Chapter 54
Anton
‘Athena’s an employee,’ I say matter-of-factly.
‘That wasn’t my question. And I’ve seen her suck your dick and hump your leg, so don’t gaslight me.’
‘Fine.’ I reach desperately for my wine. ‘She’s twenty-four.’
She remains impassive behind her sunglasses.
‘Don’t even think about sex-shaming me, Gen. She’s an adult, and she knows exactly what she’s doing, and I pay her fucking well.’
‘I wouldn’t do that, and I don’t doubt it.’ She sips her drink. I don’t know why, but her lack of reaction is pissing me off. Probably because it feels like a trap. There’s no way she can have no opinion on the fact that I’m fucking my EA.
Can she?
‘If you have something to say, you should say it,’ I tell her.
‘As long as you’re treating her properly and looking after her well-being, it’s none of my business.’ She picks up her menu and starts to peruse it.
She is a cool fucking customer.
‘Gen.’
She looks up at me.
‘It should be your business,’ I say.
I wish she’d take those bloody glasses off. I can’t see her eyes at all, but something about the way she puts down her menu and places her hands flat on top of it strikes me as vulnerable. Like she’s being very careful with her reactions.
‘I’ve spent one night with you, Anton. I’m not under any illusions as to what this is.’
Right. That’s quite enough of that crap. ‘Take off your glasses,’ I say, pulling my aviators off. ‘I want to see you.’
She sighs, then removes her dark glasses slowly and sets them down on the table. When she raises her blue eyes to me, I see exactly why she didn’t want to take her glasses off.
Those beautiful eyes are the windows to every last insecurity she has.
‘Do you remember what I said to you in your office the other night?’ I ask. ‘Before I left?’
She nods once. ‘Yeah.’
‘And what did I say?’
She squares her shoulders defensively. ‘That if you touched me, um, that would be… it. You wouldn’t be with anyone else.’
I’m unfeasibly pleased that she committed my words to memory.
‘Exactly,’ I say, reaching across the table and smoothing my hand up the soft skin of her arm. ‘Because I wouldn’t want to be with anyone else.’
She doesn’t say anything, just looks away from me and out to the golden hues of the setting sun. She tugs her lower lip between her teeth and chews.
‘Sweetheart,’ I say. ‘It may have technically been only one night, but this is a very deliberate decision on my part. Okay? I’ve wanted you from the second I laid eyes on you, and neither Athena nor any other women at the club or anywhere else hold an iota of interest for me.
I really want to make sure you know that, because I wouldn’t have got you here under false pretences. I told you you could trust me.’
‘You also told me you liked “women, plural” in your interview,’ she says, turning back to me. Her face is carefully expressionless. There’s no blame in her voice. It’s measured. Polite.
Too fucking polite.
I want her to fight for me.
‘I’m sure you remember I also told you that I’d failed in all my relationships to find a woman I was sexually compatible with,’ I say.
I lean forward. ‘This is what I was talking about, and yeah, I thought I’d have to fuck God knows how many women to get the kind of satisfaction I need.
But I knew—I fucking knew you’d be dynamite if you gave me a chance. ’
She’s staring at me, still chewing that lip, and I wish I could pull her onto my lap. Instead, I turn her hand palm up so I can stroke up over her pulse point, and I keep talking.
‘That’s why I’ll be redistributing Athena when I get back.’
‘No,’ she says with an alarm I’m not expecting. ‘You can’t do that.’
‘Yes I bloody can.’
‘Anton. I’m not going to let another woman lose her job because of me,’ she says. ‘Even if I don’t like the nature of your relationship.’
There it is. It does bother her. Thank fuck.
‘It’s a professional relationship,’ I insist. ‘I pay her almost as much as I pay Max, but don’t tell him that.
She’s from an agency I founded a few years ago.
The reason I pay her through the roof is because she’s very good at both sides of her job, but she’s also on a monthly rolling contract, and that’s a key part of our agreement.
She’s only been with me four months, so it’s no great hardship at my end to have her hand over to another EA and move on. ’
I can tell she’s agitated. ‘Why can’t she just stay and do her day job for a reduced rate?
’ she asks, and I’m in awe. Because it’s not every day a woman you’re involved with lobbies you on behalf of the employee you’re fucking, and I love her for it.
I love that she’d put aside her dislike of having me and Athena working closely together in favour of safeguarding my EA’s job.
‘She could,’ I say, ‘but I doubt she’d want to, because she can earn between five and ten times more fulfilling this particular combination of roles, which is what she’s specifically trained for.
And, more importantly, I don’t want her around, even if I never give her a second glance, which I won’t.
Because if I’m involved with you, I don’t want you to have a single second of doubt about what I’m getting up to at work. Ever.’
She gives me a sad smile. ‘Well, thank you. But I don’t think you should jump into anything. I’m a big girl—I can handle myself. And I feel uncomfortable having this conversation when I literally kissed you for the first time yesterday.’
We’re back to this again. Jesus. ‘Why?’ I ask her, my tone more harsh than I intend. ‘Because I’m freaking you out by talking about the future? Or because you’re worried I’m backing myself into a corner and at some point I’ll freak out and run for the hills?’
‘The latter,’ she says, so quietly I can barely hear it.
It should be reassuring to hear how concerned she is about whether I’m committed to this. Gratifying, even. But really, it just hurts my heart.
As I look at the spectacular woman in front of me, the woman who owns the very club I joined on a mission to emancipate myself, the woman who represents every fantasy and desire and need I didn’t know I have, I vow to myself to show her over and over that I’m committed to making a go of this.
‘I want to know what you do with her,’ she says, her voice still low.
I stare at her in horror, hoping I’ve misunderstood. ‘I beg your pardon?’
‘Tell me how you use her,’ she says.
‘No.’ I shake my head. ‘Absolutely not. Why the fuck would you want to know that?’
She licks her lips and fixes those eyes squarely on me. ‘Because I’m jealous.’
Oh, Jesus. I knew it. I squeeze her wrist. ‘I know you are, sweetheart. Which is why I think we should both put my little arrangement with her behind us. Okay?’
She pushes on. ‘That’s not what I mean. Yeah, of course I’m jealous you’ve been with her. But I mean I’m jealous that she got to be used like that by you, whenever you wanted. Because that’s my ultimate fantasy.’