Chapter 8 #2
“Jealous of all the women I get while you’re just slaving away at work. I date, and I have fun with hot women.”
“There’s no woman you could get that I couldn’t get. Trust me on that.” I smirk.
He shrugs. “Maybe, maybe not.” I stare at him and shake my head as we enter the cafeteria and make our way to the food counters. He looks around, trying to decide what he wants to eat, when he suddenly stops dead in his tracks. “Oh, shit!” he mumbles in shock.
“What is it?” I ask as he just continues standing there.
I see him pointing to the right, and I follow his gaze.
I grunt as I comprehend what has caught his attention.
Katherine is standing there talking animatedly.
She’s wearing a short black skirt and a white blouse.
Her hair is long and straight, hanging down her shoulders, and she’s chatting with an elderly lady standing next to her.
“That’s my ex,” Zac says, licking his lips. “I’d recognize that face anywhere. Fuck, she’s hot as hell. That’s my Katherine?” He whistles. “Damn. She got sexy.” He looks over at me. “You didn’t tell me she was working here.”
“I guess I didn’t know. I am the CEO, not the head of HR.”
“Hold on, bro. Let me go speak to her.” I stand there as he rushes over to her.
I’m annoyed that he’s seen her, and I’m annoyed that he’s gone to talk to her.
I follow slowly behind him because even though I don’t want to be involved in the conversation, I am interested to see how she reacts to him…
and what she says. I wonder if she’s going to go off on him as badly as she went off on me.
“Hello there, beautiful!” he says in a loud, game-showy voice, and I can feel myself rolling my eyes. Zac has never been known to be subtle.
Katherine doesn’t turn around. Then I watch as he taps her on the shoulder.
“Cat! It’s me.” She looks over her shoulder, and her eyes widen for a second. She stares at him, and I can see the shock in her eyes.
“Hi,” she says, sounding slightly confused, and not at all happy to see him. I can’t stop the grin from spreading across my face. “Do I know you?”
“Pussycat! It’s me, Zac!” He winks in slow motion. “Your ex.”
“Oh.” She sniffs. “Yeah.” She licks her lips. I can’t tell whether she’s happy to see him or not. She looks past him, and her gaze meets mine. Her eyes widen for a couple of seconds. I give her a warm smile. She gives me a tiny nod before turning back to Zac.
“How are you doing?” he asks.
“Fine, I mean great. Absolutely fantastic.” She shrugs. “This is my coworker, Cora. How have you been, Zac?”
“Not great, but much better now that I’ve seen you. Damn—girl, you look hot.” He nods slowly, and his eyes travel up and down her admittedly delectable body. “I didn’t realize you were working at my brother’s company.”
“Oh. I guess he didn’t tell you.” She shrugs.
“I didn’t think there was anything to be told,” I say smoothly and feign ignorance. Cora’s expression looks shocked by the interactions.
Zac moves closer to Katherine. I’m starting to get annoyed, but I know I can’t say anything.
“Cora, this is Zac,” Katherine says. Cora looks at him with a small smile.
“Hi,” she says, nodding. Then she stares at me. “Oh! Mr. Heathcliff, nice to meet you.”
“Hello,” I say. She may be one of my employees, but I’ve never seen this woman before in my life.
“I’m so grateful to see you again, Mr. Heathcliff.” Cora steps forward. “I have so many questions.”
“Good to see you too. Are you new to the company?” Her face goes red at my comment, and she looks over at Katherine with a frown. Katherine presses her lips together and glares at me. What am I missing here?
“I’m not new. I’ve been here twenty years.” She sounds pissed, and I can tell I’ve upset Grandma.
“Oh, holy snap.” Zac turns to me. “You need to do a better job engaging with your employees, Jack.” He gives me a smarmy look.
“This lady’s been working for you for twenty years, and you didn’t know it?
Wow.” He turns to Cora. “I apologize for my brother. Sometimes he thinks about money way more than he thinks about people, and that’s a real shame.
” He looks at Katherine again. “Well, I didn’t mean to disturb you, but I just wanted to say it’s really good seeing you again. ”
She nods. “We’re just grabbing our pizza, and then we have to go back to work.”
