BANCROFT

Sex with Ruby is unlike the sex I’ve had in any other relationship. It’s not civilized, but it’s not savage either. Ruby is the ideal balance between sweetly docile and confidently naughty, and she knows exactly when one works and the other is necessary. She’s fucking perfect.

The biggest problem we seem to have is that our schedules don’t match. She goes to bed an hour or two before I get up for my day. By the time I get home from work, she’s on her way out the door or already long gone.

Two days after our initial argument, followed by the fuck of the century, I’m woken up twenty minutes before my alarm goes off to a blow job. This time I get to come in Ruby’s pretty, perfect mouth.

Monday is one of Ruby’s days off. I go into work in the morning but I schedule the afternoon to work from home. I don’t plan to do much actual work. I plan to do Ruby. Repeatedly. On any available surface.

I arrive home just after two and find her in the kitchen, humming away, making coffee and microwave s’mores. Apparently it’s her favorite thing. I wrap an arm around her waist and pull her up against me, nuzzling into her hair. “Is this your version of a healthy breakfast?”

She turns around in my arms. “Healthy no. Breakfast yes. Want one?”

“That’s not really what I’m hungry for.”

“Oh no?”

I shake my head and pick her up, depositing her on the counter. She’s wearing her bathrobe. It’s white with red flowers and made of some silky material. “I’m more interested in finding out what’s under here.” I pull the bow at her waist and watch as the sides part, revealing taut muscles and perky nipples. She’s naked and glorious. I fuck her on the counter. We spend the rest of the day in my bedroom enjoying each other.

I know the second she crawls into bed with me. It doesn’t matter that it’s between two and four in the morning. It doesn’t matter that I have to get my ass up at five-thirty and work a twelve-hour day. All she has to do is press her body against mine and I’m instantly awake. We’ll fuck until my alarm goes off. I stopped bothering with condoms when the second box ran out on day four and she assured me she’s on the pill.

Which also happened to be the day she decided to rehearse the dance to the song that broke me. While naked. We didn’t make it past the living room floor. I have bruises on my knees from that.

We don’t address any of the important issues, such as how we’re going to deal with the fact that she’s still living here and we’re sleeping together. To be quite honest I don’t want to mess with this good thing we have now that we finally have it. Which is a problem. Because there are things we need to figure out. I don’t particularly want her to leave, but I also know that staying here indefinitely was never part of her plan. I don’t want to freak her out by inviting her to move in permanently, even though it’s something I’ve considered. It’s a little premature.

A week is not really enough time to make a highly informed decision regarding shacking up. But I’m really enjoying having Ruby in my bed every night. She gives incredible blow jobs. She has a naughty mouth. She likes it when I talk dirty to her. And that’s just the sexual compatibility, which has nothing on how compatible we are beyond the bedroom.

It’s been two hours since I left Ruby sleeping in my bed. Four hours since I’ve been inside her. I already feel as if I’m going through withdrawal.

Hours have never felt more like eternity than they do right now. The more we keep doing this, the more aware I become that we really need to stop dancing around conversations and figure out what this is. There’s no timeline on moving out, but I’m well aware that she’s been actively seeking a new agent and that she’s looking to audition for roles that will take her closer to Broadway.

It’s a bit of a messy situation I’ve gotten myself into. If I’m completely honest, I’m still a little angry at her for lying about her job, although I can understand why she did. It took me a long while to come to terms with the fact that a lot of people in my family’s social sphere would never approve of my career in rugby, even though it was completely legitimate and I made an excellent salary. Her situation is admittedly different.

The one thing I’m still having difficulty getting past with this entire situation, is that I assumed I’d earned enough of her trust that she’d be honest with me, and I worry that she’s still going to feel compelled to withhold things.

Unfortunately, that conversation isn’t going to happen right now because I’m sitting in my office, waiting for my father to call me into a meeting. I received the call at eight this morning, which is a time I’m usually up, but Ruby and I were pretty busy last night, and it was late by the time I was done fucking all the orgasms out of her sweet, hot pussy. Also, it’s a Saturday. So being called into work is a bit of a piss off. Being made to wait is even more infuriating. The office phone rings, so I hit speaker, assuming it’s my father, finally calling me into the emergency meeting. It’s not. It’s my mother.

“Hello, Bancroft, how are you this morning?” Phone conversations with my mother are fairly formal for whatever reason. She’s a good person, but sometimes she gets far too caught up in the gossip that circulates in her friend pool. Most discussions include the latest scandal.

“I’m fine. Waiting for my father to call me into this emergency meeting.”

“Ah. Yes. He shouldn’t be long now. He just left the house.”

“He just left? He called me two hours ago telling me I needed to be at the office immediately.”

“Yes. Well, he was . . . distracted. He’s on his way now.”

I cringe. Distracted has meanings I don’t want to think too much about.

“Is that why you called? To tell me he’s running late.”

“Oh! No. I wanted to make sure you’re still able to come for dinner next weekend.”

“Of course. It’s already marked on the calendar. Do you need me to bring anything?”

“It’s being catered.”

“Okay.” Of course it’s being catered. My mom doesn’t spend much time in the kitchen unless she’s pouring a glass of wine. We always had a chef growing up. And a nanny or two made it possible for her to go to her fundraising meetings while me and my brothers went to our various lessons. Mine were always of the sports variety.

“We’re having a few friends join us, so it won’t just be family.”

“Oh.” I tap on the desk with my pen. I wonder who my mother is inviting, and why. “Is it possible for me to bring a date, then?” It’s on a weekend, so it’s unlikely that Ruby will even be able to attend since she works, so I’m not sure why I’m asking.

