s job, I could stay in the city. Near Hunter.

I ran my hand over my eyes. “I’m just not getting the picture. He doesn’t want me!” I mumbled furiously.

In a way, it kind of felt good to blend in with the crazy people that frequented the bus system. I felt crazy. I felt like I was losing a piece of myself. A very important, central piece.

I thought of my dad. I wanted to tell him my woes, cry in his arms, and listen to his words of wisdom. He’d know what to do. He’d know how to help me.

As the bus made its slow way through the city, I knew where I needed to go to make a decision.

“
W
hat are you doing here
?”

I stared at my mother with barely contained irritation. “I’m visiting the house I grew up in. I still have stuff here, or did you sell it all for more space?”

I pushed past her into the moderate space of her three-bedroom house located in San Rafael, a city north of San Francisco.

“At least you’re not embarrassing,” my mom said with a flat tone as she looked me over. I had on jeans, as normal, but I’d paired it with a nice sweater Hunter had bought me. I’d also done my hair and makeup, as Kimberly had instructed. She’d said the worst thing for a person with heartache was to mope. If I did myself up, looking good on the outside would make me feel better on the inside.

Turned out, she’d been completely wrong. But looking better on the outside made people
think
I was doing okay, and left me alone. That was enough.

“It’s Sunday—aren’t you supposed to be at a garden party or something?” Only then did the murmur of voices drift to me from the living room.

“I’m having a small soiree here. I thought it might be nice for Sean to stay here while he’s in town. More homey than a stuffy hotel in the city.” My mom lifted her chiseled nose in the air. She’d had two nose jobs, both gifts from two different boyfriends.

“Sean is…new?” I asked.

“Yes.” My mother smiled with plump lips she was not born with. “I met him at a party the other night. He’s an investment banker.”

“Huh. And how does his wife feel about you?”

She rolled her eyes. “He plans to get a divorce, so it doesn’t really matter. All I have to do is hold on for a few months, and then snatch him up. After that, it’s off to New York for me. He’s just out here on business.”

“Oh, right.” I shook my head. The story was always the same, and my mother always believed them.

She surveyed my outfit again.

“Don’t worry, I won’t be in your way. I just want to get a few things and then I’ll be gone.”

My mother made a noncommittal sound and swished her blond hair away from her eyes. Without another word, she sauntered off toward the living room.

The woman was a knockout, even in her fifties. It was too bad she always went for wealthy men with wives and kids. She kept believing they’d leave their old lives and start over with her, but she always got turned down. If she kept on, she’d end up lonely and alone.

Not that I was doing any better. What did they say about a living in glasshouse with a pocketful of stones?

I slunk into my room and swiped my old teddy bear off my bed. The one thing my mom had done for me was keep my room as it was. I wasn’t welcomed around all that often, as I cramped her style, but she did leave me just the tiny bit of my past that I clung on to with both hands in times like these.

I hugged my bear to my chest and dug my face into his soft, old head. Fresh tears fell, wetting his matted fur.

I longed for the past, when I would wait with this bear until my dad showed up for our weekend together. He loved me more than the breath in his lungs. We’d have such fun together, picnicking or watching a movie. Whenever I was heartbroken, or simply had a bad day, he’d just sit and listen to the sad tale, then hug me close, promising that someday I’d meet someone who would treat me like the treasure I was. Little did I know at the time that he was that man. He was the epitome of unconditional love, and now that he was gone, I felt like I didn’t matter to anyone at all.

I heaved myself off my childhood bed and wandered into my mother’s room. I exited to the backyard through her sliding glass door and found the old tire swing hanging from the oak tree in the corner of the brown square that used to be lawn. I settled myself onto it gingerly, monitoring the bend of the branch overhead. Satisfied that it would hold, I gently swung with my bear in my arms and let the tears come freely.

The sliding glass door rolled at the other side of the yard. Laughter rumbled through until my mother’s high-pitched, excited chatter floated nearer. “See, there she is. She must’ve snuck out here, the little minx!”

I gave one of those shudder sighs that said my body hadn’t recovered from the constant crying, and wiped my eyes on my sleeve. There was no telling who she was sending out to find me. Probably the cousin, nephew, or junior associate of the man she was dating. If she got me hitched with money, or even the prospect of money, she’d assume all her troubles would be over.

