Selling Seduction (Your Ad Here #1) (12 page)

Mercy had gotten more good sleep this week than she remembered getting in any single block in her life, and all instances tied back to waking up next to Ian. It sucked that her work wasn’t blessed with the same sense of satisfaction. She’d lost almost the entire week, and she flew out tomorrow, to pitch to KaleidoMation.

She pressed her naked body against Ian’s, memorizing every inch of him as they molded together. Eyes closed, she wished the looming bitterness of having to leave didn’t mar the sweetness of this moment. “We should get dressed.”

“I guess.” He kissed her on the forehead.

It took a force of will to step out of his grasp. They’d showered together this morning—another fantastic moment for the mental scrapbook—and the euphoria lingered on her skin. “I really have to work.”

“You can use the study.” He pulled clothes from drawers and dressed. “I’ll give you all the space and privacy you need.”

She was getting addicted to the sight of him. She dragged her gaze away and tugged on her own clothes. “Give me a few hours to wrap things up, and tonight I’m all yours.”

“But just tonight.”

She couldn’t make herself confirm it. They both knew it was true. It had been one hell of a week, the kind of thing she’d never forget, but tomorrow morning was their expiration date. She wouldn’t dwell on that. They’d do what they had up to this point, make the most of the moment, and then it would be time to move on with life.

Despite the resolution, her heart clenched and protested, making it difficult for her to cling to the words. She resisted the impulse to kiss Ian, and headed for the door instead. “I’ll be downstairs.”

* * * *

While Mercy worked, Ian busied himself with anything and everything. Reviewing contracts, trying to find something to watch, starting and discarding an infinite number of ideas for Thompson Advertising.

The power light blinked on his laptop, and a bubble on the screen warned he needed to find an alternate power source soon. The five or so hours his extended battery gave him weren’t enough today. He hated to interrupt Mercy, but his cord was in the study. As he approached the room, he heard Mercy, and someone else drifting from the speakerphone. He focused on not listening and knocked, to draw her attention.

She looked up, and he mouthed,
Two seconds.

She nodded. “Andr—”

“We’ve got some footage from spring break last year.” Whoever was on the phone kept talking.

Mercy spoke again. “Hang on just a—”

“Palm Beach. Couldn’t use it. Too vanilla.” He kept talking, oblivious to Mercy’s attempts to stop him.

“Andrew. Stop.”

“What? You wanted bikinis. Right?”

Mercy rubbed her face. “Yes. But I’ve got other ears.”

“Oh. Sorry. I’m just saying, no nipple, and enough ass coverage you should be good.”

“Andrew,
stop.
” Mercy rubbed the spot between her eyes.

Despite Ian’s attempts not to listen in, pieces clicked together, and a vague picture of what he heard formed in his head. If she was still working on the KaleidoMation pitch, they were discussing using her friend’s porn footage for commercials.

“You can’t do that on TV,” Ian said.

“I loved that show when I was a kid.” The voice from the phone laughed. “And yeah, you can if you do it right.”

Mercy dropped her face into her hand.

“I’ll let you get back to work.” Ian stepped away.

“Am I keeping you from something, Merc?” The way the man said her name sounded like
Mirk
, as if she were some sort of mercenary.

Mercy gestured for Ian to stop. “Andrew, Ian. Ian, Andrew. Now everyone knows each other.”

“Holy shit.” Andrew’s voice crackled when he raised it. “The crush? Oh, wait. I’m not supposed to say that out loud, am I?”

If this guy was an associate, Ian had a better idea where Mercy had shed a few of her inhibitions.

She rolled her eyes. “You think you’re embarrassing me, but you’re not. He’s known longer than you have.”

“And he still turned you down? Stupid bastard.”

Ian didn’t mind being talked about in the third person. It was kind of amusing. He did have the right to defend himself, though. “She was fifteen at the time.”

“And she’s not now,” Andrew said. “Shit, man. Do you see her? I don’t care what kind of wild-child stories she tells you about her life abroad, she’s been psychologically saving herself for you for as long as I’ve known—”

“
Now
you’re embarrassing me.” Mercy talked over him. “That
off
switch I’ve asked you about…?”

“Jerked too hard. Broke it off.”

Ian saw the pink creeping onto Mercy’s face, and the clench of her jaw. This couldn’t be helping her meet her deadline. As tempting as it was to distract her until she gave up, she deserved the same shot at KaleidoMation Ian had, and he’d already stolen too much of her time. “I’ll let you get back to work.”

“Wait.” She rose enough in her seat to grab his wrist. “He knows his shit, Andrew. He does TV.” She looked at Ian. “What do you mean we can’t do that?”

“The censors won’t let you show that much skin. I mean
no nipple
? Really? Is everything else showing? This isn’t YouTube and thinly veiled context. The FCC keeps a much closer eye on network television.”

Mercy shook her head. “I thought you had something new for me. The FCC also has a handful of guidelines about what is and isn’t
too risqué.
We can show certain amounts of skin, as long as we cover the right bits.”

“And she intends to push that line,” Andrew said.

Ian should drop this. They didn’t want to hear what he had to say, despite Mercy’s insistence. He couldn’t walk away now, though. “What happens if the censors push back?”

“We change the creative.” Mercy’s answer came without hesitation. “We come back with new footage that packs the same punch but subtler, and try again. It’s not what I want for this market, but I’ll bend if it comes down to it.”

He heard the words, but they didn’t make sense. “You’d waste six months of creative and push your deadlines back—what?—two to three months, in order to re-do everything, because you want to push the envelope and get risqué?”

Andrew laughed.

Ian looked at Mercy, not sure what the joke was. She said, “Six months of creative? We’ve pulled this together since I got into town.”