There’s silence on the other end of the line for a few seconds.

“Mimi?” I didn’t grow up calling her mom, although that’s how I refer to her when I’m not in her presence.

“It would be best if you didn’t.”

“Won’t Griffin be bringing Imogen?”

“Well, of course, she’s his girlfriend.”

“So why can’t I bring a date?”

“The Thorton’s are coming.”

I thought I’d managed to evade Brittany and the second date. “Mom.”

She makes a disapproving tsking sound.

“I thought we already talked about this,” I remind her.

“You were ill last time. Brittany is a lovely girl.”

Brittany is pampered and a pain in the ass. I’ve been avoiding her calls since I went out with her all those weeks ago.

“I’m seeing someone.” I might as well be upfront about it, maybe it will help allow me to evade more Brittany interactions.

“Since when?”

“It’s recent.”

“So it’s not serious then? Bringing her to dinner would make it awkward for Brittany, and I arranged this before you were seeing someone. I can’t really change the plans now. And your father has business with her father,” she’s imploring now.

Of course there’s business involved. My father can’t do it any other way. I wish I didn’t feel the need to cave for my mother, but it’s not as though Ruby will be able to join me anyway. “Fine. I’ll do this for you, but it’s the last time.”

“That’s all I ask.”

It’s a dinner, with family and a few friends, so it’s not even technically a date. It’s still frustrating.

Another call interrupts the one with my mother. I’m hopeful it’s my father. I’d like to get this meeting over with so I can get home to Ruby before she has to work tonight.

“I have to go, I have another call.”

“Okay. Thank you for making this easy for me. Have a good day. We’ll chat soon, Banny.”

“Bye, Mom.” I hang up before I can get angry with her. She knows how much I hate being called Banny.

It’s my father’s personal assistant, alerting me that the meeting will begin in five minutes in the conference room. Only two hours and twenty minutes later than I anticipated. I could’ve been in bed with Ruby this entire time.

I gather my things and head down the hall. My father is already sitting at the head of the table. His assistant sets down a coffee and several folders.

“So. What’s the emergency?” I ask as I slide into a chair beside Griffin.

“One of the London properties has an issue.”

I’m suddenly uneasy. “One of the ones I was working on?”

He shakes his head and I breathe a sigh of relief. My father hates errors.

“Lex was managing it.”

That’s a surprise. I had no idea he was managing anything outside of the four hotels we’d been asked to oversee while we were there.

“Which hotel?”

“The Concord.”

We’d stopped in there briefly, so I could get acquainted with the building and the managerial staff while we were in the area. It’s a well-established hotel, up to date, not in need of any real work as far as I knew. “What’s the problem? I didn’t think we were working on that hotel.”

“We weren’t supposed to until next year. It looks like some corners were cut regarding permits.”

That’s not good. I have to wonder if this was what he was taking care of when he went back to London ahead of me. Lex slips into the boardroom, looking rough.

He drops into the chair beside our father. “Sorry I’m late. What’d I miss?”

My father flips open the file folder and pushes it toward him. “Why don’t you have a look for yourself.”

Lex’s smile drops and he blanches.

Three hours later I’m still sitting in the meeting. The first hour was my dad chewing out Lex. There was nothing I could do to help him, since I didn’t know he was working on the project in the first place. The past two hours have been taken up with reviewing the original plans for the minor renovations to the ballroom and the indoor pool at The Concord, which weren’t scheduled for another full year. Securing permits for this kind of upgrade shouldn’t have been difficult.

The indoor pool is where the problem seems to be. I’m barely listening at this point. It’s already early afternoon. I don’t dare send any messages or my father will likely shit a brick. He’s in a foul mood. I’d really like some time to talk to Ruby. If I don’t get out of here before two, I’m not going to have enough time to get home before she leaves for work.

“Isn’t that right, Bancroft?”

I look up from the paper I’ve been scribbling on. I’ve managed to draw a circle. With another circle inside it. And another inside that one. It looks remarkably like a breast.

“I’m sorry. Pardon?”

My father looks annoyed. It’s not good. I don’t want to piss him off more than he already is.

“You’ll oversee the acquisition of the new permits.”

“I don’t have the background on this project.”

He taps his pen on the desk three times in succession, then flips it into his palm. It’s one of his little quirks. When he’s angry or frustrated it comes out through small, controlled body movements. That was definitely the wrong thing to say. “You have the basics from this meeting. I’ll send Griffin along with you.”

Griffin and I glance at each other. It seems to be as much of a surprise to him as it is to me.

“I can fix this,” Lexington says. “I’ll go on my own.”

Our father turns his angry gaze on Lex. “You’ll do nothing of the sort. You’ll be here, in the office, reviewing permit code for as long as it takes to get this sorted out.”

Lex’s mouth flattens into a straight line, but he keeps his mouth shut. None of us dare say anything to contradict our father. At least not here, where there are so many people to witness it.

“You’ll leave this evening.”

“Today?” Griffin and I ask at the same time.

My father gives us the same hard look we used to get as kids when we’d gotten caught doing something we shouldn’t. “This needs to be sorted out immediately and we can’t do it remotely. We need the investors to feel confident that we have the situation under control.”

“How long are we going to be there?”

“For as long as it takes to iron things out. If you’re quick, you could be back by the end of the week.”

I grit my teeth. I don’t want to go away again. I want to be in my condo with my pets. And Ruby. We need to have a conversation. A real one. A serious one. Unfortunately, it looks like that’s still on hold.