“It’s a lot to ask,” Erin said. “Especially with your dad. Do you want me to get Marbury to call them and postpone?”
“No,” Bree said quickly. She could do this. She was organized. She had everything at her fingertips. She didn’t want to be considered
less than
. “I’ll look over the stuff they want and if there’s any issues, I’ll let you know.” She glanced at the list briefly. “It all looks pretty routine.” She clutched the paper to her chest.
“Bree.”
Bree swallowed. She knew what was coming. “I’m fine,” she said, trying to forestall Erin’s words.
“I know you are,” Erin said kindly. “How’s your dad?”
Bree pursed her lips and hated the expression it gave her. “As well as can be expected.” She didn’t say he was fine; he was far from it.
“Dominic and I are so sorry about this.”
This
. Her father’s cancer. His
sickness
. “Thank you,” Bree said.
“If you want time off, let me know. We’ll accommodate anything you need.”
“I appreciate that.” Her fingers felt numb, like they did whenever she had to talk about
this
.
They’d discussed it before New Year’s. Okay, they’d talked about her father after that huge
disturbance
regarding the fact that someone outside the company had hacked proprietary information.
“I know you don’t want to think about it,” Erin said, “but when the time comes, whatever you decide, you’ve got our full support.” That was another recent change in Erin; she’d become so much better at dealing with sympathy and grief.
“I really appreciate that, Erin.” Since the
disturbance
, as Bree thought of it, Erin had gone overboard to apologize for even
thinking
Bree was somehow involved with their sales numbers getting out. See, there was that acting-weird-and-secretive thing at work. She couldn’t blame Erin for being suspicious. But they’d gotten over that, and what Erin didn’t have a clue about was how much her acceptance had meant to Bree. Erin had validated Bree’s feelings about her father’s illness; she’d understood the fears. Erin understood all about burying your head in the sand and trying to pretend nothing had happened, or was happening, that everything was absolutely
fine
.
Erin sat back, putting her hands up as if in surrender. “I’m not going to belabor the point. I know you can handle it all, but if you ever feel you can’t, just tell me. And this audit is no big deal. Marbury will take the brunt of it. He’s assured me.”
Right. Marbury had assured
Erin
, but how he treated Bree was a different matter. Whatever. She’d handle it. And what she couldn’t handle, she’d fake.
She was good at faking. Isn’t that what Luke had said? Thinking of him made her warm, soothed the savage little beast inside her, which was odd considering how they’d parted last night.
Bree rose. “Okay, I’ve got it. And I’ll have the inventory variances analyzed by the end of the day.” There were a few parts whose valuations had significantly changed in the standard cost roll for the new year. She needed to make sense of it; could be that the routings were incorrect or the bills of material had errors.
Back in her office, she reviewed the list of audit requirements. It wasn’t so bad. The biggest issue was the overhead rates used for valuing their inventory. It would require some explanation, but she’d made good notes in the allocations file, and she’d been using the same methodology since they’d gone onto the new system a couple of years ago. She’d done a demo for Marbury, too.
Her father thought she should be further ahead in her career, at least a controller, but she wasn’t a manager, not even a supervisor. No, she was little more than a full-charge bookkeeper. Except that she knew
everything
about DKG. The DeKnights
needed
her. And she was doing well for herself. She even owned her own small condo over in Newark. She was independent. She was
happy
.
But she didn’t like change.
Her desk phone rang. “Bree Mason here. How can I help you?”
The voice on the other end was barely more than a whisper. “I just can’t do it anymore, Brianna. Please.”
Bree’s insides clenched. Only her mother called her Brianna, and only when she was really upset. “Why didn’t you call me on my cell phone, Mom?”
“Because you wouldn’t have answered.”
All right, she fully admitted she was a shitty daughter. “I’ve answered every day.” But only once a day because she couldn’t handle any more than that.
“I can’t take care of him on my own, Brianna.” Tears bubbled in her mother’s voice.
