Maliciously Obedient Part 9

Looking at Mike uncertainly but played along, not sure what the real game was here, Joe laughed and said, "Don't worry about it, Diane." And then he looked at Mike. "We'll figure it out later." Fake wink.

Mike didn't need to win this one. Let Diane have her petty victory. Losing was better than winning sometimes, he'd learned a and this was one of those moments.

He nodded, turned around, and by the time he texted Dom and made it outside into the smog-filled street, he felt the weight of the ballroom's abyss crammed with unending, unyielding, soul sucking ent.i.ties peel off, disappear, fade away, and leave him breathless.

Until he turned around for one last look at Lydia.

And found her in conversation with Jeremy.

"h.e.l.lo, there," a voice said, his openness and jocularity a stark contrast from the tight-jawed people Lydia had encountered thus far. Looking up from her papers, she felt a rush of surrealism, as it appeared her brother Miles stood before her.

He didn't a it's just that she didn't see too many six-and-a-half-foot tall men roaming around Boston dressed like something out of a bad 80s movie.

"welcome," she answered. "Would you like an auction number?" He looked like one of the band. No a scratch that. The band wore double-breasted tuxedos.

He wore the kind of tux her dad had worn in high school, in his prom pictures. And the pants were something from Old Navy, topped off with loafers. She took a flying guess and a.s.sumed he wasn't a ball guest, but she treated him as if a just in case.

"Jeremy!" Callie said, coming around to give him a big hug. "You never comes to these things!" Her face wore an expression of deep curiosity. "Why are you here, you natty dresser?"

His coloring was close to Miles', with the dark hair and brown eyes, but this guy was so relaxed. Slothlike. He cared not one whit what anyone here thought, and it dawned on her that his outfit was a form of fashion protest. Not nerd-dom. Intrigued, she watched his conversation with Callie.

"I'm here to get the corporate jet for five hours and fly 200 chickens to Zimbabwe for little chicken ma.s.sages and maybe a nice safari. Is that worth $55,000 or what?"

"You won't do that. You're too chickens.h.i.t."

A rumbling of deep laughter from him filled the marbled, arched-ceiling hall, turning heads and garnering disapproving looks. Callie winced and raised her shoulders, shushing him. He just rolled his eyes, but complied.

Then focused on Lydia.

"Jeremy Forster," he said, extending his hand and introducing himself. "And you are?"

"Lydia Charles," she replied, careful to grasp his hand with equal fullness and pressure. Thankfully, he gave her a complete handshake, and not the limp-wristed, half-shake some men gave her, squeezing three fingers as if she were too delicate to touch palms.

"You having fun?" he asked. Before she could answer he added, "Gorgeous dress. It really shows off your skin tone."

"Uh, thanks." This one set all her sensors off, but she couldn't figure out which sensors. Weird? Adorable? Hot? Perverted? Genuine? Exuding some sort of mish-mosh of signals, Jeremy wasn't easy to read.

Craning around him, she struggled to catch another look at Michael Bournham, but he was gone. Her shoulders slumped in disappointment.

"I'm that bad?" He leaned in, face softening, brown eyes fringed with impossibly-long lashes. He had a rumpled look that reminded her of David Duchovny in Californication, of some of the intensely funky s.e.x scenes where he was just so d.a.m.n appealingly real. Game for anything.

No holds barred.

"You're good," she grinned. "Just lost sight of someone."

He studied her face. Really studied it, not worried about too much time pa.s.sing, prolonged eye contact, or making her uncomfortable. Which he was.

Finally, he said, "Michael Bournham, right? You want to meet him?"

"I've met him," she answered, cool and composed, hiding the heart that tried to salsa dance in her chest. "I work for him."

"You do? Are you his personal a.s.sistant?"

No, just his dominatrix in my fantasies, she thought. Her face rushed to warmth at the thought, and Jeremy's eyes traveled down, taking in her chest, her dress, then returned to home base at her face.

"No. Just an admin." Learning to say that without gritting her teeth was a victory.

"I'm sure you're not just anything, Lydia, in Michael Bournham's world," he responded, starting to walk toward the exit. With a little wave, he rounded the threshold.

Out of sight.

"What was that about?" Krysta asked, returning from a missing pen crisis, new box in hand.

"I do not know," Lydia answered honestly. As a new attendee approached the table, she returned her attention to the task at hand.

"Jeremy donates $50,000 every year," Callie whispered to them both.

Jaw on the floor, Lydia gasped. "And he dresses like that?"

"Never judge a book by the cover. Even if it's Fifty Shades," she hissed, nudging Lydia, who groaned as Krysta and her sister snickered.

