"Perfect."
"Glad you think so, but I still can't look at a jar of peanut butter."
Trey's laugh was the kind that could warm you on a cold night or cheer you up after a bad day. "No, I mean perfect for the story. Let me ask you something—Georgie. If you could have a superpower what would it be?"
I had no idea where the heck the conversation was heading. "Flying, that would be nice. Then I could just fly over the traffic on the freeway."
"So, if you had that superpower, you would use it?"
"Of course."
"Then why don't you use the superpower you already have?"
I stopped halfway on sipping my tea. "I can't fly."
"That's not the superpower I'm talking about."
Kyle halted the strange conversation with our food. He put the food in front of us and walked away before I could ask for some pepper. I tried to get his attention, but he had sped off too fast back in the direction of the crowded, giggling girl table. I waved at him several times as he crossed the dining area, but he never looked my direction.
"Take off those glasses," Trey said plainly.
"Excuse me? I don't have x-ray vision. I need them to see."
"Just trust me."
"Sure but I just need some pepper." I waved my arm to get Kyle's attention. It seemed the kid walked around with invisible blinders on.
"Georgie," Trey said more forcefully. "Take off those big glasses. And unbutton the top button on that blouse."
I stared at him in disbelief.
"Just do it." His ordering me around should have riled me, but he managed to do it with enough charisma that I found myself following his directions.
I took off my glasses and then, with much more hesitation, I discretely reached up and undid the top button. My blouse was already stretched tight across my breasts, breasts that I'd spent my entire teen years trying to diminish in size. But to no avail. It seemed I was still guilty of trying to restrain them. The blouse parted, exposing my cleavage. I was sure I heard a low groan come from Trey's side of the table, but I eventually dismissed the notion as just the clamor in the restaurant.
Before I could rest my back against the seat, Kyle swept across the room and nearly fell over our table as he asked if I needed something. I knew his eyes were riveted to my cleavage, but I ignored it as a typical school boy reaction. "Pepper please."
He raced off enthusiastically.
Trey poured ketchup on his plate and didn't look up as he spoke. Damn, he had long lashes. "You're welcome."
"For what?"
"For showing you how to use your superpower to get pepper for your quiche."
Kyle returned with an actual pepper grinder. Like a waiter in a fine restaurant, he stood over me with his pepper. "Just tell me when."
Trey was completely entertained as he watched.
I put up my hand. "That's good. Thank you, Kyle." I smiled sweetly at him. He stumbled backwards a few steps, the pepper grinder gripped tightly in his fingers.
I shot an annoyed eyebrow twist at my lunch mate. "If you think having big breasts is a superpower, then you should try being a painfully shy thirteen-year-old running the mile in P.E. and having the entire boys' soccer team stop their game to watch."
"I'm not talking about your breasts." He stopped to admire my cleavage for a second. "Although, they are spectacular. I'm talking about you, all of you. You are beautiful and smart, but it seems you're trying hard to just be smart. The glasses, the top button, the hair up like my mom's Aunt Terry."
"You, sir, are an asshole." I put down my fork, my appetite for quiche suddenly diminished. I pulled out my phone to call for an Uber ride back to the Plaything parking lot.
"I won't argue with that." Trey reached across and placed his hand gently on my arm. It should have irritated me, but somehow, his touch felt genuinely kind. My mind momentarily drifted to the idea of that same hand smoothing over my skin.
"Wait, Georgie. I'm not trying to be an asshole. I guess I'm not doing this right. Eat your quiche and listen to my story pitch. Then I'll drive you back to your car."
I picked up the fork but didn't do much more than pick at the quiche. I listened fully but pretended that I was only paying half-hearted attention.
"I think you should write a personal journal on finding your sexual self. Your sexuality can empower you, once you find it."
"Maybe I don't have a sexual self."
