By the time we left grandma’s, I felt like I had aged ten years. Dad had tried everything he could to get me to tell him about Jake but I couldn’t. In all my years of pining after Jake, I never stopped to think about all these parts and how hard it would be to keep it from dad. They were best friends, it was vastly difficult.As soon as we got home, dad offered for us to watch a movie but I reluctantly denied. I didn’t want to give him the chance to pester me with questions. I felt guilty the moment I said no because his face fell. We hadn’t watched movies together in a while with everything going on and I immediately wanted to take back my refusal but I couldn’t so I ran up the stairs until I was safely in my room.Only after locking my door did I call Jake. He picked up on the second ring. “I’m working right now, baby girl, but if you want us to finish what we started earlier then-”“Dad is asking about the flowers,” I cut him off and he went silent. “I didn’t realize how hard it wo
I took a good look around his office and in all honesty, it was exactly what I expected. Every inch of it was tiled and the glass was one way so he could see outside but no one could see in. He had a hand carved table with his documents arranged in a neat pile on top of it. There was a couch and to the left were his bookshelves, there were two of them and they were filled to the brim. To the right however was a large and open balcony.“Do you often stand there and try to assert your dominance over the entire of New York?” I asked suddenly and he turned to me with scrunched brows. “It only makes sense. Why else would you want a balcony overlooking the city if not to remind yourself that you are above them?”“Maybe I just liked the view?” he offered and I shrugged innocently. I took his seat leaving him to stand by the door and watch me. His eyes were dark and I could have sworn I knew exactly what he was thinking about.“Dad said-”“Do not talk about your dad when you are in my office
I thought he was joking. I stood there staring at him for a full minute until I realized he wasn’t kidding. Only Jake would have me almost naked in his office and yet ask me to get dressed. I rolled my eyes but did as he asked when my phone started to buzz from where I had dropped it on the table.To say my ego was not bruised would have been a lie. I grabbed my things and was about to leave when he grabbed my upper arm and pulled me to a stop. I refused to look at him, it would have meant letting him see how I truly felt but it was Jake and he already knew.He dropped his lips to my ear. “Don’t make the mistake of thinking that this means I don’t want you. I want more than anything to cancel my appointments for the day and fuck you until we are both hoarse but my secretary will come up any minute and your dad is calling so you are going to take his files and go back to the office and we can continue this later, hm?”I nodded unable to say any words and he finally released me. He grab
I wasn’t sure what Jake had planned for tonight but I was excited. As soon as work was over, I found myself retouching my lipstick and smoothing out my hair before driving over to his house. Dad was not pleased to say the least, he wanted to know who I was spending most of my time with and we had a minor argument about it in the parking lot but he conceded after a while saying that I was an adult and was allowed to make my own choices. He did however add that he knew the commissioner should I need his help.I was just grateful that he wasn’t going through any extreme lengths to find out more. My dad could be very overprotective and sometimes his means did not always justify his intentions. When I was younger, he would run background checks on the families of everyone I called a friend. It was part of the reason I stopped bringing people over. I couldn’t explain how my father got to know about their parents childhood dog and the drug misdemeanor they had at eighteen.I arrived at Jake’
I didn’t know what I was expecting but I had braced myself for a spanking or something, Jake did nothing. He just stilled behind me before humming quietly to himself. I was still bent over the counter, my nipples grazing the cold surface as I tried to get a good look at his face. Without warning, he pushed me forward, keeping my eyes fixated on the wall in front of me.I didn’t like not being able to see his face and I was about to protest and say such when I felt one of his fingers tease the entrance of my pussy. I let out a strangled moan as he pushed in two thick fingers. He still kept his free hand at the back of my neck to keep me from moving. He pushed in to the knuckle before pulling them out.I whined at the loss of contact but before I could protest, he tugged my hair back and pushed those fingers into my open mouth. I tasted myself all over him and a small moan left my lips before I could stop it. Jake leaned forward so that his lips were brushing the shell of my ear.“Suck,
I was not the kind of person who liked having people in my space, especially not when I woke up but I was not complaining when I woke up to Jake’s stubble tickling my cheeks as he pressed soft kisses onto my shoulders and collarbone.Once he realized I was awake, he managed to pull me out of bed long enough to get cleaned while he made breakfast. There was something entire erotic about seeing a man cooking for you and it was a miracle I wasn’t all over him. The only thing that kept me in place was the reminder that I had work and I needed to be home so I could get changed.“If you had clothes here then it wouldn’t be a problem,” he shrugged and I raised a brow.“Is that your way of asking me to move in with you?”“Not yet, before that happens I would still have to talk to your father and we both aren’t ready for that,” I couldn’t help but cringe when I tried to figure out how my dad would react to the news. Whatever it was, I knew it wouldn’t be good. “I’m just saying that it would sa
