The Boss (The Boss 1)

“I remember now.” I sat up, wincing at soreness in all my limbs. Thursday morning was usually our morning to work out together, but I’d gotten enough of a workout with Neil. “Do I have to?”

“Yes. You told me I wasn’t allowed to let you make excuses.” A truly naughty smile crossed her face. “And you have to tell me what happened last night.”

Some friendships have clear-cut boundaries, wherein all relationship talk ends strictly at the bedroom door. That is not our friendship. I pulled on my sweats and blearily climbed out of bed. “Give me ten minutes.”

Holli and I have memberships to the twenty-four hour gym down the block from our apartment. It’s a small facility, and one of the best things about it is that it’s usually pretty empty early in the morning. Which might not bode well for the place staying open, but for now, it suited our needs just fine.

The need for privacy, for example, when you’re laying out all the tawdry specific details of wild sex with your boss while you’re also trying to get your cardio in on the elliptical.

“No, he did not!” Holli gasped, taking a sip from her pink aluminum water bottle. Her exclamation was in reaction to my whispered recounting of Neil wanting to put his face exactly where he’d ended up putting it.

“He totally said that,” I made the scout’s honor sign and crossed my heart. “Remember how I used to go on and on about the night in L.A., and how it was the best sex anyone ever had, ever? He topped it by, like, ten.” A shiver went up my spine just remembering it. “The sick thing is, I want to do it all over again, like right now. We had sex three times last night. He made me come right before I left. I should have reached my yearly quota of partner-assisted orgasms by now.”

“Is he going to want to do it again?” she asked, hitting a button on the display.

I nodded. “From every discussion we’ve had, I’ve gotten the feeling that he wants to make this a regular thing. And get this...”

My speech halted. I didn’t know if I could actually utter the next part out loud. I was worried about what she would think, which was silly, considering how open she was about kinky stuff the rest of the time. I was surprised at how much I cared whether she liked Neil or not, and I worried she might make some kind of judgment about him before ever meeting him.

But why would that matter? I shook myself out of my funk. “Okay, don’t laugh. But he wants to do some domination and submission type stuff with me.”

Her eyes grew wide. “Oh my god, why would I laugh at that? It sounds hot! Are you gonna do it?”

“Yeah. I’ll try anything once. And at least I know he can make it worth my while.” I snickered to myself.

“Look at you, all sexually confident.” Holli grinned, showing her perfect white teeth. “So, how does this work, do you like, get dressed up in leather and beat the shit out of him, or—”

She caught me mid-swallow from my water bottle. I almost choked.

“How can you take something awesome and make it sound so unsexy? But no. He’s into being the boss.”

“Doesn’t he get enough of that all day long?” She shook her head. “Look, whatever you want to do. I don’t think I could let someone tie me up.”

We finished our workout and I headed back to the apartment to shower and get ready for work. Holli just hit the showers at the gym, and would head to her shoot. I would never appropriately disguise my envy that she had a job where it was not only acceptable, but also preferred, for her to show up looking as ratty and unpolished as possible. Today, she would be posing for American Apparel, so the comfy clothes she’d be wearing all day just added insult to injury.

Hey, you’re the one who injured yourself, I reminded myself as I slipped my keys into my purse and left the apartment for work. I really had overdone it, and not on the elliptical. My inner thighs ached; my voice was hoarse from enthusiastic overuse, and even my feet hurt from the constant curling of my toes. It felt wonderfully wrong to strut into work the morning after fucking your boss, still sore in your muscles and other parts.

I practically ran to catch the train, and hurried up to the office. I was later than usual, but I so did not want to arrive after Neil. I didn’t want him to think I was going to take advantage of him by shaving time off my work day in trade for sex. Lucky for me, he was actually behind schedule.