Deceptive Nights Read online

  “Yes. Let me know when he gets here. I have to sign his bill and personally fax a copy of it immediately over to billing so he can get paid as soon as possible. Madeline told me to make sure I took care of his billing because he was very important to her.”

  Simone gave her a crooked salute and then left out. Putting on her reading glasses, she looked over the papers he had handed her. More work to do by the end of the day, she told herself and put it in her end of the day basket. Her desk was piled high with reports and other information she needed to get done by the end of the day or the month or the year. Either way it was a lot of work and it seemed the piles never got smaller. The last office manager had not turned in a lot of the reports needed by the head office in Lansing and the task was put on her shoulders to get everything updated. She was working overtime and not getting paid for it, yet her job pride from the completion of getting things done.

  Yes, Madeline was working her like a horse, but Phoebe figured she would be able to at least say got this office running like a well oiled machine.

  Phoebe looked up from all her work about one that afternoon to take a mental break.

  Coming into work had been a bad idea because since she awoke this morning at eight and came in an hour late for work, she found that if she didn’t think about work, she was thinking about him. Cursing to herself, she looked back down at the black and white print in front of her and forced her concentration back on work.

  Chapter 8

  Going up in the elevator with Desmond and Lawrence, Jacoby’s mind was a thousand miles from them.

  “That’s a first,” Desmond noted quietly to Lawrence.

  “What?” Lawrence questioned.

  “If I didn’t know any better, I would say Jacoby was daydreaming.”

  “You don’t know any better,” Jacoby snapped, hearing the amusement in Desmond voice and the chortle from Lawrence.

  Lawrence said, “Yes, he was Desmond. He’s been like that all morning since I had to drag his ass out of bed.”

  “I would have much rather stayed in my bed,” Jacoby growled.

  “Serves you right staying up all night with that pretty little thing I saw leaving at five this morning,” Desmond said.

  Lawrence chortled more with a surprised look on his face. “I see why you didn’t want to join us last night. Was this planned, Jake?”

  “That’s none of your damn business,” Jacoby snapped. “Fuck off.”

  Desmond and Lawrence looked at each other and laughed not at all taking Jacoby’s attitude serious. Desmond said, “So was she good as she looked?”

  Jacoby heisted for a moment, then smiled more to himself. “Better.”

  All three of them burst out in a round of laughter. It was always good to discuss these things out loud and they enjoyed listening to each other’s exploits with women, but for some reason, Jacoby wanted to keep this more to himself, but at the same time shout from the ceiling about the pleasurable night he had experienced.

  “So please relish us with details,” Lawrence encouraged as they stepped off the elevator, heading to the office of his client he had visited yesterday.

  “I’m not going to kiss and tell,” Jacoby insisted. “I think I want to keep this to myself.”

  Desmond frowned. “You’ve never wanted to keep it to yourself before. You’re usually criticizing the woman from head to toe negatively.”

  “Well this time was different,” Jacoby admitted shrugging. “I just wish-” He stopped himself.

  Lawrence stopped walking and turned to Jacoby studying his friend’s features for a moment. Desmond looked curiously on as Lawrence and Jacoby’s eyes met as if they were sending each other telepathic signals.

  “Where the hell did you meet this chit?” Lawrence finally demanded to know after the pause of silence between them.

  Jacoby bit his lip as if to keep the information to himself, then he finally admitted, “You remember the respectable woman on the corner?”

  “You saw her again?”

  “Yes. It was like fate.” He frowned not understanding it himself.

  Desmond suddenly grasped what was going on. “That woman accepted money for sex?” His voice was a little bit too loud and people walking by looked over at the three handsome men who drew enough attention on their own without Desmond being so loud over what they were talking about.

  “Tell the whole fucking world, Dez. Can’t you whisper, ass?” He looked back at Jacoby narrowing his eyes. Lawrence interest was clearly peaked. “She was very beautiful now that I think about it. I was tempted to offer her myself, but I didn’t think you were serious.”