His short laugh seemed to have been unplanned, surprising even himself. "Georgie, when you walked into my office this morning, even in your demure skirt and blouse and librarian hairstyle, sexuality was pulsing off of you in waves. You've got it. And if you couple that with those extreme brains, you will be unstoppable. Just like a superhero."
"And just how do you know I haven't already found this magical sexual self?"
"Peanut butter sandwiches?"
"Yes, but that was just because . . ." I thought about the dreary sex life I had with Mark and how many headaches I had to fake just to avoid it.
"Do you have an orgasm every time you have sex?"
I dropped the fork again and sat back with astonishment.
"Come on, Georgie, you're a highly educated, modern woman. It's all right to talk out loud about this."
"Yes, maybe with my best friend, or my—no, I don't even do that."
He tilted his head, waiting for an answer. He was persistent, and damn, if he didn't have the most gorgeous face to go with that persistence.
"No, not all the time. I mean it depends on my mood, and how skilled the partner is and the time of day, and what I ate for lunch or if I had a drink with dinner . . . Ah shit. All right, my sexual self might need a little enlightenment, but how do you suppose to do that?" My face warmed some. "I'm not sleeping with you just to write a story." Of course, I'd been sort of undressing the man in my mind since I'd walked into the office, and I'd already imagined his hands on me more than once. But I was still not making that kind of sacrifice for my job. Although, sacrifice might be a strong word because the man was rich and gorgeous and ridiculously appealing.
"That's not what I'm proposing."
My shoulders dropped with a good measure of unplanned disappointment. Trey's mouth tilted slightly at the corner, assuring me he noticed my sudden drop in posture.
"But I am going to help you with this. And to start, I'll be sending you home with this month's box of, as you noted, pleasure goodies."
Chapter Six
Trey
By the time Georgie and I returned to Plaything, I'd questioned my own motives a hundred times. A few minutes after she'd walked into my office, where she fidgeted with her glasses and the hem of her skirt and broke into a round of hiccoughs, I thought 'here is a woman who has no idea how amazing she is'. That was when the idea for her to write about her own sexual awakening popped into my head. At the time, I figured an article about a career woman's sexuality with numerous mentions of our products would be a fantastic opportunity for free advertising. But the longer I spent with Georgie, listening to her amusing stories, catching her shy smiles, all the while imagining her naked in my bed, I realized I had a far more selfish motive than free publicity for the company.
My devious plan to get good advertisement for Plaything had really come back to bite me when I had cockily asked her to undo the top button on her blouse. My intent was to show her how easily a bit of cleavage could get the attention of our server, but it had backfired big time. The second the button opened and the blouse parted, exposing the curves of her breasts, my cock strained against my fly. I wasn't able to stop the involuntary groan that followed. She'd discretely reached up and buttoned her shirt once she'd gotten her pepper. I was disappointed but relieved.
I'd phoned ahead to Olivia to have her put this month's box on my desk. It was sitting in the center of my work pile when Georgie and I walked into the office. Her blue eyes shot straight to it. The fabric on her blouse strained again as her breasts lifted and fell with a nervous breath.
/> She walked cautiously toward my desk and stared down at the box with trepidation.
"It's all right. I promise no snake will jump out."
Georgie smiled and flicked an invisible strand of hair off her forehead. "Easy Come, Easy O?" She airily read the aqua blue lettering printed across the top of the box, but her body language was anything but relaxed.
"Every box has a theme. We use common idioms and phrases that can be interpreted in suggestive ways. Occasionally, like this month, we tweak them. But you'd be surprised how many common sayings can be suggestive in the right context. Last month it was Do Over for the client in search of the multi-orgasmic experience. It received a lot of nice reviews, so I think we achieved our goal."
I spoke matter-of-factly to make it seem like a typical business conversation, hoping it would make her less uneasy and help stop me from visualizing Georgie using the products.
