19. Noah
19
NOAH
“ S he’s gorgeous, right?” James asked me.
I squinted up at the sleek black yacht from the dock and nodded. “No doubt. The color is unique. Really stands out among all the others.”
“That’s the idea,” James’s friend Theo Barnes said. “I have a few different models in my fleet, but the Black Diamond is the jewel in the crown. The perfect vessel for high-value clients who appreciate a rarity. Fifty meters, and she gets up to thirty-seven knots. Guarantee you’ve never seen anything like it.”
The guy clearly didn’t know I’d been a guest on the Sultan of Brunei’s yacht.
James had asked me to meet him for lunch at the yacht club but neglected to tell me his friend Theo would be joining us. Now I realized the lunch was a thinly veiled sales pitch for Theo’s soon-to-be-launched yacht rental business. I wished he would have given me a heads-up. I had enough going on already and didn’t have time to waste on someone blowing smoke up my ass. But James trusted him, so I was willing to hear him out. He seemed like he had a bit of an ego, but after dealing with celebrity athletes day-in and day-out, I was more than used to that and knew how to respond.
In fact, Theo looked like many of my young clients; tall and fit with a few dark tattoos trailing down his forearms and a close-cropped beard. But he had an air about him that suggested he didn’t just rent yachts. Theo Barnes seemed like he was better suited to playing on them than working with them.
Lunch had been a little tense. James and I didn’t feel the need to jockey for position after all our years as friends, but throwing Theo into the mix had shifted our delicate balance. It felt like he had something to prove. But it wasn’t like he was an asshole. I liked Theo, but I hadn’t understood at first why he kept shifting the conversation to yachts. Now it all made sense.
“Let me give you a tour,” Theo said, heading down the dock. “She’s really something.”
Once on board, I realized he was right. I wasn’t a yacht guy—I’d never had any designs on owning one—but I could appreciate the craftsmanship that went into them.
Theo walked backward like a tour guide as we entered the sumptuous main space. “The interior is by an Italian design house called Lux. My boats all have different aesthetics, and this is the sexiest. No color, just blacks and grays.”
“Not my usual vibe but I get it,” James admitted. As the owner of some of the hottest nightclubs in town, James knew all about how to generate a sexy vibe. His clubs all had it—and so did this yacht. It reminded me of a lot of the player mansions I’d seen.
“She’s got eight guest cabins, including the stateroom and a VIP suite,” Theo said, his pride obvious. “A game room, hot tub outside, and two jet skis. One of a kind, top of the line.”
It was hard not to be impressed by the vessel. After the full tour, Theo led us back to the deck.
“James thought you might be interested in taking her for a spin sometime, maybe as an overnight event for some of your top clients,” Theo said. “Can we make that happen?”
The thought had actually occurred to me during the tour. I hadn’t done anything for my high-value clients in ages, and the timing felt right. And even though I wasn’t into yachts personally, I knew how much my players enjoyed partying on the high seas.
“Interesting idea,” I mused, as if I needed convincing. I wasn’t about to let him think I was an easy mark. Friend of James or not, he still needed to work a little to sell me on the concept.
We stared at each other in silence beneath the hot sunshine. It was the type of showdown I always won. I knew how to break men like Theo. I was shocked when he didn’t fumble the moment, staring back at me with quiet confidence.
“I want to be open with you.” Theo took a step closer to me. “You’d be doing me a huge favor. I was thinking I could hire a photographer to document your event and then could use the shots in my advertising. Posting pictures of your top guys partying on my boat would attract a ton of attention. It would be a win-win for both of us.”
It felt like I was finally meeting the real Theo, the person James considered a friend. I appreciated his candor, businessman to businessman.
“And approved photos of all of them together would be a great way for us to appeal to new advertisers,” I agreed. “The problem with regular party photos is they don’t always portray the guys in the best light. If we do them here on the Black Diamond , we can stage them enough so that they look totally candid while still controlling the narrative.”
“And I can get some of my approved paparazzi guys to come out and shoot from a distance,” James offered.
“What about dates?” I asked.
Theo finally relaxed into a smile. “Wide open. You name it, and I’ll make it happen. Whatever you need. James can’t say enough good things about you, and now that we’ve finally met I can tell he was right. It would be an honor to sponsor your event on the Black Diamond .”
I held out my hand. “You got yourself a deal. PSM will be your first official client.”
Theo gave me a firm shake. “Excellent. I’ll have my assistant contact yours to start working through the details.”
“How’s Maddy working out by the way? Kaitlyn said you’re keeping her busy.”
Maddy . She was so much more than my assistant, but I wasn’t about to volunteer that information, especially in front of James.
