The Dealmaker (Sex & Bonds 1)

Did she leave because my family made her uncomfortable? Or did she leave because she wanted my sisters and mom and me to enjoy the lesson, and she knew I couldn’t do that if she was there watching us with our boss?

Why the fuck would someone like her be nice to someone like me? Especially after the way I’ve treated her? I’ve never been kind to her, that’s for damn sure.

Why isn’t she holding it over my head? The fact that she now knows things about me virtually no one else does? She could threaten me. Blackmail me. Force me into a very bad deal.

Instead, she appears to be taking the high road.

My hand shakes when I pick up my phone to dial into our morning meeting. I go through my axes so quickly, Aiden hops on the line to tell me to slow down. My collar feels too tight. I tug at it. Curse when my elbow hits my water bottle and sends it flying across my desk.

The first couple hours of the day go by in a blur. The Fed is signaling an imminent rate hike thanks to rising inflation, so companies like Walmart and Boeing are rushing to issue new bonds to lock in lower rates before that happens—bonds we’re tasked with selling and then trading when the deal frees at the end of the day. By nine a.m., Ian down in syndicate has announced no fewer than twelve new deals, and by the time price guidance begins coming out at ten, the desk is manic. I’m fielding calls from clients, brokers, syndicate, and research—sometimes all at once.

It’s a welcome distraction. I don’t think about Nora or her lipstick. Not until I see her standing up and leaning over her screens, waving at me as she holds two fingers over the microphone of her headset.

“Yeah?”

“I’ve got Brian at BamCo on the line. He’s looking to buy your Caterpillar thirties—the three point sixty-sevens. What’s your exact size?”

I pull up the bond on my bottom right screen. “I’ve got four point two million even. The offer I sent out this morning stands. Seventy-one.”

She looks down, focused, as she relays the information before covering the microphone again. “He’ll buy them at seventy-two.”

I let out a huff. “Don’t fuck with me over a basis point.”

“Don’t fuck with me when I’m on the phone with one of our biggest clients. I got you that extra basis point last week when we did that FedEx trade.”

“Return the favor, dude,” Brooks says.

Nora nods. “That’s how playing fair works.”

God, she is pissing me off today with being right and shit. “Fine, that’s done. But only because I’m too fucking busy to haggle over a small trade.”

Nora rolls her eyes but has the grace to ignore my jab. Again, why? Instead, she asks me to spot treasuries when I’m ready.

This is a seven-year bond that’s still priced off the ten-year treasury, which works in my favor, profit-wise. Bonds that mature in five years are priced off the five-year treasury; bonds that mature in thirty years price off the thirty-year treasury.

I pull up my treasury screen and give Nora the number, then wait for her to confirm. She furrows her brow. “He’s seeing a different number, one oh one point five.”

“Of course he is,” I grunt, jamming my finger into the return key so my page refreshes. To be fair, the market is all over the place today, and I really don’t have time to haggle. “I can make that work.”

“Done.” She gives me a thumbs up. “Four point two million Caterpillar three point sixty-sevens of thirty sold to BamCo at seventy-two.”

“Nice job,” Porgeous says, holding out his fist to Nora. She gives him the bump he’s looking for, laughing when he makes this stupid little exploding sound as he separates his fingers. I don’t know what it is—there’s something forced about her laugh, maybe—but the thought hits me out of nowhere: maybe she’s also playing a bigger game here.

Maybe she’s also had to pretend to be someone she’s not to fit in.

My center softens, which I immediately ignore because I don’t do soft. Soft makes you stupid, and I can’t afford to be stupid right now. Besides, Nora has an A-plus pedigree. She was literally born into this world, one I didn’t know existed until I got to college and everyone and their mother was obsessed with landing a gig in “I-banking” after graduation. She doesn’t need my sympathy. Just like I don’t need hers.

“Ticket incoming, Morgan,” she says at the same moment I get a pop-up on one of my screens.

My phone starts to ring, so I quickly scan the sales ticket and am about to approve it so I can pick up this damn call when my gaze catches on the price of the bonds I just sold her. It’s wrong.