Loe raamatut: «Once Upon A Seduction»

1

Once upon a time, in a land not far from L.A., there lived a girl who seemed to have it all.

NO, NO, THAT WASN’T RIGHT. Have it all was vague, cliché and boring. And Once upon a time? Would an editor even get past that first trite phrase to read the rest of the sentence?

Doubtful.

Skye Ellison glared at the manuscript she’d been struggling with for months. She couldn’t get the first line of the story right, so how could she expect to write an entire young adult novel anyone would want to read?

She might as well just face the fact that she sucked the big one and move on to a less creative endeavor, maybe even throw all her efforts into the job she was actually getting paid to do. Now there was a novel idea.

She minimized the document entitled The Cinderella Solution and turned her attention to the calendar hanging on her cubicle wall. Today’s square was empty, leaving her with two choices—she could start making follow-up harassment sales calls to her on-the-fence customers, or she could wade through the never-ending crapload of interoffice e-mail that flooded her inbox daily. The choices left her with a vague urge to go running out into traffic.

Skye had a theory about cubicles. She believed that if you sat in one long enough, all your thoughts became square. You’d lose your ability to think outside the box, and your creativity would get lost in a haze of geometric shapes and flickering computer screens.

After three tedious years at Dynalux Systems in her six-by-six cubicle, doing work she had trouble explaining to anyone outside the high-tech, pallid-faced world of networking equipment and the people who sold it, this had clearly happened to Skye.

She could no longer even compose a sentence that wasn’t an utter and complete cliché. Which was ironic, since she’d taken the mindless job in the first place thinking it would leave her with the mental energy to be creative enough to write novels during her off hours.

In fact, she’d slipped into such a state of crippling boredom at work in the past few months, she’d begun to fear her brain was atrophying. Nothing was going right in her life, she’d made no progress on her book, and she sometimes felt as if she was unable to complete even the simplest of mental tasks.

So when someone dropped a red lace bra on her desk, she couldn’t begin to imagine where it had come from. The burst of color alone was shocking enough, but to have something so blatantly sexy right out in the open at her office was an event unheard of since the time Bill Muller tried to spice up the corporate decor by putting a bunch of Hooters Girls posters on his cubicle walls.

“You left this at my house,” an unfamiliar male voice said as Skye stared at the bra she’d never seen before.

The only coherent thought she could form was that the cup size looked big enough to accommodate an engorged milk cow.

She looked up from the humongous bra to the source of the voice, and she realized he wasn’t so unfamiliar after all. He was someone she knew in passing—Nico Valletti, her ex-boyfriend’s landlord. And his expression wasn’t exactly congenial. He was one of those guys who smoldered all the time, regardless of whether it was called for or not.

Nico had been blessed with a physical appearance verging on the sublime. A former racecar driver who’d retired early after a famously bad accident on the track, he was gorgeous in the extreme, with nearly black hair, nearly black eyes and a body that could make a girl think dirty thoughts.

And he seemed all too aware of his power over women, as evidenced by his ever-present smirk.

According to Skye’s scumbag ex, Martin—or whatever his real name was—Nico had a different girlfriend every week. Sometimes two or three.

She finally found her voice and croaked, “That’s not mine. What are you doing with it at my office?”

“Returning it to you, because you’ve got information I need.”

“Are you sure that doesn’t belong to one of your girlfriends?”

His gaze traveled from her to the bra and back again. Something about his eyes made her feel as if he had X-ray vision, as if he could see straight through her blouse to her mismatched, no-chance-of-sex-today bra and underwear. As if he could tell she didn’t own a single red lace bra.

If he made a comment about the fact that the bra on her desk was about four cup sizes away from fitting her, she’d staple him in the hand.

“I’d recognize it if it did,” he said in a tone that made her feel like blushing.

If he was telling the truth, then where had the bra come from? Martin had left town three weeks ago, as far as anyone could tell. Not that he’d bothered to say goodbye, or return the money he’d cleared out of her savings account.

She’d been having violent thoughts about her ex ever since that horrifying day when the police had come to her asking questions about him. They’d said Martin was a wanted con artist, that he’d used so many aliases in so many states that no one was sure what his real name was.

She glared up at Nico, wondering if he’d been in on the con. “How did you find out where I work?”

“Your boyfriend mentioned it once, and I’m here to learn what you might know about where he’s holed up now.”

Her across-the-aisle neighbor and fellow cubicle hater, John Hanson, returned to his desk, watching them. With honey-brown skin and dreadlocks pulled back in a thick ponytail, John was eye-catching, and at six foot four—a couple of inches taller than Nico—he was a little intimidating. He was also Skye’s closest friend at Dynalux.

As if he felt the tension in the air, John looked at Nico. “Is there a problem here?”

Skye appreciated his interest, but she wanted to take care of herself. “It’s okay, John. We’re just talking.”

He nodded and sat at his computer, but he kept his gaze locked on Nico for a moment longer—the guy equivalent of a territorial growl.

