The Miami Millionaire (14 page)

Victoria blushed and playfully hit Jake on his arm glad that whatever the moment was, along with the incredibly intense look in Jake’s eyes, had gone.  “Let’s not mention that shall we?  I guess I drank a couple too many, but it was fun.”

“Oh yes it definitely was.”  He teased and loved to see her blush.

“Jake!”  She was sure she remembered everything from last night and apart from a few drunken dance moves she was sure she hadn’t thrown herself at anyone or stripped down to her underwear and danced on a table. “I didn’t do anything too embarrassing did I?” 

“Not at all, in fact you were perfectly sweet.”

Sweet?  Ugh Victoria wrinkled up her nose - she couldn’t think of anything worse than being called sweet!  Sexy, now that was good.  A smart cookie, yes she would take that too.  But sweet?  Great, she felt frumpy now!  She supposed she couldn’t blame Jake for thinking her sweet in her pretty little sun dresses even if they did still show her toned legs off to perfection.  It hadn’t taken Victoria long to see how the people in Miami loved to show off their bodies, something they didn’t do so much back in London – she supposed it was a mixture of the Latino culture influence and the beautifully hot weather.  The men flashed their muscles whenever possible, and Victoria wasn’t complaining because there were some seriously good looking guys around, and the women showed off their curvy assets with figure-hugging clothes and preferably as little of them as possible!  No, Victoria decided her wardrobe needed to change, she wasn’t in London now, she was in Miami, and it was hot here in more ways than one! 
‘Just wait until tomorrow Mr Jake Cumberland, and we will see who looks so sweet’
she thought - she could be just as sexy as the rest of them and Jake was about to see that for himself. 

“Okay, coffee it is then.”  Jake said as they headed to the coffee house

Victoria looked at her watch, it was getting late.  “Actually, can I have mine to go?  I think it’s time I head back now.”

Jake looked at his watch and even though Victoria was probably right he didn’t want her to leave, not yet.  “Are you sure?  I’ll drive you back to your hotel after we drink it.”

“No thanks, anyway you’re already home.  I’ll grab a cab.”

“No way, I’ll drive you.”

“Jake.  Take no for an answer for once will you?  I’ll grab a cab.  Okay?”  Victoria said as she skimmed down the ridiculously long list of coffees on offer.  After that amazing moment of chemistry on the dance floor between them, the last place Victoria thought she should be was alone in the confined space of an incredibly sexy car with him.

Jake nodded. 

Victoria woke up early and ate breakfast before she took her time getting dressed, putting on a pair of figure-hugging black trousers which moulded themselves to her curvy hips all the way down her legs to her ankles.  Her bright red high heels matched her red strappy vest top which was hidden under the new thin black jacket she bought yesterday on her shopping trip – she zipped the little jacket up so just the tiniest hint of red teased where the ‘v’ of her ample cleavage threatened to edge its way out of her jacket. 

Victoria looked at herself in the mirror. Her hair was pulled up high on her head in a ponytail and swayed as she walked.  She looked smart and professional, but boy did she look sexy, and she smiled pleased with herself - her jacket and trousers hugged to her like a second skin and there was no way Jake was going to call her sweet today!  Victoria stepped away from the mirror and then stopped.  Smiling to herself she reached into her jewellery pouch and pulled out a small pair of gold drop earrings and slipped them through the small holes in her ears.  She moved her head and watched how the earrings swayed below her earlobes when she moved and she smiled.  That was it, she was ready to go now.

Victoria looked up at the huge escalators leading up to the building’s glass front doors.  She swallowed hard realising how dry her mouth was and took a drink from her water bottle.  She was nervous, but she was excited too.  She put her right foot on the first step of the escalator and felt it pull her upwards as she focused on her destination in front of her.  This was day one of the rest of her life.  If she got this right she would be the account manager in London for one of the largest and most prestigious accounts.  She felt the butterflies well up inside her stomach as she stepped off the escalator, through the big glass doors, and out of the already hot air into the air conditioned reception. 

Victoria headed over to the reception desk.

“Good morning.  I’m Victoria Pembrose and I am going to be working here for a few weeks in marketing.”

“Good morning Victoria.  Jake is waiting for you in his office.  Here’s your pass and if you take the lift over there up to the top floor someone will meet you from there.”

“Thank you.”  Victoria said as she clipped the visitor pass to the waistband of her trousers and headed off to the lift.

Jake was on the telephone when Victoria walked into his office.  He had obviously been there for a while with his blue cotton shirt sleeves rolled up as he perched in his immaculately cut navy blue suit trousers on the edge of his desk looking out across the Miami skyline as he talked on his office phone.    Victoria knocked on his office door as she stood in the doorway waiting for him to realise she was there. 

Jake heard the knock and motioned over his shoulder for whoever it was to come in, just before he turned his head slightly to see who was walking into his office.  It took just a moment for his brain to catch up and register that it was Victoria, and his head whipped around quickly when he caught sight of her fully.  One look at her tight trousers and jacket showing her curves off to perfection, topped off by her dark red hair pulled back exposing her slender neck threw him off balance and he jumped off his desk sending a glass of water spilling across the pile of papers next to him, and he let out a curse of words.  Hastily he told the person on the other end of the phone he would have to call him back and disconnected the call.

Victoria quickly crossed the room and righted the glass pulling the rest of the papers out of the way of the spreading water.

“I am so sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you.”

“No it’s fine.  Look hang on, let me just get a towel.”  He said as he darted into a doorway at the side of his office and returned with a hand towel.  As he walked back across the office he watched Victoria gathering up papers and putting them on the dry meeting table, and he had to laugh to himself - any man would have fallen off their seat seeing that coming towards him and he decided it should be illegal for anyone to look that good, certainly within office hours.

