5. Chapter Five
Chapter Five
“Princess.” I handed Yukiko a glass of water as she took her seat at the kitchen island. “Sit. Eat. We don’t need you running on empty in front of America.”
Yukiko settled onto the barstool with a knowing smile. “Thank you, darling.” She took a look around the room. “My husband is waiting on me this morning! Wow, that’s so sweet. I must have done something really nice for him earlier…”
The room filled with chuckles. My wives giggled, Maria cackled like it was the funniest thing she’d heard in a week, Mona rolled her eyes and shot me a look, simultaneously amused and a little irritated I couldn’t keep it in my pants for a single morning.
Only Heather and Eva remained silent. The two former cheerleaders—so alike in looks and attitude that they could have been twins (and were often mistaken for them) were both sulking at the table across the kitchen.
It must have been torture for the poor pair who openly advertised themselves as “Daddy’s dirtiest girls” to have to listen to me mercilessly pound the brains out of a different girl after waiting so long for their turn with me.
I felt bad for them. A little. But I knew the frustration would just make the eventual session hotter.
“Here you go, mami,” Maria said, dropping a plate of eggs and bacon in front of Yukiko. “Eat up.”
Yukiko shot the Latina a Mona Lisa smile. “Thank you, Maria. You are such a good friend…”
Heather and Eva groaned simultaneously. “I can’t take this!” Heather complained.
“Did we do something wrong, boss?” Eva whimpered, giving a pout so spectacular it made me want to go across the room and spank the brat right off of her face. “Maria’s walking around like she just got promoted to best girl, and me and Heather have been keeping ourselves ready for you for days—”
“We’d love to go into detail,” Heather added on beat. “All the details.”
“If you need to punish us, I wish you would,” Eva chimed in. “Neither of us deserve to have asses this unbruised...”
“You two will get your turn,” Maria chuckled, sharing a look with Yukiko. “Those little Avery kids are going to need some playmates, that’s all. You don’t want your boss to have a big family?”
Heather and Eva frowned. “I mean, I guess,” Heather said.
“You’re not even married to him yet,” Eva added.
Yukiko scoffed. “Oh, please,” she said, calmly taking command of the situation. This kitchen was my princess’s court, even before taking Morning Harbor into account. “That’s really the angle you want to go with? We can’t have an unwed mother in the harem?”
As the twins giggled, I glanced over at Mona.
She’d taken up one corner of the kitchen island, her laptop open and her hair pulled back into a rather severe ponytail that was more about getting hair out of her eyes than looking good.
From the empty thermos (and two empty mugs) sitting beside her, I got the impression she’d been hard at work since she excused me from the couch and told me to crash.
As I watched, her phone buzzed. Mona looked at it, typed a response so rapidly her fingers were a blur, then set it to the side and took a satisfied sip of her coffee.
“How long have you been at this?” I asked her.
Mona didn’t glance up from her laptop. “Since you went to bed. The Morning Harbor producers have been in my ears for the last two hours—they’re insisting Yukiko sit for makeup before the interview, and they want to confirm her wardrobe choices.
” She paused. “And her preferred method of address on the air.”
“Mrs. Avery,” Samantha said, sounding like she’d slap anyone who tried anything else. “I hope you told them that’s non-negotiable, Mona.”
Mona’s chuckle told me she’d put the fear of God into them.
“Of course. Also, I’m juggling two other interview requests, having a conversation with Saskia about the exact language we want to use for Miss Fawkes’s official retraction…
” She glanced up, shooting Heather and Eva a look.
“And two of your harem girls have not stopped texting me asking to come help ‘cheer Kiki on’ and promising to wear ‘something professional’ if given the privilege.” A slight smile.
“I shudder to think what you two believe constitutes professional attire.”
“Like, secretary outfits,” Heather said without a hint of shame. “Short skirt, high heels…”
Mona cocked an eyebrow.
“But no plugs,” Eva added. “Not, you know, unless Jack thinks it’s hot.”
As a matter of fact I did, but now was not the time. “You two are cruising for a bruising.”
Heather practically salivated. “God, I hope so!”
I shook my head, chuckling. “You should get some sleep,” I told Mona.
“I’ll sleep when I’m dead,” Mona said without a hint of humor. “Or when our enemies are.”
“With how hard you’re working, they’ll be dead soon enough.”
Mona shook her head. “That’s all on your wife today, Jack. This is Yukiko’s fight, not mine.”
Yukiko paused, a forkful of eggs halfway to her mouth. She cleared her throat.
