Total pages in book: 149
Estimated words: 142866 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 714(@200wpm)___ 571(@250wpm)___ 476(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 142866 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 714(@200wpm)___ 571(@250wpm)___ 476(@300wpm)
“If you have any questions,” Hendrix says, her face carefully smoothed into a flat expression, “you can contact my office. Skipper will make sure we connect.”
I want to disrupt that studied indifference.
“I’ll call you,” I assert.
Her lips tighten, and that impassivity cracks for a nanosecond before she snaps it back in place. “Of course. I’m available to answer any questions you have about Aspire’s portfolio or any of our founders.”
I don’t know why I’m resisting her efforts to rebuild the wall of politeness that seems to collapse as soon as we start talking. I should want that, too. I want to see what’s behind that wall, though, even if I can’t ever touch what I find.
“The driver, Mav,” Bolt reminds me, staring at his phone. He’s not fooling me. He’s as attuned to my interaction with Hendrix as surely as if his phone were an antenna.
“Right.” I give Hendrix the smile I would offer any business associate. “I’ll be in touch.”
Once in the car, I let out a breath that’s been caged in my ribs for the better part of the night. The effort of not paying attention to Hendrix was more taxing than I’d realized.
“Shit,” Bolt mutters, jerking off his bow tie and unbuttoning his shirt, which has lipstick smeared around the collar like someone was trying to chew his neck.
“Did you really fuck a perfect stranger at a founders’ showcase?” I ask, unable to hide my shocked amusement. To call his behavior tonight out of character would be an understatement.
“There’s nothing perfect about that woman.” He glowers at the parade of lights the skyline offers as we drive through downtown Atlanta, but a smile teases the corner of his mouth. I drop my head back against the car’s seat cushions. At least one of us needs to be reasonable. To my dismay, it’s not him.
And I’m afraid pretty soon, it won’t be me.
CHAPTER 14
HENDRIX
So are you ready to tell me what happened Saturday night with Bolt?”
“A mistake is what happened.” Skipper all but slams my Monday morning grande on the corner of my desk and turns to leave.
“He just seemed so aloof and downright belligerent,” I say, hoping the comment will draw her out of her uncharacteristic reticence. Skipper once told me about a threesome she had in the botanical gardens. A woman who will copulate with a dude and a chick behind a bush is not what I’d call circumspect. Skipper pauses on her way to the door, turning to look at me, chagrin smeared in shades of shame all over her face.
“I don’t know what came over me.” She stomps back into my office and flops into the chair across from my desk.
“Oh, do take a load off. Not like I have work to do or anything.”
“You asked and now I’m telling you.” She runs a hand over her eyes wearily. “It was like a wild animal took over my body.”
“If this story gets bestial or even anal in nature, I’m good on the details. You can keep ’em.”
“Would you stop joking?” she asks, even though her lips twitch. “I’d never felt that way before. Especially not for someone shorter than me. Ewww.”
“Nothing wrong with short men. I’ve fucked a short man with a big dick. An excellent redistribution of inches if you ask me. Height won’t make you come.”
“You didn’t say that when you smashed that basketball player who was a good six seven.”
“Chile, I slept with that man thrice, but I deeply regret it because it was mid every time. I just kept trying, though. Kept hoping it would get better. A man that big, it just had to be better.”
“When we first met him, you said he had BDE.”
“He got the B and the D but no E. Dick included. Energy sold separately. I was like, bruh, you working with all them inches, and I still got to rub it out with the Rose when you leave? Sir, you are redundant.”
“You really have no shame, do you?” Skipper giggles.
“Says the woman who slept with a man she was actively combative to three seconds after meeting him. And in the women’s bathroom no less.”
She covers her face and screeches, “It was unisex!”
“Now, you know I stay out your business.”
“That’s a lie.” Skipper parts her fingers, allowing space for one eye to glower at me. “You always in my business.”
“At least tell me if it was good because I have to know what he is packing under that bow-tie.”
The barest hint of rose crawls over Skipper’s cheeks in a light-skinned blush. “It was surprisingly satisfying given the… quickness of it all and that he repulses me in every nonsexual way.”
“Did you come?”
“Yes.”
“Then your pussy must like him, even if you don’t.”
“Hendrix, please,” she groans. “Don’t remind me I slept with a man who insulted me as soon as we met.”