Jake was quiet. He stared at the photos but his expression gave away nothing. I hated how he managed to look so unfazed while there was a war going on inside of me. Those pictures could potentially ruin me and my father. We were not just innocently standing or holding hands. He was kissing me in the elevator and in front of my car.“I look like a whore,” I announced and his eyes snapped up to me. “He could have at least gotten a better angle where my ass was not on display for the entire fucking world. I would have preferred that, at least then I would know that-”“Stop, please,” he sounded exasperated. “You are not a whore and you need to stop fucking saying that.”“I am only preparing for what I am inevitably going to hear when he takes this to the press,” I pointed to the pictures in case he didn’t see them well the first time. “This is me and this is you and we are doing the fucking horizontal tango or whatever the hell you want to call it. My reputation is on the line here. You w
After the call with my father, I felt extremely exhausted. I felt like all the energy in me had been completely drawn out. Jake must have noticed because the next thing he did was to pick me up and place me in his lap. I curled up into a ball and just enjoyed the warmth of his skin. Neither of us spoke, he turned his attention to his laptop in front of him typing away furiously while I just stayed pressed up against him.Ever so often, he would place a soft kiss against my forehead and whisper words in a foreign language against my skin but that was about as much as he did but it was more than enough for me. I fisted his shirt and although sleep wouldn’t take me because of how worried I was, I felt slightly content.I didn’t mean to but I kept glancing at the clock. It was nearing eight p.m. and I was slightly amazed that my father was yet to call. He sounded worried earlier and I knew it was only a matter of time before my phone started blowing up. I shuffled in Jake’s lap and he loo
HAYLEY’S P.O.VGrowing up I always thought about what it would feel like to see my mother.My dad had no pictures of her, it had been a stupid fling and she never reached out to him. He could have found her if he did but he never wanted to. He told me that if I still wanted to find her when I turned eighteen then he would.I went through all the stages of grief. There was anger at the fact that she had abandoned me and never tried to come back. There was the sadness and the feeling of not being enough for my own mother. By the time I turned eighteen, I didn’t care anymore and I told my father not to bother. It had always been me and him and that was how I wanted it.Seeing the woman in front of me brought back all those feelings of anger and betrayal bubbling up to my chest“I don’t have a mother,” I said finally. “You should leave.”“Please,” she grabbed my arm. “I just want to talk. I came all the way here to find you.”“I didn’t ask you to come here,” I spat jerking my hand out of
HAYLEY’S P.O.VI sat next to my grandmother in silence.I had her hand in mine and listened to the rhythmic beeping of the machines that were hooked up to her. The doctor said that it was only a matter of time but he had given her something to help with the pain.In the midst of all this, I couldn’t get a grip on my own emotions. There was so much swirling inside of me, too many things that I couldn’t get a grip on them. I hadn’t felt this conflicted in a very long time, probably not since I was a teenager.There was anger and pain and guilt. Guilt that we had all the money in the world and I couldn’t stop this, guilt that I was so focused on my own issues that I didn’t even see that she was dying right in front of me. She came back so we could spend time with her and I barely spent any, I spent it running around with Jake and worrying about Marie and his potential child that didn’t even end up being his.I felt stupid and incredibly foolish to say the least and I hated feeling stupid
HAYLEY’S P.O.VMy hands were shaking but I fisted them by my side until I got home. I needed a minute to myself to catch my breath, what I was not expecting was to find my father and Jake in the living room. They were discussing something but they immediately stopped as soon as they saw me.I was glad that they were getting along again but for fucks sake, I wished they took their business to Jake’s house because I knew that between the two of them, nothing ever went unnoticed.“We had the meeting with Marie,” Jake began as soon as he saw me. “She was pissed to say the least but-”“You should be going home,” I told Jake and his brows furrowed in confusion.I knew I was being rude but right now, I didn’t have the patience to be nice. He needed to go home because I wasn’t sure if the question from the police was mere curiosity or if it was a threat but if they were going to follow the trail then chances were that they might officially ask me who I was with and that would mean implicating
