I didn’t really notice the redhead sitting at the back of the room until I followed Phyllis to the front and turned around to face the group. Phyllis’ juices were still damp on my cock. I could taste her on the tip of my tongue. All of which made it a little difficult to concentrate until I saw the young redhead staring at me.

When Phyllis pulled up her skirt to reveal that she wasn’t wearing panties, my cock immediately went rock hard, like a switch had been thrown in my brain that had a direct line to my crotch. I quickly locked the door and had my pants down around my ankles by the time I made it back across the room. Phyllis had pulled the skirt up to her waist and was sitting on the edge of the desk with her legs spread, her pink pussy exposed, moist and ready for me.

She wrapped her fingers around my stiff cock when I moved to stand between her legs, tugging on it slowly, back and forth, milking the long shaft as she cooed in my ear.

My tongue found hers and we pressed our lips together as she pulled me into her. She swizzled the head of my cock around her wet folds for a moment, then put her hands around me, clutching my ass to pull me closer, sliding my cock into her tight hole.

The air rushed from her lungs as I thrust into her. She bit her lip and quietly moaned my name.

It didn’t take long for both of us to cum. I rocked my hips back and forth, pummeling my cock into her tight pussy as she dug her fingernails into my ass to set the pace. She let go of my ass, then leaned back on the desk and slid her hands inside her silk blouse to play with her nipples and massage her breasts.

I held onto her hips and closed my eyes. Fucking Phyllis was like stepping into a time machine. In my mind, I was transported back in time, back to that dingy restroom in that dive bar, fucking the young redhead I’d met just an hour before, thinking that I couldn’t wait to get her back to my little apartment where I could fuck her some more.

Our sex back then was of the marathon variety. We’d spend hours on foreplay before consummating the act, then catch our breath and do it all over again. We would go for hours, seeing who was going to break first. Now, we had nothing to prove, nor were we trying to impress one another with our techniques and tricks.

Now we were just fucking for release and old-time’s sake. Some of the passion was gone, much of the energy, but the end result was still the same: pure sexual satisfaction. Phyllis and I disappointed each other in many ways, but we had never disappointed one another when it came to sex. Never.

I came hard inside her. She grabbed my ass as she came and rubbed her pussy against me, my cum and her juices mixing and oozing from inside her, lathering my cock and balls and the desk beneath her ass. The tangy aroma of our sex filled the air between us. It was a smell that made me sigh.

Phyllis moaned loudly when she came. If we had been somewhere private, anywhere but my office, she would have been screaming and thrashing about. Phyllis was a hard cummer. When she orgasmed she let everyone know it, like a train blowing its whistle as it arrived at the station.

I stifled her moans with my mouth on hers. In less than a minute it was over. We stood there for a moment, holding each other as my cock slipped from inside her and her pussy sluiced our juices on the desk.

Then, without a word, Phyllis pushed me away and slid off the desk to hurry into my private bathroom. The moment was over as quickly as it came. As I watched her go, walking with her thighs squeezed together to keep from dripping on the floor, I wondered if I’d ever see the old Phyllis again. Every time she allowed me to get close to her like this I knew it could be the last time we ever made love. The thought made me sad, not just for myself, but for her, as well. In my heart, I wanted her to be happy, but I knew I was not the man who could make that happen for her, for whatever reason. I had always been available for her and always would be, at least until the day I was not. Then, sadly, Phyllis would have to move on without me as her sexual safety net. I would always be her friend, but there would come a point when I could no longer be her lover. Even Sam Collins will have to settle down someday.

I cleaned myself off as best I could with a wad of tissue, then was putting myself back together when the intercom on my desk buzzed.

“Um, Sam, it’s time for you and Miss Goode to address the new associates.”

I could tell by Janice’s voice she knew what Phyllis and I had been doing in my office. We’d done it there many times over the years with her being right outside the door. Janice always seemed to know when we were finished. Maybe we made more noise than I thought.

I pressed the intercom button and tried to sound formal. “Thanks, Janice, we’ll be right out.”

* * *

When I first noticed the redhead sitting at the table I thought I was hallucinating. I thought that my mind was still stuck in the time warp, back to the night when I first met Phyllis. Even though I had just had sex my cock twitched and started to plump. I put my hands in my pockets to keep anyone from noticing.

