Revenge Sex (8 page)

“So you tear me down to do it.” His voice was
like the flat edge of a knife: it didn’t hurt, but all he had to do
was turn it and it would slice right through her.

“It’s not about you,” she said. “It’s about
them.”

“I realize that.”

She felt the knife edge turning on her and
wasn’t sure how to stop it. “You’ve always liked what we’ve
done.”

“Why Bradley? Why my office?”

She thought better of shrugging. “I don’t
know. It just happened.”

She realized her mistake when his features
sharpened and his jaw tensed. She’d needed something Clay wasn’t
giving her anymore. She couldn’t say that, of course, but she
should turn it around on him. “I thought you were bored with
me.”

“Then you should have told me you wanted to
play a different game.”

“I’m sorry. I will next time.”

“The rules were about safety.”

“Uh, yes.” But she hadn’t been unsafe.

“You tell me about a date so that I know
where you are and if something goes wrong, I can come to you.”

She wanted to roll her eyes. He was so
cautious. “That’s true, but—”

“We don’t jeopardize our jobs.”

“It was stupid, I know.”

“And we don’t do it in the house because the
boys could come over.”

Jesus. They were at their mother’s. They came
to Clay every other weekend. The older one had just gotten his
license, but it wasn’t like
Dad’s
house for a surprise visit
would be his first destination. Clay worried about everything. And
for nothing.

But Ruby wasn’t going to point out the
fallacies in his argument. “I would have heard them come in.”

“Did you hear me?”

“Of course.” Not really. She wasn’t sure how
he’d managed to be so quiet. It didn’t matter, though, she’d wanted
him to know eventually. When he got into bed and smelled sex on the
sheets.

“So you knew I was watching.”

“It made me hot.” It had when he clapped. The
orgasm would have gone on and on if Bradley hadn’t freaked. What a
twerp. He was definitely a mistake.

Clay stood, and she realized she’d once again
said something wrong.

“We need a break, Ruby.”

There was a sudden roaring in her ears, as if
she’d fallen under the wheels of a freight train. “What do you
mean?”

“I mean,” he stated flatly, “that I’m going
to a hotel for a few nights so we can both think about the
situation.”

She jumped up, knocking her shin on the
coffee table. “I’m sorry, Clay. I understand now. I won’t do it
again. I didn’t realize how much the rules meant to you.” It was
true. She didn’t think he’d care. He let her fuck anyone she
wanted. He gave her all the freedom she asked for. She hadn’t
understood that he would actually draw a line she wasn’t supposed
to cross.

He reached into his back pocket, then tossed
something onto the coffee table. The condom she’d given him this
morning. “I almost used this today.”

“But you didn’t.” If he had, she would have
lived with it, but she was glad he hadn’t.

“You don’t get it.”

“I said you could. To pay me back.”

He looked at her for so long, her skin
started to itch. Then finally, he said, “I don’t want to pay you
back. I don’t want us to be about tit for tat.”

“Then what do you want? Because I really
don’t know.” It was the first honest thing she’d said. She might
not be honest with anyone else, but at least she was with herself.
Lies weren’t such a bad thing. Sometimes they were necessary.

He closed his eyes for five seconds, an
interminable amount of time in which she saw her pretty little
world crumbling. “I don’t know, Ruby. If I did, we wouldn’t be
where we are now.”

Then he went into their bedroom and packed a
bag.

Ten minutes later, after the echo of the
front door closing and his car engine had faded into the sounds of
lawn mowers and children shouting, she slumped down on the couch.
The cheese and salsa she’d consumed threatened to rise up again. If
he kicked her out, she had nowhere to go.

“Everything will be all right,” she
whispered. “The boys are coming next weekend. He’ll have to come
back home then.”

* * * * *

“Did you hear? Bradley quit.”

The Monday morning rumors were rampant in the
West Coast hallways. Being a manager, Jessica didn’t listen to
gossip—it was unprofessional—and discouraged it in her employees.
But this tidbit, she couldn’t ignore. She gleaned every fact from
every source. And there were a
lot
of sources.

“He didn’t even give notice.”

