Chapter 12
Chapter Twelve
Jack
“Am I dreaming, or did tonight really happen?” I mumble to myself sleepily.
I’ve been lying naked in my bed for about an hour, and I still can’t stop thinking about the evening.
Katherine had played her role to the max, and she definitely had me questioning whether or not it had been a good idea to have her pretend to be my girlfriend.
Overall she’d made the night extremely enjoyable, even if it had also been filled with a lot of sexual tension.
Raquel had texted me that she never wanted to hear from me again, and I hadn’t bothered responding because that had been the ultimate goal of the entire charade.
I think about calling Katherine to thank her for the evening when my phone beeps.
My heart thuds hoping it’s Katherine calling me, but that’s just wishful thinking.
I look down and see that Zac is calling me. I’m not sure what he wants and I don’t really want to talk to him right now, but I always try to answer when my brother calls; even if he does annoy the shit out of me most of the time.
“Hey, bro. What’s going on? It’s almost midnight.” I yawn loudly to stress my point.
“Don’t tell me you’re in bed already. Loser.”
“Funny, Zac. I am in bed because I actually have to work tomorrow.”
“Bro, tomorrow is still the weekend.”
“And as you would know if you worked as hard as I did, weekend days are still working days.”
“I get it. I get it. You’re Jack Heathcliff: the number one son, the number one businessman, the number one—”
“What is it, Zac?” I say, cutting him off, not in the mood to hear his jealous whining. “Did you just call to mimic me and tease me, or did you actually have something you wanted to ask?”
“Actually, I did.” His voice changes. He sounds playful, and I am immediately suspicious.
“And what’s your question? If you’re asking for more money for the bar then that’s going to be a no. I’ve already put in as much as I’m going to, and I thought you were meant to be opening in a week.”
“No, that’s not what I’m calling about.” His voice softens and suddenly it has a dreamlike quality. “I was just sitting here thinking and okay, I guess this might surprise you.”
“Zac, you are fast annoying me. What were you thinking about?”
“So, to be quite honest, I was thinking about Katherine.”
“Katherine?” I say, pretending like I’m not sure who he’s talking about.
“Yeah. My ex. The woman who works in your office.”
“Oh yeah. What about her?”
“Well, she was looking really good.”
“You mentioned that when you saw her.” I’m trying hard to hide my annoyance.
“Do you happen to know what her relationship status is?”
“What do you mean do I know what her relationship status is?”
“Well, I’m starting to think that I messed up. I was young and dumb, but I’m older and wiser now.”
“And what does that have to do with the price of tea?”
“I was thinking maybe I’m ready to give it another go.”
“You were wrestling naked women just a couple of weeks ago. Zac, are you telling me you’re seriously looking for a relationship?” Disbelief drops from my voice and I can’t believe what I’m hearing.
“I don’t know. Maybe Katherine was the one. Maybe she’s the one that got away. Do you happen to have her number? If not, can you check with HR—”
“No, I cannot check with HR for one of my employees’ numbers, Zac. That is entirely inappropriate.”
“Not really.”
“Also I’m pretty confident she has a boyfriend.
In fact, I’m pretty sure I heard her tell someone today that she was in a relationship.
” Now, I know she was telling Raquel that she was in a relationship with me, and I know that was fake—but I’m not going to tell Zac that.
For some reason, I want my brother to have nothing to do with Katherine.
“Ah, shit,” Zac says, sounding annoyed. “I really thought she could possibly be the one.” He starts laughing. “At least for a few nights. Her boobs got real bouncy looking. I wonder if they’re real.”
I have to stop myself from threatening my brother for his crude words. If he thinks for even a minute that I am invested in Katherine, he will be all over me like a dog on a fallen burger.
“You mean to tell me you spent all evening thinking about Katherine? Did you not even go out?”
“I mean, I wouldn’t say all evening. Tristan and I just got back from the titty bar and… well, she came to mind when this one brunette was bouncing up and down and her name was Katy and I was thinking to myself shit, this would feel even more amazing if it was Katherine.”
“You know what, Zac? I’m going to go. I have an early day tomorrow.”
“Fine, but could you see if you could get her number for me?”
“No. Why don’t you just concentrate on getting the bar up and running, making that a success, and then meeting someone out in the wild?”
“What?”
“Good night, Zac.” I hang up and lie there for a few moments, feeling slightly guilty that I lied to my brother.
The fact of the matter is, I don’t really know whether Katherine has a boyfriend.
It’s not a conversation we’ve had. I don’t think she does, seeing as I’ve gone down on her within the last couple of weeks, and she didn’t act like she was cheating.
I decide that now I have an actual reason to call her.
“Hello?” she yawns into the phone.
“Hi. I didn’t wake you up, did I?”
“You kind of did,” she says, yawning even louder and I wonder if she’s faking it. “What is it?”
“I have a question for you.”
“You don’t need me to act like your girlfriend again tomorrow.”
“Would that be such a bad thing if I did?”
“I mean, not if it’s to Raquel, because she was a royal biatch. I don’t even know how you dated her in the first place.”
“Oh, we didn’t date.”
“Oh I see. I guess you have no standards when it comes to the women you decide to bang.”
“I wouldn’t say that.”
“You wouldn’t say what?”
“I wouldn’t say that I don’t have standards.”
“So did you or did you not bang Raquel?”
“I think that’s such a crude term, Katherine. Don’t you?”
“Whatever. What would you say? Make love? Did you make love to Raquel?”