“He needs to go into hospice, Mom.”
“He wants to die here.”
Bree concentrated on her breathing. “He’ll get better care in hospice.”
“This is his home.”
Her parents had lived in the same house in Saratoga since before Bree was born. They’d paid forty thousand; it was long since paid off and worth a small fortune, even after the housing dump. Her parents should sell it and get something smaller and more manageable.
Her father refused. He always refused.
“You have to put your foot down, Mom, and tell him you can’t do it.”
“I could if you came home and helped me.”
That was it. They wanted her to come home. They wanted her back. Her father had been diagnosed with lung cancer fifteen months ago. He’d had radiation treatments. They’d arrested things for a while. Until two months ago, just after Thanksgiving, when the doctors found the cancer had moved to his kidneys. Now, it was only a matter of time.
Please don’t make me do it, Daddy.
She could not go home to that full time. It was hard enough going over there for the usual Sunday dinner, a habit her mother had pushed her into since Bree had first gotten her own apartment after college. Last Sunday, she was sure her father’d had a stroke. His face had simply collapsed as she fed him his mashed peaches, as if every muscle had ceased to function. He’d looked like a clown, an upside-down smile painted on his face. Then it was gone. He’d finished eating as if nothing had happened. Finally, her heart had started beating again.
She simply could not do that day in and day out.
On the phone, her mother started crying. Bree stopped breathing. Her eyes ached. She sniffed.
“Please, Brianna, help me. I don’t know what to do.”
Bree thought about what Erin had said just before New Year’s, when Bree confessed about her father’s illness, his imminent
death
. Erin said she wasn’t a terrible person because she didn’t want to go, didn’t want to face it, didn’t want to see it. Erin thought it was a natural reaction for some people.
And maybe it was. But Bree knew she was a terrible person for hearing her mother’s cries and refusing her.
Don’t make me. Please don’t make me.
She was thirty-five years old and praying to God as if she were a little child. God wasn’t going to save her. He wasn’t suddenly going to offer her another alternative. And in the end, she didn’t know how much longer she could live with herself if she didn’t go.
“All right, Mom,” she finally said, “I’ll come. I’ll be there tomorrow morning.” Saturday. After she’d packed a few things and watered her plants. She couldn’t let her plants die.
After the disconnecting click of the phone, Bree held the receiver to her chest, breathing, just breathing. She could do this. She could be strong. She could be like Erin.
But if she had to do it, then she needed something to get her through. She didn’t usually ask for two nights in a row from him, but she needed him so badly.
Rising from her desk, she closed her office door with a soft snick. Back in her chair, she hit his speed dial and when Luke answered, she whispered the magic words, “Do you want me tonight, Master?”
2
HELL, YES, LUKE WANTED HER. HE WANTED TO REACH THROUGH the phone lines and touch her, lay claim to her. He sat in the spacious second-floor office of the Silicon Valley company for which he was CEO and dictated to her. “On my terms,” he said.
“It’s always your terms, Master. I’ll do whatever you want.”
He’d thought about what he wanted. He’d thought about what she needed. “You must be punished.”
“Yes, Master.” Excitement lowered her voice to a breathy whisper.
“You will not scream and you will not struggle, slut.” The kick start of heat and desire swelled in him.
He could almost feel the quiver of her body as her voice shuddered across the airwaves. “No, Master, I won’t struggle.”
He would make her beg for release. He would spank her, then he’d put his mouth to her and make her come. He would force the climax out of her.
“What time shall I be there, Master?”
“We’re not going to my house. We’re going to do this in yours.” He heard her sharp intake of breath and felt the pause like a black hole that had suddenly opened up in front of him. “Or we’re not doing it at all.”
“Please don’t make me.” Her whisper had lost all the animation of her excitement.
She might not want it, but she needed it. He needed it. “It’s time. There’s no other way. I’ll be there at eight.”
“It has to be earlier,” she said quickly, ending abruptly as if suddenly realizing she was usurping his authority.
