“You’ll have him eating out of your hand before the weekend’s over.”
“I’d rather be eating out of your hand,” he said. “And other places.”
Mark Morgan, junior vice president of CRO Pharmaceuticals, was a smooth talker who had come up through the marketing department, and his science background was limited to a few undergrad biology classes in which he’d eked out a C. Luckily, he’d met his future bride there, the straight-A grad student.
That was all fine with Alexis. She battled wits with enough eggheads as a researcher and professor at the University of North Carolina, so after hours she preferred the company of a guy whose interests included sex, swimming, and televised sports, though not necessarily always in that order.
And he looked dynamite both in and out of a suit.
“Maybe you’ll get your chance,” she said. “I have a whole hour for lunch.”
“Quickie?” He kissed beneath her earlobe and blew against the moistness, causing her to shiver. “How’s the meeting going?”
Adopting a Southern accent, she mocked, “Dr. Forsyth thinks I’m the darlin’ little flag-bearer for the Antichrist.”
“He’s a close friend of the president. Even though he got smeared in the election, he’s still got clout. I told you, that’s just the way this town works.”
“I can’t wait to get back to Chapel Hill myself.”
The elevator dinged open, and Mark took her briefcase, leading her down the hall. “I’m afraid I’ll have to stay over.”
Alexis gave a fake pout. “I thought we were flying back tonight.”
“You are. The council should wrap up by dinner. I’m going to be tied up lobbying the health committee. They’re working on some make-or-break bills for the next session, and we’ve got to whisper in their ears the whole time or the idiots will forget who put them in office.”
“You make it sound so noble.”
Alexis swiped the room key in the slot, and Mark brushed past her and went into the bathroom. As his urine drilled into the toilet bowl, he raised his voice and said, “There are two bottom lines, honey. One is helping people, and the other is helping the company. If we can’t get our drugs out there, then people will suffer.”
“Please. I’ve heard enough of that from the council.”
Mark sat beside her on the bed. He’d left his fly unzipped. “Poor baby. Want me to get you a tranquilizer?”
“Hell, no. With CRO’s markup, it would probably run me ten bucks.”
“I know a guy with the company,” he said, kicking off his shoes and crawling behind her to rub her shoulders. She relaxed and let her head hang forward, wishing she could let down her hair and undress.
Mark’s strong hands kneaded the back of her neck, eliciting a sigh. They hadn’t made love since the previous weekend, and though statistically it was considered normal for ardor to decline during the early thirties, Alexis considered sex a foundation of good mental health.
The Centers for Disease Control should set a recommended minimum daily adult requirement of at least one orgasm.
“Hmm, if you gave Senator Botox this kind of treatment, he’d hand you the pen and let you write your own legislation,” Alexis said with a purr.
He scooted against her until the hard heat between his legs pressed against her back through her blouse. “Yeah, but think of the rumors. People already believe Congress is in bed with the pharmaceutical companies.”
“If they only knew,” she said, yielding as his hands slipped from her shoulders and around to her breasts. Her nipples hardened even before his fingers reached them. A classic case of conditioning.
“That feels good, honey,” she said, and now his breath played along the nape of her neck and his lips sought the vulnerable flesh where her scalp met her spine.
He slid his hand inside her bra, stroking the underside of one breast while his thumb teased her nipple. His other hand skillfully released the buttons of her blouse, his fingertips trailing along her belly as he did so.
She reached behind him and fished inside his pants, heat radiating as his erection filled her hand. “You’re fast.”
She raised her hips from the bed so he could hike up her skirt. He stroked the outside of her cotton panties. She was already moist, a little embarrassed at her own sluttishness.
“Forsyth would demand an exorcism if he knew you were wearing garter hose,” Mark said, easing aside an elastic leg band and stroking the soft hairs beneath the fabric.
She licked her fingers and felt along Mark’s length until she reached the soft, sensitive skin beneath the head. “Don’t screw up my fantasy.”
“I’m only screwing one thing,” he said, slipping a gentle finger inside her and smearing her juices up to her clitoris. He rubbed in steady, teasing circles until it swelled, and then he caressed the underside in counterpoint to her manipulation of his penis.
She writhed, pressing back against him, debating whether to turn but reluctant to break the electric flow from his fingers to her vagina. Maybe if she lifted up slightly, he could slide into her from behind and The page buzzer was like the shriek of a bomb siren.
Mark stopped the movement of his hands. “Damn,” he whispered.
“Damn? Everything’s still in the right place, isn’t it?”
“I shouldn’t have started this,” Mark said, slipping his hand from her panties and reaching toward his jacket on the bed. “I’ve got cocktails with some FDA suits in half an hour, and with traffic like it is-”
Alexis groaned, still holding him in her hand. “‘Work before play’ is for responsible grown-ups, not us.”
“We wouldn’t have time for the full monty, anyway. You’ve got the council meeting this afternoon.”
“And I’m going to have to sit through it with moist panties.”
“Well, leave them at home.” Mark adopted a light tone, trying to minimize her disappointment. “Maybe give Forsyth a peep show like Sharon Stone in Basic Instinct. Torture him with all the delights of heaven and hell.”
Alexis squeezed his fading erection as a farewell and reminder. “Or maybe give him the first one of these he’s had since the Eisenhower administration.”
“You packed the vibrator, didn’t you?”
“No. With airport security like it is, I didn’t want TSA to charge me with smuggling torpedoes. Besides, that’s a placebo effect. I need a dose of the real thing.”
He rolled off the bed, tucked himself back into his fly as best he could, and adjusted his necktie. She pointed at the jutting tent of his pants. “You going to catch a cab like that?”
“I’ll picture the president’s wife. That ought to stifle it.” He gave her a spousal peck on the cheek. “Tomorrow night, I promise. We’ll go for a double.”
“Big promise.”
As Mark brushed his teeth, Alexis rummaged in her luggage and found a granola bar, choking it down with one of the hotel’s eight-dollar bottles of spring water. Good thing the federal government offered a generous per diem, or she couldn’t afford to serve on the bioethics council.
Mark’s salary was in the low six figures, but she still insisted on keeping their expenses separate when possible. Even though she understood the male’s traditional role as provider, she was enough of a feminist to keep gender issues neutral in her own marriage.
Man smart, woman smarter. Acting like the weaker sex.
And my sex is feeling pretty damned wobbly right about now.
She got one more kiss out of Mark before she returned to the bioethics committee and more debate about the use of psychopharmacology to make people happier, more productive, and better socially adjusted.
In short, whether drugs should be used to make everyone feel the same. To feel “normal.”
God, what she wouldn’t give for a normal life.