Authors: Claire Adams
I snapped out of it. “What? Uh… I don’t
wanna hear it Tom, I don’t wanna hear any of it. Just shut it down, alright?”
My eyes drifted towards Aria again. When
would I get the opportunity to throw that little body into the air and fuck her
brains out? Would I ever? The fact that I had to ask myself that question
surprised me. Never before had it been a question of if but when, with any
woman: actresses, models, athletes—they all gave in eventually. But I couldn’t
seduce a teller in my own bank! They usually begged me to take them any way I
liked, anywhere I liked. Some just gave in right after their first interview
here – they never actually made it to work afterwards, though. I didn’t do
repeats and I didn’t like the idea of employing girls that would be too
distracted fantasizing about me to get their jobs done. I usually sent them to
work for a business-partner or another shareholder with the highest
recommendations, so I wasn’t exactly making them suffer. That would be Aria’s
fate too, and perhaps the knowledge of that made her shy away from me.
Or maybe she really, truly, genuinely had
no interest in sleeping with me. The way she shrugged off all my advances with
confident scorn and polite laughter surely suggested that was the case. That
fascinated me endlessly. She had told me she was single, yet she seemed to turn
men down right and left. I knew she was a junior in college. Perhaps between
the coursework and working almost full-time hours at the bank she simply did
not have time for some fun. Maybe if I gave her the right kind of incentive and
somehow assured her that she will be compensated for her company more
generously than she was for her job…
But I realized I had already tried that
and she was still not interested. I was back at square one, at a complete loss.
I had unions to deal with, people to fire, emails to respond to, but all I
could focus on was a twenty-year-old girl’s ass. All I cared about was finding
a way to get her into my bed.
I was hovering on dangerous territory, but
I loved a good challenge. I picked up the phone again and watched her answer
from the teller’s booth.
“South National Bank, how may I help you?”
She was looking towards me. She knew.
“I can think of so many ways.” I grinned.
“None that would require your clothes, though.”
She chuckled, flashing her dimples. It was
a nervous laugh. I made everyone around me nervous; it was the natural reaction
I had come to expect from people over the years. The reaction coming from her
was a source of thrill because she hadn’t gave into me yet.
“Did you need something, Mr. Sinclair?”
“Well, first of all, I need you to call me
Zayden. Zay is fine too. Can you do that for me?”
“Okay Zayden,” she sighed heavily. “You’re
watching, so you know that took everything out of me. I like to be
professional.”
Mrs. Brian, the other teller on duty,
looked at Aria disapprovingly. She had worked for this bank for many years, and
had seen my shenanigans with many different women.
“I could take so many things out of you,
Aria.” My face was serious now. Wanting. “Just give me a chance to show you.
I’ll make you feel things you never thought you were capable of feeling.”
She looked away. I was beginning to get
irritated that I couldn’t get through to her.
“Thank you for the very generous offer,
Mr. Sinclair, but I think I’ll pass for now. Please let me know if you need
anything.” She paused for a second. “Anything else, I mean.”
She hung up, leaving me more ridden with
desire than before.
CHAPTER
3
ARIA
My roommates Nick and Stacey were having
the hardest time deciding on the kind of pizza to order, as the three of us
curled up on our living room couch watching Friends.
“God Stacey, you’re such a Monica!” Nick
exclaimed.
“Well excuse me for not wanting to give us
all cancer,” Stacey snapped back.
“Get off WebMD, Stace. Pizza crust cannot
give you cancer.”
“You would be surprised by the kinds of
things gluten could do to you if you took some time out of playing space games
to actually read about important things on the internet.”
Nick sighed and looked at me as I began to
cover my face with my palms.
“I am not going to play judge to yet
another pseudo court-drama about the importance of video games in your
burgeoning career as a programmer,” I mumbled. “Deal with your girlfriend yourself.”
Stacey gasped. “Traitor! You’re supposed
to be my best friend!”
“I am. Which is why I am staying out of
this.”
They both looked confused and annoyed, as
though they were completely clueless about where to go from here. It was
comical. Nick and Stacey were the best couple I had ever seen: they were best
friends first, and argued over everything from Nick’s video games to Stacey’s
Cosmo-inspired women’s blog to pizza and gluten. I also happened to secretly
know that they were both working extra shifts – Nick at the Southern Eastern
University’s IT help desk, and Stacey at the library – to save money so they
could surprise each other on their three-year-anniversary.
Stacey had been my best friend since 9th
grade, and when she had met Nick – a freshman in college at the time – we were
in our senior year of high-school. At first I was worried sick that we would
grow apart after she had found a boyfriend, but it turned out that Nick was
incredibly cool and we got along well. So much so that when Stacey and I joined
him for college at SEU two years ago, moving into his two-bedroom apartment
seemed the natural thing to do. Most people seemed surprised to learn that I
lived with a couple, but to us it was just three best friends being roommates
and goofing around the house. And my room was far enough away from theirs for
me to not hear things I wouldn’t want to hear. I was going to miss them when we
all graduated and they moved on to get married, have babies, and do other
things couples do. I was a tad envious of what they had. They really were
perfect for each other.
Watching their relationship had been one
of the reasons I had grown to become ridiculously picky about men. The other
reason was a guy I had dated my freshman year who cheated on me with a sorority
girl. Rick – a Dick if there ever was one – was my first boyfriend, and things
seemed to be going great as our first anniversary was approaching. I was going
to lose my virginity to him that night. Everything was planned. Nick and Stacey
were on a weekend getaway, I had cleaned and double-cleaned the apartment,
bought candles and incense and all kinds of other romantic crap. I had cut my
shift short so I could set everything up, but when I got home I caught him in
bed, in my bed, with a blonde girl I had never seen.