  Incredulously, Jacoby admitted, “I was shocked that she took the offer. I mean when I first approached her with the offer in mind, I thought for sure she was going to slap me in the face, but this serene look came over her face and she accepted as if I was answering her pray.”

  “And once you got her to the hotel room?”

  Jacoby became excited in his speech as he said, “She was a dream come true, man. I have never met a woman so uninhibited about herself. She was so incredible in bed-”

  “Alright that’s enough bragging,” Lawrence snipped. Clearly he was jealous for Jacoby for not taking advantage of the situation. Both of them knew, Lawrence had seen the woman first and had drawn Jacoby’s attention to her.

  It wasn’t like Lawrence to take a woman so personally, but Jacoby had never expressed interest in a woman like he had this one, so Lawrence knew something was pretty special about her.

  “Don’t you have an appointment with this client?” Desmond questioned Lawrence.

  “Nothing set in stone, but let’s hurry up and get this over with so we can get back to Lansing.”

  Jacoby could tell Lawrence was not in a good mood anymore, but for the life of him he couldn’t imagine Lawrence actually being jealous that Jacoby had taken advantage of the opportunity that had just practically fell in his lap last night.

  As they proceeded to the office, Lawrence decided to interrogate Jacoby trying to sound as nonchalant as possible, but Jacoby knowing Lawrence all too well could tell there was some hidden motive behind his questioning. “Did you get her digits?”

  “Yes and I told her when I was in town again I would look her up.”

  “So she lives in the city? What’s her name?”

  “April.”

  “April what?”

  Jacoby became defensive and annoyed. “I didn’t ask for the last name.”

  Desmond intervened. “You sleep with an incredible woman and you don’t even know her whole name.”

  “It’s nothing new, Desmond,” Jacoby snapped. “Just because you’re getting married doesn’t mean you have to act so high and mighty. Before you met your woman, you were sleeping around like a wild mutt.”

  Desmond snickered. “Then maybe you both need to find a woman like mine to understand how sick all of this sounds.”

  Lawrence and Jacoby gave Desmond a lethal glare, clearly telling him to keep his opinions of the lifestyle they chose to himself, but of course Desmond wouldn’t take either one of them seriously.

  “Jez, you guys, why don’t you lighten up and get some rest. You’re both acting as if someone rained on your parades,” Desmond encouraged them.

  At this time, they arrived at the office and that skinny guy with the pretty eyes greeted them again.

  “Glad to see you finally came, Mr. Ripley,” Mr. Bowen said. His voice was full of sarcasm, but that didn’t get Lawrence out of his moody disposition.

  “I just came to get this in the system then I’m out of this city with the quickness, Mr. Bowen,” Lawrence gruffly.

  Mr. Bowen led them back to the server and left them to do what they had to do. Desmond, who had assisted Lawrence in writing the program assisted in the upgrade and the testing. The whole process took about ten minutes. Upon completion, they were all eager to leave. Jacoby hadn’t said one word to anyone and still looked a bit peeve at Lawrence. Lawrence was st
ill moody about the latter conversation they had discussed out in the hallway before entering the offices. Desmond seemed amused about the entire situation.

  Jacoby could have stayed in the limousine while they did all this and waited until they were done with the upgrade, but he knew the office manager would be up in the office today and he really wanted to met and speak with the mother of those two beautiful children. Plus, all the nice things Lawrence had said about the office manager had piqued his interest and she sounded like a very interesting person. Lawrence had never met her personally himself, but had spoken to her over the phone and found her to be a very vivacious professional, hardworking person. She had single-handedly whipped the failing transcript division into shape and was working like a horse to keep it on track. Jacoby found women like her to his liking and even though she did have extra baggage, he still wouldn’t mind trying to see if he could get to know her better since he would be moving here.

