Billionaires, Bad Boys, and Alpha Males (62 page)

It was tedious, tedious work.

Every so often she’d break and look at
her inert cell phone, then go upstairs to her cubicle and check her email and
phone.
 
There was nothing.

Somehow she’d failed him.
 
Didn’t he at least want to see her
essay?
 
Should she go up to his
office and barge in, demand to be seen?

That was crazy thinking.
 
But she was growing desperate with her need
to see him and talk to him.
 
She
wanted to feel his strong, insistent hand grabbing her hair and pulling her
head back.
 
His lips against her
ear, his deep voice whispering.
 
Taking control.

She bit her lower lip as this fantasy
took hold.
 
It was after four p.m.
and still no word from Red.

Nicole took a break and went to the
handicapped bathroom for privacy.
 
Once inside, she locked the door and sat on the toilet, legs
spread.
 
Her eyes closed, she pictured
Red in between her legs, his tongue delicately licking her in the most tender
way.
 
She started to rub herself
through her panties.

The orgasm was delicious in its quiet
intensity.
 
She came while picturing
him sucking her clit.
 

Please
let it happen.
 
Please God.

Afterward she had a surge of self-loathing.
 
Here she was, coming alone in this
bathroom its florescent lights and the smell of cleaning solution in her
nostrils.
 
It was the opposite of
Red’s opulent office with the smell of aftershave and leather.
  

This wasn’t how she was supposed to be.
 
A girl who degraded herself alone in a
company bathroom wasn’t what Red would desire.
 
She needed to be above such
weakness.
 
She would wait for his
touch and his touch alone to satisfy her intimate cravings.
 
It would make it so much more exciting
when she finally was allowed to climax.

For the first time, Nicole wondered if he
had secret cameras hidden throughout the building.
 
It seemed the kind of thing Red would
do.
 
Maybe he was watching her even now.

Part of her thrilled at the notion,
another part was terrified.
 
She
didn’t want to disgust him with her animal like lust.
 
Red was refined, calculated, poised and
strong.
 
He didn’t simply grope her
like a college boy, fumbling with her bra straps.
 
He was seducing her—taking his
time and making her want him more and more.

She needed to learn from his
example.
 
Be patient, she told
herself.

Finally, the workday ended.

Heartbroken, she left the Jameson
International building and walked to her train.
 
She kept thinking he’d appear behind her
in a limousine, honking until she noticed him, then pulling over to let her
inside.

Of course it didn’t happen.

Her roommate Danielle was home when
Nicole arrived.
 

“Oh, look at you!
 
Hattie alert, hottie alert!” Danielle
cried out, as she cut cucumber and onion and carrots on a plastic cutting board
at the kitchen counter.

Nicole tried to smile.
 
“You’re cooking?”

“Just making a salad.
 
Want some?”

“No.
 
I’m not really hungry.”

Danielle looked more closely at her.
 
“You’re exhausted, Nicole.
 
You’ve got dark circles under your
eyes.”
 
She walked from behind the
counter as Nicole flopped onto the couch.
 

“I’m fine.
 
Just hard to get used to my new work
schedule.”

“I woke up last night at like two a.m. to
go pee and saw your light on,” Danielle said carefully.

“Oh.
 
I must have fallen asleep and forgotten to turn it off.”

“And I heard you moving around.
 
You were awake.”

“Haven’t you ever heard that spying on
your roommate isn’t very nice?”

Danielle folded her arms.
 
“I wasn’t spying.
 
The bathroom is right next to your
bedroom.”

“I had a…a work thing.
 
It was important.”

“What kind of work thing?
 
You’re an intern.”

Nicole sighed.
 
She felt a headache coming on and
pressed her fingers to her temples and rubbed in small concentric circles.
 
“Don’t worry about me, Danielle.
 
I’m fine.”

“Sure you are.”
 
She walked back into the kitchen and
began aggressively chopping veggies.
 
“Don’t say I didn’t try and help,” she called out as Nicole retreated to
her bedroom.

***

Her phone was buzzing.

Nicole swam out of a deep, dreamless
sleep, struggling to wake up.
 
She
knew it was imperative that she answer her cell, but she was so tired.
 
So awfully, terribly exhausted.

And then she woke up, as if breaking the
surface of a dark lake.
 
It was very
late at night—that much she knew.
 
Her heart was pounding.

The phone buzzed.

She’d fallen asleep with it right next to
her.
 
The number was private, which
could mean only one thing.
 
She
answered it fumblingly.
 
“Hello,
hello?”

She cursed herself for sounding
desperate.

There was silence for a few awful
seconds, and then Red’s voice on the other line.
 
“You will be outside your apartment
waiting in exactly fifteen minutes.”

“You’re coming here?”

He exhaled impatiently into the
phone.
 
“Stop questioning.”

“I’m sorry, sir, for my questions.”

“Don’t make me doubt my faith in you,
Nicole.”

“Never, sir.
 
I will do better, sir.”

