Alex
I watch Hailee’s head rise and fall with my breathing. Ninety minutes of sex was plenty. I could go longer, but I do want Hailee to be able to walk in the morning, and with her bad ankle she might have enough trouble as it is.
It’s close to midnight, and I don’t want her falling asleep quite yet. I pick up her delicate hand and run my thumb over the backs of her fingers.
She tilts her head up at me. Her brown hair is all frizzy from getting fucked, and her expression is smiley, almost drunkenly content.
“Why didn’t we do that in Nantucket?” she asks.
I smile. “My cottage isn’t in Nantucket.”
“Whatever.”
“Maybe it wouldn’t have been as good. We can’t be as loud in the cottage. Unless you don’t mind security hearing.”
“It was worth the wait.”
It was. But I’m somewhat infuriated with myself because I probably could’ve been doing this years ago. All I know now is that I don’t want to lose any more time with her. “I want you to come with me in the morning.”
Hailee lifts her head more and turns so her chin hovers above my chest. “To Switzerland?”
“And the Riviera. The whole trip.”
She widens her eyes in surprise. “. I have to look for a job. I have rent. I can’t even afford a hotel in Switzerland.”
Any other girl saying these things to me would just be fishing to have me offer to pay for it, but Hailee genuinely doesn’t want a handout. I’ll have to fight her to take it. But not if… I move her hair out of her face and cup her cheek.
“You’d be staying in my hotel, and I think as your boyfriend, I could offer a little assistance while you get employed.”
She freezes like a deer in headlights. I almost think I said something wrong. It feels like I did. Boyfriend? That word came out of my mouth.
But yes, that’s obviously what I want. The idea of another man touching Hailee is enough to send me into a white rage. I don’t want to imagine her four thousand miles away. Away from my protection. Away from my arms.
“Do you…want to date me? Officially.”
“Officially,” I say and grin. Thankfully my smile is enough to bring her back to reality.
“Of course,” she says, her brown eyes beaming. “I mean. Sure.”
I move my hand to the back of her neck and gently bring her face to mine. We kiss sweetly for a minute. It’s her who pulls back this time.
“If our flight is in the morning,” she says, setting her pointer finger on my chest, “then I should probably pack my things.”
“You have your passport?”
“Yeah.” She rolls off the bed and springs to her feet.
I can’t take my eyes off her naked body. Her breasts are perfect Bs, sticking straight up and perky, and you’d think her ass was built by a thousand sets of squats, but she was just born with it.
It, too, isn’t the largest, but it’s shapely and rounded perfectly over her thighs. It matches her breasts. Just like her beautiful face, there is nothing incongruent about her body.
I have an urge to pull her to me and fuck her until she’s sore tonight and has to give me puppy eyes to stop. But we do have to get to Geneva.
Hailee gives me a playful smile from the doorway, and once she’s gone, I lean back and stare at the ceiling, content.
She didn’t even put on her sweatpants. I picture her walking naked on the spiral stairs to the second floor. I’ve had a lot of luck in my life, but I haven’t really felt it until this moment.
***
Hailee and I sleep in my bed together. She plays little spoon the whole night.
When I open my eyes to my alarm, the world is pitch black before I realize my face is pressed into her hair.
I lean back and stretch. I’m hard, as I often am when I wake up, but there’s no time for fun this morning. I get out of bed, go over everything to make sure I have everything I need packed, and take a shower.
Downstairs, Hailee votes for pancakes and bacon for breakfast, and I don’t protest. I wish I could eat like this every day. She’s in a celebratory mood, and I’m not about to break it by telling her I don’t believe pancakes are breakfast food.
In another hour, we’re at Teterboro boarding the private jet. I wish we had the plane to ourselves, but I’d originally booked this trip for business only.
Richard Wierman, my lawyer, is already seated and drinking a cup of coffee. We greet each other, and he and Hailee shake hands.
“Hailee, would you mind taking the couch while Richard and I finish some business this morning?”
“Of course not,” she says and walks towards the back of the plane.
I sit across the glossy oak table from Richard.
He’s bald on top of his head and in front and has red hair horseshoeing the rest of his head. If he looks a bit eccentric in his three-piece Donegal tweed suit, it’s because he is. Ask the people he’s gotten out of trouble, and they’ll tell you—he’s the best lawyer in the country. Half of that is him being on the good side of almost every judge.
We keep the conversation light until the captain boards and we start to taxi. We talk once the hum of the engines hides our conversation from the two stewardesses and Hailee.
“The indictments are coming down Monday,” Richard says. “Investigators have apparently ruled out that Blackwell Mining had a hand in this money laundering. The original financial figures that were reported to the press appear to be forged. However, when investigators started digging into Summit Bank, they discovered fraud. Lots of it. Not just money laundering. They’ve been hiding profits. They’re building a tax-evasion case. The criminal complaint is going to be lengthy.”
“Good. I was afraid this was going to be swept under the rug.”
“So was I, but it would appear the attempts on the journalist’s and bankers’ lives kicked this into the highest gear. The feds want someone’s head.”
I quiet as the plane begins to pick up speed for takeoff. Our conversation pauses until we’re a few hundred feet off the ground.
“What about the judge? We’ve got Lansky, right?”
“Yeah, I’ve been moving the strings. A lot of men with money don’t want the judge to be Lansky. He’s the toughest on these kinds of sons of bitches. They’re not getting a slap on the wrist if they’re convicted.”
“What about these hitmen? Is the FBI any closer to an arrest?”
Richard shakes his head. “The hitmen are probably out of the country already. The motorcycle they used was stolen. The bomb parts recovered in the attempted car bombing haven’t led anywhere. The case seems cold, and it will likely stay that way.”
I wonder if that means Lucas is going to stay in hiding for months. But in order for his paranoia to end, he’ll probably need to know he wasn’t a target.
He should put that together himself. Lucas Barnes simply isn’t that important.
I sigh and lean back. I see Manhattan out the window for a moment before it disappears, leaving nothing under us but the Atlantic.
“The criminal complaint should be posted in a couple days. They’re going to arrest both Chester Ford Senior and Junior. They’ll be out on bail by lunch, however.”
“I wouldn’t expect anything different.”
“The courts and the Fords will want this trial to move as quickly as possible. I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a ruling by the end of October.”
“And what about these Swiss accounts we plan to open? Are we in the clear now that the company isn’t suspected?”
“, I’ve told you. I’ve got it drawn up so we could be under audit, and still, no one is going to find this money. You don’t pay me seven figures a year to worry.”
I sigh and nod. The stress of this is eating at me. I could’ve done this much easier with a bullet or two. But this was the plan that was put together perfectly. I need to breathe and stick to it.
I look over at Hailee. She’s looking out the window and listening to music with a blanket held up to her neck.
She has no idea. If she did, she wouldn’t be on this plane. And she sure as hell wouldn’t date me.
This relationship is a lie, and her obliviousness to my evils seems emphasized as she gazes wistfully down to the sea.
I’m as bad of a man as I thought I was.
And Hailee Barnes and all her beauty can’t change that. I’m using her like a drug. A prop to forget what the life I’ve made for myself truly is.
Cold.
Ruthless.
A constant struggle to stay at the top.
But she’s here. The decision is made. And for the next month, I’m going to forget the world with this woman, even if it means both of our ruin.