PARTI
1
GIO
My alarm started to scream, piercing the silence I and my most recent conquest had struck. I knew inviting her over after midnight was going to be problematic when my alarm went off for work at the ungodly hour of five o'clock, but ever since meeting this woman, I'd been trying to get her into my bed. She was an up and coming, New York City defense attorney, so her schedule was packed, to say the least. As for me, well, I was the founder and CEO of a rather successful architecture company in the heart of the city.
Among other things.
Thanks to my hard work, I dictated my own schedule but poor Selena.
Selma?
Selia?
Poor, sexy, defense attorney woman was a slave to the dictation of those around her, including how she spent her time. For a few hours, I asked her to letmebe in control. At least when she bent to my will, the rewards she got were immediate and exquisite. We had our fun, and if I had my way, we'd have more, maybe before the inevitable, sub-killer came around to bite her.
"Your alarm is so loud," she groaned. "You owe me breakfast after we've gotten some real sleep."
Maybe not.
"I've got to get ready for work," I replied. "I can call you a ride home if you need one, or did you drive?"
I was already half out of bed and reaching for my phone when her slender hand wrapped around my wrist. "What happened to all that talk of being the CEO and making your own schedule? I'm off today, so let's get some more sleep then we can grab a bite. I know an incredible place in Queens."
Pulling my wrist from her hand, I stood up from my modern, California king bed and walked over to where I had a silken, navy blue robe hanging on the wall. "No. That's not what this is." I pulled the robe down and wrapped it around me before finally turning around and looking at the mess of whips, cuffs, collars, and rope strewn about the floor. I frowned at the sight of it. She'd really let me put her through the paces. What a waste that she was already expecting more from the arrangement than she was ever going to receive. "Did you drive, or do you need a ride?"
“Hey, what’s the matter with you?” she asked. “I’m not asking for marriage or anything. Breakfast ain’t harmful.”
“Breakfast is how it starts,” I said. “Trust me.”
She sat up in bed, clinging the blankets to her chest to keep them from falling down as if I hadn’t seen all of her inside and out just a couple of hours ago. “Trustme, I’m just looking for a meal to cap off this already pretty satisfying time.”
“Look, no offense to you. Maybe you are just looking for breakfast, but I’d rather not take the risk. This was fun, but this is where it’ll end,” I explained. “I have to start getting ready for work, so do you need a ride or not?”
She rolled her eyes as she climbed out of bed. “Don’t worry about me, Mr. Big Shot. I’m fine.”
“Fine,” I said. “If you head straight down this hallway, take a right at the first juncture and then a left at the second, and head all the way down, you’ll get to the elevator, or the stairs if you prefer. There are people literally everywhere, so don’t try and steal anything, you’ll get caught and it won’t be good.”
“Don’t tell me with a place like this, you’re actually some secret mafia don on the side?” she asked, picking up her stuff. “You’d have to be for that threat to scare me.”
I smirked as I turned around and headed back into my attached bathroom. “No, of course not. Just a businessman. A late one at that. Thank you for your time.”
“Yeah,” she said as she put on just enough clothes to leave without raising eyebrows. “Bye.”
I heard my bedroom door slam and knew that, even if I did want to call her again at some point, that option was gone now. Losing good ones always sucked, but I’d find another to replace her in no time, I always did.
Turning my shower on so that I could start cleaning myself up and getting ready, I pressed a couple of buttons on the electronic panel to set the built-in speakerphone system to call my friend Kellyanne, who was also the CFO at the company I owned. She, along with myself and our friend Benson—better known as Punk—started KGP Architecture and quickly rose to the top. New York City was constantly in need of successful architects if it was ever going to continue popping buildings up overnight, and Punk was one of the best in the business.
We also found that when it came to investigating businesses for less legal lines of business, architecture seemed to stay off most peoples’ radar.
“Gio,” Kellyanne said with a sigh “Please tell me that you’re calling me this early because you went to bed early and are bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and not because you tormented some unsuspecting victim all evening.”
I chuckled at her as I dropped my robe and climbed into the shower. “Why are you asking questions you don’t want the answers to?”
That earned me a long, indignant sigh. “Then shouldn’t you be sleeping?”
“I’ll sleep when I’m dead,” I responded. “Success comes from...”
