“I want you to give her a job here.”
And there it was. The pound of flesh. Shank might very well have been the ugliest man I’d ever seen. Greasy, salt and pepper colored hair pushed back from his face allowed the world to see the ravages acne had left on his skin, and eyes like a snake’s didn’t add any good to the overall picture. If his daughter looked anything like him, there was no way she’d be able to be a dancer or a bartender for me. Plus, did I really want some relative of Shank’s getting a bird’s eye view of the inner workings of Club X?
But there was no way I could say no. Not if I wanted to keep our arrangement going. “You want your daughter to work here? Things get kind of rough here sometimes. I wouldn’t want her to get hurt.”
“I trust you. She’s a good girl, a lot like her mother. She has experience bartending, so just tell Stefan he’s got a new worker.”
“Okay, John. No problem. I’m sure it will work out fine for her and us.”
He flashed me that old crooked cop grin and stood to leave. “I knew you’d say that, Cassian. She’ll be thrilled. I’ll tell her to come over.”
As he left my office, I just hoped she looked a lot like her mother too. If not, maybe I’d have to consider placing a bartender on one of the upper floors in a corner somewhere. But if she looked like Shank, I wouldn’t have to worry about Stefan going after her. At least there was that.
* * *
Leaning back against the couch cushions, I closed my eyes and let Rachel do what she did best. For all the hassle and unhappiness she’d brought into my life on more occasions than I cared to remember, she did know how to suck cock like a champion. Ordinarily, I’d be enjoying it like I always did, my hand stuffed into her long black hair guiding her, not that she needed any help. We’d done this enough times over the years that she knew exactly how to get me off. There were no mysteries about her, no secrets to uncover. Rachel was what she’d been for years—someone to fuck. No more, no less.
Her hands danced over the tops of my thighs, gently raking her long, perfectly manicured nails across my skin before she wrapped her palm around the base of my cock and squeezed. I’d always enjoyed that moment when her hand’s motion let me know she was about to take me into her mouth and deliver a world class blowjob. I’d had every intention of enjoying it tonight, but as I sat there watching her slowly bob up and down in my lap, it just wasn’t there.
I was barely there.
My hand slid from her head and landed on the couch next to my leg, a not-so-subtle sign I was bored. Rachel may have been self-centered and thoughtless most times in her life, but she wasn’t stupid or blind, and I wasn’t even trying to hide my disinterest.
She looked up at me as she slid my cock out of her mouth, those nearly jet black eyes questioning me before the words passed her lips. “What’s wrong with you tonight, baby? Hard day at the club?”
“No. I’ve got other things on my mind.”
Rachel sat back on her heels, but her hand never left my cock. Stroking it from base to tip and back again, she shook her head. “Poor Cash. Always so worried about everything. Let me guess. Another lawsuit from a disgruntled worker? You need a better screening system there.”
I rolled my eyes at the veiled reference to my younger brother’s sexual antics. Of all the people in the world, Rachel was the last one I wanted to discuss Stefan’s indiscriminate fucking with. “No, it has nothing to do with a lawsuit.”
Her expression showed me she didn’t care why I was distracted, just that I wasn’t fulfilling my role in the play we acted out at least one night a week. As I looked down at her petulant face, I suddenly felt like I didn’t want to do this with her anymore. It had been nice for a while, but I didn’t want this.
“What’s going on, Cassian? Is this about that thing again? I told you he meant nothing.”
“No. I don’t care about that.”
Her hand stopped its movement against my skin, and as she let my cock loose, it smacked off my stomach. She stared down at it in its still rock hard state, her mouth turning down into a pout. “Then what? You’re killing our good time here, baby.”
I ran my hands through my hair while I tried to figure out what was going on with me. It had been a long time since just sex hadn’t been enough, but now as Rachel worked to coax interest out of me with her mouth on the inside of my thigh, I just couldn’t fake it. This wasn’t enough.
The truth was that since hearing Kane say Olivia had reserved one of the fantasy rooms I couldn’t think of anything but her. And the thought of one of Kane’s guys taking care of her made me want to hit someone. After working with her for just a short time, I shouldn’t have been jealous at the thought of Samson or even Kane being with her in any way, but I was.
I wanted to be the one with Olivia when she finally shed the mask of control, not my half-brother or one of our employees. That she was my assistant didn’t make my desire for her easy, though. I’d religiously stuck to my belief that fraternizing with employees was a mistake none of us could afford to make, and now I was quickly becoming obsessed with the idea of doing just that with her.
“Cash, did you hear me?” Rachel asked in a voice full of irritation, shaking me out of my thoughts about Olivia.
I pulled up my pants and walked over to the bar for a drink. Pouring myself a glass of whiskey, I looked out the enormous window at the bay below my condo. The alcohol warmed my throat going down, and I took another swig before turning back toward Rachel now sitting in my spot on the couch.
“I think it’s time we admit this isn’t what either of us want, Rachel. We had fun. Most times we did. It’s just run its course.”
She stared at me for a long moment before that mouth that had given me so much pleasure in the past hitched up into a knowing smile. “Who is she, Cash? I’ve known you long enough to know when you’re in love with someone. Remember? You used to look that way when we got together.”
Turning back to look out the window, I took another drink, holding it in my mouth for a second before letting it slide down my throat. “I’m not in love with anyone. You forget who you’re talking to. I don’t do love. I do sex. Sometimes I do sex exclusively, but I don’t do love.”
“Yeah, right, baby. Don’t tell me you weren’t in love with me, Cassian March. I know you better.”
I didn’t want to have this discussion with her. She wasn’t wrong. I had loved her. Up until just recently, I’d thought I still loved her, even after she tore my fucking heart out. I’d lied to myself and convinced some part of me that fucking her like I did would show her I didn’t care anymore, but for a long time the spark she ignited in me still burned strong.