"So Easy Come, Easy O is to help—" She pressed her fingers against her mouth to stifle a hiccough. I'd told myself I would keep my hands off of Georgie, mostly out of self-preservation, but I couldn't stop myself from taking her hand away from her highly kissable lips. Then I wrapped my fingers around her other hand. The button on her blouse was near breaking point as her breathing quickened. She stared up at me, her blue eyes behind the lenses sparkling with shock and possibly a little excited anticipation, as I lifted her hands up in the air. Her luscious tits lifted up with her arms.
Georgie's bottom lip dropped a bit as if disappointed. I quickly had to squash the vision I had of my tongue slipping over that lip and into her mouth.
"Take a deep breath and hold it for five seconds."
It took her a second to comprehend. "Oh, right." She sucked in a deep breath, and I worked hard at not exploding as I held her slim wrists in my hands and watched that cleavage rise up with her breath. Another erotic image flashed through my head. Only this time, it was my cock slipping between the mounds of her breasts, wedging itself snuggly in her deep, warm cleavage.
She released the breath she'd been holding. I released mine too. I let go of her hands.
She waited to see if my little trick had done the job and smiled. "You sure know your hiccough cures."
"I'm sort of an expert. Growing up, my younger brother always had the hiccoughs. With him, it wasn't as much nerves as it was him gobbling his food too fast."
"I'm not nervous," Georgie insisted. "I guess I'll let you get back to work. I'm sure you have a lot more important things to do than cure my hiccoughs. Thank you for lunch." She reached for the box, but I put my hand on it.
"On second thought, I'm going to hold onto this. Leave your address with Olivia on your way out. I'll have a car pick you up tonight at eight."
"Why would you do that?"
"Judging from the fact that just looking at the box gave you a case of hiccoughs, I think this little project is going to take more effort on my part." Before she could protest I continued. "I promise, I won't touch you. You'll be on the self-discovery part of the journey all by yourself." At least for now, I wanted to add but didn't.
Georgie's chin shifted back and forth in thought. It seemed I might have just scared her away from the plan. My own erotic impulses had gotten in the way. Her obvious case of nerves had made it clear that she'd need a lot more coaching, but a good deal of my decision came from my own need to see her again. Of course, I would probably have to chain myself to the fucking wall not to touch her or guide her self-exploration with some heavy duty exploration of my own.
I leaned against the front of my desk and crossed my arms. Georgie took a small step back to put more space between us. It was hard to know why. Maybe I repelled her. Fuck, I hoped that wasn't the case.
"What do you say, Georgie? Otherwise, I can tell you all the hardship tales my partners and I endured as kids, and you can write one of those predictable and preachy rags to riches stories. Although, something tells me predictable and preachy is not your style. Provocative, controversial, edgy, that seems more like the kind of story that would get those long fingers of yours floating across the keyboard.”
She thought about what I said for a few minutes, and I greedily used that time to look at her, every inch of her.
Her blue eyes floated to the box on the desk and then back to me. "Eight o'clock?"
Chapter Seven
Georgie
The driver, Noah, a quiet, hairless man, with two silver plugs in his ears and a courteous smile pulled the blue Jaguar up to a pair of iron gates. He pushed a button on the console and the gates swung open. Once again, I found myself fidgeting with the hem of my dress, just like I'd done with my skirt during lunch. The dress, like the skirt, came to just a few inches above my knees, a length that would have passed muster with even the strictest Catholic school nun. I'd changed five times, first opting for something a little more party like, with a short, flirty hem. But with each change of wardrobe, I went a little more conservative. The plain dress I'd ended up in as the driver buzzed the intercom on my apartment had been one that I bought for my grandmother's funeral. Unlike the blouse that I had now tossed in the Good Will bag, the dress fit nicely across my ample chest. It buttoned up easily and there was no gap, like this afternoon's gap, an innocent parting of fabric that had Trey's complete attention. And he'd made no real effort to hide his extreme interest in my ill-fitting blouse.
