7. Large Capable Hand
Bailey
It’s easy to forget how large Sacha is until all eight feet of him is standing behind you, holding an umbrella big enough to shield a family of five. He waits patiently while I fish my apartment key out of my purse.
Even though it’s Saturday he’s still wearing a suit; I wonder if he was in the office today or if he just dresses like this all the time. His dark blue suit jacket is tucked around my shoulders. He’s wearing a neatly tailored white button-down, with a thin black tie. The guy knows how to dress himself, that’s for sure.
His posture is excellent. He carries himself with the confidence earned from being a tall, handsome, self-made millionaire. Billionaire? I wonder how much money he actually has. He his eyes flick down to mine, and I realize I might be staring. I flash him a quick grin. He gives me an easy smile in return. My stomach flips with delight.
And oh shit, I am in trouble.
I might want to have sex with my boss.
This is why I can’t have nice things. Because I’m an idiot, who makes bad decisions, and falls for unattainable men. Of course I like him. I already know he’s a bad guy who fucks his assistants and then fires them. Or fires them when they turn him down? Which is worse?
All that matters is that I can’t have a fling with my boss at the best paying job I’ve ever had. I have to keep it.
“Thanks for the ride, Mr. Kwatch.” My fingers finally wrap around the cool metal key. “I’d love to invite you in, but—” I mentally catalog our dirty living room, the stained futon, the mismatched thrift store end tables, the scratched Ikea coffee table we found on the curb when our neighbor moved out, “I think I’m actually too poor to let you see how I live.”
“I’m sure your home is perfectly acceptable.” Sacha shakes his head.
“I doubt you’d say that if you saw it; I’m saving you from getting covered in cat hair—” I hurriedly open my door, hoping to get him out of my hair. Later, I can get him out of my head with a quick flick of the bean.
“Wait! Shit! Stop!” My roommate, Margot, yells as the apartment door swings open.
She’s too late. A herd of tiny foster kittens swarms the entrance, mewling excitedly as they make a break for the terrifying freedom of the city streets.
Crouching, I manage to grab the two slowest escapees by the scruff. I swivel to capture the rest, but Sacha has easily scooped up the remaining three with one large, capable hand. He cradles the two black kittens close to his broad chest, while the little calico uses her tiny needle claws to climb his shirt, yowling the entire way to his shoulder.
Yep. I definitely want to fuck my boss.
“Shit, shit. Sorry, Cheddar! I’m so sorry!” Margot appears in the doorway with the sixth kitten in one hand and a wooden spoon in the other. “I didn’t think you’d be home for hours. They can get out of their enclosure now. Did you know that?” Her words stop when she catches sight of Sacha, and her eyes trail from his bare toes all the way up to the top of his head. She smirks and pushes a strand of long brown hair behind her ear. “Who’s this?”
“This is Sacha Kwatch. My new boss.”
Margot’s big green eyes widen. “Is this the coworker you went on the date with?”
“No.” I shush her with a look before she can say anything else and scoot past her into the living room.
Rhapsody, the exhausted mama cat, gives my leg a brush hello before I set Galileo and Figaro down in the playpen that they previously couldn’t escape. Figaro immediately begins to scale the side. Keeping them contained might be a thing of the past.
“You were on a date with a coworker?” There’s an edge to Sacha’s voice, probably because I’m already breaking some office fraternization rule I didn’t know about, he shakes his head. “Don’t answer that, it’s none of my business.”
I take the piebald Magnifico and the tiny black Scaramouch from his hands and put them with their siblings. Beelzebub is clinging desperately to his shoulder, leaving little pulls in the fabric of his nice shirt.
He extracts the kitten from his person gently, scratching under her chin with one large finger. The little daredevil purrs for him. Rhapsody weaves between his legs. He stoops to run his fingers along her back and return her kitten.
Margot watches all of this with her lower lip tucked between her teeth. “This is the guy who said you smell bad?”
“Margot, please!”
