“Good morning, Mr. Cross.”
Leah, our new receptionist’s, singsong voice dances across the lobby from her spot at the sleek reception desk. I can see her legs under the desk. Her skirt has run up her thighs, and she’s wearing stockings.
I know this little show is for my benefit. Like it has been every day since she started. A different seduction technique, but it’s not escaped my radar that Leah wants to fuck me.
Of course she does. I’m hot and rich as fuck. And I’m also the boss. And the soon-to-be CEO of my family’s company, Under Her Lingerie, when my parents retire and hand the reins over to me.
That’s right. I sell underwear. Sexy-as-fuck underwear. The very thing that I love to peel off a woman’s body right before I screw her senseless.
I have the best job in the world.
“Good morning, Leah.” I give her a brief, pleasant smile. Not the smile I know can get women into bed or on their knees for me in minutes.
No flirting back with Leah because she works for me.
Rule number one: Never fuck the staff.
I don’t want or need the complications that sleeping with an employee would bring.
Aside from leaving myself wide open for a lawsuit and that my mother would kill me for dipping my pen in the company ink, I can’t deal with the drama and tears when she clues in to the fact that all I wanted from her was sex.
Even though I would have repeatedly told her that it was a one-time thing.
That’s rule number two: Always make it clear that hook-ups are just that.
Rule number three: Never let them know where you live, work, or what your phone number is just in case rule number two doesn’t stick.
I press the call button for the elevator, and the door opens immediately. I get on and hit the button for the fourteenth floor where my office is.
I fucking love this building. It’s home to me. Everyone here is like family. My parents like to run a happy ship, and they treat their employees very well. My folks are well loved. They are the best. I know everyone here is sad to see them retire. There were a lot of tears the day it was announced.
Honestly, it will be weird for me, being here and running this place without them.
But I’m excited, too. This is what I’ve been working toward my whole life.
The elevator arrives on my floor, and I step out when the door opens. I walk through the lobby and toward the executive offices, and then I push open the door to my office area.
My PA, Chrissy, is already at her desk.
She lifts her head from her screen. “Morning, Wilder.” She picks up my takeout coffee from her desk, which she brings in for me every day, and holds it out.
She’s the best PA ever. I’m lucky to have her.
“Thanks.” I take the coffee and have a sip. I love my coffee hot, to the point of almost burning. How the hell people can drink lukewarm coffee is beyond me. The hotter, the better. Just how I like my women.
“Good weekend?” she asks me.
“Of course.” I grin.
Don’t get me wrong. I fucking love my job, but weekends are reserved solely for playtime, and I love playing.
Friday night was spent between the legs of Ida, a Swedish supermodel I’d met at a show a few weeks ago. Saturday night was boys’ night out with my buddies, Cooper and Dominic. The three of us go out every Saturday night, and we end it with each of us in a different chick’s bed.
I am in no way ready to settle down with just one woman. I don’t have anything against relationships per se. I just don’t want one.
Well, not at the moment anyway. I like—no, I fucking love my life.
I love my job. And I love having a different woman in bed with me every weekend. I get to have regular sex without the demands and complications of a relationship, as there are always plenty of women willing to service my needs. But I’m not a selfish bastard. I like to make sure that the woman I’m screwing is having a good time. I can’t get off if she doesn’t.
I’m a total boss at oral sex. I’ve had a lot of practice. I fucking love going down on a woman. There’s nothing better to get me going than that first taste of a woman’s pussy.
I have a perfect setup.
Sex is reserved for weekends because the week is for work.
Work always comes first, and I don’t see that changing anytime soon. Especially not now that I’ll be taking over the running of the company from my parents.
Maybe, in the distant future—like ten or fifteen years—I’ll meet some girl I want to have a relationship with, but if I’m being totally honest, I just can’t see it happening.
And, really, it would be grossly unfair to the women of Chicago if I took myself off the market. My dick is just too awesome to keep to one woman.
Sundays are brunch with the boys, so we can talk about the escapades from the night before, and then I usually spend the rest of Sunday working from home, getting ready for Monday morning.
“How was yours?” I know she was going to Milwaukee to spend the weekend with her fiancée’s parents.
Yes, fiancée, as in another woman. Chrissy is gay, and she’s getting married to a woman called Wendy. And, no, she’s not your stereotypical butch or porno-hot lesbian.
She’s just a normal, good-looking woman. And she runs my life like a champ.
“Yeah, it was okay, but Wendy and her mom were talking wedding stuff nonstop all weekend.”
She rolls her eyes, and I laugh.
“Anyway, I’ve got this morning’s schedule ready for you, but first, your mom and dad are waiting for you in your office.”
“They are?” I move my eyes in the direction of my office door.
“Yep.”
“How long have they been waiting?”
“Only five minutes or so.”
“And they didn’t say what they wanted to see me for?”
“Nope.”
A mild unease settles in my gut.
Of course, it’s not unusual for my parents to turn up in my office unannounced, but first thing in the morning is unusual.
The last time they were waiting in my office for me this early in the morning was seven years ago when I was in a much smaller, much shittier office, working in the sales department, and I’d just screwed up the Renshaw deal. The big deal that they’d trusted me with.
And, by screwed up, I mean, I’d screwed Mr. Renshaw’s daughter, Amber, a few months prior.
In my defense, I hadn’t known who she was then, and the deal was in its infancy at that point.
But the problem was, Amber had wanted more than one ride on my dick, and when I’d told her—as I’d told her before we boned down—that it was a one-off, she hadn’t been so happy at all.
Like took-her-high-heeled-shoe-off-and-threw-it-at-my-head not happy. I was lucky I hadn’t lost an eye.
Seriously, why is it that some women will agree to no-strings sex, and then once the sex is over, they completely forget the prior conversation?
I know my dick is awesome, but he doesn’t have mind-erasing skills.
I don’t have time for relationships. And I like my life the way it is. Sex with no strings.
But Amber had been at the dinner meeting with Mr. Renshaw, and she had taken one look at me, whispered something in her father’s ear, and that was the end of that. Renshaw had decided he no longer was interested in considering stocking our products in his department stores. Well, he hadn’t exactly put it that politely, but you can imagine what he’d said.
I get that she’s his daughter, but it’s not my fault that she’s batshit crazy. And, seriously, if the guy can’t detach business from personal, then we shouldn’t want to work with him anyway.
But my parents didn’t exactly see it that way.
I got reamed out for losing the deal and also a lecture from my mom about how I should be treating women with respect and not trying to sleep my way through Chicago.
But that was seven years ago, and even though it still bugs me that it was the one deal I fucked up, I have to allow myself the fact that I was wet behind the ears in business. Everyone is allowed one screwup in business.
But I didn’t let the Renshaw fiasco put me off. I like fucking way too much to stop having it on the regular.
I just had to learn to be a lot smarter about who I climbed into bed with, which means that I make sure to keep my weekend activities far, far away from anything associated with the office. One sniff of a business connection with a potential screw, and I’m out of there and on to the next.