I ended up getting drunk to try and wipe
away the sadness, and that led to having sex with another bar-goer. When I woke
up and saw my mistake next to me, I pledged that I would not casually date men,
I would not settle for anything less than what Nick and Stacey had. One year
later, I was still going strong on the pledge. Except for the part where I
often dreamed of my boss’s naked body. These dreams were sporadic at first, but
were occurring more and more frequently. I was still very firmly set on never
acting on my feelings or falling for his advances.
I turned my attention back to Nick and
Stacey’s bickering and gave up. “Guys, just get a medium pizza with rice-crust
and a medium regular. Problem solved.”
After a short pause, I looked at Stacey
with amusement. “I’ll be eating the regular, Stace, but I am still morally on
your side.”
She threw a pillow at me and we burst into
simultaneous giggles.
Half an hour later the doorbell rang.
“That should be the pizza,” Nick said,
popping up.
“God I am starving. I hope they sent the
extra pepper flakes. They always mess that up,” I said.
“I don’t understand your inability to
consume any kind of food that doesn’t burn your soul.”
“It doesn’t burn, that’s the point. Not in
a bad way, at least. Spice makes me appreciate the flavor more.”
“Weirdo.”
“Says the girl who refuses to eat regular
pizza because she read something on The Great Internets.”
She scowled. “God, you’re starting to
sound just like Nick.”
“Where did he disappear to anyway? It shouldn’t
take this long to-” she stopped as Nick showed up looking utterly confused.
Instead of two pizzas, however, he was
holding a giant bouquet of red roses.
“When I said I wanted gluten free, that’s
not what I had in mind,” Stacey said. “But how sweet, Nick!”
His eyes widened. “No! No no. Shit. I can
order you some flowers if you want! Sorry, baby. These are for Aria. From
someone named Zayden.”
Stacey gasped loudly, covering her mouth.
“Zayden as in-“
“As in her boss Zayden,” Nick finished her
sentence, looking equally confused.
They were both looking at me sharply as
though I would know what to say. As though I had been expecting flowers from my
boss, who very likely had his assistant Lana order them for every teller he
hadn’t yet gotten his hands on.
Nick handed me the flowers after picking
out the note.
“Hey!” I shouted trying to reach for it.
Nick was 6’5. I wasn’t going to win.
“Dear Aria,” he read out loud in a
dramatic voice, his right arm over his chest. “I hope you enjoy the roses. One
rose for each day until I change your mind.”
Nick gasped as Stacey counted: “Thirty
roses!”
I felt myself get hot in the face with
embarrassment, but a tiny bit of me fluttered in excitement. What the hell was
wrong with me?
“There’s a P.S.” Nick announced. “P.S. I
picked out the roses myself, so don’t bother thanking Lana tomorrow.”
“Have they developed technology to
intercept brain-waves yet?” I looked at Stacey.
“No Aria, he can’t read your mind.” She
flashed a huge grin. “You have a lover!”
“What?” I said louder than perhaps
necessary. “I do not have a lover. Zayden – Mr.Sinclair – is not my lover.”
“Looks like he will be in about,” Nick
surveyed the roses, “thirty days.”
I sighed. “No he won’t. I’ll return the
roses.”
“No you won’t!” Stacey yelled, looking
like I had just said I would amputate her imaginary puppy. “He’s a
multi-squillionaire. And so handsome. So, so handsome. Are you stupid?”
“That’s not the point-” I stopped myself
mid-sentence and gave her a suspicious look. “How do you know he’s handsome?”
“What?” she said defensively. “I read ZEN
Magazine.”
Oh right. That. I had a copy of the issue
with Zayden’s interview under my bed.
“I found it under your bed,” Stacy added.
“You’re already kind of sleeping with him.”
“Shut up, Stace! Let’s just eat the pizza,
watch some T.V., and never speak of this again.”
“Sure, if by never you mean thirty days,”
Nick butted in.
“Thanks for the unsolicited opinion,
Nicholas,” I said turning up the volume on the T.V. and getting under a
blanket.
They continued to offer what they thought
were clever comments but I tuned them out, focusing instead on the giant
bouquet of red roses. Was I in trouble? Would he manage to get what he wanted
in thirty days? He couldn’t take what I didn’t want to give. I felt a strange
pang in my chest. The problem was, I was not entirely sure I didn’t want to
give in. My cellphone rang, breaking the dangerous train of thoughts.
“Hi mom! How are you feeling?” I answered
the phone.
“Hi sweetheart. I am doing much better.
The doctors said I’ll be running around by the end of the month.”
I smiled. “I am so happy to hear that,
mom.”
“Don’t be, we still have to pay for the
stupid surgery. If I hadn’t gotten the damn surgery-”
“If you hadn’t gotten the surgery I
wouldn’t have a mother,” I cut her off. “So you just worry about getting
yourself all better, and I’ll worry about the bills.”
“Like you don’t have enough expenses
paying your way through college. I’m sorry for being such a lousy mother,
baby.”
“Don’t say that!” Tears formed in my eyes,
ready to break free. “Having to file for bankruptcy because dad bailed on you
after forcing you to co-sign on his loan does not make you a lousy mother. It
makes you a good person who faced terrible consequences for being one. You need
to stop blaming yourself. You took care of me all my life, now let me take care
of you. It’s going to be okay.”
“But-”
“No but. I’ll figure out a way to pay the
hospital bills. You relax and get all pretty. It’s nine o’clock, John will be
over with his daily tea service.”
She chuckled nervously. “What do you mean
get pretty? He’s just my neighbor who likes to help out sometimes. And bring me
mugs of tea. Just a…friend.”
“Okay mom, have fun with your
neighbor-friend,” I laughed. “I love you.”