Thirty-four

Berlin, Germany

“Mr. Shaw … Mr. Shaw.”

The words were delivered on an exasperated tone, followed by a sigh, the kind usually reserved for unruly toddlers and carpet-pissing puppies. He knew it well—his babysitter couldn’t go five minutes without using it on him.

Ben burrowed his head under his pillow and pretended not to hear her.

“Mr. Shaw.” This time Gail said it through clenched teeth, emphasizing the last word with a sharp smack to his bare ass with what felt like her day planner wrapped in barbed wire. “You’ve missed your morning meeting. Again.”

“Oww … so?” he mumbled, taking a swipe at her, his eyes still screwed shut. “Do your job and reschedule it.”

“I did. Again.” She sounded angrier than usual so he lifted his face from the mattress and took a peek. She glared down at him with equal parts anger and affection, the hiss of the shower running in the next room filling the silence between them. “She’s still here.”

He burrowed his head under his pillow again to hide the fact that he was just as surprised as she was. “Again, I say, so?” He turned his head to the side so she’d hear him. All he could see were her no-nonsense navy slacks and plump hands wrapped around the planner she used to try to dictate his life. Sometimes it worked. Most times it didn’t.

“So have you given any thought to what will happen to that poor girl when your father finds out the two of you are carrying on?”

The running shower meant Celine had spent the night. She was usually gone before he woke up. Overnights were an unspoken no-no. That she felt confident enough to spend the night meant she thought she could count on him to protect her if his father found out about them.

She was wrong. He’d already picked his team and she wasn’t on it.

On the upside, it also meant that after weeks of fucking her silly, his father’s personal assistant finally trusted him. Oxytocin was a wonderful thing.

He pulled his head out from under his pillow and looked up at Gail. “Carrying on?” He laughed a little, the sound of it sharpening her glare. “Is that what the kids are calling it these days?”

“I don’t know about the kids,” she said, disapproval dripping from every word, “but I call it stupid and selfish.”

Instead of answering her, Ben rolled over, stacking his hands under his head, and gave her the Full Monty. “Gail, Gail, Gail …” he said, giving her a lewd grin even though she was old enough to be his mother. “Always the Grumpy Gus.”

Gail narrowed her eyes at him, completely unfazed by his behavior. “I’m being serious, Mr. Shaw,” she said, the worry in her voice overriding the disapproval. “Your father will—”

“Never find out,” he finished the sentence for her even though he was pretty sure he was lying. “Look—it’s not a big deal. I’m just blowing off steam,” he said, gingerly setting a discarded pillow over his morning wood. “God knows I can’t have any real fun with you hanging around my neck all the time.”

Gail wasn’t buying it. “Fun?” she said, shaking her head. “There are a dozen women working for FSS who are under the age of fifty and relatively attractive—eleven of them are not your father’s personal assistant.”

He shrugged. “I have a thing for blondes.”

“What you have is a thing for is driving your father crazy,” she said, taking a step away from the bed. “It’s as immature as it is dangerous.”

“Why, Gail,” he said, shooting her a lopsided grin, “are you worried about me?”

“You?” She huffed the word while reaching over and lifting his robe off the chair to toss it at him. It was a game they played. She tried to get him to wear it and he refused. “Hardly,” she said, marching toward the door. “Who do you think is next after your father kills the two of you? Me, that’s who.” Even though she denied it, he knew she was concerned and not just for herself. That for some reason, she cared about what happened to him. It made him feel bad—mainly because she was right. Gail’s job was to make sure he kept his dick in his pants and his tie on straight. One task was proving infinitely more difficult than the other.

“Am I still on for that thing today?” he called after her, trying to make up for the fact that he made her job categorically impossible, just by being himself.

Gail stopped in the doorway. “Yes, Mr. Shaw, you’re still on for that thing,” she said, her back still turned, shoulders squared. “Your plane leaves in three hours.”

“I’ll be there in two.”

She mumbled something as she walked out the door that sounded like bullshit.

As soon as he heard the door click closed, he tossed the pillow off his johnson and stood up, scanning the room, hoping Celine hadn’t taken it into the bathroom with her.

Nope, it was exactly where she’d left it. Pausing for a moment to make sure the shower was still running, he reached for her purse, rifling through its contents until he found what he was looking for.

Celine’s keycard.

As his father’s personal assistant, Celine went where he went. Her keycard wasn’t just good for his Berlin office—her card was the equivalent to keys to the kingdom. A master card that opened every door and private elevator in every office his father kept across the world. Aside from his father, no one had that kind of unrestricted access to FSS. Not even him.

Using the scanning app on his phone, Ben scanned the coded strip on the back of it before punching out a quick text.

Thirty minutes or less.

He attached the scan to the message and hit send, receiving an answer in less than a minute.

Seriously? Do I look like the pizza guy?

Ben smirked at the screen, tapping out a response before tossing Celine’s purse back on the chair where she’d dropped it.

No. You look like my bitch. Get it done.

In the next room, the shower shut off. He imagined Celine, wet and naked, drying herself off with one of his ridiculously huge towels. Without bothering to wait for a text back, he locked his phone down and tossed it onto the bed on his way into the bathroom. He wasn’t worried.

It didn’t matter who or what it was. He was his father’s son and that meant he always got what he wanted.