Overtime (5 page)

He glanced at her and back down at the paper.

“This is what the client asked for,” he said. “They were very specific. The formatting is fine.”

Valerie wiggled a little. “Are you sure?”

Jasper locked eyes with her and held her gaze for a long moment.

“Valerie, please don’t come in here with questions like this. I hired you because of your ability to use your judgement to work independently and not bother me with nonsense every five minutes. You know very well that there isn’t anything wrong with the formatting. Now, please leave. I’m very busy.”

Valerie felt ridiculous. She was bent over her boss’s desk like a dog in heat, wiggling her ass around for a man who couldn’t have been less interested—who just wanted to talk about work, and for her to go do her job. Tears began to prick at her eyeballs. She stood up straight.

“Sorry, Mr. Declan,” she said, and hurried out of his office, trying her best not to cry. She left the office fifteen minutes later, exactly at 5pm, without saying goodbye.

Valerie finally cried when she was on the subway, still wearing the stupid skirt that he’d bought her but apparently didn’t like, or something. Thankfully, on the subway, no one gave a second glance to the young woman sniffling in the corner. She knew it was dumb to hope for some big sweeping romance with her boss—who was, first and foremost
her boss
, she reminded herself—but after Ethan had dumped her unceremoniously she’d wanted something to get her mind off of that, and the whole thing with Jasper had seemed like such an exciting fantasy.

She ordered in Indian food she hadn’t budgeted for and watched stupid crime procedurals on her computer until she fell asleep. The next morning she felt a little better, but started wondering again if she should go to work Monday.

As she puttered around her kitchen, slowly making coffee and wondering if she
really
needed to do the dishes yet, there was a knock on the door. Valerie’s heart felt like it skipped a beat, because lately knocks had been bringing good things—bracelets, stockings—but she knew this knock could be anything.

What if I’m fired?
She thought.
I could totally sue
, she thought, as she walked to the door, even as she knew she’d never win a suit against the company, especially since they could actually afford to hire lawyers.

It was a bike messenger, again. He held out a paper-wrapped package to her and was gone practically before she could say, “Thanks.”

Well, she probably wasn’t fired, Valerie thought as she closed her apartment door, or if she was, she’d at least gotten a gift for it. She put it on the kitchen counter and unsafely used a knife to cut the paper open.

Inside was a matte black box, about 5x7. The top slid off easily, the way expensive box tops do, and inside was a card on top of tissue paper. The card was thick, embossed with
JD
in gold lettering on the front. It read:

Valerie,

I apologize for yesterday. We need to talk some things over. Can we meet for dinner at the Plaza tonight at 8pm? I’ll send the car around 7:30.

Jasper Declan

PS: Sophie is available all day and waiting for your call.

Valerie read and re-read the note with a combination of relief and annoyance. On one hand, she wasn’t fired and Jasper wasn’t finished with her, all of which was good, but couldn’t he ask twenty-four hours in advance what her weekend plans were? She didn’t have plans tonight, but she’d actually been looking forward to doing nothing, and now she had to call somebody and get gussied up for a fancy dinner. He hadn’t even given her a way to say no—just,
the car will be there at 7:30
. Valerie briefly considered saying no, or better, just staying in her apartment and not going down when it arrived. Maybe he could learn to schedule things a little.

Speaking of which...

Under the tissue paper was a notecard. Valerie wasn’t a paper expert, but she knew expensive when she saw it.
Sophie Pembroke, Personal Shopper
, it said, and gave a phone number.

She leaned back against the kitchen counter and thought about this, briefly. Her mother would tell her not to go, that a man would never respect her if she just gave in so easily. But the truth was, she kind of liked it: the presents, the sneaking around. She shouldn’t be a little turned on that Jasper had no regard for her schedule, but... she was.

Rebelliously, Valerie drank her coffee before calling Sophie.

Sophie was a British woman maybe ten years older than Valerie, who wore cat-eye glasses, had a full sleeve tattoo on each arm, and who Valerie liked almost instantly. Going in she’d been dreading the stuffy personal shopping experience, since she didn’t know much about fancy clothes, and because fancy clothes never even came in her size anyway, but everything Sophie’d shown her had been exactly her style and had fit like a dream. For the Plaza they decided on a black off-the-shoulder dress that nipped in at the waist and flared at the bottom, and Sophie had even had the right bra for her—longline, strapless, and pushup.

“Just a little too much cleavage,” Sophie had said, straightening Valerie’s dress. “Perfect.”

Valerie had to agree. She had these boobs twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, and even she couldn’t stop staring.

When the limo came at 7:30, Valerie was ready. She’d pulled her hair back into an elegant knot, put on eyeliner and lipstick, and wore the black heels with the tiny padlocks he’d bought her that Monday. She was surprised to see a limousine instead of the car from before, but then
 
she remembered where she was going.
 

Couldn’t hurt to be a little fancier,
she thought.
 

The driver got out and opened the back door. Valerie took his hand and climbed in, making sure not to fall over herself or accidentally flash either him or the sidewalk, so she was seated in the car and looking for her seatbelt when she heard the voice.

“You look stunning,” Jasper said from the other side of the back seat.