"Jeremy, what the h.e.l.l are you doing here?" Just as Mike was about to step outside to get into the car he saw his friend wearing a comical version of a tuxedo with a powder blue jacket, a ruffle that looked like something out of a bad Awkward Family Photos entry. And was he wearing cargo pants ? With scuffed Merrills? He knew that Jeremy's net worth had to be in the couple of millions, so this was not about a lack of money.

This was Jeremy.

"Picking up a hot rich chick," Jeremy said, nodding. "So far, all I see are Botox Barbies."

"It doesn't work that way, dude. The hot chicks come here to pick up the ugly rich dudes."

"Oh. So who bagged you?"

Mike paused, a bit perplexed and not sure how to explain it. Instead, he let frustration seep into him. "It's complicated."

"It's always complicated, Mike."

"This isn't about me. Why are you here? And," he cringed, taking in Jeremy's outfit, "why do you look like Tim Gunn's worst nightmare?"

"I am here because I think the cause of autism and research is important," Jeremy said in a loud voice meant to carry. Mike stared at him, hard. He didn't doubt that; he knew that Jeremy had a nephew with autism. In fact, Jeremy had been the one to get him involved in this particular non-profit organization, but he had always been an anonymous donor behind the scenes.

Finally, it hit him. "You thought I might bring Lydia here and you wanted a chance to see her."

"Maybe."

"If you wanted to meet her, why don't you just swing by the office?"

"I can't do that, Mike, because you're not Mike at the office."

"s.h.i.t." Which was precisely why he hadn't approached her tonight. "So, you came all the way here looking like Weird Al Yankovic playing a homeless dude just so you could catch a look at Lydia?"

"I didn't have anything better to do."

"You never have anything better to do, Jeremy."

"Life of the idle rich."

"Must be nice," Mike sighed.

"It is nice, Mike, and you can do it too." Jeremy thumbed his fist at the doorway. "And that Lydia is one fine lady in red."

"No, I can't." He frowned. "And if you're thinking what I think about Lydia, I don't think she's...you know." How she spoke so freely about MFM and menage ran through his head at rapid-fire pace. Tuck the thought away for later, he told himself.

"Yes, you can."

This was a well-worn argument between the two and Mike was having none of it. "Fine. I can, meaning I am able to, but I categorically reject the premise."

"Why?" Jeremy had made it no secret that he wished that Mike would be his traveling buddy, his companion on world adventures. And that he wanted to find another Dana for them to share. Mike knew that he would just end up being his caretaker and vomit wiper, and would essentially get him out of whatever messes he got himself into. On three different occasions he had had to take a plane across thirteen time zones in order to rescue Jeremy from some mess.

Only once had it involved law enforcement, but that one had been a doozy, when Jeremy had attempted to procure the services of three different prost.i.tutes at once, two of whom were underage and one of whom was an Interpol agent. He suspected that mess had been less intricate and had fewer implications, though, than what he was facing right now.

"Let me be really clear here, Jeremy," Mike said, going cold. "She's off limits."

The last response Mike expected was for Jeremy to peer, intently, at the pocket of his tux jacket. "Nice pocket silk." Poke. "What is that? You don't normally have silk there."

Caught! "It's just some standard piece of a " Jeremy's fingers deftly pinched the top corner and pulled, Lydia's panties unfolding out of the pocket, lace and frills dangling from his friend's enormous hand.

"Give me that," Mike growled, s.n.a.t.c.hing it back. Laughter poured out of Jeremy in great whoops. What Mike had thought would be a fun secret for himself had just turned into a humiliation he didn't need. f.u.c.k.

Jeremy recoiled slightly, his face slack with concentration. Mike hadn't seen that look in nearly a decade. "Are those Diane's or Lydia's."

Mike refused to answer, trying to stare him down.

"You're really falling for her, aren't you?" Hating that he had to look up to answer, his eyes burned into Jeremy's, which exuded a humanity, an approval, that Mike didn't expect. Compet.i.tion? Sure. Acceptance? Wha a ?

"I'm not falling for anyone. I have a television show that needs to be successful so that I can get the b.u.mp in profits that I need to get the payoff that I want. I don't want you, or anyone else, to jeopardize that."

Jeremy golf clapped politely. "Nice speech. How long did it take you to memorize that?" He hadn't had this kind of conversation with Jeremy since intense arguments over code reviews years ago. With no more words, he simply broke the gaze, and walked to the car where he knew Dom waited for him.

Chapter Seven.

The nightclub was absolutely packed. Part of a three story entertainment complex with a huge dance club and bar on the top floor, a bowling alley and arcade on the second floor, and an enormous restaurant on the bottom. A group of friends from work, which thankfully did not include Dave, had decided to convene for drinks, discussion, and of course a office gossip.

