His Terms

“That, or they were fucked so hard by him they couldn’t walk into work the next day.”

Sorcha started laughing.

Cora shook her head. “But seriously, you know the majority of them left because he fucked them and then refused to have more of a personal relationship with them.”

“The majority?” Sorcha lifted a brow and grinned.

“Okay, not the majority, but more than one and that is a lot.” Cora stood. “I’m getting a couple more beers. You want the same thing?”

“No, give me something hard, because I have a feeling whatever Rian Hartford wants from me tomorrow is going to make me wish I had gotten trashed.”

6

Sorcha felt the drool on the side of her face before she even blinked her eyes open. Her pillow was damp beneath her cheek, and when she lifted her head and glanced at the clock, she had to blink a few times to have the numbers become clear. She might still be slightly drunk, and she also knew that her hangover would be hell rolled over and shat upon. At twenty-five one would think she could have known when to say stop to the alcohol, but after a certain number of shots, she was feeling good, and certainly didn’t want the fun to stop.

Now she regretted tossing the drinks back like they were water, but then again Cora had been buying, and Sorcha’s day had been shitty.

She glanced at the clock again, rubbed her eyes to try and clear her blurry vision, and then did a double take. “Shit.” Eleven in the morning was late as hell, especially when she had to meet Mr. Hartford in an hour, and traffic would be a bitch. Sorcha rolled out of bed and immediately clutched her head in pain. She stumbled over her clothes scattered on the floor, and opted to forgo a shower to make sure she could get there on time, but screw that. She smelled the alcohol coming from her pores.

“You’re up early.”

Sorcha glanced at the small couch in her living room, and saw Cora sprawled out on it. The blanket covered half her face, and she was in her bra and underwear.

“I’m going to be late for the meeting with Mr. Hartford, and it isn’t early, but eleven in the freaking morning.” She grabbed an outfit from her closet, a clean pair of panties and a bra, and headed into the bathroom. She was going to have to take the quickest shower in the history of showers if she was going to be even ten minutes late.

Once she had her hair and body washed, she toweled off, got her underwear on, and quickly rubbed on some concealer under her eyes to get rid of the raccoon look. She put her hair in a bun, and got dressed. It was Saturday, and fuck Rian Hartford if he thought she was snazzing up for this impromptu meeting he had planned.

“Good luck,” Cora said without moving from the couch, or taking off the blanket from her face.

Traffic was, as Sorcha expected, horrendous, but once she reached the office building she finally let herself breathe. Her heels clicked on the marble flooring, and she showed the security officer at the front desk her badge. The Hartford and McNamara office building was pretty heavily secured, even on weekends, and unless a visitor had an access code for the elevators on the day of their appointment, or worked here with a badge, they weren’t getting any farther than the elevators.

She nodded at the guard that was stationed at the bank of elevators, swiped her badge to unlock one of them, and then stepped inside when the doors to the elevator opened for her. After hitting the top floor button, she glanced at the floor to ceiling mirror right behind her. She quickly fixed her bun again, but a few, dark wavy strands refused to be restrained. The outfit she wore was a simple black dress, empire waist and a sheer grey cardigan over it. And then she had on her black pumps, no panty hose, and no make-up aside from the under eye concealer.

So, all in all she looked like a hot fucking mess.

She didn’t look good enough to be working in a place like this right now, but hell, it was Saturday, she was nursing a half-hangover, half-still-drunk mindset, and so this was as good as it was going to get. She just hoped that whatever Rian Hartford had to say was quick, and that he got to the point.

The elevator reached the top floor, and the doors slid open. She smoothed her hands on her thighs, feeling so damn nervous for some reason, and actually had to make herself take that first step. The office was silent and still, and there was this thickness in the air. Sorcha couldn’t describe the feeling she had as she walked closer to the double office doors, the ones she knew closed her off from Rian Hartford.