And now everything was hanging by a thin thread. The deal he'd made with the devil, in disguise as Bournham Industries' Board of Directors, had just about killed him. Increase profits by fifty percent in one year and get the equivalent of one billion in stock options, salary, and other forms of compensation.
Did that include Lydia? His face felt wolfish as he allowed himself a grin at that thought. The uber-feminist wasn't exactly spoils of corporate war, any more than he would want her to be. Oh, no -- a woman like Lydia had to be treated with kid gloves. High maintenance women were easy to manage. Give them what they thought they wanted. Like clockwork, they would want more, and more, and more, until their own dissatisfaction was their ruin.
Lydia? A different breed. No playbook existed, no game rules were laid out for pulling her in. This one was a true challenge, one that “Matt Jones” found increasingly appealing, like playing chess against a formidable opponent. The thrill of the attempt was worth more than the actual win.
The win, though, was what drove him to try. And succeed. Mike had learned the hard way never, ever to give something a shot if he didn't win.
Not if he didn't think he could win.
His world had no place for doubt.
The Corrolla felt comfortable, a throwback to twenty years ago when he'd been part of the ninety-nine percent, when life was about getting an entry-level job, working on stock investments with a portfolio the size of his current monthly gym bill, and when throwing back beers with buddies on game day was his idea of entertainment. Now he owned box seats at those games.
How long would it be before he could own the entire team?
Bzzzz. The display on his phone read Jeremy. He paused at a red light and read the message. You in for lifting tonight?
Mike typed back: Hell, yes. Need to whip your ass into shape.
The light changed and he accelerated. Bzzz. Jeremy's response: C'mon, old man. I'll take you down.
Mike was a year older than his best friend, the old man crack an old joke. They'd met college and worked for the same Web 1.0 start-up in the late '90s. When stock options made them millionaires Jeremy opted out of corporate everything, playing beach bum now for more than ten years. Mike took the opposite path, parlaying millions into tens, then hundreds.
And now on the verge of his first billion.
Traffic was too thick to respond, but then Jeremy texted again. Thailand with me next month? You need a break.
Running a hand through his hair, he stopped cold. Shit. His hair. His eyes. His clothes weren't a problem; gym threads were always junky looking, but his appearance didn't even match the ID card for the gym where he and Jeremy lifted.
Mike grabbed the phone and typed back: Change of plans. Meet me at home instead. Making a U-turn, Mike winced at the groaning turning radius on the car. His Tesla spoiled him.
Bzzz. The text message was one word: Pussy.
Chuckling, Mike knew what Jeremy meant, but the word right now made his pants tighten as he thought of Lydia. And that made him want to lift out all his frustration and aggravation and the growing, gnawing thought that no amount of weights, no grueling deadlifts, no crushing squat cage was going to stop what had started deep inside him that very morning.
“Mid-life crisis? Hair club for men spokesman? Your black soul finally showing itself?” Jeremy marched right into Mike's apartment unannounced; no knock, and there hadn't been any pretense of formality since that day in college when he'd barged into the dorm room and announced there was no f**king way he was rooming with the redneck, racist gun nut next door, so make room for him. Mike had, with a caveat: he had to beat him at chess. Jeremy's eyes had lit up at the challenge and, four draws and a fifth of Captain Morgan later, Jeremy passed out in the room and declared squatter's rights the next morning.
A friendship was born.
“I told you about this.” Indeed, he'd called Jeremy to announce the scenario, swearing him to secrecy. The only person he'd told, he trusted his friend, and knew he would needle Mike forever but would sooner have his dick cut off and fed to him than reveal the secret.
Jeremy's long, surgeon's fingers touched Mike's newly-brown locks. “And holy green leprecaun!” he nearly screamed, stepping back in horror. “You use those eyes to shoot lasers, or what? Auditioning for the new Green Lantern series?” As usually, every word that came out of his mouth was over-the-top, animated, and made his tall, slim figure seem cartoonish, shoulders hunched over and basketball-players legs bent at the knees to inspect Mike's eyes. At 6'2” Mike was no shorty, either, but Jeremy towered over him at 6'6".
Mike grimaced and grabbed two beers from his fridge. The apartment was less luxurious than it could have been, most of his money tied up in investments or in his beach house on Cape Cod, in Osterville. All he needed was a basic one bedroom in the city, and he got it, with stainless steel that glared back.
“That bad?”
“I've seen calmer greens at a St. Patrick's Day parade in Boston.” Jeremy studied his hair again. “That's my shade! Clairol Bullshit Brown.”
Cracking open the beer, Mike left it on the counter. “Hey, bullshit brown helps me jump sales by twenty percent. I'll take it.”
“You and that damn fifty percent increase. You're already worth triple-digit millions, Mike. Why do you need this?”
“Says the man who is so bored in early retirement that he plays D&D.”
“I balance that out with rock climbing, so I'm officially a hipster geek.”
“That is so much better.”
