9. Ivy
IVY
This is how we return to normal.
By being . . . business as usual.
And business as usual includes morning to noon to night meetings.
The first week is the hardest—the memories are the freshest. Every time I see Callum, I’m plunged back into a reel of images of him taking me on my desk, owning my body.
In the morning, I wake thinking of his smile, his laughter, his big, warm heart.
The idea of him lingers with me, floating around me all day long—both sides of the man I want.
I try my best to stay in the moment with each person I meet. Finalizing menus, organizing cocktails, and confirming our PR.
Exactly seven days after soul-shattering, mind-bending sex, I finish a breakfast meeting with my floor manager, Jen, patting myself virtually on the back for having only thought of Callum three times during the meeting.
My daytime bodyguard, Russ, waits outside Jen’s office.
The hulking six-foot-seven tree of a man follows behind when we leave, then when I say goodbye by the craps tables.
“Have fun at the musical this weekend. I know Madison will be the best Wednesday her high school has ever seen,” I say, since Jen’s seventeen-year-old daughter is performing in The Addams Family this weekend.
“I can’t wait. I don’t know who’s more nervous. Her or me,” the pretty brunette says with a smile.
“I’ll send her flowers.”
I wave, then head to the stairs, making my way to my offices, as Russ walks next to me, earpiece in, saying something I can’t make out.
For a fleeting second, I wonder if he’s talking to Callum back at the office.
But I try to flush the thoughts of the man I want from my head.
When we reach the corporate offices, Russ opens the door, and I step inside.
“Thank you, Russ.”
“You’re welcome, Ms. Carmichael.”
He is all business, as a bodyguard should be, I suppose.
In my office I find Sage, Kate, and Raphael waiting for me. Sage and I are fraternal twins. Both blonde and blue-eyed, and both a little taller than average. We look close enough that some people ask if we’re identical, but different enough that most don’t.
Kate waggles her fingers in a hello. She runs a marketing firm The Extravagant contracts with and is also president of the book club we’re in. “Hey there. Good to see you in between fiction and memoirs.”
“Yes, we must keep meeting like this,” I say, with my best cheery grin.
“I’m psyched to get to work on planning this concert,” Kate says.
“It’s going to be amazing,” Raphael chimes in. He’s on the events team here at The Extravagant.
“We have our work cut out for us,” Sage chimes in.
They’re on a soft, plush couch. I sit across from them in a comfy chair. “We do indeed. I spoke with Stone’s manager, and he wants to do the show in exactly five weeks. So, we will be busy, busy, busy.”
The next thirty-five days will be more like an all-consuming storm. Perhaps that’s a good thing. I’m grateful for both the opportunity and the distraction from thoughts of Callum.
His hands on me.
His hands all over me.
His hands everywhere.
Squeezing, kneading, grabbing.
Giving me the hottest, dirtiest sex of my life that freed my mind, that relaxed me, that made me feel like all my wishes weren’t . . . base .
My late-night desires have always felt a little inappropriate.
A bit too naughty.
As if something might be wrong with me for promoting luxury, sensuality, and beauty during the day, and wanting filth at night.
“Earth to Ivy.” Sage waves from her spot on the couch. “You kind of zoned out there.”
I blink, trying to center myself. “Sorry, I was distracted for a second.” I fight like hell to shake away the thoughts of Callum.
After all, I should be this woman. The one I am now. The co-CEO who envisions gorgeous lobby displays, who embraces music, art, luxury.
Not the woman who loves porn, filth, and muscular men who take matters into their own hands.
God, I watch too many dirty videos at night.
My internet is getting to know me far too well.
And I’m getting to know two-dimensional men far too well.
But right now, I have to be the public face of this gorgeous hotel, not the freak in the sheets.
“Anything in particular?” my sister asks, a little coyly. “Don’t make me use my twin mind-reading powers to figure it out.”
“You wish you had mind-reading powers,” I fire back, praying she never develops such abilities—anyone who could see into my mind would be shocked.
The woman in Louboutins likes it rough. Likes it to hurt. Likes to be . . . dirtied .
“I can read you, and I bet you have a crush on Stone,” Sage says, with a glint in her eye.
I laugh, then cough. If she only knew who all my feelings were for, all my lust, though admittedly Stone is empirically handsome. “A crush on his music,” I say, clarifying.
“But you have to admit, he is wickedly handsome,” Raphael says.
“And mega-talented,” Kate adds.