She looked just like Phyllis had twenty years ago. Tall, thin, a naturally pretty face and long red hair that she had pulled back into a tight bun. I imagined her tugging the bun free to let the hair cascade down around her shoulders (in slow motion, of course) as she straddled me, moving her hips back and forth over my cock.

She had fair Irish skin and little freckles across her nose that she didn’t try to hide with makeup. Her lips were full and pink. Her eyes blue like the morning sky. I caught myself staring at her. When our eyes met, she smiled. I swallowed the lump that had lodged in my throat and managed to smile back.

I tore my eyes away from her and did my best to focus as Phyllis addressed the group. I wondered if she had spotted the redhead and saw the same similarities that I had. Phyllis usually disdained young, attractive women in the firm, even though she had once been one herself. Barry said it was just petty jealousy, like the evil queen in Snow White who would kill to keep the title of fairest in the land. He said Phyllis had a mean girl complex, whatever that meant. If it was up to her, she’d be the only woman in the firm. It was a point I could not argue.

When it came my time to speak, I muddled through the same bullshit “we’ll make you great lawyers if you listen” speech that I gave every year. Only this year, I added something at the end, a twist, something I didn’t even know I was saying until the words were dribbling from my lips.

I looked at the redhead and spoke specifically to her. “If you let me teach you, I promise I can make you great.”

She frowned for a second, then blinked a few times, as if the words were bouncing around inside her head, trying to shake loose the hidden meaning.

Fuck, I didn’t really know what the words meant.

I just knew what they inferred.

I wondered if she did.

* * *

“What the fuck was that all about?” Phyllis asked when we were back in my office a few minutes later. She didn’t say a word as we left the conference room and walked down the hall past the flurry of lawyers and clerks, past Janice’s rolling eyes, but she pounced the moment we were back in my office with the door closed.

I gave her a confused look. “What are you talking about?”

“You know exactly what I’m talking about,” she said, standing with her hands on her hips as she watched me pour us both a cup of fresh coffee from the pot I kept going in my office. I added two packets of sweetener and a little hazelnut creamer to hers and gave it a stir. I held the cup out to her, but her hands didn’t leave her hips. I set her cup on the desk and slid into my chair, wishing I could just blink and make her go away.

She sat down across the desk from me and folded her arms over her chest. She gave me the stern look my mother used to give when she knew I was about to lie about something she’d caught me doing red-handed. Even as a little kid I would argue with her for hours, denying I’d done anything wrong, making up excuses for my actions, trying to instill a smidgen of reasonable doubt in her mind. That was probably why I ended up being a lawyer. I had hours and hours of arguments under my belt by the time I was ten years old. I never won a case against my mother, but it was wonderful practice.

Phyllis arched her eyebrows and pursed her lips. “Well?”

“Well what, Phyl?” I asked, hiding behind the cup.

She mocked me perfectly, “If you let me teach you, I promise I can make you great.” She shook her head as if she was trying to get the words out of her ears. “Seriously, Sam? Where the fuck did that come from? Could you have been anymore blatant?”

“Blatant about what?” I tried to look innocent, but it was hard for me. “I was trying to pump them up. Seriously. What did I do?”

“You were trying to pump someone up all right,” she said in a disgusted tone. “Let me guess, the blonde with the big tits caught your eye with her ‘I’m sure I’ll specialize in divorce’ line of crap. Jesus Christ, Sam, is this how we’re recruiting associates now, based on cup size and willingness to suck your cock?” She jabbed a thumb over her shoulder. “Should I have Janice clear your calendar for the afternoon or will a quickie suffice?”

“I didn’t recruit her, goddammit,” I said weakly. “Barry did.”

“Well then you’d better keep your cock out of her until that fat fuck gets his.” She threw her hands in the air and swore at the ceiling. “God, I can’t believe we’re even having this conversation.”

“Neither can I,” I said, matching her tone. “Now, can I go to work, please? I have client meetings all afternoon that I have to prepare for.”

“The only time you want to go to work is when I have you backed into a corner,” she said, eyeing me for a moment. “If it wasn’t the slutty blonde…”

I wiped coffee from my lips with my fingertips and rolled my eyes. I couldn’t win an argument with Phyllis any better than I could with my mother. I asked, “Did you see the redhead sitting at the right side of the table?”