  She seemed like a nice woman he could spend some dinners with her, while he was in town while he spent his nights with April. The thought of last night flowed into his mind and he became semi-hard thinking of her. Closing his eyes and concentrating, he tried not to think about it, but found that difficult to do.

  He should have asked for the office assistant to take him in to meet the manager, but he didn’t want to seem too overzealous to meet her when he hoped that she would at least make an appearance with Lawrence and Desmond there. Plus, he had always known he had a formidable presence and being alone with her might intimidate her.

  Once Lawrence and Desmond were done, they found Mr. Bowen in the front of the office and Lawrence handed his bill to the office assistant. Mr. Bowen held up his hands as if he were at gunpoint.

  “My manager would kill me if I took those from you, sir.”

  “Then who the hell should I give them too?” Lawrence snapped.

  Desmond intervened again. “Calm down, Law. He didn’t sleep with your girl, Jacoby did. You’re jumping down the wrong man’s throat.”

  Jacoby stepped to Desmond as if he were about to do some bodily harm. Desmond stepped back immediately.

  “Remember we’re suppose to be professional gentlemen,” Desmond quickly reminded both of his friends. “Let’s act like this until we are at least in private.” He took the papers from Lawrence’s grip and turned to Mr. Bowen. “If you aren’t suppose to handle it, then who do we give this paperwork too, sir?” he asked politely.

  Mr. Bowen narrowed his eyes distrustfully at all three men as if he couldn’t believe the way they were acting. “I was about to let Mr. Ripley know before he jumped down my throat that I’m to instruct him to give them to the office manager as soon as he is done with the upgrade. She’ll be back any second now. She just called from the elevator. She got tired of waiting around for you to come and went downstairs to get her something to eat. I just spoke to her from the elevator on the phone.” He looked down at his watch.

  “What if I don’t have a second to wait?” Lawrence snipped.

  “You were late, Mr. Ripley. As I said, she’ll be here any second. The rest of the office personnel have gone home as you can see because it is after five.” He looked at Lawrence very disapprovingly. “We thought you would be here before quitting time.”

  “I didn’t expect the delay I had, but I didn’t have an appointment set in stone.”

  Mr. Bowen looked like he wanted to argue more about the subject, but decided against it seeing Lawrence wasn’t in the mood and looked quite dangerous.

  “So you’ll be leaving?” Desmond asked.

  “Yes. I was on my way out the door as you were coming in, but I trust you in the office alone until she returns.” Mr. Bowen looked past the three men out the glass lobby doors and smiled relieved. “Ah ha, there is she stepping off the elevator now.”

  All three men turned around to look at the voluptuous woman walking tall and straight with an air of confidence about her that one couldn’t help but to notice.

  “Damn she’s fine!” Desmond noted out loud. “That’s the beauty Madeline’s been bragging about?”

  “Yes,” Mr. Bowen said proudly. “She’s the office manager.”

  Desmond looked over at the shocked expressions on Lawrence and Jacoby’s faces. “Now that’s the woman you should have slept with Jacoby,” he teased.

  Lawrence gave him a look as if he had lost his mind. “You dumb ass that is the woman he slept with! Don’t you recognize her?”

  Desmond’s eyes grew wide like saucers as he now gave the office manager a second look. “Well I’ll be damn!

  Chapter 9

  Stepping off the elevator, she gave the glass office doors a brief glance to see the three tall men with their backs to her. They stood over poor Simon’s short height like giants and she couldn’t believe how incredibly big they were even from behind.

  Someone called her name to the right of her to say good-bye and she looked over that way seeing it was one of her typist coming down another hallway. She waved to them just as she was two feet from the glass door entrance into the office.

  Immediately, she dragged her eyes to those gorgeous framed men who had now turned around to greet her and she stopped dead in her tracks dropping her food to the floor as her eyes grew wide as saucers.

  She couldn’t move as she meet those beautiful intense cinnamon brown eyes that just twelve hours ago was ravishing her visually. Lord no, he was not standing there looking as though he wanted to choke her.