“Just packed up his stuff and left.”

“He said this place sucked.”

“Are you sure he didn’t actually get
fired?”

That’s what Jessica wanted to know. Funny
thing, Ruby had called in sick today. Did Clay have anything to do
with all this?

In the end, Jessica couldn’t help herself;
she went straight to the horse’s mouth, Bradley’s manager, popping
into his office next door. “Is it true?”

Greg Stevens lifted his head out of his hands
and stared at her morosely. With short blond hair, pale blue eyes,
and cherubic cheeks, he was very Scandinavian. His characteristic
smile was absent this morning.

“I’m going to kill him,” he muttered. His
desk was a clutter of folders and binders that had begun to migrate
to the round meeting table in the corner by the window. The
computer keyboard was buried somewhere beneath the mess, his inbox
stacked twelve inches high, and three of the file drawers on his
credenza were open as if he’d recently torn through them.

“Guess it’s true then,” she sympathized.
Finance and budgeting was a two-man department. Greg had lost fifty
percent of his workforce. “What happened?” It had to have been
Clay.

“I swear that kid must have been in at the
crack of dawn.” Greg shook his head. “He cleaned out his cubicle
and shoved a resignation letter under my door.”

Jessica wanted to be controller. She felt she
was more qualified. Greg was intimate with the workings of every
department, but he didn’t have the equity background, fixed asset
knowledge, or payroll expertise that she did. Still, having his
only employee quit on him was a raw deal.

“Did he say why?”

Greg laughed without the least bit of humor
in it. “He wrote that he was quitting due to a hostile work
environment.” He slapped both hands to his chest and jutted his
head at her. “Do I look hostile?”

“Not in the least.” In fact, Greg had bent
over backward making excuses for Bradley’s crappy work product.
That was another strike against him as controller. Employees needed
to have expectations put on them, and there had to be consequences
if they didn’t perform.

Greg simply continued shaking his head. “I
called him, but his phone went to voicemail. I hope he’s all
right.”

Trust Greg to wor
ry about
the guy.
He’s a complete asshole, and most likely he quit
because he was afraid Clay was going to fire him.
But she
commiserated. “I’m sure he’s fine. Did you fill out a requisition
for a new financial analyst?”

He nodded. “Thank God he didn’t do this in
the middle of the budget process.”

Greg had probably done the majority of the
work anyway. “If you need any help on the quarter-end analysis, let
me know.”

He waved his thanks.

She stood for a moment outside her office
door. It was chicken not to check in with Clay as well. She’d done
nothing else but think about what happened between them on
Saturday. What did it mean? How would it change things? Her worst
thought was that he’d pretend it hadn’t happened.

But facing him? Well, that was going to take
a bit of courage, too. If she didn’t want to clean out her desk,
leave her resignation under his door, and slither away like Bradley
had done, she was going to have to suck it up.

Chapter Nine

Leaning back in his chair, Clay was reading a
sheaf of papers. Jessica’s heart rolled over in her chest. She’d
always found him attractive, but now it made her ache to look at
him. It was good, it was bad. She almost wished she’d never seen
Ruby, never begged Clay to touch her. Fantasy was so much
easier.

She knocked on the doorjamb. He laid down the
papers. “Jessica, come in.”

She managed a few steps inside without
tripping or otherwise looking like a lovesick idiot. “I heard about
Bradley, and I’ve told Greg I can help out on any of the
quarter-end analysis.”

“I’m sure Greg appreciated that. Close the
door and have a seat.”

She could feel her blood pulsing in her
fingertips. “Sure.” She took the chair opposite, then wondered why
the hell she was being reticent. “Did you fire him?”

He snorted, shook his head. “He left on his
own.” Then he laughed. “At least I don’t have to call him out in a
duel for my girlfriend’s honor.”

Ruby didn’t have any honor. “He was scared
you would, so he made a preemptive strike to avoid having to say he
got fired on his resume.” Not that anyone actually admitted they
got fired. You claimed a difference of opinion, disparity in
management style, downsizing.

“I want to apologize for Saturday,” he
said.

