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Carter
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My desk phone rings. “Carter Lockwood,” I answer.
“It’s Jim Shaffer.”
I smile. “Hey, Jim. How’s it hangin’?”
“Good, good. Got the monthly info for ya.”
“Perfect,” I say excitedly. I love Jim’s calls, I literally see dollar signs. “Go ahead.”
“Date, June 30. Eight p.m. to four a.m. Location, 1592 Moorland Drive, Denver. Ten rooms, straight and gay workers this time. Password: Moorlove, one word.” He spells it out for me.
“Got it!” I say.
“Will I see you there, Carter?” he asks.
“Ya know, that’s not very far from where I live. I think I might stop by.”
He laughs jovially. “Great, just great. Take care, and thanks again,” he says before ending the call.
I log into my secret app and input all the details. After double and triple checking, I send out the mass text to our thousand-plus users with a smile on my face.
Having only visited the roaming sex club twice in the past year, I think I will stop by. I might not engage in anything, but I’ll check it out. Maybe I’ll find a woman who perks my interest.
I log out of the app and click on my emails.
There’s an email from Jeff with Taryn’s one-month performance evaluation. Damn, has it been a month already?
I click on it to see nothing but high praise. I smile, glad she’s getting her work done, learns fast, and gets along with everyone in her department and in the company in general. I reply to the positive and suggest re-evaluating her salary at her six-month mark.
Leaning back in my chair, I stare at the email while I tap a pen on the back of my neck. I can tell Taryn is trying to engage me in conversation when I run in to her. But I keep myself closed down. Truth is, I both can’t stand to be around her and wish I could spend every minute in her presence. She looks so damn cute and sexy every day, it’s hard for me to look at her. I’ve been distant and cold on purpose, hoping she’ll get the hint that we have to keep this professional.
Lisa isn’t watching me like a hawk like she was at first, but I don’t need any more professional hassles. It’s best if Taryn and I just remain boss and employee. In fact, I’m hardly the boss to her at all. Jeff’s her supervisor, I’m just the CEO.
But every night, and every weekend, whether I have downtime or am busy with social things, I think of her. Wishing I could text her and ask her to come over. To come with me to that wedding, that street fair, that neighborhood wine party that goes on once a month in my exclusive gated neighborhood. It’s mostly boring, but I go to keep up my relationship with my neighbors. Most of them are okay, but seem to be slightly older couples who are rather dull. I usually go alone or drag Declan with me, if he’s not busy on a date or doing his own thing. The guy never sits still.
But wouldn’t it be nice to have a date to bring? A gorgeous woman on my arm.
I’ve fantasized plenty about what life would be like with Taryn in it as my partner. My lover. My live-in love. My best friend. To have her in my bed every night, her breathy moans as she writhes underneath me, my cock buried to the hilt in her sweet pussy. What I wouldn’t give to taste her again. To see if her cunt is just as tight and wet as it had been back then. It took everything in me not to strip her clothes off and put her to bed a few Fridays ago, and then climb in with her and worship that sweet body ten ways ’til Sunday.
A few weeks ago, when we rode the elevator together... I wanted to hike up that skirt and fuck her up against the mirrored walls. To feel her fingers in my hair and her lips against my ear as I made her come all over my dick.
Fuck, I’m getting hard at work. Briana or anyone could walk in at any time. I adjust my pants and force myself to think of something else, knowing I’ll never have Taryn. Besides, what would Eric say? He’d whoop my ass.
I glance at the clock to see it’s a little past four. I’ve got to get out of here.
I shut everything down and see that everyone has already left the office. Fishing my keys out, I hold them tightly as I turn off all the lights and turn the deadbolt to the stairwell so nobody can access the floor that way. Then, I hit the elevator call button. Once I’m inside and the doors close, I use my key to lock the floor, making sure the elevator doesn’t stop on the tenth floor until myself or Lisa unlocks it in the morning.
David is waiting by the curb in my town car.
“Did you have a good day, sir?” he asks, opening the door for me.
“I did. How about you?”
“Fine, just fine.” He closes my door and gets into the driver’s seat. I watch the city go by as we roll through downtown. It’s slow-going at times due to traffic, but I barely see it. My mind is on Taryn again.
Maybe I shouldn’t be such an ass to her. But it’s the only way to keep her away. For her to stop looking at me like she wants me. Like the longing in her eyes isn’t just for me.
I tell myself she’ll get used to it. That she’ll stop thinking we can be friends or more and those looks will turn to a professional mask and she’ll no longer think we can have anything. But is that what I want?
I don’t know and I can’t think about it.
“Dave, swing by Wok Away, will you?”
“You got it, boss.” He puts his blinker on to head to the popular Japanese restaurant so I can get takeout. I’m in no mood to cook—not that I do that much, anyway.
Him calling me boss reminds me of when Taryn had done that today. Perhaps she was getting the hint.
Though I’d love to hear her call me that in the privacy of my bedroom, while we’re both naked and I’m wearing her out.
Stop it, Carter!
***
After the game is over, I finish my stir fry and get up from the couch to put the stuff in the trash. When I get back to the living room, a game show has started. I pick up the remote to turn it, as I detest game shows, but pause when the host says, “This Midwest state is the home to the heroine, Dorothy, in the 1939 film, The Wizard of Oz.”
I roll my eyes. Kansas, duh.
My brain immediately takes me back to my time in Wichita. At 26, I was done with college and working in an IT firm, but I met a beautiful Kansas girl named Kelsey, who was homesick and wanted to move back. I had reluctantly agreed to go with her, telling myself I’d been in Colorado my whole life and should venture out. Plus, the job paid more so I had nothing to lose. My dad had died five years prior from an overdose and I hadn’t heard from my mom in over a year, which wasn’t unusual. With no siblings or anything tying me here, I’d left.
That relationship fizzled out quickly, though. She turned out to be not so sweet but rather bossy and overbearing. It lasted a little over a year before I quit that job, packed my shit, and determined to open my own tech firm here in Colorado. With a very hefty, scary loan from a bank, I’d started Lockwood Technologies, Inc.
It was the best decision I ever made. After busting my ass to create that super exclusive app—many sleepless nights trying to perfect its secrecy—my first year of profits from Jim’s sex club app had me paying off that loan and putting a down payment on this house. The second year saw me paying off the house and then cash for the Bugatti and a Harley I rarely rode.
I leaned back on the sofa and looked around at all I’d accumulated and acquired thanks to a bank who trusted me, the breakup with Kelsey, and a lot of hard work. Growing up with sometimes nothing to even eat, I was also grateful to God, karma, or whoever was looking out for me.
I just wish I had someone to share it with who isn’t a crazy stalking psycho. Then, Taryn’s face pops into my mind, but I know that can’t happen.