Sacha winces. “You don’t smell bad, Ms. Thorn. Sorry if that was implied. Bigfoots just have an…intense olfactory ability.”
“You gave Cheddar Bay Biscuit a ride home?”
“I saw Ms. Thorn on the street while I was headed to dinner,” Sacha says. He’s still petting the foster cat, who’s rolled over to show him her belly.
“Right. Of course you did.”
“I got caught in the rain,” I say. “It was very nice of him.”
“Clearly.” Margot eyes the large jacket that engulfs me.
I start to shrug the coat off, regretting that I have to give it back. It’s warm and it smells like him. “Sorry, if it’s covered in cat hair now.”
“It’s not a problem.” He holds out the new phone.
“What’s that?” Margot points her wooden spoon at the box. “Did you finally get a new phone? Did he buy you a new phone?”
“It’s for work.” It’s a small lie and when I glance at Sacha hoping he will confirm, I catch his eyes skirting across my unsupported tits again, the way he did in the car. I roll my shoulders back, trying to present the girls in their most flattering position. It should be irritating for your boss to ogle you, but right now I only feel slightly complimented.
“Well, I hope you stay and help her set it up, because, after the last one, I am not spending hours trying to teach this Luddite how to transfer her information. Do Bigfoots eat chili?”
He blinks at her.
“I’m making vegetarian chili for dinner. I thought I’d be home alone for the evening, but there’s more than enough for everyone. I assume you didn’t eat either, Bay, since you are home early.”
“You assume correctly,” I mutter.
“I couldn’t possibly impose,” Sacha says.
“Not an imposition. I offered it up!” Margot waves her spoon through the air.
“Margot makes good chili. You should stay,” I find myself saying, “If you want,” I hurriedly add, realizing a billionaire doesn’t need to slum it in his assistant’s grimy apartment. I turn toward the hallway to my bedroom. “I’m just going to change out of these wet clothes.”
I escape down the hall to my bedroom, where I stare at my wardrobe for a long time, trying to decide what to wear. Nothing too revealing. Nothing too cute. Something comfortable, but not too comfortable. My favorite leggings are so threadbare you can see my ass through them, but I don’t think that’s what I want to expose him to tonight. I need to remove all sexual tension from this situation; it will ruin everything if I try to fuck him. I pull an old pair of Christmas pajamas from the bottom of my drawer. The safest bet. Baggy red flannel, with reindeer leaping across them, definitely does not say ‘Please try to sleep with me, big sexy boss man’.
Fully dressed, I return to the living room to find Sacha sitting on the carpeted floor, his back leaning against the cat-hair-covered futon, half a dozen kittens clamoring across his lap, and one large hand idly stroking Rhapsody, who is already completely in love with him.
Good taste, that cat.
“What’s her name?” He grins up at me, his whole face melting into something alarmingly attractive. He looks, actually—happy.
I may have been too hasty when I chose my outfit.
“Rhapsody,” I say. “She’s a foster, just staying here until she finds the right place to live forever.” I crouch beside him, and his nostrils flare as I point to the kittens. “Galileo, Figaro, Magnifico, Scaramouch, Fandango, and you already met Beelzebub. You like cats?”
“It’s uh…a Bigfoot thing. Animals tend to love us. I usually love them back.” There’s a quiet contentment on his face.
“You have any pets?”
He shakes his head. “Grew up with some, but since moving to the city, I haven’t taken the plunge. We moved around a lot with the start-up, but now that I’m settled, I’ve thought about finding a friend.”
“Rhapsody and her kittens will be available soon. Some already have homes lined up, but I foster all the time, so if you have any questions, you can ask me.”
“I will.” His voice hits a low pitch that unsettles my stomach.
Margot is humming something in the kitchen, and that makes me far too aware of being completely alone with Sacha. Aware of the way his thick dark eyelashes flutter on his cheeks, the way his broad shoulders move under his shirt. He’s rolled up his shirt sleeves, exposing more inches of muscly hairy arm; the long red fur at his wrist snakes up his forearms to disappear under his shirt.