“A car will pick you up outside your
apartment in fourteen minutes.
 
Wear
a cocktail dress.
 
And nothing
underneath it.”

“Yes, sir.”
 
She was excited, she was over the
moon—and devastatingly moist.

The line went dead.

She checked the time.
 
“Oh my god,” she whispered.
 
It was 3:18 in the morning.
 
But she didn’t have time to worry about
the lateness (or earliness) of his call.
 
She had to get ready in short order.

So she jumped out of bed and ran to her
closet.
 
Luckily she had a cute
little dress that would fit the bill, dark and sheer, it hugged close to her
body, showing her curves in a very flattering way that few of her outfits
did.
 
She’d only worn it once previously,
and a lot of her friends had remarked on it.

Nicole stripped down and slid the dress
on, marveling at how intoxicated she felt from just the few moments they’d
spent talking just now.
 
It was like
she was on speed or coke or ecstasy (none of which she’d ever done—only
what she’d imagined them to be like).

He hadn’t mentioned shoes, but to be safe
she put on her dark Prada heels.
 

Then she ran to the bathroom, looking
both ways first to make sure Danielle wasn’t nosing around.
 
Brushed her teeth, put on deodorant,
splashed water on her face—no time for makeup unfortunately.

Being late for this appointment was
simply not an option.
 
She
envisioned him driving by, stopping for the briefest of instances, and then
simply driving off if she wasn’t curbside when he arrived.

Not two minutes later, Nicole was
downstairs and out front, standing alone in the darkness of her street.
 
Nobody was around.
 
The only light came from the moon and
the few streetlights nearby.

It was creepy and the air was chill.
 
With no coat on, she was shivering,
hugging herself for warmth.

And then a sleek black town car turned
onto her street and slowly, smoothly came to a halt in front of her.
 
Nobody got out.
 
The windows were tinted so that she
could not see inside. There was no sign of Red—this could be
anybody.
 
She could get in the wrong
car and end up raped and murdered and left in a dumpster.

These things happened in the big city.

But despite the danger, Nicole opened the
door and got inside.

Red wasn’t in the car.
 
The driver was a short, dapper,
middle-aged man wearing a suit coat and driving cap.
 
He smiled at her in the rearview
mirror.
 
“Miss Masters?”

Relieved, she smiled at him.
 
“Yes.”

“Relax,” he said, “we’ll be there
shortly.”

“Where?” she asked.

“Our destination.”
 
He started to pull away from the curb
and she still had the door ajar, so she closed it and sat back, watching the
scenery go by—at first slowly, then more quickly as the town car picked
up speed.

Before long, she no longer knew where
they were going.
 
The driver went up
one street and then the next, and soon they were in neighborhoods that looked
increasingly dingy and run down.
 
Not what she would have expected from Red.
 

Where
are we going?

About twenty minutes later, the car
pulled over to the curb again.
 
Across the street was a 24-hour convenience store that seemed
popular.
 
It appeared to be
frequented by black and Hispanic customers mostly.

About a block away, five or six women
dressed in next to nothing yelled out to one another, called to cars as they
drove by.
 
One car stopped and a
woman in a skirt that showed almost all of her ass, bent over and consulted
with one stopped vehicle before getting in the passenger side.

Hookers.
 
They weren’t the first she’d seen since
arriving in town.

But still—she was surprised by the
choice of location.
 
What could he
have in store for her?

Nicole took a deep breath and got out of
the car, telling herself she was safe.
 
She was under Red’s protection.
 
He wouldn’t allow any harm to come to her.

As soon as she stepped onto the sidewalk,
the town car pulled away and disappeared.
 
She hugged herself and turned in a circle, looking for Red.
 
Nothing.

Now she was getting afraid, and a little
angry too.

“Hey, baby, nice ass.”
 
The voice came from startlingly
close.
 
She turned to see a short
but stocky Hispanic man looking at her from the stoop of a nearby apartment
building.
 
He stood up, his blue
jeans hanging low, his Nets jersey revealing well-muscled arms and too many tattoos
to count.
 
“You from around here,
honey?”

She looked again for Red.
 
Panic was rising in her throat.

“Hey, honey, you got a hearing problem?”

She started to walk away from him.
 

“Baby.
 
Wait.”

He was coming closer.
 
She didn’t want to run but she would if
she had to.
 
She’d scream.
 

Suddenly his hand grabbed her bicep and
squeezed.
 
“I said wait.
 
What’s your problem?
 
You one of them stuck up bitches from
uptown?”

“Leave.
 
Me.
 
Alone.”
 
She hissed the
words.

He smiled.
 
“I like that talk,” he said through grit
teeth.
 
His eyes were deadly cold
and cruel.
 
“I like bitches who talk
back,” he said, “because it’s that much more fun when I bust a nut in their
fucking faces.”

“That’s not going to happen.”

“Oh yeah?
 
It will if I say so, mama.”

He gripped her arm tighter and she
winced.
 
“You’re hurting me.”