Skye stood and made like she had work to do elsewhere, grabbing a stack of papers to deliver to destinations unknown. “Whatever I thought I knew about Martin was a lie, so I can’t help you.”

Nico’s eyes narrowed. “You expect me to believe that?”

“How do I know you weren’t in on his scam? Have the police checked you out yet?”

She tried to walk around him, but he stepped into her path.

“Your boyfriend rips me off, and you accuse me of being part of his con? I’d say you’re his biggest suspected accomplice.”

“Accomplice?” Skye eyed her stapler, wondering how much force it would take to penetrate flesh.

She’d been through hell ever since Martin had run off. And now to have someone suggest she’d been an accomplice in his crime was the cherry on top of her crap sundae.

“I know not to trust appearances, thanks to Martin.”

“Well, trust this—he stole ten thousand dollars from my savings account. I’m not his accomplice. Now you’ll have to excuse me, because I have a job to do.”

Being conned by her ex had been the final straw that had convinced Skye all her instincts about men were wrong. If Martin had been the only loser she’d ever hooked up with, then, okay, maybe she could have called it a fluke, but unfortunately, Martin was just one of a long line of losers on Skye’s ex list.

She couldn’t name a single one of her exes who’d left her with pleasant memories.

She edged around Nico and was a little surprised he let her escape, but then she faced the dilemma of leaving him at her desk alone. What if he stayed?

As if he’d read her mind, he plopped down in her office chair and looked up at her with a grin that didn’t quite reach his eyes.

“I can wait,” he said.

He certainly could, and then when her boss happened by, he could make her life hell.

She noticed now that she was standing that the scene at her desk had gotten the attention of the entire office. People were peering over cubicles, talking amongst themselves as they cast curious glances at her and Nico. It was only a matter of time before the boss sniffed a lack of productivity in the air and came out to do one of his motivational stalks around the office.

“You have to leave now,” she said in a stage whisper.

But instead of doing as she’d asked, he turned around and looked at her computer monitor. That was when Skye remembered the document she’d minimized a few minutes ago—her work in progress. She hurried back into the cubicle and leaned over Nico to grab the mouse, but it was too late.

“What’s this?” he asked, covering the mouse with his too-large hand before she could reach it.

“Nothing.”

With a click, the first page of The Cinderella Solution glowed on the monitor for all the world to read.

“Don’t read that!” she said, to no avail.

“Once upon a time—”

“Stop!” Skye felt her face flush. She hated anyone reading her lousy rough drafts and hated getting caught slacking off on the job even more.

“Is this what you do for—” he glanced up at the wall, where the company’s logo was emblazoned in royal-blue print “—Dynalux Systems? Write stories?”

“I was taking a break,” she lied. “Haven’t you ever heard of those?”

“Looks to me like you were slacking. Does your boss know you write stories at work?”

“It’s my business what I do on my breaks.”

He looked at his wristwatch—an expensive Swiss one, Skye couldn’t help noting. “A break at four-thirty in the afternoon? Aren’t you about to leave work?”

So she was busted. “I finished all my Dynalux work, okay? Now don’t you have a car to go wreck or something?”

He gave her a look. “I wonder how your boss would feel about your slacking, or the fact that he has a probable criminal working for him.”

Her manager, Nelson Rudderman, whose favorite words were maximize and strategize, would have a cow if he found out she was doing something besides maximizing her time and strategizing how she’d contribute to the future success of Dynalux on company time.

“I’m not a probable criminal,” she snapped.

“I don’t know that. I think either you tell me where Martin disappeared to, or I’ll have to tell your boss about your dirty little secrets.”

“I don’t have any dirty little secrets, and I have no freaking idea where Martin went.”

“You’re lying.”

Nico might have been hot, but he was a world-class jerk.

“I can call security. You’re not even supposed to be in here.”

“Go ahead. I’ll make sure I talk to your boss on the way out the door.”

“What makes you think I’m Martin’s accomplice?”

“He talked about you constantly. ‘Skye’s so hot. Skye’s so smart. Skye’s gonna write the next big craze in kids’ books.’ Why would any of that drooling adoration have been an act?”

“Because he wanted you to think he was a nice guy?”

“He could have accomplished that without being so damn annoying. I don’t think he would have taken off without a plan to hook up with you again in a few months when the police have forgotten about the two of you.”

“Why wouldn’t I have just disappeared with him?”

“He’s trying to protect you by making it look like you weren’t involved.”

Skye looked at the bra on her desk. Clearly not hers and apparently not one Nico recognized as a garment he’d removed from any recent dates.

It was just her luck that when she found a guy who was crazy about her, he was also crazy enough to clean out her savings account—not to mention that he was a crazed sex hound who would hump anything in a skirt.

“You’re wrong. He was so crazy about me he just couldn’t resist taking some other woman’s bra off.”

“Look, I never said he wasn’t a scumbag. But he didn’t talk about other women. He talked about you. Constantly. Until I wanted to puke.”