Good. All the more time with her. “Then I will see you at seven.”
“I don’t have a headboard or anything you can attach handcuffs to,” she told him.
“We won’t need them. Because you’re going to accept everything without fighting me.”
She hesitated, then finally said, “Yes, I’ll do everything.”
Not
Yes, Master
. He wondered at the difference and whether it boded ill or good. Not that it mattered. He’d already decided the way things would be done.
“You need to email me your address.” He didn’t know exactly where she lived. But now he would own that secret along with everything else.
“Yes.” She said it so softly, he almost mistook it for her breath.
He pondered a long moment after she hung up. Despite the dominance play between them, he gave her an extraordinary amount of control. He never called her; he always let her call him when she needed him. He never pressured, never pushed, always gave her freedom. That was the problem; he gave her too much freedom. It was time to take off the kid gloves. He would enter her home, he would punish her, he would make her come. Then he would hold her in his arms, and there would be no rushing out of the bed. He would stay until the morning.
Before he could give rein to fantasies of the evening ahead, he had work issues to manage. He punched in an extension number on his desk phone.
“Yeah, Luke?” Beeman’s answer came only seconds later.
“I need preliminary numbers for the board meeting on Wednesday.”
Beeman sighed. “Luke, you know that’s impossible.” No
Yes, Master
from him. As CFO, Beeman said everything was impossible, then it looked like he was a miracle worker when he came across with what Luke asked for.
“We’re talking prelim, Beeman. They know it’s subject to change.”
“I don’t have an answer from the auditors on that reserve question yet.”
“Put it in a footnote, worst case, best case.”
“And there’s something wrong with the currency conversions.”
They’d built a manufacturing plant over in Germany two years ago, and while the product shipped out of the German facility, the billing was done in the United States. It had given accounting nothing but headaches. The Germans didn’t like being told what to do. He understood the issues; they didn’t change the facts. All he said was, “Beeman.”
“Shit. All right. Prelims by Wednesday.”
“Tuesday night, Beeman. I will review them before the board meeting.” He never went into a meeting blind.
His CFO growled assent.
“Thank you, Beeman.” He was actually a good guy, did his job extremely well. A CEO was only as good as the people he had supporting him, and Luke had assembled an exemplary team.
His cell rang again. A phone, be it cell or landline, had become almost another part of his anatomy. His heart skipped a beat anticipating that it was Bree again.
But it wasn’t her number when he picked up the phone. “Hey,” he said.
“Dad?” His eldest, Keira. She was a sophomore at Cal Poly down in San Luis Obispo.
“Who else is going to answer my phone, sweetheart?”
“Your secretary.”
“She doesn’t answer my cell phone.”
Keira sighed and he could actually hear her roll her eyes. “I just called to tell you I broke up with Billie.”
“I’m sorry, sweetie,” he offered. Keira started dating Billie at the beginning of the fall quarter. Luke hadn’t met him.
“It’s a good thing.” But she punctuated her words with another sigh.
“I’m glad you’re handling it well.”
“He started pulling all this dominant crap.”
For a moment, Luke bristled. No one took advantage of his little girl, but one thing he’d taught both his daughters was to stick up for themselves. Keira went on. “He actually told me that he didn’t want me seeing Stephie anymore because she was a bad influence.”
Luke held his tongue.
“Does he think I’m lame enough to start smoking dope just because my friend does? Like I’m some weakling?”
Keira had been friends with Stephie since middle school. In high school, when Stephie fell in with a bad crowd and started smoking marijuana, Keira stuck by her, hoping to get her back on the straight and narrow. His daughter had always had a good head on her shoulders. She was strong, knew her own mind, and what she wanted. He truly believed that if it weren’t for Keira, Stephie would have started using hard drugs, gotten hooked. God only knows what her life would have been like now.
“I’m proud of you for sticking by your friends, sweetheart. There’re plenty of other fish in the sea.”