I wonder how much more hair there is. Does it stretch all the way up his broad shoulders? Does it cover his wide chest? How hairy is his back, or his ass? Or his dick? He’s a big guy. I bet his dick is big too. I try to ignore the urge to look at his lap, but my eyes naturally fall there.
And then I notice the phones in his lap. Two phones. My broken one and the brand new one. Panic wells up inside of me.
“Are you going through my phone?”
“I gave him your passcode. I don’t have the patience to help you with it again!” Margot calls from the other room.
“I’m just moving your data to the new one.”
“There are private things on there.” I scowl in my roommate’s direction.
“You don’t have anything he shouldn’t see.”
“There are certain things he definitely shouldn’t see, Margot.”
“Whoops. Forgot about the photos.” Margot feigns innocence, but she is a scheming two-faced liar who did this on purpose.
“Photos?” Sacha asks, and then his face blanches, like it hadn’t even occurred to him that my phone might contain private information, private photos. His eyes drop to the devices in his lap. “Oh! I didn’t see anything! I didn’t look for anything! I wouldn’t! Confidentiality is a cornerstone of the Cryptech company!” He coughs and hands me the new phone. “You should be all set up.”
“It’s okay, I trust you,” I say it on instinct, but am kind of surprised when I realize it’s true.
“Trust is a vital quality between employers and their employees.” He gently dislodges the kittens from his lap and stands to his full height.
“Are you leaving?” I didn’t really think he would stay, but I’m still a little disappointed to see him go.
“I have places I should be. Please tell your friend that I appreciate her offer.” He’s already retreating toward the door, his attention back on his own phone screen, but he looks up and gives me a smile before he opens the front door.
“Thank you, sir. For the ride. And the new phone.” I start wrangling kittens as my boss closes the door, leaving my small apartment.
“Is he gone?” Margot’s head pops into the room a moment later. The latch has barely closed before she is asking, “You are going to fuck him, right?”
“Margot,” I hiss.
She just grins. “I would fuck him if I were you, is all I’m saying.”
“Yeah. Obviously, you would. You’re a whore.” I toss a throw pillow in her direction.
She laughs. “I’m not a whore, Cheddar. Whores get money. I’m just a poor law student who sleeps around!”
“I don’t think he wants to sleep with me.”
“He definitely does,” she counters.
“Probably,” I admit. We both saw him staring at my tits then. I scrunch my nose. “I think he fucks a lot of his assistants, and none of them have lasted very long. I need this job, Margot! It’s such good money. If I play my cards right, they might actually hire me full time! I won’t have to keep being a temp.”
“But if you fuck your rich boss, then maybe you will have a rich boyfriend and a job!” Margot grins wildly.
“I’m trying really hard not to fuck it up this time.” If I make this last, then I can finally put my business degree to good use. I can follow my real dreams. I can find a way to make a difference in the world.
“I know, babe.” Margot’s face softens. She’s my oldest friend; she’s stuck by my side through every whim or wild idea I’ve ever attempted. “Chili?”
I happily follow her into the kitchen. Margot is my ride or die. Since we met our freshman year of college, and beautiful, talented Margot’s life has always gone swimmingly. She’s got an excellent GPA, a killer internship, and she’s about to start her last year of law school.
Meanwhile, I finished my MBA thirteen months ago and am still floundering to find my footing. Margot’s always supported every odd idea I’ve had, until each of those plans failed out. I’ve feel like I’ve been jumping from one job opportunity to the next, but it’s hard to stand still when bills and debt make the world feel like it could crumble out from under you at any moment. The only thing I can seem to commit to is helping animals find people who love them.
Too bad toe beans can’t be used to pay rent.
I need to make this job last. I’m not going to fuck up and get fired, I’m not going to run away at the first sign of trouble, and I am not going to sleep with Sacha Kwatch.