HAYLEY’S P.O.VThe sound of whispers woke me up.I tried to ignore it at first but it only got more urgent and I felt the covers shift as Jake got out of bed. With a small groan, I peeled my eyes open, the room was still dark, the only source of light was from the moon that spilled in through the drawn curtains.“Are you sure?” I heard Jake ask, the urgency in his voice taking away whatever remnants of sleep were left in me.I dragged myself up into a sitting position and my eyes found Jake. He was standing with his back to me, shirtless save for the boxer briefs he wore to bed and he was pacing. That was never a good sign because Jake never paced, at least not when everything was fine.“What’s wrong?”He turned to me, almost surprised and cursed. “Go back to bed, Hayley. Don’t worry about me.”“You’re pacing like a mad man and you look like shit,” I leaned over to turn on the bedside lamp drowning the room with a soft orange glow. “What’s wrong?”“The results are in.”If I wasn’t ale
JAKE’S P.O.VThe bottle of whiskey almost seemed to mock me as it sat on my dining table.A few years ago, I would have drank the entire bottle until I forgot everything and taken the first plane out of the city- maybe even the country. I had a knack for running away from my problems. It was what I did when Marie left me for the first time. I was living in California at the time and I got on the first place to London.I stayed there for a few weeks and by the time I returned, I packed everything up and moved to Las Vegas. I moved around a few times before finally deciding on New York because I remembered that Michael stayed here.Now, however, there was nowhere for me to run. It wasn’t because I couldn’t, I had too much to leave here. I could always leave the office and go to one of the many branches over the country so it wasn’t about work, but I had Hayley. I wasn’t completely sure if I had her, she seemed ready to run but I couldn’t blame her.I had to leave her in bed this morning
HAYLEY’S P.O.VI woke up with the knowledge that someone was in my room.I didn’t know who it was but there was a feeling at the back of my neck that alerted me to the fact that I was being watched. I couldn’t brush it off no matter how hard I tried so I reached out for the nightlight and turned it on casting the room in a warm orange glow. I found the person staring at me seated right opposite my bed.I glanced over at the clock beside me. It read one thirty a.m. “How long have you been here?”“In your room or in your house?” Jake asked not missing a beat.To his credit, he didn’t seem to be drunk but then again, he never drank that much. Even if he did drink at whatever time he arrived here first, chances were that the alcohol was already out of his system and he was sober.“My house,” I responded to his earlier question.“Eleven.”“My room?”“Twelve.”I raised a brow. I wondered how I didn’t realize he was here earlier. I was the kind o child who woke up the minute someone opened m
HAYLEY’S P.O.VIt was amusing how many people were interested in my love life.I tried to keep my head screwed on straight, tried to focus on making my day run as smoothly as possible but everyone else had other plans. Everyone had an opinion about my relationship, even my clients would allude to it during our meetings. I tried to keep everything as professional as possible but by lunch, I was tired.As usual, Jake sent me lunch and Sienna brought it up for me. I had no idea why she chose to act like my personal assistant but I wasn’t complaining because I truly didn’t want to leave my office and face the crowd. It had little to do with fear and more to do with the fact that if I did and someone said the wrong thing, I was going to snap.“You can sit here if you want,” I told Sienna and her eyes widened in surprise. “Stop staring at me like you just won the lottery.”“I don’t know if you’ve noticed, Hayley, but you are not exactly a people person. You don’t invite people into your off
HAYLEY’S P.O.VMy father was in my boyfriend’s living room.It took me longer than it should have it process what I was seeing because for a full minute, I just stood there staring and wondering if what I was seeing was an apparition or a figment of my imagination.Dad was in a tailored suit and he sat at the counter with Jake. They were looking over the files together and I just stood there watching until I felt a warm hand on my shoulder. Kate handed me a mug of steaming hot coffee with a smile.“You look like you’ll need that,” she whispered and I couldn’t help but laugh. I did need it.The sound caught my father’s attention and he turned to me with a smile. He walked over to me and placed a soft kiss on my forehead. I was suddenly so grateful that I decided to put on something before coming down. It would have been incredibly distasteful for my father to see me in nothing but Jake’s shirt.“Did you bring clothes for me?” I asked and his brows furrowed in confusion. “Work clothes,
HAYLEY’S P.O.V“Hayley,” I heard Jake call my name but his voice sounded like a buzzing in my ears.I could hear my father speaking but I couldn’t make out his words. My eyes were completely fixed on the words on my screen. I knew it was Marie, it had to be her. No one else could have leaked the news to the press in record time.I wasn’t sure whether to be pissed or impressed. I had grossly underestimated her and that was my mistake. She was a cunning individual and I wish I had thought about that before I pissed her off and became her number one enemy.A warm hand settled on my shoulder and I nearly jumped. Jake looked pissed but also sad at the same time. He watched me with a fear in his eyes as if he thought I was going to run away and leave him. I could tell he wanted to do more than just touch my shoulder but he was holding back for my benefit.“She’s smart, I’ll give her that,” I said finally and I could see everyone’s faces twist with confusion. I lifted my phone to my ear and