“Do you need me to sign all of these now?” I ask taking off my glasses just as Annie clicks the door shut.
She nods and I take a seat to start signing the twenty or so papers.
“Well, hi Luca. Nice to see you, too,” Mitch starts.
I look up to him and blow a kiss. Leo pretends to catch it and then the two of them are instantly in some sort of boy like wrestling session.
“How old are you two?” I question.
“Luca, I can answer that question if I could be frank, “Annie states.
I looked up to her, amused. I nod for her to continue.
“They are smarter than any two men I know, but I’m not sure that they ever got rid of their Batman underwear.”
Both men stop wrestling and look at Annie in shock. I bust out in laughter and high five her. Annie is simply fabulous. If I had a best friend, she would be it. I think she knows it, too. However, my life is too busy for a best friend to grab martinis or eat ice cream with. I have places to go and people to meet. She and I occasionally get these few moments at work to act like the twenty something chicks we are, but outside of this building, she would never be able to understand my life style choice.
“Annie, Mitch, Leo – I’m going to Georgia for the rest of the week to do some business exploration down there.”
“Bull shit,” Mitch spits out. “You hate the weather and you’re making an excuse to get out of it.”
No one says anything. He is right, but I will drum up business there and everyone knows it. I finish signing the papers on my desk and hand them to Annie with an eye roll. No one understands me here and the more I try to explain myself, the more I feel like this place is a fucking prison of butch women, wanting their way with me in the bathroom.
“Tell Colin to have Margie get me packed and ready to go in an hour,” I state without a glance in either of my partners’ direction.
“But we will really miss you,” Leo whines like a little child. Annie snickers as she makes her way out my door and presumably down to her office.
“Luca, your assistant is so fucking hot,” Leo announces. I look up to find him slack jawed, eyes trailing Annie’s movements down the hall through the little slice of window that exposes me to the rest of the office. I should cover that up, I think, until the horror of what Leo has said completely registers.
With our jaws dropped, both Mitch and I stare at him. “Since when?” Mitch asks as I exclaim, “That is disgusting! She’s my assistant!”
Leo shrugs like it’s no big deal but for Leo – he gets off on computers and brand new BIC pens. He color codes his socks, as I once confirmed during our senior year at NYU. I wasn’t sure if he ever thought about women unless they were in his lap. Stretching his arms, Leo hugs the back of the couch with a small smirk. Was he holding out on us? Of course, I couldn’t be too mad. If these boys knew what I really did in my spare time, well…I pray we would still be friends.
No one actually knows who I am. Hell, sometimes I forget, and think I’m an actress living a privileged life. The closest I come to being my true self is around these boys. They are NYU geeks and I related to their club better than any other group on campus. Equations and formulas were my thing until I started living my other life. I quickly stand up and go to sit in the middle of them.
“Yeah, well – you are too out of her league, Leo. What happened to that lovely brunette who you’re banging?” I ask, putting my arms around both my boys’ shoulders.
“We still bang.” No emotion accompanies that statement. Leo is stating a fact in Leo style.
The three of us sit there in an awkward silence for a while until I clear my throat.
“Did you just say bang?” I ask looking at him with a grin.
Leo, in the true boring conversationalist form, shrugs again. Ugh, yes I am the most like myself with these guys, but holy shit we are so fucking boring.
“So what’s on your calendar for the rest of the week?” I ask, moving to return back to my desk.
“We have two engineering meetings. You know nothing that you would ever care about,” Mitch states.
I look up and sigh, placing a manicured hand on my pin stripped suited hip. “Oh cut the shit, Mitch. You know I don’t understand all that mumbo jumbo. Give me numbers and I’ll make them look any way you want them to, but shit, engineering? What is the program?”
“Something to do with another GPS tracking application because Lord knows we can’t have enough of those,” Leo says, rolling his eyes.
“I thought we did well with our map application. Mapperz is cool.” I purse my lips and scrunch up my nose to think about why people feel the need to compare one program’s directions to ten others. They all get you to the same place. Mapperz comes equipped with police and accident trackers, and it will cost us more to make a new app, but if people want to buy it, it might not kill us to spend the week, making it happen. I mean, it won’t kill Leo and Mitch. They can bitch all they want, but this is their game, their passion. I am along for the ride because we are as tight now as we were in college and well, it was the three of us coming up with the company on napkins at a coffee shop in our last semester in college.
Despite all of that, I don’t feel bad about getting out of the snow for a few days. They knew me, the Florida girl with perpetual cold feet. They knew I drummed up business anywhere and everywhere I went. Nevertheless, Luca and winter are not friends but no matter what happens, I will never permanently leave Chicago. I am owned by Divider and these geeks so in return, I own them. I can’t disrespect that by permanently moving anywhere else. That didn’t mean I wasn’t willing to travel to get what I really want every weekend.
What I really want is just a matter of a few phone calls away to my dearest acquaintance, Carl. Carl is my token gay friend who has a penchant for hooking me up with what people might call one night stands. Except they aren’t really “one night” and there is a lot more to the “stand” than sex. No, I wasn’t paid for sex or my time. That would make me a hooker and excuse me, but I have more money than most women my age or any age for that matter. No, I enjoy the men, the flowers, the gowns, the envious looks from other men and women, the jewelry, and finally, the mindless orgasms each and every one of those men gives to me. Whether I have to teach them or they come fully trained, I am always richer in experience after the nights with my secret men.
A low burn starts between my legs as I begin to think about the diamond tear drop earrings I recently saw at Tiffany’s. A quick pang to my stomach flashes as I think of my body in a satin gown with a glass of champagne in my hand. A hot flash comes over me as I ponder those earrings and that gown discarded as I take in a strong and wealthy man that meets all of my needs.
Shit. I need a fix. All I have to do is get through this day and find my next man.
TWO
“Oh look, her limousine awaits! Must be nice to have a driver take you to the airport.” Leo’s high pitched squeal that sounds like a little girl who just saw a puppy startles the shit out of me as we exit the building after a non-stop day of phone calls. My mouth has been running all day answering questions to our newest client, Evan Myers about how we’re going to pitch his campaign for his financial company to the investors he has lined up for next week. The man is a genius at the age of twenty-five, with a face that leaves a stain on my chair from my panties getting soaked every time he leaves, but at the same time, the man is starting to get on my last nerve. I may sound like a bitch at times, I assure you I’m not. I’m fun, energetic, and willing to try anything once. Except drugs. Drugs are way too dangerous, addictive, and not to mention, they mess with your mind. I need to be in control of my mind at all times, especially on the weekends where I leave town to become the desirable Lucia Westwood. But I swear to god, if he doesn’t let me do my job, which I do extremely well, I’m going to throttle him and it will not be in the way I have fantasized about many times before.