Insufferable Proximity (63 page)

“I don’t have a choice.” she whimpered, her head bowed in defeat. He hated seeing her like this and made a personal vow to destroy whoever was doing this to them.

“There is no chance in hell I am going to let you leave the firm, so get it out of your head. Fritz is hot on the saboteur’s trail, there will be an arrest soon and then we can get back to our lives. Everything is going to be alright.”

“No it’s not! I can never face those people again, I can’t go back there.” she sobbed, her head going back down, but Julian grabbed her chin and lifted her face to look into her eyes.

“Then let’s get married.” he said and Heaven instantly stopped crying, looking completely baffled.

“What?” she asked completely stunned by his perplexing words. “Did you just say let‘s get married?”

“Yes.” he nodded with a straight face, letting her know he wasn’t kidding.

“And you’re serious!” it was more of a statement then a question.

“It’s simple, if we get married, they can never question our relationship. They will know beyond a shadow of a doubt that you are not my personal whore.” he grinned. “Although, I do like the sound of that.”

“No way, I am not going to marry you to soften the blow of public humiliation.” She shook her head.

“Why not?” he asked, more shocked that she refused to marry him then he was for asking her to marry him in the first place.

“Because it’s wrong, it’s unethical!” she explained.

“No, fucking you from behind in my office while under contract is unethical, getting married, after all of our co-workers watch our sex tape, is practical.” he didn’t mince his words.

“But it’s still for the wrong reason.”

“Don’t tell me Ms. Stone-hearted Heaven Deville is one of those sappy girls who will only marry for love.” he raised his eyebrows.

“Yes I most certainly am!” she said as her chin rose with pride. “There is nothing wrong with getting married for love, that’s the reason you’re supposed to get married in the first place.”

“So you’re saving marriage for love?” He asked.

“Of course.”

“Is that why you were saving your virginity too?”

“I refuse to answer that question.” she turned her head, refusing to look at him.

“You were saving yourself for that perfect wedding and your perfect groom, weren‘t you?”

“Maybe.” she shrugged.

“So if you were saving your virginity for marriage and I took your virginity, wouldn’t it make sense to get married?”

“No, only love makes sense when it comes to marriage.”

“Well I know you definitely don’t love me, sometimes I wonder if you still hate me.”

“Of course I still hate you, you’re mean.” the corner of her mouth raised at her weak attempt of sarcasm.

“So are you.” he smiled, glad to see her attempting to grin.

“Touché.” she shrugged.

“But regardless of how mean you are, I don’t hate you.” he confessed and Heaven just watched him for a moment, seeing the truth in his eyes.

“I guess I don’t hate you either,” she finally confessed, tired of hiding it. “Actually, Julie, I don’t hate you at all. In fact, I like you more then I want to, a lot more.”

“I feel the same.” he said taking her hand and sliding a ring on her finger.

“Julian-”

“Shush,” he put his finger over her lips, preventing her from speaking. “It’s not a proposal, it’s just a ring I want you to wear until this dies down, but there are a few rules.”

“No more rules, Mr. King.” she shook her head.

“Just one- no other man but me.” he warned her and she nodded.

“That’s easy enough, since I will not be having sex until I find the man I want to marry and then actually get married to him.”

“You mean when you find your future ex-husband.” he grinned.

“Why would you say that?” she pouted.

“If you’re going to wait until your wedding night for sex that means you’re going to wait just long enough to find out that your new husband can’t make you feel the way that I make you feel. I know exactly how you like your sex” he slid his hand up her thigh, pushing her gown up as he went, “and I know you’ll divorce him before the ink is dry on your wedding license. Then you’ll come running back to me.”

“You think so?” she asked spreading her legs a little further apart.

“I know so.” he said as the tip of his finger slid under the edge of her panties. “Now that you’re my fiancée I get to burn all of your panties.”

“I thought you said it was just a ring?” she asked, confused by the sudden glimmer of hope that she felt.

“It is just a ring, a ring that ties you to me.” he answered as the tip of his finger toyed with her opening for a moment before partially sliding in.

“Until the saboteur is caught?”

“Yes.”

“Then what do we do? A huge public break up?”

“No, we’re not going to publicly break up.” he thrust his finger deep inside of her and she arched her hips off the bed.

“Quietly break-up?”

“No breaking-up.” he had just bent to kiss her when his cell phone rang. Normally when he was with Heaven, he ignored his phone, but there was a chance it was Fritz with some information.

“Yeah.” he spoke into the phone. “Shit! We’re on our way.” he barked then looked at Heaven with an unreadable expression on his face. “We have to go.”

“Where?”

“Your place.”

“Why? What happened?”

“Someone broke into your house.”

***

After an intense ride to Heaven’s house, they jumped out of the car and walked through the small front yard. Julian headed towards Fritz who was looking at a window on the side of the house, while Heaven went towards her front steps.

“Oh no.” Heaven shook her head as she neared the open front door and then looked into her ransacked front room. Her jewelry was dumped in the middle of the floor and over five hundred dollars was scattered across the room.

“The police should be here any moment.” Fritz said as walked towards him. “I’ve checked every window and none of them have been tampered with. The back door is still locked from the inside and again, no evidence of tampering. I believe the point of entry was through the front door.” they turned to see Heaven storming towards them with a look of pure fury distorting her pretty features.

“This wasn’t a robbery, some of my expensive jewelry as well as the petty cash I had locked away are scattered across the floor.”

“This is definitely your saboteur.” Fritz said then pointed to the window behind him and Heaven saw a computer printed picture of her and Julian, exactly like the one that had been passed around the firm. “Here come the police now.”

