“A charity run? You and Masque?!”Fucking hell!
“Quite, but it’s not as obscure as it sounds,” he said. “We have a famous footballer on our books, Jason Redfern.”
I rolled my eyes. “I’m not a total imbecile, Andy. I’m well aware we have Jason Redfern on our client list.”
“Good. Well, there was some big deal about him raising money for sick kids when he was last in the country. PR stunt, I’m sure, but Raven got all passionate about it and roped the lot of us in. Even me. She’s somewhat tenacious.”
“An Explicit fun run?” I laughed. “Did Masque wear his mask? I can’t imagine him taking the thing off.” The mystery of his actual face was crazily erotic. I fought back the need to ask Andy what the hell Masque really looked like.
“Not just an Explicit fun run, and no, Faye, he didn’t wear the bloody mask.” He made himself a coffee and topped mine up. “We ran neck and neck the whole route, got talking along the way. We play squash once a week as a result, it hardly makes it a fucking bromance.”
The idea of the two of them getting all sweaty and smashing a ball around was quite fucking hot. All ripped and grunting and competitive. I smiled as I sipped my coffee. “Who’s the better player?”
“It’s an even match.” His eyes met mine, and they were dark. “That’s why I like playing him.”
“Like hell,” I scoffed. “I know how much you like winning.”
“Only when it means something,” he said. “I’d rather lose to someone who can put up a fight than come top over someone who doesn’t challenge me.”
“I’m not so sure I believe that.”
“Believe what you want, Faye.” He leaned against the kitchen island only to recoil like a snake as his ass touched granite. “I got my arse kicked this morning thanks to your psycho vampire attack. I was limping around the court like a battered old cunt.”
“You’re welcome.”
“Andyou’regoing to be late if you don’t get your fucking ass in gear.” He pulled the mug from my hands. “Shower. Now. You have five minutes.”
I couldn’t wait to get the bossy motherfucker in the office.
***
My parcel arrived, next-day delivery. All I needed was an excuse to use it.
It came close. Really fucking close, every fucking day, because that power-hungry sack of shit clashed heads with me at every single opportunity. Taking a secondary role in Explicit’s parenting did not come easy to Andy Morgan. It didn’t come easy at all.
He argued every single one of my suggestions, just because he could, and whined like a bitch every time I demanded any actual information from him. He had this annoying condescending tutting sound he made whenever he’d catch me on the phone, making it perfectly clear I didn’t know what the hell I was talking about, but despite all of this, and the ever-present urge to slam a big fat dildo into his pretty-boy asshole, I was finding my feet.
The office atmosphere was strained and hours were long, meaning the time spent at his apartment was minimal. We’d retire to our separate bedrooms with a grunt of goodnight, but there were none of the trysts I rubbed my clit off to every fucking bedtime. Most of the time he was so annoying it was easy to convince myself I didn’t want him, but my pussy never let me believe that for long.
I wanted Andy Morgan alright, and I wanted him really fucking bad.
To chisel my return in stone, it was clear I needed to put my stamp back on Club Explicit in one way or another, and the solution was easy. Our main entrance stairwell was classy, but tired, suffering from far too many drunken elbows knocking the artwork. It was the perfect place to put theFaye’s backstatement piece, and by mid-week I’d made my plans perfectly clear to Mr Know It All.
“No major refurbishments,” he hissed. “The rules were quite clear.”
“It’s notmajor,” I snapped. “It’s a bit of fucking paintwork.”
“I don’t give a fuck,” he said. “This isn’t your call. There’s no way you’ll get that artwork done by the time we toss next, so chill your fucking backside.”
But he was wrong.
Mistress Raven pulled the strings for me, and she must have pulled them bloody hard, because on Friday morning our resident Savage, known by day as Callum Jackson, the infamous London street artist, was well at work on my new mural. Andy nearly shit a fucking brick when he saw it, but even he couldn’t maintain his disapproval for long. Savage’s mural was a masterpiece, a blur of naked bodies lining the stairway, in various forms of play. They were in the throes of passion, armed with crops, and whips, and cuffs, and canes, and everything in between. It was incredible, and it brought tears to my eyes.
Savage didn’t want payment, and he didn’t even seem to want thanks.
At least that was one less thing for Andy to gripe over.
Saturday was the day it all reached a head, and it’d been a long week brewing. We’d been working closely, so closely that my knee was pressed against his, and his thigh was burning mine through my skirt. So closely that I could smell him, smell his aftershave, smell his gorgeously musky fucking skin. So closely that I could feel the heat from his sweet fucking flesh. So closely that the atmosphere was charged and heavy and ripe to fucking explode.