The next morning I had one task on my mind. I couldn’t resolve my feelings for Tatiana quickly, but I could definitely use some creative math to hide the fact we’d gone over budget at Barneys.

I didn’t have the heart to tell Tatiana to return her overpriced dressing gown, and even if she would agree to, there was the small matter of the come stain on it. I knew Tatiana got the VIP treatment at Barneys, but I didn’t think they’d be that accommodating, even for a Montalla.

I couldn’t let Sergio know we'd gone over budget. For one thing, I didn’t want him on Tatiana’s case. More importantly, I wanted Sergio to trust me; trust me with his finances and also with his daughter. If he knew that I’d allowed Tatiana to spend so much, he may have the inkling that something was up between the two of us. And that couldn’t happen.

Quickly making a pot of coffee for Tatiana to wake up to, I snatched my keys, jumped into my car, and drove to the office. If she needed anything, she'd text me. Part of me expected her to get dressed and scramble home the second she remembered where she was.

Or would she be waiting for me when I got back?

Half-dressed, newly ruined pussy waiting for another round, and we—no. I had to fix one mess first before I got caught up in another.

Walking into my office was the favorite part of my day. As soon as I saw my neatly organized desk, everything in its place where I’d left it the day before, I was flooded with a familiar peaceful feeling. I was good at what I did. That gave me confidence, which I needed right now.

I opened my laptop and pulled up Sergio’s account. With a few clicks of the mouse, I retrieved the Amex statement. Tatiana’s card was under the same account as her father’s. I scanned the recent charges. For all of Sergio’s talk about tightening his purse strings, it was clear he was full of hot air. The Barneys purchase didn’t stand out in the list of charges. In fact, there was a recent charge from Brooks Brothers that exceeded Tatiana’s. The old man was obsessed with luxury goods. The gold encrusted apple didn’t fall far from the tree.

As long as Sergio doesn't directly ask me about the shopping trip, he won't notice the overspending. Fuck, had I been so worried over nothing? No, she really did waste too much money. Normally that would strike me as terrible. Somehow, when I remembered Tatiana wearing that gown, her breasts displayed for me... it was a struggle to get mad.

Comforted that, for now, both I and Tatiana were off the hook, I decided to do some real work. It was the only way to soothe my guilt towards Sergio. I cracked open the files that Marcus had left on my desk. It had taken him days to get me these, and I’d been frustrated with the delay. Sergio was giving me more responsibly, and today, I was going to familiarize myself with the Montalla Shipping Division, his flagship company.

Sergio’s corporation had started with a single truck. He told the story frequently and with pride. In his youth he was a truck driver, making the same route every week, delivering heavy machinery throughout the state. But when Tatiana was just three years old, tragedy struck when her mother died from a sudden heart attack.

He knew he couldn’t continue driving as a single father, so he used the insurance money from his wife’s policy and bought his own, then paid for a driver. Through persistence and hard work, he undercut the competition and earned trust, securing a few lucrative long haul routes and building his business steadily with a team of drivers.

His determination to provide for Tatiana urged him on. She may not have had her mother anymore, but he would give her the world. Smart financial advisers, instinct and luck had made him one of the wealthiest men in the state in just fifteen years.

I started reviewing the last few quarterly reports, feeling calm as the numbers floated pleasantly in front of my eyes. Everything seemed in order, but I always liked to look at data from several perspectives, so I opened my laptop to graph the expenses and profits to see if I could find any room for improvement. I was in my zone. X axis. Y axis. Inputting numbers and watching them come to life on my computer screen. After yesterday’s storm of unpredictable emotions and events, this activity calmed me. I found myself humming, thoroughly enjoying my work.

But then I saw something that bothered me. Little kinks every few months in the expense curve. Had I inputted the numbers incorrectly? My skin started itching unpleasantly looking at the anomalies and not understanding where I’d made a mistake. The numbers weren’t making sense.

I scrapped my model and started again, paying closer attention to my work. After the fourth rendering of the graph, each one displaying the same discrepancy, I was certain I hadn’t made an error.

I took the elevator upstarts to the filing room. It was an enormous labyrinth of cabinets, lit by overhead fluorescent lights. I was surprised when I first joined the company that so much of Sergio’s records were exclusively on paper. I’d taken to the habit of digitizing every record I worked with as I went along, and it irked me that the rest of the employees weren’t doing the same. The system was senseless and outdated.

It took me half an hour to find the cabinets marked Montalla Shipping Div., and another half an hour to pull all the records I’d need to make sense of the numbers I’d read downstairs. I loaded them into a box and went back to my office, eager to lose this gut feeling of paranoia.