I wasn't exactly sure why I'd decided to go along with his plan, whatever that plan might be. Mostly, I wanted to write an interesting article, and the angle of four boys from a poor neighborhood becoming massively rich selling sex goodies wasn't going to cut it with my boss. I had to admit, I was also more than a little curious about exactly how Trey intended for me to discover my sexual self. As far as sex went, I considered myself to be the typical modern career woman. I wasn't prudish. I liked a good romp in the hay as much as the next person, but as far as my sex life becoming a critical and intriguing part of my life, I just couldn't see that happening. Still, I had to admit, Trey was the first man I'd met who could make me blush from my head to my toes with just a suggestive smile or casual touch. When he took hold of my wrists to help rid me of my hiccoughs, before I realized what was happening, my heart had set off on a speed competition with my pulse.
Noah pulled the car around a fountain and parked in front of a large contemporary style house. He opened the door and I stepped out. It was a balmy night with only a slight breeze to tease the palm trees lining the driveway and house. The house was more glass than walls. Sitting at the top of a hill as it was, it seemed there would be views from every room.
Tall cherry wood doors, both polished to glossy perfection, beckoned me up the stone steps. Trey met me at the door. He'd traded his suit and tie for a black t-shirt and jeans. His arms bulged with muscles and a smattering of ink covered each bicep. I was quickly trying to decide if he was more stunning in a suit or in casual attire, but I gave up because there was no right answer. He was just plain stunning. In fact, his all around gorgeousness might very well have been the deciding factor for me going along with this crazy idea.
The interior of his house was just how I'd expected it, masculine, minimalist and modern. Which meant no woman. Or at least that was what I was hoping.
"Follow me." Trey led me from the foyer to a hallway. "I thought a drink or two might help you loosen up."
"Absolutely. It's a warm night. I wasn't sure what to wear and after a few choices ended up on the floor of my bedroom, I ended up with this dress. I wore it to my grandmother's funeral, so it's probably the wrong choice for tonight. In fact, the more I think about it and her, my grandmother that is, it's a supremely bad choice. She was one of those super sweet granny types." We turned the corner to a big room. He stopped at a wet bar but that didn't stop me from prattling on with my nonsense.
"I'd tell you that you have a lovely home, but it seems kind of silly since you probably realize that it's lovely." I knew I was rambling but couldn't stop myself. Now all I needed was a good loud batch of hi
ccoughs to really make me look ridiculous.
Rather than stop my longwinded blathering, he listened with those dark smooth brows and that non-judgmental gaze.
So I stopped on my own, deciding I was done making a fool of myself. "I'm so sorry about that. As you might have guessed, I'm a little nervous."
Trey had a confident smile that revealed some highly sexy creases on each side of his mouth. This afternoon, at work, he'd been clean shaven, but tonight, a dark stubble had sprouted along his strong jaw. Thankfully, he hadn't taken the time to shave it off. It suited him very well. Oddly enough, my mind went straight to imagining that beard stubble chafing my chin and even my nipples as he kissed me.
Trey's hand lifted, and before I knew what was happening, Trey was pushing a strand of my hair back off my face. "I don't want you to be nervous. Which is why I've prepared a shaker filled with a Manhattan . . . or two."
"A Manhattan or two just might do the trick. At the very least, it will stop me from spilling out all my deepest secrets." I shrugged. "Not that I have many of those. Oh my gosh, drink, please, so I can shut up."
Trey poured a rose pink Manhattan into a martini glass, and I sipped it like a kid drinking Kool-aid. I winced as the drink burned my throat. It was extra strong, which would help soothe my nerves.
"Too much whiskey?" he asked.
"Normally, I'd say yes, but—" I lifted the glass and clinked it against his glass. "Bottoms up."
Trey's eyes gleamed. "Bottoms up." He reached behind the bar and found a pen. He pulled out a napkin and wrote down the phrase. "I think you just came up with a theme for a box."
"Did I? Clever me." Then I replayed the phrase in my head. "Oh, well, that should be an interesting box of goodies."