Mikalo's Flame (7 page)

He had pulled back, easily guiding me to him,
his strong arms holding me tight as I sat on his lap.

His fingers worked the large buttons of my
coat.

The material opened and spread, falling to
the side to hide us.

He had kissed me then, his hands finding my
breasts through my shirt and giving a gentle squeeze.

I had gasped.

“No,” I said, rising to stand.

He had pulled me back, holding me firm, his
other hand working his zipper.

“Lift your skirt, my Grace,” he had
breathed.

A jogger approached.

We paused.

I couldn’t do this. Public sex just wasn’t
for me. I craved the warmth of our bedroom. Tasting his naked
skin.

This desperate fumbling of zippers and
buttons in plain sight of anyone who bothered to spend even a
millisecond watching us just didn’t do it for me.

And with things at work suddenly iffy, the
last thing I needed was to be arrested for public indecency. Or
whatever they’d call this.

So, no.

He gripped his hardness in his fist.

Oh shit.

I suddenly wanted him.

The jogger ran past, oblivious to my desire
or Mikalo’s nakedness.

“The skirt is lifted, yes,” he urged me, “And
then you sit and I will move, gently, quietly.”

His lips found mine again as he reached under
my coat for my skirt.

“It will be very quick,” he said, his lips
close to mine. “I know this to be true. And this appetite, it will
be happy.”

Another kiss, his tongue moving deep as he
inhaled and then groaned, the sound resonating in his chest.

A sound I found incredibly sexy.

I flirted with the idea. Ignored how
preposterous it seemed. How idiotic it would be in retrospect were
we to get caught. How dangerous it all was.

And then I thought of that night, drunk on
ouzo and giving in to my own appetite, I had taken him in the park,
in the dark, among the trees. Had demanded he satisfy my hunger.
And how he, maybe, had battled his own doubts to make me happy, the
eventual coupling quick, exciting, dangerous. Memorable.

“Okay,” I said before pressing my lips to his
and standing slightly, enough for him to push the skirt up past my
hips and, his fingers briefly flirting with my growing heat, move
aside that thin layer of fine silk.

He paused, thinking, his mind racing.

“Phone,” he suddenly said.

What?

“Your phone,” he repeated. “Bring it out.
Hold it to your ear as if there is a talk.”

Ah, got it.

Poised above him, his hardness hidden by the
coat, my skirt bunched above my waist, his fingers teasing the
growing wet, I jammed my hand into my pocket and brought out my
cell, placing it to my ear, the pantomime of a shared cell phone,
our heads pressed together as we listened, explaining our being
close should anyone care or look twice.

Gripping himself, he pressed his hardness to
me and closed his eyes.

“Please,” he whispered.

I waited, teasing him.

An older couple turned the corner many steps
away and started ambling their way toward us.

Suddenly afraid, I hesitated.

And then I gasped, Mikalo slapping his
hardness against me.

“Wait,” I whispered.

The couple drew close.

“Talk on the phone,” he quickly said,
pressing his face close to mine as if we were both listening.

I acted as if I was talking, the phone at my
ear.

The older man and woman, lost in
conversation, oblivious to us, ambled past.

Finding my courage, I lowered myself, his
width stretching me, his length filling me, the beauty of it almost
indescribable, the brief pain damn near addictive.

He sighed, his forehead pressed to mine.

It began.

The movements, his movements, small, slow,
careful. The phone pressed to my ear, our cheeks pressed together,
my voluminous coat shielding us, our secret sex unknown to those
strangers who wandered past.

Small beads of sweat rolled down his
forehead.

I snaked my hand around the back of his neck,
my fingers reaching into his hair to grip and then pull.

“Do it,” I whispered.

A quick thrust.

I bit my lip.

“Fuck yes,” I gasped. “Do it. Quick.”

I pulled his hair again, my lips moving to
his to kiss and then, gently pulling away, to bite, my teeth
catching his lower lip.

“God,” I said into his mouth, “So fucking
good.”

His pace quickened, the movements still
small, my coat still hiding us.

“Yes?” he asked, his voice quiet and thick
with desire.

