Then, the accounting department went up in flames. No one wanted to recognize Delilah, but once she was gone they felt her absence. Numbers were calculated wrong and totals were off. Bank accounts for the company were unbalanced and our international compatriots were flailing without accurate numbers regarding their budgets. It was a fucking mess, and I was seething with anger. Was the company made up of complete morons? My first few days here had been wonderful! Or maybe they had just been wonderful because my eyes had been hooked on Delilah’s tits.
Either way, it was batshit crazy.
I had another meeting with the investors to make sure they were solidifying their investments for the rest of the year. I had no idea why the hell this company did quarterly investment meetings, but I was going to change that. At most, companies who operated on this level did bi-annual meetings. Once to contribute money, then again to see how their money was growing and going to be returned to them tenfold. But four fucking times a year? With each meeting handling a new amount of money? That was insane.
Maybe Bernard Hathaway did that shit because he had a secret weapon in Delilah, but it was exhausting. And my company wasn’t going to run that way.
I got a lot of kickback in that meeting. The investors enjoyed meeting as much as they did because they got to keep their hands in things. I figured out many things in that meeting. Things that made me appreciate Delilah even more. Not only was she keeping up with their accounts and cutting them checks when necessary, she was also sending them a monthly newsletter. Charts and pie graphs and potential growth rates. The fucking works. She sent them a monthly email with a PDF file of all this shit, and not once had she ever steered them wrong. She was accurate down to the dollar with how much money the investors would earn.
It was amazing, how good she was with numbers.
But a two-hour investor meeting turned into an entire fucking afternoon. And by the time it was done, I was ready for a drink. I was maintaining my good behavior with everyone and trying to control my temper, but I had to bring down the banhammer when it was necessary. I had a running watchlist of people I would keep my eye on until Delilah was back, and then I would consider their layoffs at a later date. Right now, there were two things on my mind.
Keeping the investors happy and tasting Delilah’s pussy.
In fact, every night when I closed my eyes, I saw her. Her color-changing eyes and her thick thighs. The beautiful dip in her waist and how my fingertips fell perfectly within it. I could feel the soft skin of her breasts underneath my teeth as I marked her body. Pulling bruises and welts up onto her skin so she could remember me in the morning. I thought about how perfectly her walls throbbed around my cock. How eager her body was to pull me deeper when she came on my cock. I woke up smelling the ghostly phantom of her scent in my bedroom.
It was almost too much to bear sometimes.
I had to get out for awhile. After a particularly long day at work, I called up a couple of my buddies and told them the drinks were on me. I needed some time to clear my head. I needed to get this woman off my mind. She was pervading my thoughts when I dropped my walls at night, and I didn’t like it.
I was supposed to be in control.
“Preston! Holy shit, dude. You look like hell,” Bryan said.
“Hey there, Bryan. Colin.”
“Don’t ‘Colin’ me. What’s up with you? We were supposed to get drinks after your first day at this new fucking company, then you ditched us. What gives?” Colin asked.
Bryan Peachland and Colin Hasselbeck were a couple of guys I befriended during my Harvard Business School days. Bryan was an instructional technology nerd and Colin started his own fucking publishing company. The man always had his nose stuck in a damn manuscript with a red pen in his hand, ready to obliterate the author on their story or their grammar.
“I don’t see a manuscript tonight, Colin,” I said. “You gonna get drunk with us?”
“Yeah, especially since it’s on you,” Colin said. “I’ll consider it your apology for ditching us a few weeks ago.”
“You know how it goes with a new company,” I said.
“The least you could’ve done is called us if you were gonna have a late first night,” Bryan said.
“Hey. The drinks and the food are on me. Come on. Quit bitching and let’s get inside,” I said.
The guys and I ventured inside one of the premier bars in Philadelphia. They had a kitchen with finger foods, but they specialized in alcohol and women. Cages were dangling from the ceiling by chains that had luscious women dancing in them. The waitresses were clad in leather and lace. And there were plenty of women you could conspicuously rent out for an hour or for a night. There were rooms someone could use in the back of the bar, or someone could leave an address if anyone had any intention of taking the girls somewhere.
It was the place to be for the businessmen of Philadelphia. But for some reason, I wasn’t as excited to be here as I usually was.
“So! How many people have you fired, man?” Bryan asked.
“No one as of yet,” I said.
“Wait. Preston Walker hasn’t fired anyone yet?” Colin asked.
“Did you stroke out? Have you been abducted? Who are you and what have you done with Preston?” Bryan asked.
“Okay, assholes. I get your point. I haven’t fired anyone yet because there hasn’t been a reason to. There are some things I’m watching people for, but nothing that has threatened to destroy the company. Yet,” I said.
“Ah, so the layoffs are coming. What are all the fuck ups you’ve got in your view?” Colin asked.
“Some idiot in the graphics design department fucked up sending over the design for the new sign. So we had to return the sign and reorder it. I did it myself, because what the fuck else am I doing with my life? The investors at this company meet four times a fucking year.”