“What happened?”
“We’d been dancing around each other for weeks, then it all became too much yesterday. He was there, and then he was kissing me. Before I knew it, his hand was between my legs, and he was grinding his erection against me while he rubbed me to the best orgasm of my life.”
She licks her lips. “And then?”
I shook my head. “I sort of…bolted.”
“No!” she cries, making a few people at nearby tables glance over as she flings herself against the back of the chair and looks at the sky. “You didn’t!” she continues, turning back to me.
“Shh!”
She sighs, leaning forward against the table again. “Please tell me you didn’t just bail on him.”
My eyes drop to the table. “I didn’t know what to do, and I did have to get ready to head to the hospital.”
“Oh, Harper, what am I going to do with you? You’re finally on the verge of getting a man between your legs, and you leave him hanging with a case of blue balls.”
“I think…”
“What?”
I try to remember how his body reacted, but I’m not sure. “Nevermind.”
“So, what now?” she asks, taking a sip of her own—much smaller—smoothie. “Dinner, dates, the whole thing until he rocks your world the right way?”
I sigh. “It’s not that simple.”
She laughs. “It is, you’re just overcomplicating things in that gorgeous head of yours. Girl meets boy, girl decides if it’s worth going for, boy rocks girl’s world. You’ve already passed the middle step because whether he’s properly fucking you or not, you don’t just get a hand down your panties without deciding that he’s worth your time.”
“Up my panties…actually,” I correct, regretting it as soon as the words leave my lips.
She laughs. “Okay, miss it’s not that simple, tell me what’s so complicated about this. Besides him being one of your bosses, of course.”
I bite my lip. “Well, there are rumors and how he acts.” I pause. “He’s not into, well, ordinary sex.”
Lee shrugs. “So he’s got some kinks. What’s wrong with that?”
I remember how he held my hands above my head, how he pinned my arms so that all I could do was take the pleasure. I shiver. “It’s…” I pause to consider my words. “He’s a man who likes to take control.”
She stares at me for several seconds before her eyes widen. “Control?”
I nod. “There’s this club. The long-time employees talk about it sometimes. Apparently, whips and chains are for more than decor.”
“Damn girl, you don’t mess around, do you? Keep that V-card intact for this long, then go right to a man who’s interested in the hard-core stuff.”
I fold my arms on the table and drop my head onto them. “What do I do, Lee?”
“What do you want to do?”
“I don’t know.”
“Then, I suggest you figure it out. Is this guy the one who’ll pop that cherry, or is something going to be wrong with him, too?”
I sigh. “What if he’s like the others, only interested in sex and willing to say or do anything to make it happen?”
“And what if he’s not? I know you’re still hurting over that jackass, but not every man is like him.”
“Are you sure?”
“The question you should be asking is why you think every man is like him.”
“Because no man has given me a reason to think otherwise.”
“Do you give them a chance?”
I’m silent. I thought I did, but maybe she has a point.
Monday’s meeting came and went, neither Axel nor I addressing what happened on Friday. Instead, we were all business, fine-tuning the presentation. Now, I’m waiting to pitch to Declan and Maddox.
I don’t know how I feel about the ambiguity in our relationship, but ignoring it gave me a bit of much-needed breathing room and allowed me to come to a decision. That decision will have to wait, though. I need to push it from my mind. I have a presentation to make, one that could boost my career or leave me on a longer path to associate status.
“We’re ready for you,” Declan said, poking his head out from the first-floor conference room.
I nod, take a deep breath, and follow him inside. On one side of the conference table are Declan, Maddox, and Axel, and on the other are the leads in the sales, marketing, and creative departments.
This is like any client presentation, I remind myself. My bosses are the clients, and I need to sell them on this marketing plan.
I force a pleasant smile on my face and step up to the lectern perched on the end of the table. “Thank you for coming, everybody.” I take a breath. “Today, I’d like to talk to you about selling our services to the merchants at the Eastside Mall. I plan to cover how we determined that this is a viable group, why it’s a good match for our services right now, and some of the ways we’ve worked to keep costs down all around to make the packages more attractive to potential new clients.”
I pause to briefly make eye-contact with my audience, then I’m off. I walk them through the process of identifying the mall merchants as ideal targets for new marketing campaigns, why we chose them rather than other smaller but potentially higher-paying niches. I point out how the merchants will want to dive into fresh advertising as soon as the renovation is complete to begin recouping losses, and how we will decide on template-based rather than bespoke packages to maximize the deliverables.
The presentation lasts more than an hour, but by the time I finish, almost everybody is nodding and smiling. Finally, I reach the magic phrase at the end of the presentation, “Any questions?”
Everybody takes a moment to look at each other, then Maddox speaks up. “How soon can we get the ball rolling on this?”
I smile. “That depends on how many additional template options we want to include in the offerings. Creative has already designed five styles, and they’re ready to go as soon as we start our own campaign. Beyond that, we’ll just need the sign off on our own materials. Language has already been drafted, as well as methods. We decided that a direct mail campaign can provide the soft introduction now, while the work is still underway, and we can either launch a phone or walk-in campaign once the renovation is nearly complete.”
I take a breath. “Anything else?”
Axel looks across to one of the sales leads, and they speak softly for a moment. Unfortunately, it’s in hushed enough tones that I can’t make out. But when they stop talking, they both shake their heads.
I nod at the lack of further questions. “Thank you all for coming. I’m available to discuss further or clarify as needed, and I hope that you’ll see this initiative as a promising venture.”
Declan looks around the table after my conclusion, then speaks. “That was quite impressive. You properly identified a potential market, determined their needs, developed a campaign with both them and us in mind, and you came to us with the bulk of it ready to go.”
I shake my head. “Axel—Mr. West—played a large part. He signed off on several aspects, including the go-ahead to get creative working on templates.”