Zac nods and turns back to me. “I guess we’re gonna grab sushi or something, right?”
“Whatever you want,” I say, shrugging. “You have a good day, Katherine and Cora.” I nod and then turn away. Zac follows behind me.
“Damn. She’s fine,” he says under his breath as we make our way to a table. “She didn’t seem too happy to see me, though, huh?”
“You dumped her after cheating on her, why would she?”
“I mean, I was young. I was dumb. I made a mistake,” he says, shrugging. “But holy shit, she is sexy now. I wouldn’t mind her giving me another chance.” He looks at me. “Do you know if she’s seeing anyone? Do you know if she—”
“Zac, really?”
I narrow my eyes at him. “Do you really think she’d be interested in seeing you again? She would need a lobotomy even to think about that.”
“She was young; I was young. Maybe I’ll get her a dozen roses and apologize and whisk her to dinner and then see if she wants to give me a second chance. I mean, I’m single, free, and disengaged.”
“You literally just got out of a relationship.”
“That wasn’t a relationship, bro. That was a situationship. And hey, it’s over. Fuck, I haven’t banged anyone in two weeks.”
I just stare at my brother. “You know you sound pathetic, right?”
He starts laughing as he runs his fingers through his hair. “It’s a good thing I’m so good-looking and rich.”
I shake my head. “If you weren’t my brother—”
“What? You wouldn’t be my friend?”
“I totally wouldn’t be your friend.”
“It’s a good thing you can’t ‘un-bro’ me then! Or cut off my inheritance,” he laughs. “Only Mom and Dad can do that, and seeing as I’m their favorite, they never will.”
“How on earth are you my brother, Zac? I just do not understand where your brain cells are.”
“Well, it’s a good thing it’s not for you to understand.” We take a seat, and I watch as he pulls out his phone.
“I don’t suppose you have her number, do you?”
“What? Whose number?”
“Pussycats. I want to text her.”
“Why would I have her number?”
“I don’t know.” He shrugs. “I just figured maybe you would. But I guess if you don’t even know employees who’ve been working for you for twenty years, you wouldn’t have her number.
Shit, if I had a good-looking woman like her working under me, I don’t know how much work I’d get done.
” I stare at him for a couple of seconds.
For a few moments, I consider telling him that my lips had been between her legs just a few weeks ago.
That I’d made her come on my face. That she’d been more intimate with me than she’d ever been with him.
But I decide not to. I don’t want him in my personal business.
And I don’t want him to think I’ve crossed any lines, which I don’t think I have, technically, but maybe he would.
So instead, I sit back in my chair and study his face.
“Are you really interested in her?” I ask him in a low tone. “Is this someone you want to consider having a relationship with?”
He stares at me for a couple of seconds and shrugs. “I mean, I don’t know how serious I want to get with her. Fuck, I hadn’t seen her in years until today. But do I want to get her back into my apartment, under the sheets? Sure. She’s fucking hot. Did you see those legs?”
“You keep saying she’s hot, and she has good legs, but do you want to get to know who she is as a person? Do you want to figure out what she’s been doing? Are you—”
He stares at me. “What the fuck, Jack? Are you high or something?”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You’re talking like this is the fucking Pussycat Club. You’re my bro! A dude can’t imagine just getting some and moving on with his life?”
I let out a deep sigh and shake my head.
There’s no reasoning with him. Absolutely no reasoning.
I don’t feel guilty because even though I didn’t know what I wanted from Katherine, at least I knew I respected her enough not to just want to fuck her and walk away.
I respected her enough to care about what was happening in her life.
I respected her enough to want the best for her.
Which couldn’t have been said for my brother, which was something I already knew. I suppose I’d had high hopes that he’d matured as a man, but that day still hadn’t come. The best thing that could have happened for both Katherine and me was my brother staying far away.
“Listen, Zac, I’m only going to say this once. Don’t even think about trying to get your hooks into Katherine again.” I cross my arms and stare at my brother, giving him my best-fuck with me and you will pay-glare.
“Or what?” He asks, almost daring me to take him down.
“Or you’ll live to regret it.”