“I know, right?” Big swig of beer. Belch. Jeremy opened both doors of the giant Viking refrigerator, triggering the interior lights. “Beam me up, Scotty! Why do you need such a huge fridge for one guy?” Pulling out an assortment of food, Jeremy set up a buffet of sorts across the kitchen's island. Meat, cheese, and strawberries he didn't remember buying.
The fridge did look like a giant, glowing spaceship when both doors were open, he had to admit. “It came with the place.”
“So how's that look working for you?” Jeremy wasn't exactly a fashion plate himself. “You look like a young Anderson Cooper auditioning for the next X-Men movie.”
Shit. “Are the contacts really that bad?” Bending over, he popped one out. “See?”
“You look like you're wearing a really bad disguise for some cheesy reality TV series. Oh.” He took a swig of beer, finishing off the bottle. “Wait. You are.”
“Twenty percent bounce in sales. That's all I needed to hear.” Mike slid the lens back in place, blinking hard. He needed saline solution, but his stomach growled louder than his eyes were dry. A piece of brie called his name and he shoved it and a strawberry. Followed by a slice of salami.
“You sure they were telling the truth?”
The food turned to lumpy, wet sawdust in his mouth. “Wha' woo dey eye?” He walked to the fridge and pulled out another beer, the liquid making the food easier to get down. For someone who was meticulous in his investment research, he felt like an idiot. It hadn't occurred to him to double-check that stat.
“They lie because they're reality TV producers,” Jeremy laughed. “Everything is twisted and manipulated and bent to meet advertising goals, dude. Product placement, consumer pushes, you name it -- you should know that better than anyone. You run a f**king media company!”
“I'm the CEO. I don't deal with the details.”
“Your dad did.” Ouch.
“The difference between the business my dad built and what I run now is like the difference between a canoe and a cruise ship.”
Jeremy weighed that out by chewing on a salami and cheese sub. Mike wondered where he got the sub roll. Why was he buying food he couldn't remember? “Your dad sold you the company for a share of your start-up's stock options. You made him a happy man...” His voice faded out. Mike's dad, Joe Bournham, and founded a white-pages advertising company in the 1960s. Mike helped to bring it to database and mailing list level, and in the late nineties Joe had sold it to him for 1,000 stock options. Stock options that paid out big time, and that had made it easier to fund his dad's medical bills when the pancreatic cancer made its death march into their otherwise happy life.
Turning Bournham Industries into a juggernaut had helped ease the pain of his dad's loss.
“When did we get so f**king serious?” Mike asked, his stomach sour.
“I'm the one who has threesomes in Bangkok on the beach while you peruse new merger contracts and go over the twenty-seventh mission statement revision.”
Mike just cleared his throat. Silence. Jeremy started twitching a bit, the change in the room's atmosphere tangible. “If you really want to talk about threesomes, Bangkok isn't the one I reminisce about...” The two men had, on and off, found an affinity for sharing women. Not many – in fact, exactly two. One had been a fluke, in college. Debbie was a cheerleader who decided to experiment, and Mike and Jeremy were the lucky lab rats. She had married a rising-star quarterback her senior year and was now a well-known football wife in the NFL. If they crossed paths at charity events, she acted like she didn't know Mike.
Which was just fine. He didn't need acknowledgment. He knew her.
Jeremy pitched back another beer and cocked his head. “Dana's done with us. You know that.” After two years of a permanently-casual arrangement that was ill-defined, Dana had decided to go monogamous. Mike got over it in, a few weeks. Jeremy still wasn't quite over it, a year later.
“And we should be done with her.”
Nodding, Jeremy stood, dumped the empty in the recycling bin, and grabbed another bottle. “Wild times in Thailand again, Mike. C'mon...”
“So I can get you out of jail after propositioning a gender-bending prostitute?”
“You live for that!” Jeremy recoiled in mock horror, as if offended. “Did I ever leave you on a roof in Vegas?”
Snort. “No, but I might throw you off mine if you keep lying to me.” Jeremy was about as capable of a Bangkok brothel visit as Mike was of forgetting Lydia.
Damn it. There she was again, invading his brain.
“Why'd you make me come here? I'm dressed to lift.” And, indeed, he was.
Mike gestured to his face. “This. I realized I can't live my regular life for six weeks, because then my cover will be blown.”
“Cover? You sound like a DEA narc.”
“How do you know I'm not?”
Bzzz. Saved by the bell. He read the email that came through. “OK, good. My tech access is set up for Matt Jones. At least she did something right.”
“She?” Jeremy cocked on eyebrow. “You got someone new?”
Mike nearly choked again. Except he had nothing in his mouth. “Uh, no.” Faltering, he tried to pull it together, but just the thought of her name was making it hard to think clearly. “New admin.”
“Your alter ego has an admin? Is she cute?” Jeremy propped his chin in his hand, elbow on the grey granite slab, intrigued.
“Lydia's, well...”
“A dog, huh.” Smirk.
Possessive anger welled up in him out of nowhere. “Don't talk about her like that.”
“Ooooo, Matt Jones has a nerve, and I just hit it.”