I worked straight until the setting sun was streaming through my office windows, casting an orange glow across the piles of papers in front of me. It took three more trips up to the filing room, but I’d finally gotten to the bottom of this puzzle.

Montalla Shipping Division was siphoning money.

To where, by whom, I couldn’t be sure, but I had discovered deep in the records a dummy vendor who was being paid monthly for services or goods that were nonexistent. I’d discovered the same fraud in two other Montalla companies, the frozen food division and the Chinese import division. Each of the dummy vendors' names was almost identical to a real vendors' name, so it made sense the deceit could go undetected.

I knew Sergio’s early business bordered on the unsavory, that was a given in the trucking industry, especially when you’re first starting out, but nothing about him suggested to me that he was a dishonest businessman. I knew he paid his taxes. In fact, he hired a new CPA at my advice because I felt his other one was taking too many deductions that could raise red flags.

I’d never heard from any vendors or contractors that they weren’t paid on time or that they hadn’t been treated with the utmost professional respect. Everything I knew about him as a businessman didn’t jive with this fraud.

His personal life... well that was a different story.

He was an extravagant man, I knew that, obsessed with his wealth and maintaining it. His daughter’s future meant everything to him. The fear of leaving her without any parent plagued him, and made him plan meticulously for her financial future.

But it also wasn’t a well-guarded secret that Sergio had women. There were a string of hotel charges on that AmEx account that didn’t come as a surprise to me. He’d never publicly stepped out with someone on his arm since Tatiana’s mother died, but he wasn’t a monk.

I was getting that buzzy feeling again—my clothes seemed too tight. I needed more information but I didn’t know where to turn. I wouldn’t confront Sergio with my suspicions, I didn’t have enough information to be confident he was involved. I had to play this carefully, collect more data before I came to a conclusion. But how? As I was rubbing the bridge of my nose and surveying the mess of files I’d need to return upstairs, my phone buzzed. Tatiana. Maybe that was my answer.

Picking up, I put the device to my ear. It was icy cold on my hot skin. “Hey, Tatiana. I was just thinking about you.”

“Convenient. Thanks for the coffee this morning.”

I glanced at the time. Fuck, was it that late already? “It was the least I could offer. I'm no five star hotel.” Hotels. Ugh. Now I was back to thinking about Sergio's shady activities.

Tatiana chuckled sweetly. Her voice was so soothing, I needed to drink it up in big gulps. “Speaking of, I haven't eaten yet. There's a great Greek restaurant in the Hilton near your place,” she purred. Was she still at my apartment? “Meet me, Rolland? We can talk and relax a bit.”

“I'll be there in ten,” I said.

I wasn't going to be able to relax.

But I did need to talk.

****

I was waiting outside the restaurant when Tatiana walked up. I guess my mind had been so occupied thinking about Sergio’s business dealing, that I’d forgotten the effect Tatiana had on me. Instantly my senses were flooded. I remembered every noise, every movement, every inch of her skin that I’d licked and explored in my bed the other day.

She stood in front of me in a yellow jumpsuit, but she may as well have been naked. I was momentarily paralyzed with the memories, and caught between two worlds: wanting information about her father and wanting to skip dinner all together and feast on her.

“Rolland?” Tatiana asked with a bewildered grin. “Should we go in?”

“Yeah, sure,” I stuttered, coming back to myself. “Right this way.”

I opened the door for her and we headed inside.

The hostess took one look at Tatiana, then sat us in a corner booth by the fireplace. “The most romantic seat of the house!” she announced. After we ordered drinks, we fell into an awkward silence. I was searching my mind for an icebreaker, anything to say, when Tatiana spoke first. “Do you make coffee for every girl you take home?”

I furrowed my eyebrows. “Just my boss's daughter.”

“Your boss’s daughter? Really, Rolland?”

“What do you mean? You are my boss’s daughter.”

“Well I don’t look at you and think my father’s employee,” she said. Then she leaned closer and whispered, “I look at you and think you’re the man that left this mark on my shoulder when you came all over my hand the other day.”

Her smile was sly and seductive. Sure enough, just to the side of her yellow jumpsuit’s strap, was a quarter sized purple bruise from where I’d latched on when my orgasm overwhelmed me. The memory had me shifting in my seat.

“I liked that, by the way,” she continued. “That's why I called you tonight. To tell you I had fun, and... to thank you. I’ll never forget it, Rolland. In fact, I haven’t stopped thinking about it.”

