Total pages in book: 58
Estimated words: 55765 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 279(@200wpm)___ 223(@250wpm)___ 186(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 55765 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 279(@200wpm)___ 223(@250wpm)___ 186(@300wpm)
Screw it. I’m done playing these games. I take out my cell phone and call him directly instead of his assistant. I don’t think he’s going to answer at first. The phone keeps ringing. Finally, he answers with a gruff, “Yep?”
“Some way to greet your friend,” I say jokingly.
He’s clearly not in the mood. “The company’s hemorrhaging money, and you’ve disappeared, Luke. Don’t play games with me.”
I grind my teeth, almost snapping at him. I feel far more on edge than I usually would. My usual clear, processing mind has been knocked dangerously far off-track. All this desire is twisting me up. “I’m doing my job,” I tell him. “You can’t argue with that.”
He sighs. “Okay. Fair enough. You are. You haven’t let anything slip. Is that what you want to hear?”
“I should’ve spoken to you first,” I admit, “before I did the live. But hell, Seb, just the idea you’d want to cover this up—”
“I never said that,” he cuts in. “I wanted to explore other options.”
“Like what?”
“It doesn’t matter now.”
Outside my office door, I hear a floorboard creak. It causes a shimmer to move through me, making me want to rush out there and grab Maci’s thick hips, pull her up against me, and lean down, driving my groin against her ass, letting her feel how badly I want her.
“It does,” I tell him.
“So you can see if you made the right decision?” he snaps. “So you can feel good about yourself?”
“Okay. Cut the crap. What’s your problem?”
He scoffs. “You know what my problem is.”
“No. This attitude started way before the live. You’ve had an issue with me for a while.”
He doesn’t say anything for almost a minute. One lesson I’ve learned is to be silent as often as possible. It gives other people the room to reveal their secrets and gives them spots in which to slip up. It’s worked many times, and it works now.
“Maybe I’m sick of being second fiddle,” Sebastian mutters.
“Second… what?”
“Don’t act dumb. Don’t insult me.”
“Seb, I swear, I’ve got no idea what you’re talking about.”
“You’re the one who appears on magazine covers. You’re the one everybody thinks of when they picture our company. You’re the one who’s become a celebrity.”
I lean back in my chair, massaging the bridge of my nose. I don’t often get headaches, but one is starting now. “Seb, I never asked for any of that. I rarely even give interviews. I’m pretty sure you’ve had more interviews than me.”
Now that I think about it, Sebastian has chased fame multiple times.
“Not that it matters. They still talk about you more.” He sighs heavily. “It’s just… you’ve got a family. You’ve got Kayla. What have I got? A failed marriage. No kids.”
“I’ve got a failed relationship, too,” I point out.
“My wife cheated on me with three men. Yours did you a favor by leaving you and OD’d. It’s not the same thing.”
A smile spreads across my face. Not that this is smile-worthy. It’s so surreal that Seb would say this to me—that he would throw that in my face. How can he think I have some happy-go-lucky family life when he just pointed out why that’s incorrect? We lived together once. We built this company from the ground up.
“How long have you resented me?” I ask him.
“Don’t do that. Don’t reframe it.”
“Dammit. Fine. How long have you felt this way?”
“I don’t know… a long time.”
“Seb, if you want to be the face of the company, we can work on that. It makes no difference to me. As long as we’re on the same page with this VR crap.”
“You didn’t bother to ask if we were on the same page.”
“Then stop whining and tell me what you would suggest!”
He hangs up the phone, leaving me to grind my teeth, my head splitting right down the middle.
I leave my desk, go into the bedroom, and grab more swimming shorts. It’s too late and cold for the outdoor pool, so I head into the basement instead. However, the basement is an understatement. It’s more like an underground sports center.
As I reach the bottom of the steps, I pause, hearing splashing water. “Please let it be Kayla,” I whisper under my breath. Maybe she’s decided to skip her fashion thing and take a swim instead. That will make my life easier.
When I lean around the corner, I’m met with the ball-flooding sight of Maci swimming through the clear water. From the way the light bounces against the surface, I can see her curvy ass in the swimming bottoms. She turns, kicks off the wall, and swims on her back, hell, showing me the shape of her perfectly plump, wet tits.
She stops at the edge of the pool when she spots me. I quickly walk down the remaining few steps in case she thinks I am spying. I am spying, but I don’t want her thinking of me that way.