Skye blinked away an unwelcome dampness in her eyes. She’d been crazy about Martin, too. Crazy stupid. It was the story of her love life: Skye meets a guy she thinks is great, Skye dates said guy, then said guy takes off with all her money or, at the very least, her dignity.

She’d learned her lesson this time though. Now she knew for absolute sure that all her instincts about men were dead wrong. And she’d vowed that from now on, whenever her instincts told her a guy was right for her, she’d better run in the opposite direction.

For the rest of her post-Martin life, she would live by the rule of opposites. Whatever her instincts told her to do about a guy, she had to do the opposite.

“I don’t know what to tell you.”

“You’re not getting off that easy. Don’t you think your employer ought to know what kind of person is working here? Either you cooperate with me, or—”

Skye’s temper flared. She hated being backed into a corner, but the truth was, she needed her job, and recent cutbacks at Dynalux surely meant she was being looked at. Sooner or later, the powers that be were going to figure out she wasn’t exactly essential to the company. “Or what? You’ll get me fired?”

He leveled a gaze at her that was neither friendly nor hostile. “I don’t have any control over what your employer decides to do with the information I have.”

“What did Martin steal from you?”

“About twenty grand and my favorite motorcycle.”

“Isn’t that like a drop in the bucket for a racecar driver with a house in Malibu?”

“Former racecar driver. And twenty grand is twenty grand.”

No point in arguing that. She could, after all, understand his frustration.

He continued. “It wasn’t what he stole so much as how he stole it. He acted like we were friends, and he lied to me.”

“Tell me about it.” He’d lied his way into her bed and into her heart. “So what? You’re going to hunt him down and demand an apology?”

“I’m going to hunt him down and get my money back, then turn him over to the cops, since they don’t seem all that interested in the case.”

“He’s probably left the state.”

Skye dropped her handful of papers back on her desk, giving up the ruse of having work to do elsewhere.

“You want to know the truth? I think I know where he is. But you do, too, don’t you?”

“Right, because I’m his accomplice. I’ve been looking all my life to hook up with a guy who has five wives in three different states.”

Nico shrugged. “I just need some more information to be sure I’m looking for him in the right place.”

Dottie Kuzoski got up from her desk three cubicles away and came toward them, her permed ash-blond hair taking on a weird green tinge under the fluorescent light. She slowed her pace as she passed, staring in unabashed lust at Nico. Just when Skye thought she’d leave, she stopped in her tracks and turned around.

“Skye, is this our new rep from the southwest region?”

“No,” Skye said and shot Dottie a look.

“Oh. Well. You know, we’re not supposed to have personal visitors on company time.” She gave Skye a snotty smirk, then smiled at Nico in what must have been her attempt to look seductive. He continued to stare at Skye. “But I won’t tell Mr. Rudderman if you don’t.”

“Thanks, Dottie. I’ll be sure to put you in my will.”

Skye and Dottie were natural enemies, mainly because Dottie didn’t like anyone who got higher sales numbers than her on a regular basis. Not that Skye had ever tried—it was simply a fluke that, without much effort, her mediocre sales numbers consistently topped Dottie’s.

Dottie flashed Nico another smile and scurried off, her brown skirt bunching over her ass in an entirely unappealing way.

“Rudderman—that’s your boss?”

Skye sighed. “I believe his official title is Big Kahuna.”

“I’ll give you one last chance to tell me what you know.”

He expected her to grovel, to do whatever he demanded? He was messing with the wrong office drone. Dottie had wiped away the last shred of Skye’s good humor.

“You can’t march in here and accuse me of being an accomplice to a crime and expect me to do whatever you want.”

“Maybe I’ll just go have a talk with that Rudderman guy then.”

He stood and left the cubicle, heading straight for the office Nelly—as she referred to Rudderman when he was out of earshot—occupied near the entrance of the office suite.

“Go right ahead,” she blurted to Nico’s back, sounding as ridiculous as she felt.

Across the aisle, John was pretending to work, but for a talented wannabe actor, he wasn’t doing such a good job of faking it. He had on his headset but hadn’t said a word to a customer since he’d returned to his desk. He glanced over at her, and she turned away, ashamed of the misery he might see in her eyes.

Alone in her cubicle, she noticed the red lace bra lying on her desk, mocking her in all its full-figured splendor. She was a 34B on a bloated day, and normally she couldn’t have cared less, but at that moment, the bra made her feel somehow inadequate.

She flopped into her chair and saved her manuscript to a disk that was already in the floppy drive, then removed the disk and put it in her bag. She deleted the document from her hard drive, thus eliminating the evidence of her misuse of company time.

So much for her characters finding happily ever after today, or even next month, for that matter. At the rate she was going, she’d end up having to go back to the waitressing work she’d done in college and never again have enough energy to write anything more creative than her yearly holiday see-my-life-doesn’t-suck-that-badly newsletter.

Who had come up with the idea of happily ever after, anyway? Probably some giddy lovesick girl back in the Middle Ages when people lived to the ripe old age of thirty-five, and “ever after” wasn’t such an ambitious concept. These days, happily never after was far more realistic.