Scarlett
"Although this is a mere formality, you still need to be on your best behavior," Mary says warningly while we wait for my new boss.
"Got it."
"I've only met Mr. Stanford a few times, but from what I've observed, he's a lot like your uncle—-"
"A control freak then."
My uncle's secretary allows herself a smile. "Your words, not mine."
"But...you've made it clear, right? That I'm Uncle Nicolaas' niece?"
"I did, yes, but..." Mary seems to be choosing her words with care. "I don't think it will keep you from getting fired—-"
"But it's just an internship!"
"He's a very serious man," Mary says apologetically, "and if he sees that you're not working like you're supposed to, then..."
"I'm starting to have second thoughts about this," I mutter.
The only reason I have to apply for an internship is because of my mother. I've just graduated from high school, and she's only agreed to me having a gap year if I complete an internship in a "respectable" company for two months.
"If you back out from this," Mary reminds me, "your mother's certain to make good of her threat of shipping you off to Switzerland—-" She stops speaking when we hear the door open, and Mary quickly motions for me to get to my feet like some soldier about to inspected by his sergeant.
I feel like it's overkill, but oh well.
Although Mary's only twenty-five, she has a tendency to act twice her age and is extremely professional.
I don't think I've even seen the other girl ever let her hair loose, figuratively or literally—-
Oh my!
Thoughts of all-work-and-no-play Mary fly out of the window as soon as my new boss strides into view, and I am totally blown away.
Although Nic's long told me the name of his friend and my future boss, I never bothered to look him up online.
He's old, after all, and I've never been into older guys. They tend to be too serious and boring, with the way they seem to think clubbing is just one step away from doing drugs.
But now...
I realize I was wrong.
There are exceptions to the rule, and my potentially new boss?
He's the most beautiful man I've ever seen in my life, and I want him.
I love how his hair is a rich shade of chocolate, and I adore how his silver eyes seem to flash the moment his gaze settles over me.
His pinstriped suit is divine (and divinely expensive), but it's the amazingly ripped body underneath that has my mouth running dry in an instant. I'm dying to tear his shirt open a la Superman, just so I can run my hands over his bare chest.
I know I sound obsessed with him, and I am.
Even worse, I think I might even be halfway in love with him, as silly as it sounds.
I remember Mary mentioning earlier that Slater graduated the same year as Nicolaas and Stone, which would then make him thirty-three...and fifteen years older.
Old enough to be my dad even, and the thought, coming out from nowhere, makes me squirm in a mixture of shock and arousal.
I like having naughty thoughts now and then when I'm touching myself, but on a dirty scale of pathetic to a one-way-ticket to hell, my secret fantasies would probably score around 3.5.
I mostly fantasize playing hooky with my imaginary boyfriend, but that's basically it.
So this suddenly kinky thought of dating a guy who's old enough to be my daddy?
Way, way, WAY out of my comfort zone here.
But I like it.
Slater
I think I've been had. The Nic I know from college was cool and efficient to a fault. It's why I didn't hesitate to say yes when my friend asked if I could let his niece work at my office.
I assumed I'd simply end up with a younger, female version of Nic...but instead I get something completely different, and I find myself biting back a curse when Nic's secretary excuses herself from the room.
Shit.
Just like that, I'm alone with her: a barely-legal blonde with big, doe-like eyes that were now shamelessly gobbling me up like I'm her favorite flavor for a lollipop.
What the hell?
I can feel my dick swelling into a huge damn bulge under my pants, and I'm suddenly thankful I've got myself a massive desk to hide my erection behind it.
"Take a seat, Ms. Duke."
She obeys without question, and as she places her hands on her lap, that's when I see she's holding her phone...and what's on its screen.
I gesture to it with one raised eyebrow. "What's that about?"
The screen on her phone is currently displaying rows of photos of me with some girl or another by my side, which I'm guessing are the results of an image search.
She follows my gaze, and her lips curve. "Oh, this?"
Her voice is soft...and unexpectedly playful.
It's definitely not the way an intern should speak to the CEO of a billion-dollar business, and the sound of it makes me want to yank her out of her chair so I can bend her over my lap and—-