About the Author
Jill Ramsower is a life-long Texan—born in Houston, raised in Austin, and currently residing in West Texas. She attended Baylor University and subsequently Baylor Law School to obtain her BA and JD degrees. She spent the next fourteen years practicing law and raising her three children until one fateful day, she strayed from the well-trod path she had been walking and sat down to write a book. An addict with a pen, she set to writing like a woman possessed and discovered that telling stories is her passion in life.
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Interested in reading the book that kicked off The Five Families series? Check out the book readers are calling “one bombshell after another.”
Forever Lies
By
Jill Ramsower
Here’s a taste of Alessia and Luca’s jaded tale …
Chapter 1
Alessia
It was fucking Monday all over again. Why did they have to suck so much? Mondays crept into the week far more frequently than any other day—at least twice as often as Friday—and they lasted three times as long as any halfway decent Saturday. Mondays are the first day of a diet and the last day before a paycheck, all rolled into one. They’re starting your period while wearing white pants and getting a flat tire on the tail end of a road trip.
There is not a single redeeming quality about Mondays.
I shouldn’t complain.
I was gainfully employed by the largest construction company in New York City. That’s nothing to sneeze at. I was the Associate Director of Marketing with my eyes set on obtaining the coveted director’s position. If only it wasn’t already occupied by the smarmiest, most disgusting man in the city, my boss, Roger Coleman.
Even his name was sleazy.
He tainted each of my days, marring the work that I loved with his presence like greasy food stains on a pristine wedding invitation. His lewd comments and presumptuous stares were the lingering aftertaste of rancid food, turning my stomach long after I’d had a taste of his vile brand of seduction. I did my best to keep our interactions professional, public, and as brief as possible, but that was difficult when we worked together regularly on important projects.
His advances had started out small—telling me how lovely I looked or commenting on my hair or eyes. In romance novels, having an older executive pursue the young professional may have sounded sexy and exciting, but when my fifty-five-year-old boss with a fake-and-bake tan and leathery skin started hitting on me, it was repulsive and unsettling. I’d done my best to discretely brush aside his advances and discourage his behavior in the hopes he would take the hint and move on, but after a year of working in the office, he had yet to cease his efforts.
Only once had his pursuit escalated to a physical level. Six months ago, at the company Christmas party he cornered me in a hallway and pressed me against a wall, his dick thrust against my stomach. He’d been drinking heavily, and I made the mistake of walking to a restroom alone. I’d been so repulsed and terrified, I didn’t even hear the unquestionably revolting comment he made. I gave a stuttered excuse and tore from his grasp, leaving the party without another word.
The incident only lasted a matter of seconds but had been seared into my brain. He never acknowledged it, and neither did I. That’s not to say I pretended it hadn’t happened. The threat of his unwelcome attention was always in the back of my mind. I’d taken every effort to distance myself from the man, both professionally and physically. I made certain I pulled in coworkers to help on projects, so there was always an extra set of eyes working with us.
Our offices, along with several others in the suite, were constructed with glass walls, which helped give me a certain degree of security—no hiding behind closed doors outside of the conference or break room. Another fortifying fact—Roger’s advances weren’t a daily affair, not even weekly. The problem wasn’t their frequency; it was the uncertainty of not knowing when they might occur that was the most stressful.
Thus, the misery that was Monday.
Yet another week of wondering what lewd propositions I might have to fend off.
Unlike my sisters, I had made the choice early on to go into the family business. Had I known how complicated it would be, I might have pursued a job elsewhere. But now, I had put in a year of my time and was poised to move up the ladder—I wasn’t going to entertain the option of quitting. I wouldn’t let my scumbag boss make me walk away from what I’d dreamed about since I was a child—my family legacy.
Instead, I made sure the neckline of my blouse didn’t hang too low and marched into work swathed in a protective shield of confidence. This week would be one of the better ones. My boss was only in for the day before he would leave on a week-long business trip to L.A.
I could survive one day with the devil.
Most of the morning passed uneventfully. I was left to my own devices, preparing for a full week of project meetings and impending deadlines. It wasn’t until almost eleven when the intercom on my phone blared with Roger’s voice.
“Alessia, can you come in here, please?”
A seemingly harmless request, but it stirred an overwhelming sense of dread in the pit of my stomach.
I didn’t answer—there was no need. He could see me as I stood from my chair and made my way to his office next door. While I didn’t so much as glance his direction, I had no doubt his beady eyes would follow my every step. Our offices lined the outer wall of windows—the glass walls allowing the rest of the employees to enjoy the soaring views from our building. It was a double-edged sword—no privacy was a good thing, but it also meant there was no escaping Roger’s stare.
“Did you need something?” I stopped several feet from his small conference table where he’d laid out his presentation materials.
“You sure you can’t come with me? You know the material as well as I do and would be an enormous help when I make the pitch. It’s not too late to get you a ticket.” He arched a brow, hands propped on his hips where he stood on the opposite side of the table.
“My sisters would kill me if I’m not there to help get ready for Mom’s party this weekend. It’s her fiftieth and—”
“I know, I know,” he cut me off as I began to blather about my mother’s pretend birthday. She’d turned fifty years ago, but the party had been the best excuse I’d come up with on the spot when Roger had initially asked me to accompany him on the trip. There was no way in hell I was traveling with the man. Fortunately, he hadn’t bothered verifying my story, so I continued to uphold the ruse.
“You told me already. Well, get over here and let’s run through everything one more time before I head to the airport.” He waved me over with a frown, clearly disgruntled I hadn’t caved to his pressure to accompany him.