Jake mopped up the remaining water from his desk and then offered Victoria a seat across from him as he sat down on an oversized black leather chair behind his desk.  He cleared his throat and put on his professional face trying to ignore the screaming of every nerve ending in his body and the hardening feeling down below.  Oh hell he was in big trouble if this was how she was going to look every day – he’d had trouble enough keeping his hands off Victoria in those cute little sundresses she wore, all sweet and sexy at the same time.  But this?  This was a whole new level!

“So Victoria, welcome to Creative Technology Holdings.”  Jake said finding a piece of paper to focus on rather than look into Victoria’s dark brown eyes because that would be just too much!

The rest of the day flew by for Victoria with a flurry of introductions to various personnel followed by time spent in several different departments.  She met the people in charge of advertising and product placement, then spent the afternoon sitting down with the heads of marketing and sales discussing what new products were planned to be launched in the United Kingdom first.    She loved their new state-of-the-art products and closed her folder containing the top secret information as the meeting came to an end.  She stored the folder in the lockable top drawer of her desk in her little office only too aware that if this information were to get into their competitors’ hands it would be disastrous for Jake’s company, and her.  

Victoria looked up as she heard Jake’s voice at her office door.

“So, what do you think?”  He took up most of the space in the doorway as he stood with his large tanned hands on his hips giving her his full attention.

“Of your products for the UK?   They’re great.  I’m looking forward to working on the campaigns.”

“You understand that at this moment you cannot tell anyone what you will be promoting, not even your boss.  Just for now you will need to refer to anything as “the product” and that way you won’t slip up, because believe me I’ve found out the hard way in the past you can’t trust anyone in this business, and until all the contracts are signed and the actual release dates are confirmed I don’t want anyone knowing what we are releasing.  That’s part of the beauty of our campaigns.”

Victoria knew what he meant only too well remembering how his promotional team had taken her by surprise, but it certainly had worked and Jake and his team knew exactly what they were doing.  She nodded, “I understand.” 

“Did Jenny give you the line-up of events and promotions we have going on for the next fortnight?”

She nodded tapping a piece of paper on her desk.

Jake walked inside the door and stood across the desk from her, “Good.  This is the kind of stuff I want going on back in the UK.  I want product placement, I want to see the latest bands wearing my watches and drinking my Vodka, and I want to see their kids wearing our kiddie tracker watches, and everything else I bring out next.  I want competitions people want to win and huge publicity of the winners – days out on a yacht, you name it.  Don’t be afraid to spend the money because we will make it all back on the sales, don’t worry about it.  I want everything we do here to go on over there.”

“Okay that’s all great except for the yacht bit – I’m sure you remember we aren’t hot like Miami, so you might want to reconsider that one.”  She half joked, “But don’t worry, we will come up with something else and it will be spectacular – we’ve got the Thames in London and we can do swanky cruise boats and things, that always catches attention.  And I’m thinking along the lines of some events at stately homes, we have some amazing huge old houses over there, club nights and plenty of product placement on some of the reality programmes.”

“You do that Vicky, because I want you to be the envy of every marketing person in London.  I am still getting calls from other agencies in London touting for my business, but I don’t want that, I don’t want them.”

“Thank you for this opportunity Jake, I know there are people who would give their right arm for this and I am really grateful you are giving me that opportunity.”

“Everyone deserves a fair chance, and I know what it’s like to be told you can’t do something when you know you can.”  There was that intense blue-eyed look again, and then abruptly Jake turned around and walked out of Victoria’s office calling over his shoulder, “The first promotion is tonight so go get yourself something to eat and then head on down to the beach.” 

And with that Jake was gone.

Victoria took off her jacket revealing her little strappy red top with her black skinny trousers.  She kicked off her shoes and left them in the promo trailer - the sand was warm underneath her feet and her high-heeled shoes didn’t quite cut it on the sand, she preferred to be barefoot for now.  She was happy to be involved with the promotion work and she was enjoying walking around handing out leaflets to the people near the open-aired arena on the beach.  It was so crowded there was standing room only now, people had heard they had a surprise appearance lined up from one of Miami’s biggest rappers and, in the meantime, the locals were only too happy to stand around and wait watching the huge screens for Creative Technology Holding’s advertising.  The word had gotten out as people messaged and called their friends to hurry on down to the beach and there were hundreds of people waiting behind the security barriers for the next show straight after this one.  Victoria could already see the news crews taking their positions – this particular rapper had been in hiding for the last few weeks after a rather conveniently-timed minor sex-tape scandal, which just so happened to coincide with his new song and raunchy video release.  Everyone was looking forward to getting a glimpse of him on his first public appearance since then.  The particular product they were promoting tonight was to appeal to the male thirties and early forties market who wouldn’t be put off by a bit of a naughty consensual moment in the back of a tour van caught on camera.  In fact, they probably just envied the guy and wished it was themselves! 

Victoria went to stand by one of the security men at the edge of the barriers and watched as the rapper came on stage and the audience went crazy screaming so loud she thought her eardrums would never recover.  Out the corner of her eye she saw a white Lamborghini pull up next to their promo vehicle and Jake stepped out.  He was still in his blue shirt with his sleeves rolled up revealing his brown muscular arms and his mirrored Ray-bans gave him the look of a movie star as he walked around his car.  It was only then that Victoria noticed the tall dark haired beautiful woman sitting in the passenger’s seat waiting for Jake to take her hand as she slid out of his car.