I rested my chin on the tire swing, waiting for the bachelor of the moment to saunter in front of me, thinking I was as easy as my mom.

“There now. Can I get you something? Are you sure you don’t want some wine? Or sparkling water?” my mother asked, a few paces behind me.

“No.”

Cold washed down my spine as I snapped my head around.

Hunter stood next to my mother in one of his tailored suits. Straight and tall, handsome and broad, he looked like a million dollars while standing in the wilderness of my childhood backyard. He slid his hands in his pockets as my mom winked at me and walked back. A few people looked out the sliding glass door at Hunter before my mother shooed them back into the house and closed the door.

Hunter’s deep brown eyes, always hooded as though just emerging from the throes of climax, gazed at me with regret and uncertainty. “Need a push?”

Aware that my face was probably still stained with tears, and worried it was streaked with worse, I turned away to wipe my eyes and nose on my sleeve. “No,” I said with a hoarse voice. “I don’t trust the branch to hold up.”

I heard his six-hundred-dollar shoes crunch on the brittle, dead grass. He stopped in front of me, looking down on my face.

“What are you doing here?” I asked softly, not daring to meet his eyes. I knew better than to ask how he found me—the man could get whatever information he wanted, one way or another.

“Brenda doesn’t put my coffee in the exact same place on the desk every time she brings it to me. She also doesn’t smell like lilac on a fresh spring morning. She doesn’t have the low, sultry hum to her voice, or the uncommon beauty I look forward to. Her hips don’t sway in a completely unassuming way that still manages to catch every male eye in the vicinity. I don’t want to look up from my work when Brenda walks away, as I always do with you. I don’t want to touch her, or kiss her, or watch an embarrassed flush creep up her face. And I certainly don’t want to do that with some other random admin after my cock or my money.”

I blinked up at him, barely daring to believe what I was hearing.

“I missed you as soon as you walked out of my office,” he continued. “I’ve not got anything done since you left. I might as well have stayed home. But home wouldn’t have you there. And with you is where I want to be.”

“But…your contract…” New tears were flowing now. Tears of hope. I was desperate to believe him.

He stepped closer and brushed his fingertips along my chin to lift my face. “I can’t have you near, because you distract me, but banning you from my life completely derails me. A contract can’t fix what’s wrong with me. It was to prevent the feelings you are forcing me to feel. I can’t go back to the way things were. I can’t pretend I don’t have feelings for you, Livy. So I find myself in uncharted waters.”

“What does that mean for us? For you?”

He bent to brush his lips along mine. “I’d tell you to run, but I would chase you. I am chasing you. Come back to work for me.”

I nodded, not trusting my voice.

His eyes softened as his lips turned up into a grin. “Good. I hoped I wouldn’t have to beg.”

“I didn’t know begging was something you did.”

“It isn’t. Neither is breaking my own rules and getting attached. Or kissing. Yet with you, all I seem to do are things I usually don’t.” He bent and gave me a slow kiss. “Show me your bedroom. This is where you were raised?”

“You’re not going to do a personality flip again, are you?” I asked, gingerly getting out of the tire swing. With my luck, the branch holding it would break in half and crack me on the head.

“I hope not, because then I’d have another miserable week. I don’t think I could go through that again.” His strong arm wrapped around my waist, pulling me closer. “I’m sorry. For everything. You are a saint for sticking with me.”

“I didn’t really have much choice. Last week wasn’t much better for me.”

“I know,” he whispered, touching his lips to mine again. He opened my mouth with his, flicking his tongue inside.

I fell headfirst into the kiss. My surroundings dropped away as I focused completely on his touch.

“Show me your room,” he murmured against my lips.

I led him through the sliding glass door and my mother’s bedroom until I could shut the door to my room with him inside it. Unable to wait, I pushed him against the door and captured his kiss again, sinking into the feeling of his lips moving against mine. I unbuttoned his shirt before sliding my palms along his smooth, muscled skin.

“Here?” he asked in a heavy voice. “Are you sure?”

“Yes.” I pushed off his jacket before undoing his pants.

His hands slid up my sweater and covered my breasts. “Your mom won’t come in?”

“That’s what locks are for.” I giggled, turning the catch on the handle.

“I feel scandalous.” He pushed down my pants before sucking in a breath as I took his hard length in my hand.

“Says the man who orders his admin to bend over the desk.”

“Hmm.” He walked me backward. “We’ll do that tomorrow.”