“Oh,” Valerie said. She stared at him for a moment. He wore a three-piece black suit, a little nicer even than what he wore to the office every day. She swallowed. “You look nice, too.”

He reached for her hand and held it in his, rubbing his thumb over the back. “Thank you for honoring my request. I know it was a bit sudden.”

It’s not like I had a choice
, Valerie thought, but she was quickly melting under the pressure of his simple touch on her.
Shoppers, limos. A girl could get used to this
.

He reached for the limousine fridge and dropped ice into two glasses, then poured something from a decanter. The smoky aroma drifted over to Valerie, and she took the glass he offered her.

“It’s been such a long week,” he said. He looked down, at her shoes, as he put his hand on her knee. “You wore them.”

“They’re beautiful,” she said.

“I liked the locks on the back,” he said. Sitting on the seat he reached down and caressed one, turning it back and forth in his hand. He moved his hand back up her leg slowly, bringing the hem of her dress with it, exposing her ankle, then her calf, then her knee to the inside of the limousine.
 

Valerie glanced at the partition between them and the driver. It was up. She sipped her whiskey, not quite sure what to do, as Jasper’s hand made its way higher. Her cunt began to buzz.

At her knee, Jasper slipped his hand under her dress, moving between her thighs. Valerie moved her knees apart on the seat, letting him through, feeling the anticipation build, her heart beating faster. She remembered sitting on his desk, one of his hands around her wrist and one inside her, the most intense orgasm she’d ever had. Valerie leaned her head against the seat and sighed.

Jasper leaned in an brushed his lips over her shoulder, nibbling his way up to her neck as his fingertips brushed against the silk thong she’d worn, the light touch of his hand on her sex sending jolts through her body.

She felt a sharp bite on her neck at the same time that his fingers on her cunt pressed down, and she gasped.

“Don’t ever come in my office like that again,” he murmured into her neck.

“Like what?”

Her bit her again before answering.

“Yesterday. Coming in with some work nonsense, sticking your ass in the air like a common harlot.” His fingers pulled aside her panties and stroked her lips, slick with her moisture, gently. “It’s disgusting, and it’s beneath you to offer yourself like that.”

Valerie made a noise somewhere between a moan and a whimper. He laughed softly, his breath tickling her. “And don’t get too excited and ruin this nice dress.”

“I’ll try,” Valerie said, barely able to form the words.

His fingers slid between her folds and found her clit, tripping back and forth over it, every touch sending Valerie closer to the edge. She moved her hips and arched her back, trying to keep his fingers focused on that one spot but every time she tried he danced them away, backing her down from the orgasm as Valerie’s frustration mounted. She was so close to that release, she thought, so aroused and ready that all it would take was one more simple touch and she would explode, right there in the car—

The limousine stopped and she heard the driver’s door open. Jasper withdrew his hand.

“Here we are,” he said. He reached for a linen napkin on the bar and wiped his long, graceful fingers. Valerie stared in disbelief, breathing hard. She couldn’t think about anything but how badly she needed to come, right now, right here in the back of this car.

“You should be decent when my man opens the door,” Jasper said.
 

Valerie blushed and pulled her gown back down. She touched her hair, hoping she hadn’t gotten too messed up, and hoped that there wasn’t a wet spot on the back of her dress. The driver opened her door and she took his hand, swaying gracefully to her feet, and then let Jasper escort her through the Plaza’s enormous doors, opened by white-gloved doormen.

As she strode in the room, Valerie had a thought.

“What if someone from work is here?” she whispered to Jasper.

He looked down at her, towering over her even in her heels, and smiled.

“Who from work do you think can afford it?” he asked.

“Your partners?”

“Don’t worry about them,” he said.

They were seated at a window table, overlooking Central Park and the city lay before them, sparkling. Valerie’s cunt still pulsed as the blood receded, something she was painfully aware of. Without asking Valerie, Jasper ordered a bottle of champagne and oysters on the half-shell as she looked at the array of silverware before her, and hoped she’d use the right fork.

Outside in
, she reminded herself.
Outside in, and just watch what he does.

He ordered for her all night: another bottle of champagne, lobster bisque to start and then an exquisite sea bass dish as an entree. As they ate he told her stories about New York in the 1980s when everything had been shittier, stories about the time he did so much cocaine he thought his heart might stop, about meeting shady dealers in alleyways outside the after-hours clubs, about getting held up at 4 o’clock in the morning and laughing in the guy’s face because he’d spent all his cash on drugs already.

“That’s all a very long time ago, of course,” he said before ordering them the Black Forest cake for dessert. “A young man should never have as much access to money as I did.”

“You seem all right now,” Valerie said.

“I was a late bloomer.”

She twisted the stem of her champagne glass back and forth in her fingers as the waiter set the cake on the table between them. She was getting more and more nervous with every course, and this was the final one before whatever was going to come next.

As she reached for her dessert fork, Jasper plunged his into a corner of the cake and drew it out, moist and rich.

“Lean forward,” he said, holding the forkful of cake aloft.

Valerie did, parting her lips, aware that he could look right down her dress if he wanted to. She didn’t mind. He watched the cake disappear between her lips with an intensity that made her nervous, as his gaze slid from her lips to her bosom, then finally up to her face.