“Me?” She tried to make it funny, but I could see the nerves underneath. “You mean you won’t be able to fix it if I freeze up in front of the cameras and blow the whole thing?”
It didn’t come out like a joke, even though Kiki had probably hoped it would. More like a confession.
This was the life Yukiko had always wanted. The CEO’s wife, the power couple—the girl who stood in the spotlight and became the lightning rod that shielded everyone else from criticism. And she was made for it more than any woman I’d ever met.
But that didn’t mean she didn’t get nervous.
“Princess.” I leaned over and put my hand on top of hers. “You are not going to freeze up.”
She swallowed. “You don’t know that.”
“Yes, I do.”
The way she looked at me told me she’d thought about this.
That she’d been thinking about it for longer than I realized.
“It happens, Jack,” she said, frowning. “It happens to politicians. It happens to celebrities. We had a speaker to come to Stillwell once and she just froze up in the middle of her speech—she stopped talking for almost twenty seconds. And that woman was a Nobel laureate!”
“I remember that,” Samantha said, gingerly nibbling a piece of bacon. I wondered if her nausea was back. “I think she might have been drunk?”
“You’re not going to freeze up, princess,” I insisted.
Yukiko was quiet for a long moment. “I believe you,” she said at last. “I always believe you, Jack. But… how can you possibly know?”
I favored her with my best smile—without the faintest idea of what I was really practicing it for.
“Because you are the most competent person I’ve ever met,” I said simply.
“You didn’t freeze up when Victoria Ruocchio got up in your face and insulted your family.
My God, princess, you sat on a Zoom call with Marcie’s father and told him you had spreadsheets detailing how you were going to help run my business and my harem at the same time.
If you freeze up during that interview, I will cut my McLaren into tiny little pieces and eat it. ”
Mona snorted at the mental image. Marcie smiled and shook her head.
Even Yukiko looked a little charmed.
“That is a very expensive bet,” my princess noted. “I know you love that car.”
“I love you more,” I said, meaning it.
Yukiko blushed. “My mother would never forgive me if I let you eat that car,” she said, her expression turning goofy even as her tone remained deadly serious.
“She loves driving that thing almost as much as you do. I think she’s hoping you’ll give it to her once the twins are born and we switch to a minivan. ”
“I don’t know about that,” I said, my brows rising. “I’m more than happy to let your mother take my car out for a joyride every now and then. But I’m not selling it. We can afford to have two cars.”
“Fair,” Yukiko said.
There was quiet in the kitchen for a moment.
Everyone looked relaxed as they could be given the challenges of the day—with two very blonde, very bratty exceptions.
Heather’s knee bounced up and down, while Eva kept trying to catch my eye and shove her tongue in her cheek like she was looking for permission to climb beneath the kitchen island and service me.
Yukiko noticed. A sly look lit up her face.
“Jack?”
I made a show of pretending I didn’t know what she was going to say. “Hmm?”
“You know how you offered to wait on me hand and foot after the interview?” Her tone was a touch arch, but the smile on her face undercut it. “And I told you I’d just get the cheerleaders to do it, instead?”
Both Heather and Eva started.
“I very much do,” I said, wondering where she was going with this.
“I’ve been thinking,” she said, stretching out the syllables. “I heard Lakshmi did such a good job supervising those two before the wedding. Would you help me supervise them this afternoon?”
Both girls sat up ramrod-straight.
“Please please please tell me that means what I think it means,” Heather blurted.
“It means sex,” Eva added on beat. “It means sex, right?”
“Princess, you don’t—”
“You said you’d do whatever I want after the interview,” Yukiko said smoothly. She smirked into her coffee. “That’s what I want. All three of you waiting on me. And me being a real bitch about it.”
I knew there was no universe in which Yukiko could plausibly be a bitch. But her ‘supervising’ the twins the way Lakshmi did? Yes. Yes, that would be all kinds of fun.
“We are so in,” Heather said, nodding like a bobblehead.
“We’ll do whatever you want, Mommy!” Eva chorused.
Yukiko nearly spit out her coffee.
The twins shared a look. “What?” Heather asked, looking honestly flummoxed. “Maria just called you mami!”
“That’s… that’s different,” Yukiko said, trying not to laugh. “That wasn’t a sex thing…”
“Well, this is,” Eva said with a shrug.
I watched the wheels turn behind Kiki’s eyes. I knew her so well that I could practically see the question written across her forehead: do I find this hot?