“Fuck me,” I said. “Fuck me, Mikalo.”

He was getting close. His eyes were closing,
his lids growing heavy with the approach of his own quiet
storm.

“Do it,” I said yet again. “Fuck me. Hard.
I’m yours --”

“Yes.”

“I’m yours, Mikalo, to fuck. C’mon --”

Another pull of the hair.

“Do it --”

“Oh ...”

“Yeah, that’s it --”

“My Grace .. “

“C’mon --”

“Yes ...”

“Now,” I whispered.

A groan, low and strong, his chest rumbling
with the sound.

He stopped, throbbing deep within me, his
breath ragged, his flesh dripping with small beads of sweat.

And then he was done.

I kissed him as I stood, his hands at once
pulling down my skirt, his hardness -- yes, Mikalo still stayed
hard even after we finished -- uncomfortably tucked into his jeans,
pushed painfully to the side, and zipped away.

The phone still to my ear, I kissed him again
and then, gathering my coat around me, sat next to him on the
bench.

He leaned his head back, grinning from ear to
ear.

Then he looked over at me.

I smiled back and then was suddenly
afraid.

What if we had been seen, our lovemaking not
as secret as I hoped, and there were cops on the way to bust those
perverts screwing on the park bench?

“We should go,” I said.

“Yes,” he answered with a nod of the head.
“In a moment.”

He glanced down at his jeans.

Oh right.

“Think of your grandma in bloomers,” I said
with a grin.

“Oh no ...”

“Or a group of nuns --”

“Are they naked nuns?” he asked with a raise
of his eyebrows.

“No,” I said. “Just nuns. Old and saggy. In
black. Very stern and mean.”

“I will think of Mara Byzan,” he then said.
“And then my excitement will go away.”

I laughed.

“You like this idea,” he asked, teasing
me.

“I love it! Thoughts of me get you excited,
thoughts of her make that excitement go away. It’s perfect.”

He paused, squeezing his eyes closed, his
nose scrunched up, a grimace on his face.

“Ah,” he then said as his eyes popped open.
“And like the magic, thoughts of her make my pleasure go away.

“Now I can stand, I think.”

He stood, his hand out to me.

I rose, his arms at once gathering me to him,
his lips pressed to my forehead.

“Your scent,” he breathed against my skin. “I
love it.”

Pulling away, I turned, pulling him along
with me.

“Let’s get you home before we get into more
trouble.”

He laughed, following me as I turned down the
path.

We walked, hand in hand, around the
corner.

We stopped.

Deni stood hand in hand with a very young
handsome man.

She smiled.

I smiled back.

With a nod of her head, she passed, her
gorgeous, silent stranger in tow.

I glanced at Mikalo who waited, confused.

She took several steps and then I heard her
stop.

I turned.

She was facing me.

“You’re glowing again, Ronan,” she teased. “A
fresh glow. Minutes old.

“In fact, he’s still got beads of sweat on
his forehead,” she then said, looking at Mikalo with a grin.

“I mean, seriously,” she continued. “This is
getting damn near ridiculous.

“Do you guys ever stop?”

And with a smile and a small squeeze of her
young man’s hand, she turned to go.

“You have to be joking,” he repeated.

“I’m telling you, Bill,” I said. “He sat
exactly where you’re sitting, claimed M&A as his, and then
insisted he and ‘Partner White’ --”

Bill laughed.

“Partner White?” he asked.

“Yeah, the newly ordained Partner White.”

“Does this make you ‘Partner Grace’?” he
teased.

“No,” I said. “What it makes me is crazy and
irritated and annoyed.

“Anyway, Abby sent Marcus to follow me around
and make sure the work I’m doing for the Byzans is up-to-scratch,
or something.”

“That’s ridiculous.”

“Tell me about it,” I said. “Who the hell can
focus with that cologne-drenched, greasy-haired Neanderthal
breathing down my neck?

“Anyway we can get her to call him off? The
boy is fucking annoying.”

“Yeah, yeah, let me have a few words with
Richardson upstairs.”

He paused.

I sighed, relieved Rainier Richardson,
Managing Partner, was going to get a heads-up. One word from him
and they’d have to back off.