“Let’s just say I’m lucky to have her,” I said.
I fielded calls during the drive back to work.
In the office, Maddy glanced up at me as I rushed by, and even in the split-second look I could see that something wasn’t quite right. I wanted to find out what was going on with her, but I was working through the final negotiations for a breakfast cereal deal with one of my soccer players. It wasn’t going to make him rich all on its own, but it would position him as the right kind of presence for other more lucrative family-friendly deals. I just hoped his rampant womanizing would remain a secret.
When the call finally ended, I texted Maddy to come into my office. She slid in the door seconds later wearing a trace of a frown, closing the door quietly behind her.
“Hey, what’s going on with you?” I asked when I saw her creased brow. I got up from the chair and took her into my arms. “Everything okay?”
For a moment I worried her unreadable expression was about me. About us.
She nodded against my chest. “All good. Just busy.”
Maddy was good at many things, but hiding her emotions wasn’t one of them.
“You sure?”
She pulled away and looked up at me. “Yup. Playing catch-up, staying on top of everything. I just got back from lunch with Gigi and Allison.”
Her expression went pinched again.
I knew firsthand that both women were great team members, so they wouldn’t have done anything to purposely upset Maddy. And I knew she was more than capable of handling the massive amount of work I threw her way. In fact, she seemed to thrive off of it. I studied her face. She was holding something back, but if she wasn’t ready to tell me I certainly wasn’t about to pressure her.
“I hate to tell you this, but things are about to get even busier,” I said, opting to focus on work. “We’re booking a party.”
Maddy finally smiled as she pulled out her phone, stepping away from my embrace to shift into business mode. “That’s a good thing! I love parties. What’s the occasion?”
“Nothing specific, it’s just time. I had lunch with James and his friend Theo. Turns out Theo is soft launching a yacht rental business and he wants to use my event as a promotional aid. So that means you and I need to pull names for who’s attending.”
“You’re really going to let me help pick?”
I was relieved to see the spark come back to her eyes. “Well, of course I am. You’ve got a great read on social media and who’s trending. Between the two of us we can put together the right mix of people.”
She was already scrolling through her phone. “Do you want to do all top tier, or a mix?”
“What do you think we should do?”
Maddy held her phone to her chest as she considered my question. “This might sound counter intuitive, but my gut is telling me to mix it up. If you sprinkle in some of your newbies and lesser-known players with your big names, it gives them a chance to increase their social capital by being seen with marquee guys. It would also make the atmosphere friendlier—if you put too many top dogs in one room, things can get tense. This way, they won’t have to compete as much for the spotlight.”
“Do you feel comfortable pulling a first round for me to check out?”
“Of course! What’s our headcount?”
I paused. “Huh. Not sure. But I’ll forward Theo’s assistant’s info—she’ll know what a good capacity would be. I trust you to run with this and get back to me when you have a rough guest list. You know the hierarchy with my guys.”
She beamed at me. “And I also know how to shake it up. This is going to be fun. I’m going to get started right now!”
I watched the delicious swish of her hips as she walked toward the door and felt the hunger stirring within me. As usual, Maddy was wearing a dress that would be so easy for me to pull up to her waist. The fact that her sweetness was right there, so accessible to me under that thin tan fabric, made me grow hard.
“Hey,” I said softly, stopping Maddy in her tracks.
She turned to face me.
“Come here. I need to tell you one last thing.”
My pulse kicked up when she gave me that smile, the one that said she knew what I wanted. What I needed.
“Yes?” she murmured when she was right in front of me. “What can I help you with, Mr. Parker?” She glanced down and her eyes went wide when she noticed the bulge in my pants. “Is it time for dictation?”
I would’ve laughed if I wasn’t so damn turned on. “I just wanted to give you a kiss before you left.”
“Oh? You want a kiss?” she asked in an innocent voice. “And where would you like that kiss, Mr. Parker?” She moved closer to me.
“You drive me up the wall.” I reached out to cup her breast. “You know that?”
“I’m sorry. I… I can leave if you like,” she managed to get out as I ran my thumb over the fabric covering her nipple. She arched against my hand.
“You better not,” I grumbled at her as I slipped my fingertips beneath the top of her dress. Maddy rarely wore a bra, but today she had one on that was sheer black mesh. I started forcing my way beneath it, eager to touch her.
“Wait,” she said, sounding slightly out of breath. She pushed my hand away then dropped to her knees and locked eyes with me.
How the hell could she look so powerful and vulnerable at the same time?
“Me first,” she said.
She never broke off eye contact as she reached up to unbuckle my belt and unsnap my pants. It was only when she took me into her beautiful mouth that I had to close my eyes and surrender to the pleasure she gave me.