  Simon stepped in front of the three men with a wicked smile on his lips and opened the door for her. “Ms. Green, the computer expert is here. He’s all done.” Simon bent down and picked up her dropped sandwich. When she still didn’t move, he took her arm and pulled her inside the office.

  One of the other men with friendly handsome features, who was the only one smiling out the three, said, “This is quite awkward, isn’t it?”

  “Awkward?” Lawrence sneered. “Jacoby, did you know she was the office manager here?”

  Jacoby finally broke eye contact with Phoebe to look at Lawrence. “Does it look like I knew?” He looked back at Phoebe even more angrily. “You lied.”

  “I never lied,” Phoebe defended herself. “We never got into our jobs.”

  “How could you do this?!” he asked incredulously.

  “That’s none of your business,” she stated angrily.

  Jacoby looked at his friends and then looked over at the office assistant, who was soaking this up like a soap opera. He grabbed her arm and dragged her into the nearest office slamming the door behind them to give them some privacy. Once the door was closed, she snatched out of his grip and whirled around at him.

  “You told me your name was April,” Jacoby accused her.

  “It’s my middle name,” she defended.

  “I don’t believe this! I don’t believe that you’re the same woman I slept with last night. How could you accept money for sex?”

  She stood akimbo. “That’s none of your business, Mr. Knight. I have my reasons.”

  “Do you do this often?”

  “No and you know I don’t,” she snapped offended.

  He shook his head. “That’s the point. I don’t know anything about you. I didn’t until last night. I heard about you running this office, but I can’t put you being the same woman I was with last night together. That’s two different women.” He said it as if that was an impossible fact.

  “Does the fact that I’m the office manager here bother you or the fact that I accepted money for sex bother you?” she asked confused.

  He ran a frustrated hand through his head. “Both,” he admitted calming down. “Because I still want you.”

  Those words were like fire to Phoebe’s senses igniting heat to her groin. Turning away from him to gather her equilibrium, which had been thrown off by his words, she said in an unsteady voice, “I didn’t have any intentions of seeing you again.”

  He moved up behind her and gently rested his hands on her
shoulders, speaking softly near her ear. “But you gave me your number,” he pointed out.

  Her voice was stronger and full of sarcasm. “It’s not my number. It’s a dummy number. I lied.”

  Jacoby turned her around. She really expected to see him angry at her deceit, but he looked amused down at her. Even with her heels on she still had was a couple of inches shorter than him. In this light, he was a nice deep almond shade that her fingers and mouth long to just touch, taste…

  “Then it is fate, Phoebe Green that I came here today,” he declared, smiling as if he knew what she really wanted to do to him.

  Breathlessly, she said, “There’s no such thing as fate for me, Mr. Knight, only bad luck.”

  He chuckled huskily, looking as if he wanted to eat her alive. “I can stay in town tonight for you.” His arms moved around her waist and molded her body against his.

  She gasped at his hardness that she could feel through his clothing on her stomach.

  “We could have watermelon and whip cream.” He raised a hopeful dark brown brow and those cinnamon eyes were tender, making her insides feel jittery with excitement.

  Trying to keep a straight face, she said, “You are crazy.”

  “Only about you right about now, Phoebe.” His warm lips pressed up against hers molding to them.

  It felt so sinfully right kissing him like this and Phoebe wanted to take him up on that offer so bad, but the thought of giving herself to him was so wrong. Breaking the kiss by turning her head away and pressing her hands against those broad thick shoulders, she fought to control the situation. “No.”

  “Speak up you two!” Desmond muffled voice shouted on the other side of the door. “We can’t hear you.”

  Jacoby cursed loudly and released her, seeing she was again in control of her wits when he wasn’t. Again he ran another frustrated hand through his hair. He released her not wanting to force her. “I want to see you again, Phoebe.”