Her hand rested on my kneecap, her skin was glowing from the firelight. This was a romantic booth. When the hostess brought our drinks and I watched Tatiana take a sip of wine, it occurred to me like a bolt of lightening–Tatiana and I were on a date! How could I have been so obtuse?

Tatiana, now that I looked at her closely, was dressed for a night out. Thin hoop earrings, her hair was freshly blown out, not a strand out of place, and that jumpsuit she was wearing, with those sexy heels, that was an outfit that she planned carefully.

My suspicions about Sergio were just another chaotic addition to an already messy situation. My feelings for Tatiana couldn’t be resolved easily; not until I figured out what the hell was gong on with the Montalla’s finances. So despite her hand on my knee and the way her cleavage peeked out the top of her jumpsuit, I was going to tackle problem number one head on.

“Do you think your father is capable of breaking the law, Tatiana?” I asked flatly.

“What?” she said, her mouth hanging open. Her hand stopped stroking my knee and I instantly missed it.

“I’ve noticed some irregularities in the books, and I’m trying to make sense of it all. Obviously I don’t want to accuse your father of anything without knowing all the facts, so I thought I’d run it by you. I mean, I feel like we have a connection. We can talk like this, right?”

She was looking at me like I was a stranger.

“I’m such an idiot,” she said.

“You're not,” I assured her.

“Were you getting close to me to try and get at my father?”

“No, god, no! I just need you to clear up a few things for me. Like when your dad first started the Chinese Import division of–”

“Stop!” she said, loudly enough that some guests looked over. She raised her hand in front of me. Her cheeks were turning red, but not the way they turned red when we'd been in my bed. “I don't know anything about my father’s business dealings. In case you hadn’t noticed, I don’t work there and I don’t have an interest in his companies at all. But Rolland,” she said, seeming to calm down a bit, “if my father were guilty of some crime, and I can’t even begin to imagine what you suspect him of, why would I rat him out to you? He’s my father.”

“The law is the law, Tatiana. If your father is–” I lowered my voice to a whisper, “hiding money, my ass could be on the line. And it’s wrong. Tell me if you think it’s impossible. I could do some more digging, maybe expose that someone he trusts has defrauded him. I need to know.”

A single tear trailed down her cheek. It stunned me to see it appear. Holy hell, was I being that terrible? I reached out to take her hand, hoping she was upset by the revelation that her father could be a crook, and not angry at me. As soon as my hand touched hers she jumped back, sliding quickly out of the booth and heading for the door. What was happening?

I threw a twenty on the table to cover the drinks, then followed Tatiana down the block to the parking lot. I found her by her car, digging through her purse, searching for her keys.

“Tatiana, don’t run away like this. Let’s go back,” I suggested, touching her cool shoulder and gently turning her to me.

“Back off, Rolland,” she shouted, jabbing a finger so close to my face I felt the air fly past my nose. “I’m a person, not some spreadsheet filled with numbers and statistics that you can play with and figure out to your satisfaction. You can’t fuck me one day and then use me to nail my father the next. And you certainly can’t accuse my father of being a criminal over cocktails and then think we can exchange our life stories over appetizers. Really, how can someone as smart as you be so fucking stupid?” She practically spit those last words in my face. She was seething.

Tatiana opened the car door and slid behind the wheel. As she was twisting the key in the ignition, she paused, giving me a feeling of hope. Maybe she'd had a change of heart? “My father’s not guilty of anything, Rolland. You’re on the wrong track. He worked hard to build his company, pushed by grief for my mother and love for me. Now get your hand off my car and forget you even know me.” She slammed the door closed, almost taking my hand off in the process, then she reversed the car and sped down the street, leaving me in the parking lot.

I’d royally screwed this up, that I knew. But where did I go wrong? I never thought Tatiana would be so defensive about her father. All indications had been that she loathed the guy. All I’d heard from her was resentment, and watching her shopping the other day, it was obvious every one of those purchases was a giant “fuck you” to the man.

There had to be a bigger picture that I was missing, and I hated missing anything. Maybe Tatiana was right, maybe I looked at the world too simplistically, expecting everything to add up, everything to be either black or white.

Did I retreat to my orderly columns of numbers and data because I was incapable of handling feelings? How was it possible that one minute I was ogling the hickey I’d left on Tatiana’s shoulder, getting turned on from her hand on my knee, and the very next minute I'd decided interrogating her about her father’s business was better than enjoying her presence over drinks?

It didn’t feel wrong in that moment, but looking back, I realized I’d made a big mistake.

I wouldn’t be able to rest until I'd worked this out. I needed to make this right; not for my career, but to protect any chance I had of being close to Tatiana again.

There was only one person who could help me.