“I don’t know what it is that you want. Did you know I worked here?” she asked.
“No, I had no clue.” If he had, he wouldn’t have waited around a year to make a final ultimatum to Arthur. The takeover would have been completed months ago.
She tucked some of her hair behind her ear and nibbled her lip.
“I’ll fire you,” he said, offering up that as a solution.
“What?”
“You don’t want to have dinner with me, fine. I can make cutbacks. That’s no problem.”
“Why are you doing this?” she asked.
“Because I can. That’s all I’m asking. Dinner or unemployment.” He watched as she clenched her teeth, clearly pissed off with being given this choice. It wasn’t a hard one. It wasn’t like he’d asked her to fuck a room full of guys and ride that dick all the way to a paycheck.
Nope, just dinner.
“You can’t do this.”
“Why not? I’m checking through the finances. Making cuts.”
“I’m one of the best people for this company. I’ve been able to keep it afloat for so long.” Her hands were clenched into fists. Soon, he’d have her screaming in pleasure. The thought of seeing her naked, struggling beneath him, it flooded his mind, and his dick went impossibly hard.
“And I’m here. I’m the best this company is going to get, so I suggest you either agree to go on a date, or start looking for a new job.”
Silence fell between them, and he knew he had her. Jobs were not that easy to come by. He may still even fire her, but first, he wanted to have dinner, talk.
“Fine.”
“Tonight.”
“Noah, please, give me some time.”
“I’ll pick you up tonight at seven.”
“You don’t even have my address,” she said.
“When you’re me, it’s not that hard to come by.” He held up his cell phone and he already had her details.
Before she could respond Arthur entered the office, and Skye had her excuses to leave. His day had just picked up.
****
Skye stared at her morbid reflection. The dress she wore had been one she’d attended a funeral in a few months ago. It wasn’t that she wanted to be all in black or to have the memory of that bad time, but it was all she could afford.
Arthur Sanderson was a sweet man, a kind man. After her divorce, he’d been a rock to her, and she’d done everything she could think of to help him stay afloat, taking pay cut after pay cut. Laying people off was one of the worst experiences of her life, one she hoped to never repeat.
When he put the multiple options of the buyouts and takeovers, he’d trusted her decision, and somehow, she’d picked Noah’s out of a handful of offers. How was that even possible?
She knew Noah had gone on to achieve greatness. She’d seen his picture on covers of magazines and in news headlines, but really, how could she have picked him? Now he wanted to go on a date as if the last fifteen years hadn’t happened.
Seeing him today, it felt a little similar to waking up inside that cell all that time ago. Of course, there were huge differences. For one, they were not locked away by some predators who were going to abuse them in the worst possible ways. No, she felt locked within his embrace, unable to move.
The last time they spoke was in that hospital bed when she knew she had to let him go. There was no way she could have allowed him to stay. He deserved a life far away from the one they lived.
High school in his absence had been a nightmare. Random people kept asking her what happened, or saying shit that she didn’t need to hear. They all wanted the dirty details. She worked her ass off to be able to graduate when others did, got a full ride out of town, and took business courses to where she was today.
The sound of her doorbell pulled her out of her thoughts. She lived in an apartment block that didn’t have much security. People could come and go as they pleased, and for the most part, she loved it like that. She didn’t have the irritating sound of someone pressing her buzzer at three in the morning, completely drunk but wanting to be let in.