Lydia needed this so much. She didn't hang out often with her co-workers and Krysta, though technically one, worked five stories down in purchasing and receiving, processing paperwork and like Lydia, a Bachelor's-degreed woman who was vastly underutilized. Lydia was more vastly underutilized, possessing a Master's degree, but she didn't like to think about that. Especially with a few drinks in her.

In that crazy, territorial way that corporations had, the fact that Lydia invited Krysta meant that she had included someone from another tribe. Too bad. Over the past two years, people had just accepted it. Both she and Krysta noticed that very few of Lydia's co-workers ever spoke to Krysta beyond the requisite "Hi." By the time the dancing started, though, no one cared. It was all baccha.n.a.lian, alcohol-infused fun and for a few hours she could pound, stomp, wiggle, shimmy and shake her worries away.

She was on her third Cosmo (and by the looks of it these were three or four ounces of alcohol per) when a familiar face walked in the nightclub. Even in the dark, those green eyes practically glowed. She ducked her head, leaning in toward Krysta, who was sitting with her, trapped in the giant, semi-circular booth with what felt like a hundred people on either side of them.

"He's here!" she told Krysta.

"Who?" Krysta's head twisted wildly around the packed nightclub. "There are lots of 'he' types here."

"Him. Matt Jones," Lydia whispered and then realized she didn't need to. In fact, she could have screamed his name and he wouldn't have heard.

A throng of dancers, arms up in the air, b.r.e.a.s.t.s bouncing, chests pumping, hips gyrating, separated him from their group at work. Until Krysta turned traitor, raised her arm in the air, stood up and let out a wolf whistle, the kind you hear at baseball games, except this one was a come hither.

She cupped her hands around her mouth and shouted, "Hey, Matt! We're over here!"

Lydia had two choices. She could die on the spot or she could kill Krysta. Instead, she froze, then grabbed the fresh Cosmo and drank it all down in one big slurp.

"You're supposed to sip those." Krysta's eyes were wide, calculating what Lydia had just done and the aftereffects of it.

"You're not supposed to invite the enemy," she retorted, feeling angry and empty and most of all, indignant that her brain couldn't a.s.semble the right burning response right now.

"What?" Krysta played innocent. "Just including a guy from the office in our a "

"Yeah, right."

"So one minute you let him slip your panties off you, the next he's the enemy?"

"My logic needs no explanation."

"'Logic' isn't the word for it. 'Bulls.h.i.t,' on the other hand..." Krysta just shook her head and took another sip of her magarita.

Matt's eyes locked on Lydia's. Suddenly, no one else existed in the room. Just him, with those bright green eyes, that sandy brown hair, those broad shoulders that, even in business casual clothes, made him look sensual. She knew that he was muscular, strong, tight a that those biceps underneath could lift her easily if they wanted to. She knew that his ribs tapered down to a narrow waist and that beneath that a "Hey, how's it going?" he asked, smiling. How in the h.e.l.l did he manage to make it here so fast? she wondered. Time blinked. One of her favorite songs popped up and she jumped at the chance to get away from what was turning out to be a very, very uncomfortable situation.

A million people a no, actually, six on one side and eight on the other a blocked her from getting out of the giant booth. Some matched up as couples in various states of intimacy, tongues in throats, hands on thighs. Frustrated that she and Matt were not one of those couples, and nearly in tears that he hadn't talked about their latest encounter with her, she decided to get away from him.

And so, in a stroke of brilliance, she just climbed under the table, finding herself at Matt's feet as she crawled out through the other end. Lydia looked up, head pointed directly at his belt buckle. She tipped her face up to see him smiling down, a wolfish grin on his face.

"Well, h.e.l.lo there. That's some table service."

Mike had groaned inwardly when Jeanie from accounting had invited to go out with "the gang," as she called them, a group of about ten or fifteen folks from work who occasionally went to a giant entertainment complex to unwind, hang out, have fun. It sounded very mid-twenties to him and while he had had his share of those nights, he wasn't sure that getting that close to his employees was a good idea.

When Jonah had caught the invitation on camera after Jeanie left, a perfectly timed phone call made Mike realize just how watched he was.

"So, hey, Mike," Jonah said, that voice still filled with oil and, Mike knew, vinegar. "Mike, we saw that whole clip with Jeanie inviting you to the bar and we think that's a great idea. You should go and we can follow with the cameras and, you know..."

"Cameras? How are you going to do that, Jonah, without tipping everyone off?"

"Oh, it'll be great. You can wear a hidden ca a "

"No. No. Nope. No way." His voice was cold steel. There were lines that he needed to draw in this reality television mess. "I don't wear a wire. I don't wear a hidden camera. I don't play 'Mike cam'."