I knew by the look on her face that she had seen the redhead. Hell, she couldn’t have missed her. It had to be like looking in a mirror and seeing her younger self. I wondered if that was a good thing or a bad thing for her. We had just had sex not because I was utterly irresistible, but because she was feeling old and needed to feel desirable. Now here’s this girl that could be her daughter, or at least her younger sister, sitting there staring back at her.

Now I’m a guy. Seeing my younger doppelganger would have just been a laugh for me, but I had the feeling it was different for Phyllis and probably most women. This girl reminded her of her younger days, the days she missed and mourned. I just hoped Phyllis didn’t go off the deep end and treat the girl unfairly simply because they resembled one another. Or because I had fucked up and said something stupid in the orientation.

“Yes, I saw her,” she said, lifting her chin to look down her nose at me. “What about her.”

I shrugged noncommittally. “Oh, nothing. I just thought she resembled you, that’s all.”

“You mean resembled me from twenty years ago.” She huffed out the words. I sighed inside. I regretted bringing it up. The old Phyllis had crawled back inside her shell and the crack had been sealed shut.

“That’s not what I meant,” I said, even though it was exactly what I meant. I set the coffee cup aside and fell back in the chair to rub my eyes. When Phyllis was in a mood it was exhausting trying to deal with her. I could feel a headache starting to punch the back of my eyeballs.

“Bullshit,” she snapped. “I know you better than that.”

I held out my hands, pleading with her. “Phyllis, for the love of god, I just thought she looked like you. It was the red hair. Let’s not go off the fucking deep end with this.”

“I know what you’re thinking,” she said, narrowing her eyes at me.

“What am I thinking?” I immediately regretted the question.

“You’re thinking that maybe you should take this girl under your wing and personally teach her a thing or two about being a great lawyer. And along the way maybe you could teach her a thing or two about sucking your cock and bending over double so you can fuck her from behind while she plays with your balls.”

“Jesus, Phyl,” I said. “Where the hell is this coming from?”

“Maybe she can be the girlfriend to you that I could never be,” she said, anger building in her voice. “Maybe she will be willing to throw her future away and stay home to have your babies.”

“That’s enough,” I snapped. “I never asked you to be my girlfriend or have my babies, for Christ sake. I never asked you to give up your career for me. Hell, I never asked you to do a goddamn thing for me except be my partner.”

She twisted her lips into an angry pout and stared into my eyes. “Maybe you should have asked me, Sam,” she said quietly. “Have you ever thought of that?”

I leaned over the desk and stared back at her. “You would have told me to fuck off,” I said, hands in the air like I was waving down a taxi. “Fuck you, Sam! I’m an independent woman. I don’t need you or any man to make me happy!”

I did a pretty lousy impression of her, but she’d said those exact words to me enough times that I could recite them back at her verbatim. I brought my hands down to the desk and balled them into fists. “Tell me that isn’t true.”

Her shoulders twitched slightly and she looked away. “Whatever.”

“So why bust my balls about something that never was?”

She shrugged again, this time holding her shoulders up for a couple of seconds before letting them fall. “I don’t know. Forget it. I’m just having a very weird day.”

Thankfully, the intercom on the desk buzzed. Janice said, “Sam, the luncheon for the new associates is starting in the dining room. If you’re finished, that is.”

“What does that mean?” Phyllis asked, frowning at the intercom as if it were really Janice, whom Phyllis couldn’t stand (younger, attractive, etcetera).

“Finished talking,” I said, pushing out of the chair and coming around the desk with my hand out. “Come on, partner. Let’s go press the flesh.”

“We’ve already done that,” she said, taking my hand and letting me tug her out of the chair. She put her hand on my chest and gave it a little pat. “Remember your promise, Sam. Don’t do anything to embarrass this firm. That includes getting involved with a certain redheaded associate. And warn that fat fuck Barry not to hit on the blonde in public.”

“Don’t you worry,” I said, holding out my hand toward the door. “We will never embarrass you again.”

We both knew it was a hollow promise, but we shook hands anyway and I followed her out the door. I watched her red ponytail bounce and thought of the new girl waiting in the dining room just down the hall. By the afternoon, her first assignment would be in CBG’s divorce law division, rotating under me, no pun intended.