She swallowed. On Saturday, she’d come in
fresh from sex with another man, the scent of come all over her,
exactly what pushed Clay’s buttons. What happened hadn’t been about
her
, but about the timing. It was inevitable that he’d
regret it, but it hurt anyway.

She wasn’t, however, going to show any
weakness. “You don’t need to apologize.”

“I do. First Ruby put you through the
wringer, then I messed with you. It wasn’t fair.”

She didn’t like the sound of that.
Messed
with her.
The euphemism belittled what had happened between
them.

His features were handsome yet expressionless
as he went on. “I hope we can continue our working relationship
without letting this get in the way. You’re excellent at your
job.”

“Of course. Not to worry.” She stood
abruptly. If he said one more thing, she’d have to scream. “I
better get out there and see how I can help Greg.”

Rushing to the door, she was half afraid he’d
call her back so he could grind her down a little more. Thank God
he didn’t. In the restroom, she checked her face, her eyes. Her
makeup was fine, and she didn’t appear devastated. No one would
know Clay had just crushed her. Her blazer was crisp, her blouse
buttoned to the neck, her skirt circumspect.

Ruby Williams would never wear such staid
business attire. Her tops were tight and low-cut, her skirts short
and formfitting. Damn Ruby. Jessica knew she had to stop comparing
herself to Ruby
, stop wanting what Ruby
had, whether the woman deserved it or not.

And she had to stop hiding in the ladies’
room, dammit.

* * * * *

“You’re down another worker bee, Clay. Where
are we on the new controller?” Holt Montgomery was seated at the
head of the board room conference table, and the Monday afternoon
executive staff meeting in full swing. In his early fifties, Holt
had a pair of gray eyes that penetrated through even the thickest
cloud of smoke anyone blew at him. Though the companies had
changed, Clay had worked with him for almost twenty years, and
there was a healthy mutual respect between them.

They’d had reports from David Farris,
manufacturing, Ward Restin, R&D, and Neal Thomas from business
development, then had come Clay’s finance report, to be followed by
Spencer Benedict in marketing and sales. For his part, Clay had
already covered the cash forecast and the Q2 budget. Now they were
down to the minutia.

“I’m staying on plan,” he said, “interviewing
outside candidates and making the final decision by the start of
next week.” Standard operating procedure, you always interviewed
outside as well as inside
.

Holt shook his head. “In the meantime, you’re
spending too much time managing the whole accounting group.”

“Jessica Murphy is doing a good job keeping
everything in line.”

Holt raised one eyebrow. “Then promote her.
Our management flowchart is top heavy in male versus female
headcount anyway.”

Holt had been in favor of Greg Stevens until
today, but Clay didn’t call him on it, especially when Holt had a
point. He wouldn’t have called himself wishy-washy, but he was
definitely being indecisive about Jessica, though she was the best
choice.

Or she would have been before Saturday.

The April sun was shining through the open
blinds, and Clay felt like he was sitting in the hot seat. The
coffee, which had made before lunch, smelled acrid. Ruby was out
today. No fresh coffee for the meeting.

“Why’d Bradley quit anyway?” David Farris
wanted to know. As VP of manufacturing, he’d worked extensively
with Bradley and Greg on the five-year forecast, an amazing feat
considering the man’s wife had been dying of cancer. She’d passed
on just before Christmas. At least his two kids had been home from
college at the time. Farris had been a military man, serving in
Desert Storm, and despite the fact that he’d been out of the
service for over fifteen years, he still had that military bearing.
He hadn’t displayed an ounce of emotion, yet fresh streaks of gray
had appeared in his sandy hair, and his eyes were bleak.

“He was fine last week during our meeting,”
David went on. “Are we in for a lawsuit?”

Farris was referring to the hostile work
environment. Clay quickly dispelled any worries about that. “No.
I’ve got Human Resources reviewing the details. Palmer never
reported a problem. The only incidents recorded in his file
regarded his tardiness.” In addition to the fact that the
accusation was crap, Clay was sure Palmer wouldn’t push the issue
for fear of his after-hours activities on company property coming
to light.