“Jane, where are you?” Danielle’s voice came drifting into the house.

“I’m coming! I’m coming! I’m just getting a drink. Can I get you something?”

“Yeah, whatever you’re having.”

I looked around in the kitchen, poking my head through cupboards and fridges – amazed again at how much Danielle had when it came to anything alcohol related. Eventually I decided on a gin and tonic and headed outside to the pool.

“Gin and tonic? Nice! Perfect for this weather.” Danielle said, grinning at me. Danielle was lying by the pool in a bright yellow bikini that barely covered her body. I almost asked her what the point was but I was worried that she’d just agree with me and take it right off. She was uninhibited like that. Not me.

“Danielle,” I said while gingerly taking off my towel and climbing into the pool. I was wearing a black bikini with small white flowers that I had thought to be quite cute when first buying it. Now, I was just worried that I looked frumpy next to her. “Can I ask you something?”

She sat up, taking a huge sip of her gin and tonic, “Of course you can. Ask away. But if it’s about the birds and the bees I should hope you know the answer to that one.”

“How did you get so confident about yourself? I mean, I know you’re gorgeous. Which helps. Easy to be confident when you look so good, right? But you were always like this. Even when you didn’t have the body of a goddess. You were always so confident. It’s the one thing that I always remember about you from back in the day. It was something that I always admired and honestly it was something I was always quite jealous of. I still am really. I’m just tired of always running scared. It must be nice to be so carefree.”

She stared at me open mouthed for several moments, surprised by my question and then lay back down. “Well, firstly thank you for the compliments. My inner goddess thanks you. But to be honest I’m not nearly as confident as you may think I am. I still get nervous around cute guys. Hell, I get nervous around any guy. I still sometimes want to kick myself for the stupid things that come out of my mouth when I’m in an awkward situation. And I definitely still look at myself in the mirror and think, “You could do better.” But I don’t think that’s a good way to lead a life. It doesn’t make me feel good to constantly be that way and it’s not fun for those around me if I’m always beating myself up. Everyone wants to be around someone that’s positive and happy. So… I pretend.”

I gawked at her… “You… you pretend? What do you mean?”

“Well, at first I did. I mean, I just kept it to myself. I started acting more confident. I didn’t tell people how much I cringed at the way I looked or the things that I said. I kept it to myself. The only thing that I portrayed was confidence. And you know what? Well, slowly but surely I started believing it myself. And… I started to like it. I started to realize just how much I shouldn’t really give a damn. Life gets taken far too seriously. Where’s the fun in that?”

“So basically, it’s the whole fake it until you make it thing?” I asked.

“Absolutely. Most people do it in business but it works just as well when you do it with yourself. But why are you asking all this Jane? What’s on your mind?”

“Well… something happened.” I said awkwardly, unsure of where to start.

She sat up. “Something happened? What? Does it have to do with a guy? Oh I do hope you have some good gossip for me Greiner.”

“Uh… yeah.” Then I went underwater for several seconds and came back up.

She laughed, “Jane! You can’t run away under water. Thankfully you need to come up for a breath eventually. Okay… spill it. Who is this mystery man that’s getting you so tongue tied?”

“Sebastian Taylor.”

I could see the cogs turning in her brain before she gasped, “Wait! THE Sebastian Taylor. As in the guy who runs your casino? As in the hot billionaire? As in… YOUR BOSS? Are you talking about that guy?”

I grinned and then went under water again. When I came back up she cried out, “Jane! Stop that!”

I giggled. “Sorry. Yeah. That guy. My boss. The one and only.”

“And what happened? And don’t think you can get away with just telling me ‘oh not much’ – I want details Jane. DETAILS.”

I got out the pool, wrapped my towel around me and went to lie next to her.

“I had a meeting in his office yesterday. Okay, no that’s not it really. Uh… okay so he asked me out for lunch. It was all through text message and the whole thing seemed a bit flirty. I said no. He kept pushing and I kept saying no. I told him that he was my boss and that it would be strange. Hey why are you rolling your eyes?”

“You turned down a free lunch with a super cute guy? Crazy girl.”

That made me laugh, “Yeah, it does sound a bit crazy out loud. Anyway so, after a bit of back and forth, he restructured the message and told me that he was getting food ordered into his office. He said that he wanted me to come in to do some work and that I was welcome to have some of the food on offer but I also didn’t have to.”

“Clever man. I like the sound of him.”

“Yeah, so I had to go. And for a little while we really did discuss work. And we ate from this huge array of food that he had ordered. But then… well then he started getting a bit flirty again and I started flirting back. Before I knew it he was kissing me. Like proper kissing.”

She burst out laughing, “As opposed to un-proper kissing?”