“You’ve been pitching KaleidoMation for weeks.” Ian was missing something.

“I have. And for each new round of decision making, they see something new. You do that too. Don’t you?”

“Of course. But we worked it all up the moment we started bidding. We tweak each pitch based on their reactions, but we don’t have time to build new story boards and art from scratch, every round of bids.”

Mercy furrowed her brow. “Does Jonathan know that?”

This was getting ridiculous. “I expect he does. That’s the way most companies do this. How are you not?”

“We’re flexible. We don’t play the
decision by committee
game.”

“This isn’t a matter of flexibility.” Ian’s frustration built that she seemed to be speaking a different language. “You’re talking about shooting with new models. Assembling people out of nowhere. We don’t have the budget for that kind of last-minute filming.”

Mercy’s mouth twitched in an unformed smile. “You don’t have a business partner with terabytes of half-naked men and women in photos and video he owns the copyright to and is willing to sell.”

“You’re using porn?”

“
Hey
.” Andrew cut into the conversation. “Keep the disdain out of your voice. You might be immune to Miss Mercy, but you’ve beat your meat to videos of people fucking.”

“That’s not my point.” Ian wasn’t even sure any more what his point was.

“You’ve got prestige, longevity, and money behind you, Mr. Thompson.” Mercy’s tone shifted to calm, as if she wanted to deescalate. “I’ve got flexibility. That’s why it’s a competition, right?”

“I’ll let you get back to it.” Ian grabbed his charger. He wouldn’t talk to two stone walls.

“Nice to finally meet you, Suit.” Andrew sounded more smug than sincere.

Mercy stopped Ian halfway to the hallway and intertwined her fingers with his. “I’m almost done. Just another hour or two.”

“No worries.” Ian gave her a smile and strode from the room.

As he rounded the corner, he heard Andrew say, “He’s protective of you. You finally fucked him, didn’t you?”

Ian knew he shouldn’t stop, but he couldn’t help straining his ears.

“Yes.” Mercy’s answer was soft.

“And?” Andrew asked.

If Mercy replied, Ian couldn’t hear it.

Andrew said, “I hope the reality came close to the fantasy.”

“Blew everything else out of the water.” Mercy sounded sad.

“I’m sorry, Merc.” The brashness was gone from Andrew’s voice, replaced with sympathy. “Let’s wrap this up.”

Ian moved out of earshot before leaning against the wall. Too many thoughts assaulted, and it all crawled under his skin, harshing his sensibility in a way he wasn’t used to.

*

A few hours after the disruption, Mercy found Ian in the living room, flipping through TV channels fast enough there was no way he registered what was on. “Sorry to keep you waiting.”

He dropped the remote when he turned to face her, and it clattered to the table. The smile that spread across his face was better than a hot shower on a cold day. “It’s okay. Did you finish what you wanted?”

“Yeah.”

“I’m sorry about interrupting.”

“It’s done and in the past. Nothing to worry about or apologize for.” She didn’t want to talk about that afternoon’s conversation. They were about to be separated by several thousand miles. No reason to let work add to that chasm. “Any plans for the evening?” she asked.

“Being wherever you are.” He patted the couch, and her chest squeezed in on itself.

She curled up next to him. The rest of the night passed too slowly and too fast at the same time. She didn’t want to count the minutes until it ended, but her gaze drifted to the clock above the TV without her permission every few minutes.

The conversation flowed, the way it always did with Ian, hopping from one topic to the next. At some point, he suggested going to bed. It was too defining a moment, though. —like admitting their time was up. They drifted off wrapped around each other. As far as Mercy was concerned, it was worth the resulting kink in her neck the next morning.

Neither of them suggested sharing the shower this time. He let her go first, while he took care of work remotely so he could drive her to the airport. She checked in for her flight and made some last minute tweaks to travel plans while she waited for him. Then they were on their way.

Neither of them had said it yet, but she suspected he saw their goodbye looming as bleakly as she did.

“You’ll keep in touch.” His statement shattered her focus.

She looked at him wide-eyed, while he watched the road. He hadn’t asked. It was so tempting. She’d considered it. But the chat with Andrew and Ian yesterday drove some hard points home for her. “No.”

He clenched his jaw. “Just like that? You’ve put thought into this.”

“I have.”

“Care to share it with me?”

She owed him that much. “This whole thing with KaleidoMation is going to happen again, as long as we’re in the same industry. Us competing, I mean. Even if we don’t know up front next time, it’ll come out when one of us wins the contract. Someone will be hurt.” She already wondered how they’d deal with this one. Ian’s refusal to back down yesterday, though she had the conversation and the project under control, was proof the friction would be there regardless of their mutual assurances.

“So business wins over lo—” Ian shook his head. “Personal relationships? I didn’t realize money drove you.”

The slip in words, the almost-confession, caused an internal with his implication she was doing this out of greed. “That’s not fair, and that’s not what this is about. I’m not asking you to give up your business; you can’t expect it from me, either.”

“I didn’t mean that.”

“I hear that from you a lot, Ian. I’m wondering when you’ll say what you mean, instead of backpedaling when I call you on it.”

“You want to know how I actually feel?” He gave her his full attention when they stopped for a light. “I don’t want you to leave, but I can’t ask you to stay. It’s not fair we only got a week together. I feel selfish and childish for wanting more, but I do. I don’t want to force that on you, but fuck, it’d be nice if I wasn’t the only one thinking it.”

“You’re not”—her frustration rose, and her voice went with it—“but it doesn’t matter. Even if we push everything else aside and pretend keeping in touch works, we’ll be long distance. It won’t last. One of us will get bored, eyes will wander, and it’ll be over. I’m cutting to the chase now.”