“Do you really want to know the answer to that question?”
“No. I don’t really care anyway.”
“I was just calling to thank you for the evening. I appreciate your acting skills.”
“Really? You appreciate them, huh? Even though I could see you making faces at me.” She starts laughing.
“You do have to admit, you did go a little bit far.”
“What’s a little bit far?”
“Telling everyone that we went to a psychic and that the psychic said we were going to be married within a year?”
She giggles. “Okay, I mean, it wasn’t that bad.”
“Telling everyone it was my idea to go to a second psychic to get our palms read, just to make sure the first psychic was correct didn’t exactly make me look great.”
She laughs even louder. “Hey, you didn’t tell me there were parameters of what I could or couldn’t say when I was your girlfriend.”
“I guess that’s true. But anyway, thank you. Raquel texted me, and it seems like she wants nothing to do with me now.”
“She’s probably nervous that I’ll scratch her eyes out.”
“Yeah, maybe. So, Katherine, that leads me to a question.”
“No. I don’t want to have phone sex. No, I don’t want to have real sex. No, I’m not going to give you a blowjob. No, I don’t want oral from you. No, we are not going to make out.”
“Those are not the questions I had for you.”
“Okay. Then what is the question you have for me?”
“I was wondering—”
“You were wondering what?”
“I was wondering if you were in an actual relationship. With a real man—or I suppose a real woman.”
“Are you asking me if I’m gay? Do you think I’m a lesbian? Is that why you think I don’t want to sleep with you—because I prefer women?”
“No. I was just curious if you were in a relationship. I guess I just want to know if you’re dating anyone.”
“Why do you care?” she asks suspiciously.
“I just want to know if there’s anyone I should be apologizing to for making you pretend to be my girlfriend.”
She laughs loudly. “No, Jack. I don’t have a boyfriend. I don’t have a girlfriend. I am currently single. In fact, I tell my friends I’m desperately single.”
“Desperately single, huh?”
“And no, don’t get any ideas. It doesn’t mean that I want you. I’m not that desperate.”
“Ouch,” I exclaim loudly, though I can’t stop myself from chuckling. “So being with me would be something you’d only do if I were the only man on earth?”
“Not even then.”
“So if I were the only man on earth, you would not be with me?”
“Nope. Mankind would be done forever.”
“So you wouldn’t want to save the future of mankind?”
“Nope. Not if it meant having to be with you.”
“Why do I not believe that, Katherine?”
“I don’t know. You can believe what you want to believe.”
“Just like I don’t believe your story about the PowerPoint slides.”
“What do you mean?” Her voice gets low and nervous.
“I mean, there’s information in those slides about members of the board you’ve never even met.”
“Google is a thing,” she says quickly.
“Google is a thing, but so are coworkers who’ve been working there for years and know all the gossip.”
“I am not saying anything, and I want to go back to sleep. Is there anything else you wanted to ask me?”
“There are many things I want to ask you.” My voice turns husky.
“I already told you no phone sex.”
“That wasn’t one of them. Though if you were to offer, I wouldn’t say no.”
“I’m not about to offer that. You have one more question, and then I’m hanging up.”
“Did you have fun tonight?” I ask.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, did you actually have fun, or was it all just an act to you?”
“Are you seriously asking me if I had fun pretending to be your girlfriend to your friends?”
“You know my friends didn’t believe it. They know the truth. The only one you were fooling was Raquel.”
“Okay. Well, she obviously believed me.”
“Because?”
“Because you told me she doesn’t want to see you again.”
“Yeah, that’s true. But you still haven’t answered my question. Are you evading having to tell me the truth?”
“I’m not evading anything. Did I have fun tonight? Yeah—because I had a very delicious filet mignon with the most delectable peppercorn sauce I’ve ever had. The potatoes au gratin were crispy and delicious, the broccoli rabe was tasty, and I had three martinis, French bread, and real butter.”
“Don’t forget you also had chocolate cake for dessert.”
“Thanks for reminding me. Now I feel like a piggy.”
“You could never be a piggy,” I say in a low voice. “In fact, you looked absolutely stunning tonight.”
“Thank you,” she says. “And I’ll give you one little compliment because I’m being nice and I’m tired.”
“What’s that?”
“You didn’t look half bad yourself in your blue suit.”
“Oh, so you do think I’m hot.”
“I wouldn’t say that. I said you didn’t look half bad. It’s not like I called you Brad Pitt.”
“I think Brad Pitt would like to be called Jack Heathcliff.”
She bursts out laughing. “You’ve got an ego the size of Neptune.”
“I always thought it was the size of Mars, but hey, you know better than me.”
“I’m going to go now, Jack.”
“Okay. Sweet dreams, Katherine.”
“You too, Jack.”
She hangs up, and I just lie there feeling warm and hard.
I put the phone down and smile to myself.
“So she’s single.” I whisper, thinking about all the sensual things I want to do to her and how I wish she were with me in bed at that very moment.
I think about how I’d slide her dress off, how I’d run my fingers up her thigh, kiss the side of her neck, play with her hair, have her bouncing up and down on my hard cock.
“Fuck it,” I groan, closing my eyes. I just need to go to sleep.
I cannot think about Katherine Jenkins this way. She and I will never be more than employee and boss, and that’s how it has to stay. My hand reaches down the front of my boxers and as I grab my cock, I picture Katherine’s face in my mind.
“Take me big boy.” She whispers and I groan loudly as my hand pumps back and forth furiously.