I lay down on the bed, wincing as if in pain.
Dana seemed relieved to be back in the role of assistant. “Let me phone down to reception for some aspirin.”
I let her do that, then told her I wanted to sleep. She turned off the lights and left the room.
We didn’t talk about what had just happened.
But the incident had aroused me.
I looked at my watch, Ethan would be in bed by now.
I texted Natalie: What r u doing?
She responded: Nothing.
What r u wearing?
Again, she responded: Nothing.
I knew that wasn’t true. I was smiling.
I sent back: U must be cold.
Thinking of you keeps me warm.
How warm?
Very warm. Sweaty, in fact.
We continued along this vein for some time, I was masturbating and picturing her in my mind, imagining that it was her on top of me instead of Dana just now. I pictured Natalie with her gorgeous breasts swinging in front of my face, riding my cock and getting me harder than any woman had ever been able to do. I couldn’t wait to get back to her, to take her to bed and make the picture in my mind a reality.
The following morning, Dana and I met for breakfast downstairs. We discussed work and our conversation was strictly business-like.
“I don’t think I can eat yet,” I said, pulling a face and looking at the breakfast buffet. “I had too much to drink last night, can hardly remember a thing.”
Relief flooded her face.
She knew I was giving her an out of a very awkward situation.
“Me too! I don’t know what I got up to last night!”
“We must have drunk too much,” I said.
“What were we thinking?!”
“I know, right?”
I could have fired Dana and found someone else. But I trusted her, and she’d been working for me since Luma had been a small startup with almost no clients. She had worked from a tiny desk, sharing office space with me, answering all the phones, and making coffee for the office every morning. She was our receptionist, our messenger, our project manager and on occasion, even a graphic designer. As the business grew, she had moved on up with it.
She knew me, had helped to plan the wedding with Skye and when that fell apart, she helped me deal with the lawyers. She’d looked after Ethan, when necessary, then took care of managing the nannies.
She was my oldest and most loyal employee.
I was going to write off last night as a momentary lapse of reason. She’d drunk too much, and the lines got blurred. Maybe she even misinterpreted something I’d said or something. Mistakes happened, right?
Perhaps it was being with Natalie that had made me more forgiving, more inclined to give second chances. I was determined to wipe the slate clean.
I had no idea what was going on in Dana’s head, of course. At that point in time, I only thought about Natalie. Our relationship was new and fresh, and we were discovering one another with a confidence that we’d never had in college. I was not the kind of guy who talked about my emotions and so I kept much of my thoughts to myself. I didn’t think it was necessarily a good idea for Natalie to know how crazy I was about her. She didn’t need to know how often I’d thought about her over the years, or that I had thought to myself, quite a few times, that I perhaps I’d been hasty to break up with her.