I turned us and pushed. He fell back onto my bed. I knelt over him and took his erection into my mouth. I tickled the tip with my tongue before sucking it in. He groaned.

I backed off, trailing my lips against his shaft, before sucking again. I took him deep into my throat, loving his hasty release of breath. I worked my hand in tandem with my mouth, seeing his muscles start to flex. I stopped and climbed on top of his body. I braced over him as his head came up and his hands grabbed my hips. I sat down.

A spark of color made me pause. “Oh, holy— Hmm.” I smiled with my eyes closed, just feeling his size fill me up. I moved my hips in a circle. My smile melted as the sparks turned into bursts, lighting up my body.

His palms slid up my chest and cupped my breasts. His thumbs rubbed my nipples.

I blew out a breath as my sensual beginning turned into a harried gyration. I rocked forward and back, my hands braced on his chest and my head back. “Oh, Hunter,” I said, bucking now. Working him inside of me. Feeling the friction.

His fingers clutched my hips. He lifted and then pulled back down. My body crashed onto his.

“Oh
shhhhhii—
”
I rocked forward again, then back, before he picked me up and pulled. The tightness in my body started to pool in my core. Heat blazed, white hot. I rocked, then sat as he thrust up into me. My breathing turned ragged. Our movements were sloppy and fast, but perfect. Wild.

“Harder,” I begged, face pointed upward. Muscles flexed. Fingers dug into him. “
Harder!
”

Hunter sat up and encircled me in his strength. He trapped me to his chest and bucked up into me. His size pierced me, forcing the breath from my lungs. My bed screamed against the floor. The end slammed into the wall.

“Oh… Oh!” I held on. Almost there. Another thrust. One more.

“Ahhh!” Fire spilled over and coursed through my body. I let out a glorious moan as an orgasm lit me up. I shuddered over Hunter as I felt him shake beneath me.

I grabbed his face and gave him a deep kiss, sucking in his tongue as I trembled on top of him. His hands slid up my back languidly. He lay down, controlled the whole way to the bed. His abs held both our weight. I had no idea why that impressed me as much as it did.

I snuggled my face up to his neck and just breathed in his familiar smell. Lord how I’d missed it.

After a while, he said, “I fell in love for the first time when I was barely sixteen. It was to one of our maids, a girl three years or so older. She was a beauty, with heart-shaped lips that always seemed to be pouting. I lusted after her immediately, of course—I was basically a constant hard-on at that age. I would’ve been entranced with any pretty girl, but as I was homeschooled, she was the only one I was around for any length of time.”

Hunter’s hand reached out slowly and traveled down my arm until he clasped my hand. “I barely flirted before she noticed me, and a short time later I was sneaking her into my room. I basically fell into intimacy. She wasn’t a virgin, nor was she interested in taking it slow. Our first time making out, I felt all the intimate places on her body. The second, we both stripped down to our skin. The third I lost my virginity. Just like that. I loved it, though—as you would expect from a sixteen-year-old. I didn’t have a clue about what I was doing, but she was always willing.

“After a while I wanted to spend more time kissing. Or just being together. She never did. Thinking back now, I realize I missed out on a lot of sexual enlightenment. Don’t get me wrong, she taught me the ropes on how to please her, but when it came to me, she just lined me up and let me hump away like a rabid animal until it was over. Sex couldn’t have been that much fun for her, but that realization came later. Too late.

“We kept on for a few months before my mother figured out what was going on. She sat me down one day and said that it wasn’t exactly prudent for me to be fornicating—that’s the word she used—with the hired help, but I would do as I pleased. She asked me, simply, that I use protection. Not only for safety, but because I was much too young to be having a child. I told her that Denise—that was her name—was on the pill. My mom never spoke against that, but she still asked me in her levelheaded way to take charge of my own fate. Use protection.

“My mother is a sensible, reasonable woman. She was always fair with me, even when I was being Satan’s helper. I did as she asked. And oh, the fights that caused with Denise. She raged at me, and fought with me, and denied me, saying I didn’t trust her. This just made me dig in my heels all the more. I don’t respond well to that behavior. I’m too stubborn. Besides, my mother was right—I needed to take charge of my own fate. Denise started seducing me all over the house, often away from my bedroom—I suspect she was trying to get me away from my stash of condoms. I always had one on me, though.