“Stop mocking me! This is the first time I’ve ever kissed my boss, you know!”

“Well, that’s a good thing. Anyway, then what happened?”

“He locked the door. And obviously that’s when I knew that things were going to go further. And I let it happen. There was just no way that I could turn away from him then. The most gorgeous man in the world was kissing me and I wanted him to do it again and again and again. Then he took off my bra. I was still wearing my blouse, but it was open at the front. And then, he… uh…” I found that I was blushing and I stared longingly at the pool.

“Jane, don’t you dare jump back in that pool. What happened next?”

I took a sip of my drink. Liquid courage and all that. I took another sip. “Uh… well then he took off my panties and went down on me against his desk.”

“JANE! I cannot believe I saw you last night and this morning and you didn’t say a word to me. No wonder you were acting all weird. I thought you were just tired from work. You naughty little scoundrel. So… this beautiful man didn’t ask anything in return?”

“No. But after that happened his phone rang and the secretary said there were people to see him. So I had to quickly sort myself out before they came in. I was on my hands and knees searching for my bra.”

Danielle was laughing and now so was I. “Oh what I would’ve given to see that moment.”

“I had like five minutes to find my bra, put on my bra and then put on my panties. And then make myself look presentable. It didn’t help that ten minutes later he called and asked me to bring in coffee for them all. That’s not normally my job but the receptionist was on her lunch break.”

“So you had to go back in?”

“Yep. And only after did I realize that my skirt was still tucked into my panties. Thankfully the men didn’t see it but Sebastian did.”

Tears were falling down Danielle’s face now. “How do you know he saw it?”

“Because he sent me a text message afterwards letting me know.”

“HE SENT YOU A TEXT MESSAGE. Oh Jane, you’re killing me. This is like a movie.”

“Also, my one button on my blouse hadn’t been done up. The top button. And I did bend down to give those men coffees. I have no idea if they noticed. But yeah… that’s my life.”

“Which is why you asked me about the confidence thing?”

“Pretty much. I’m a bubbling idiot as I’ve now proven to you.”

“You’re confident where it counts Jane. And anyway, you must be doing something right for that thing to happen with Sebastian.”

“I guess. But what am I going to do now? I can’t face him again after what happened. I’m going to die of embarrassment.”

“Why? He obviously likes you. I don’t understand what the problem is. It’s also quite obvious that you like him too.”

“But… he’s my boss Danielle. And anyway, that’s beside the point. I’m not dating anyone anymore. Not for a while anyway. I promised myself that I’d be off men for this year. So nothing more can happen with this.”

“Why? Because of that asshole who left you for your best friend? You do realize he’s your ex-boyfriend? You do realize he cheated on you? So you’re just going to deny yourself because of him?”

“But it’s more than that. I owe it to myself.”

“Exactly. You owe it to yourself.”

“No, you don’t understand. I can’t be with another man like that again. Not now.”

“So you’ll deny yourself a hot billionaire who practically gave you the best orgasm of your life?” Danielle said to me, grinning at that last bit as if she were very pleased with herself.

I was flushed and I suddenly had no idea what to do with my hands or where to look, “I never said it was the best orgasm of my life!”

“Well, was it?” She asked, a cheekiness to her voice.

“Well, yeah, but that’s beside the point.”

She laughed. She had gotten me. “The point is that you have no point. That you are just letting Justin ruin your life. That you’re not allowing yourself a bit of fun. The point is that you are not allowing yourself to move on.”

“I just don’t know Danielle.”

While everything that I had told her was true, what I didn’t tell her was that I was also worried about his reputation. And the fact that he was the type of guy that could drop me and hurt me in an instant. I didn’t tell her about Abbie’s warnings or the amount of girls he had slept with. I was so confused about everything. And she was right, it was the best orgasm of my life, and that part was hard to forget. Also, Sebastian confused me. I knew the type of man that he was but I also saw something in him that was very different to the man that he was portraying himself to be. Or was he just very good at manipulation? Was I just falling right into his trap? I opened my mouth to say something but before I could the doorbell rang.

“I wonder who that is? I’m not expecting anyone.” Danielle got up and went to answer the door. I smiled at how she didn’t even bother to put a towel on. She just walked straight into the house with just her bikini on. Her small bottom moved from side to side as she walked. I wrapped my towel around me in case whoever was at the door came outside.

Danielle emerged with a man in a uniform and a clipboard. He looked extremely nervous and I could see that he kept glancing at Danielle in her yellow bikini. It made me want to laugh.

“Jane, it’s for you.”

“What?” I said, confused.

“Hello, are you Jane Greiner?” The man asked me. I nodded. “Well I have a delivery for you that I need you to sign for.” He held out his clipboard while I started at him in confusion.