Unfortunately, I stared a little too long, and to my horror, it wasn’t Laurie that noticed my gaze, but her mom. Fuck. The old woman shot me a look, which made me quickly bury my head down into my work.
Then, I overheard a dulcet voice say, “Looks like another one has a crush on you. How about that?”
Laurie laughed, her voice tinkling. “Whatever you say, Mom.”
Once Cruella de Ville made her exit, Laurie and I made eye contact. She smiled subtly, nodding her chin once. My heart raced. Maybe she felt something. Maybe Laurie would call me to her office for some discipline.
And I wasn’t too far off the mark. Because at the end of the day, a text message bleeped on my phone. It was from an unknown number, but the contents of the message told me who it was right away:
You will be punished for disobeying me.
Hell yeah … I was ready for my punishment at the hands of the beautiful brunette.
But all in its own good time. Laurie hadn’t told me when or where, so I stuck with my original plan. After work, I met up with my best friend Asher Turner for drinks at our favorite bar downtown. We simply wanted to chat and catch up on things, but the more drinks I threw back, the looser my lips became. It was easy to open up with Asher because he was pretty open about his own exploits as an assistant coach for the L.A. Chargers. Dude always had stories to tell, whether it was drama between the players or some cheerleader he was scoring with.
I told Asher about everything that had been going on since my internship started. He almost didn’t believe me at first when I said that I was having hardcore sex with the editor-in-chief. Plus, the fact that I’d actually hooked up with her randomly before my first day was even more unbelievable.
“It might not be a bad thing,” Asher said to me after I was done with my story. “You guys are into that BDSM kind of stuff? Maybe she means ‘punish’ in a good way.”
“I doubt it,” was my grunt, taking a sip of my fourth rum and Coke. “This woman is the boss.”
“You might’ve misread her,” Asher argued. “Sounds like you two had a really good thing going on. I doubt she’ll want to stop now.”
I shrugged.
“It just sucks,” was my reply, the words growing more slurred by the minute. “I’m still so turned on, bro. I’m going to be so fucking bummed if Laurie calls it off. I just, you know, I want to at least fuck her one more time, just to get it out of my system. She’s so goddamn hot, man.”
“Well, if she calls it off, just move on to the next one,” he said reasonably. “There’s plenty of hot chicks here tonight. We can go in and double team it.”
But my mind couldn’t focus on anything but Laurie.
“I don’t like being told no, though,” were my words. “She’s the best lay I’ve ever had. She’s a lot of fun, too. I never want it to end whenever we’re doing it, it’s like the gift that keeps on giving.”
“Dude, you know things can get complicated when you’re fucking your boss,” Asher warned. “Believe me, I have to tiptoe whenever I’m trying to smash a cheerleader.”
I ignored him.
“Laurie is such a woman,” came my low growl. “I’m never this comfortable so quickly around a chick. I actually wouldn’t mind actually taking her out. Sucks that we work together.”
“You’re fucking drunk, man.” Asher laughed.
“Shut the fuck up,” was my slur. “I’m not drunk. Laurie is a real woman.”
“I get it, man, she’s a woman.” He laughed.
Suddenly, my head jerked around as I looked around the bar in a brief bout of paranoia, scanning for any familiar faces.
“What’s up?” Asher asked.
“Just making sure no one from work is here,” was my morose answer. “I don’t know who I’m going to run into anymore. The woman I hooked up with on Tinder turned out to be my boss the next day. You never know anymore.”
“Don’t freak out about one girl, man,” he said lightly. “I’m thirty-one, and I’m happier than all my married friends. The secret is diversity. Having sex with just one woman will get boring, I assure you. Keep up what you were doing before, buddy. You’ll enjoy life more.”
“Yeah, maybe.” But I didn’t believe my words anymore. Things had been so hot with Laurie lately that it was hard to believe I’d ever want anyone else.
“You know dude, I can still talk to Chuck for you if you want,” Asher said. “He’s got a lot of pull over there at Sports Life. I’m telling you, he could help you out.”
“Sure,” was my grateful reply. “This magazine I’m working for now is girly as fuck.” Not to mention that my boss was driving me crazy after only three days.