***

The woods across the street from Heaven’s house were dark and suspiciously still, and neither the police officers, the private detective, nor the lawyers saw the dark figure crouched behind the monstrous tree watching them. The dark clothing blended with the black shadows that twisted around the trees and the low breathing was covered by the hum of the slight breeze that rustled the leaves. The saboteur sat still as stone, delighted by the scene and listening to their every word, enraptured by the empowerment of invisibility.

***

Unfortunately there was nothing the police could do, without the identity of the suspect. Their hands were tied and after an hour of getting nowhere, they finally left. Fritz on the other hand knew just what to do, his reason for coming to Heaven‘s house in the first place was to install a security system. So he waited until the police finally wrapped it up and left the premises before he installed it. After he was finished he taught Heaven the different functions of the security keypad from the outside to the inside of the house and helped her set up her pass word. Fritz then informed them that he would be installing a few surveillance cameras around her house tomorrow before he jumped into his truck and left for the night.

“Let’s go to my house.” Julian said holding her hand.

“No, I have to clean this up.” she said looking around at her ransacked house, feeling her anger begin to spark. “I can’t wait until we find who did this.” she sneered then suddenly heard the familiar sound of her mother’s annoying car horn and ran over to the window to pull the curtain to the side.

The white limo pulled in front of Heaven’s house and a half a dozen women stepped out of the car, one at a time. They all wore matching white spandex mini dresses and had cleaning supplies in their hands. Last but certainly not least to emerge from the limousine was her mother, dressed in a hip length white faux fur coat with a bushy collar that dominated the lower half of her face. She also had a ridiculous hot pink and white striped miniature top hat perched off to the side of her perfectly black coiffed hair.

“Aw shit, who called my mother?” Heaven shook her head, already knowing her mother would start with her dramatics, but still happy to see her none the less.

“Where are you, my precious, darling daughter?” Sybille cried as she walked up the front steps, two of the women holding the front doors open for her as she walked through. “Oh my poor baby!” she cried when she set her eyes on her disheveled daughter, then wrapped her arms around her and held her close for a moment before pulling back. “I want you to just sit back and relax, mother will take care of everything.”

Heaven sat at her dining room table with Julian as her mother made a fresh pot of tea for them and the women began working their magical cleaning skills across her house.

“I should be helping. “

“Nonsense, you should be resting. You have had a traumatic week and I insist you let us handle It.” her mother said setting a cup of tea in front of her.

“Fine.”

“And Brutus should be here soon.” Sybille said, her sister had already informed their most reliable security guard at the brothel, to sit at Heaven’s for the night.

“Mom, I don’t need Brutus guarding my front door.” she shook her head ready to object.

“Well call your aunt Coco and talk to her, she made the arrangement.” Sybille said knowing how her daughters mind worked. Heaven would assume Sybille was being over protective with her usual dramatic flair, but Coco wasn’t the least bit over dramatic and only made moves she felt were necessary.

“Brutus is a good idea.” Julian added and Sybille smiled from ear to ear.

***

They walked into her bedroom and Julian locked the door behind them. He then proceeded to check the windows, all the while stripping down to his pale grey boxer shorts. Heaven quickly stripped down to her bra and panties then slipped on a red cotton nightgown.

“Why are you putting that on?” he asked in disapproval and she shrugged.

“Because there could possibly be some freak-show pervert watching us right now.”

“No one can see us and I’m stripping it off you before you get in bed.”
Julian finished then sat on her bed and leaned back against the headboard. Heaven walked over and sat on the edge of the bed, her back to him and her head down looking at the ring on her finger.

“It’s been a crazy week.” she said absently. “From the debut of our sex tape to our fake engagement.”

“We could always wait a few days before we go back to work.” he slid his hand up her thigh then under the skirt of her nightgown.

“No, I want to get it done and over with.” she answered, if she was ever going to face her co-workers again, it was now or never.

“I agree.” he said, his finger sliding lazily over her panty covered sex.

“Besides, we need to find out who’s doing this and since the saboteur is our co-worker, it will be easier to figure it out at work,” Heaven said looking back at him. “One of those people in that firm did this to us and tomorrow we will look directly at them, maybe even bump into them, but still not know who it is.”

“Shush,” he sat up wrapping his free hand around her waist as the hand under her dress slid up to caress her breasts. “I’ll be right there next to you and there’s no way I am letting anyone touch a hair on your pretty head.” he kissed the side of her head. “Now come on you need to get some sleep.”

“There is no way I’ll be able to sleep any time soon.”

“I know how to put you to sleep.” he grinned watching her get up and then strip her nightgown off. He slid back to make room for her then tapped the space next to him, she walked over to the bed then stopped and quickly removed her bra. “Good girl.” he whispered, delighted that she voluntarily bared her breasts. The moment she laid down on the bed next to him, he bent his head to kiss the tips of her breasts, his hand sliding into her panties and his talented fingers immediately went to work on her sensitive sex.

***

Julian watched Heaven sleep, thinking of the crazy events that had forced him to give her the ring. What that ring stood for was as torturous to him as it was comforting, and he was still unsure of his feelings. He was by no means ready to settle down at this point in his life, but at the same time he was not ready to let Heaven go either. He hated the thought of settling down with just one woman, but he hated the thought of Heaven being with any man other than him. He didn’t want to marry anyone but he refused to let Heaven marry anyone other than him. He was being selfish and he knew it but had no idea how to settle the duel with himself enough to compromise.