Page 20 of Not Safe for Work
Thankfully, though, Abel quickly stepped in. “No you didn’t.”
“Must you contradict me?”
“I would stop but that would leave you a liar.”
“I am quite content to be one if it means I can avoid this awkwardness.”
“No you’re not. If you were, you wouldn’t have asked me to help you explain all of this to Amy.”
Her heart jumped to hear that one. However, she didn’t have time to consider it.
They were still arguing. Bantering. Flirting.
“At the time I was not quite feeling like myself,” Hartford said.
In reply, Abel licked at his upper lip, as if he was going to kiss him instead of just make a point. “Really? I thought you were more yourself than you’d ever been.”
“So then you believe the real me is a jealous, lustful fool who can’t so much as express his own desire to the people he adores? How low your opinion of me is, Abel.”
“My opinion isn’t low. My opinion is that you should embrace those feelings. They don’t make you less of a titan of industry. You won’t suddenly drop ten points on the stock market if you indulge yourself. Nobody cares if a billionaire enjoys a little voyeurism and kinky sex with two attractive people. In fact, I think it’s practically expected of a man who has his own plane.”
Hartford shot him an impatient look. “Yes, expected of philanderers and immoral thieves and treacherous blaggards. People who are beyond the pale.”
“You think you’re a treacherous blaggard because you want to watch us again?”
“I didn’t say again. I didn’t say it like that.”
“Then explain to Amy how you did say it. It seems she would very much like to hear.”
“I said . . .” Hartford started. Then stopped when her eyes met his.
He’s floundering,she thought. But over what? The thought of her judging him? It seemed like that might be the case.
It took him an age before he finally rushed out: “That if she were not my employee then perhaps I would enjoy such things.”
Once he had said it, he looked at the floor. His face actually blazed red in a way that made her almost giddy.
Giddy—and now able to talk to him with the confidence with which he’d always spoken to her.
“Well, it’s a good thing you fired me then.”
Behind Hartford, Abel brought his fist to his mouth and bit down. His eyes flashed with delight, as if she’d said the rudest thing in the world.
And Hartford seemed to agree with him.
“You can’t possibly mean that. It’s obscene to ask it of you.”
“I know,” she said. “That’s exactly what I like about it. The obscenity.”
“Perhaps you would not say so if you knew what my proclivities truly are.”
“Are they mostly a fetish for watching people you are attracted to having hot sex with each other while you masturbate? Because if so, then I have to say: It’s not that much of a mystery. Or that obscene.”
“You would probably think so if you knew the rest of it.”
He dropped his tone when he said the words, as if to warn her off.
Not that he succeeded in any way whatsoever.