“What’s he like?” Raphael asks, leaning forward, eyes wide and eager. “I’m dying to know. Is he the playboy they all say he is?”
I cut that off at the knees. “I don’t think we should be discussing whether he’s a playboy or not.
His private life is just that—private. But I will tell you this—he’s a great guy.
A wonderful friend. And he has a big heart,” I say.
Funny, how I met him once, for only a short while, but I already feel protective of Stone too.
There was such vulnerability in him, and it was thoroughly endearing.
What was even more endearing was how Callum looked out for his friend. The memory of that makes my heart thump.
Makes it thump wildly.
Apparently, it’s not only my basest, naughtiest parts that Callum claims, but the safest, squishiest ones too. Had it always been that way? A sexual tension but also an emotional one that maybe runs deeper than friendship, deeper than just a close confidante?
We work our way through our to-do list, dividing and conquering our plans for the next several weeks.
When Sage and Raphael leave a little later, Kate lags behind. “You okay? You’ve been so intensely focused the last week you’re like a machine.”
“Busy, busy, busy,” I say, trying to keep everything light.
“Well, don’t forget to unwind now and then. And if you need to chat about anything, you know where to find me.”
“Thanks, Kate. I appreciate that.”
I’m grateful to have good friends like Kate. Friends who get me. Friends who can tell when I’m elsewhere. I resolve to do better. To keep my eye on the prize. Focusing on this part of my life—friendship and business. “By the way, I saw that you gifted me a very naughty book.”
She feigns surprise. “Oh, did I?”
I laugh, rolling my eyes. “Yes. When I turned on my Kindle the other night, it popped up. What was the name of it?” I tap my lip playfully. “ The Tryst. It had a pair of shoes on the cover. I read the first chapter.”
“And?”
I give her a knowing grin, remembering the steam rising from the very first page. “It was . . . illuminating.”
“And by ‘illuminating,’ you mean it’s going to be a fantastic exploration of the boundaries of kink and trust?”
“I believe it is.”
“Well, I hope it gives you a great escape,” she says, then turns to leave.
I shut the door after her, alone now in my office.
A great escape.
That’s what my night with Callum felt like.
A great and absolute escape, and what I wouldn’t give to take her up on her advice to unwind into that kind of escape with him again.
With a pull of my hair, a bite on my shoulders.
Better yet, he could put me on all fours, press a palm between my shoulder blades, and shove my face against the pillow.
Tell me to raise my ass for him.
Oh God, I would.
Then, after he took me to the edge of my desires, he’d lift me in his arms, carry me into the bath, and sink down into the water with me.
Tenderly slide his hands all over me.
I slump down on my couch, wishing for all those things.
Every single one.
All the things I can’t have.
I center myself, focusing on the other part of who I am. The businesswoman. The one who takes care of her employees. I call my favorite florist and arrange for a gorgeous bouquet of tulips to be sent to Jen’s daughter’s school this weekend along with a note of congratulations.
There. This is me now.
By the end of the second week post epic sex, the longing starts to normalize.
But only in the sense that wanting Callum is like breathing, and somehow the wanting becomes a part of the fabric of my life.
When I talk to Callum as he escorts me to dinners, to events, I sometimes imagine he’s not only the man watching my back, but the man by my side.
I’ve imagined it since he met me at the door to my suite ten minutes ago. I visualized a dirty rendezvous between us as we rode the elevator down here, and now, as we stand outside the ballroom on the function level of the hotel, I’m imagining the man on the clock is here for something more.
For me .
“Welcome, Ms. Carmichael,” a woman in a cocktail dress says as she opens the majestic double doors for us and ushers us toward the gala inside.
We walk into the tightly packed room, and without even looking I can tell Callum’s eyes are roaming, surveying, assessing—making sure no threats are imminent.
“Looks like a good turnout,” he says, nodding to the assembled crowd surrounding us.
And it is. The gentle hum of conversation mingles with the sultry sounds of the jazz singer on stage, crooning a seductive lullaby to his audience. A cocktail of women’s perfume, men’s cologne, and money dances right alongside the couples swaying dangerously close to one another on the dance floor.
I turn to the man who ravished my body barely fourteen days ago and meet his dark gaze. “It is. Sage sent me a report earlier—we sold two hundred tickets. That’s a lot of money to raise for the Las Vegas Canine Rescue Foundation.”
“Impressive.” He nods to the charity’s logo, a line-art image of a dachshund plastered all over the steps. “Did you have a pet growing up?”