“I guess it makes sense now,” he then
said.

“What’s that?” I asked. “What makes
sense?”

“Why you were a no-show at the dinner last
night.”

I leaned back in my chair.

“What dinner?”

“Ah,” he said, his eyes suddenly on his
shoes.

“Let me guess: the Byzans had a dinner and
Marcus and Abigail sat front and center and did their best to worm
their way into their lives.”

Bill nodded.

“Yep. And you had no clue?”

“No one told me,” I said.

“Then Marcus didn’t have the okay from you to
offer them tax planning suggestions?”

I closed my eyes and groaned.

“He didn’t.”

Bill nodded.

“He did,” he then said. “And even I knew it
was bad, bad advice. When someone questioned him, he kinda
shrugged, said it was your idea and they should talk with you.”

“Jesus fucking Christ! What is it with this
people? Seriously?”

“Gotta hand it to ‘em, Ronan. They do have
pretty big balls to be this overtly nasty and desperate.”

“But what’s the end game, Bill? What’s the
point of it?

“I mean, I get that Abigail doesn’t like me.
Yeah, whatever. I don’t give a shit. I’m not her biggest fan
either. Who the fuck cares, right?

“And I get that she really, really wants her
children to marry well, or something.

“So if she wants to try and, I don’t know,
pucker up and kiss Byzan’s ass to try and make that happen, then
fine. Go for it.

“I just don’t get what any of that has to do
with me.”

“Mikalo Delis.”

“So that’s what all this is about?”

He nodded.

“Janey mentioned something along those line,”
I then said. “That Abby is angry that he and I might get married or
something.

“But I still don’t get what’s driving her to
amp her bitchery off the map. So what if I marry Mikalo someday --
and I’m not saying I am, by the way.”

“No?”

“I’ve known the guy five minutes! Like I told
Janey, check with us in a few years and see where we are.”

“Listen,” he began, “whatever’s driving Abby
has nothing to do with you or whatever this is with Mikalo or your
work or your clients or, really, even the Byzans.

“What’s driving her to sabotage you is
something much deeper and, frankly, something that doesn’t have an
answer and can’t be fixed by any sane, rational, perfectly
understandable thing you could do.

“Simply put,” he continued. “It’s jealousy.
And, now that I think about it, I realize it’s not simple at all.
It’s complicated and deep and is something she probably has no
control over.

“Think about it,” he quickly said, quieting
me. “You come in here fresh out of law school. Top of your class,
big offer in hand, law firms falling at your feet to bring you on
board. No Junior Associate title for you. It’s straight to the
top.

“You’re young, gorgeous, driven, fiercely
intelligent, unapologetically brilliant, and you work your ass off
and you succeed. Quickly.

“It’s a success you earn, Ronan.

“And then there’s Abby.

“Older, not as brilliant, not as polished.
Her success is earned, of course, but it’s one that takes many,
many years. A success that’s not based on amazing work or even
smarts. It’s based on time. Being here for years and years and
years. Working diligently. Adequately. Sometimes brilliantly.
Sometimes not.

“But a success earned by diligence and time
isn’t the same as one earned by brilliance. No matter how many
hours she puts in, she will never be considered at the same level
you are.

“For someone of her ego, which is massive, by
the way, that’s rough.

“And then you add your Greek god billionaire
boyfriend to the mix?”

He paused before continuing.

“Just be grateful she’s not boiling a bunny
in a pot on your stove.”

“And none of that is my problem, Bill,” I
said. “None of that excuses her taking steps to hurt my
relationship with one of the Firm’s biggest clients, taking steps
to hurt my reputation by spreading malicious lies, and doing her
damndest to relegate me to the sidelines in favor of her son-in-law
to be.”

“You’re right,” he said. “It doesn’t. But now
you know what’s driving her.

“You understand, of course,” he continued as
he stood to go, “That she’s not going to stop and, eventually, if
you don’t do something to rein her in or stop her or just, for
God’s sake, shut her the hell up, people will start believing the
lies.”

He paused at the door before looking
back.

“Like it or not, Ronan,” he then said. “This
is war.”