X: The Hard Knocks Complete Story (44 page)

M
argo

I cross my legs feeling Alexander King’s cool gray eyes, which are set beneath a pair of dark eyebrows, taking in every inch of my exposed flesh. Even when I catch him staring, he doesn’t seem the least bit apologetic. Rather than look away like most men would do in his position, he gives me one of those smart-ass smirks that I’ve grown accustomed to over the past few days since I started working for him, and he continues to stare at me blatantly.

The man is infuriating, and to make matters worse, he’s impossibly good-looking. If I hadn’t seen him in person, I would swear every picture I’ve ever seen of him had to have been airbrushed because no man ever looks that perfect all the time. But, sadly, Alexander is the exception. Everything about him draws me in. His Roman sculpted nose, chiseled cheekbones, and masculine jawline covered in a light beard—all of it fits exactly what I find attractive in a man to a T. It’s a shame he’s such a rat-bastard. Beauty is wasted on the wicked.

Infiltrating Alexander’s business and seducing him in order to gain access to all the information my father needs is a far more difficult task than I had originally anticipated. Most men are all too eager to please me, but not Alexander. He’s hell bent on making me miserable and teaching me what he deems as my place in this situation—below him. He has no idea that I’m not like most of these ridiculous Manhattan twits who run around here. His infamous name and hoards of wealth don’t do a thing for me. He won’t be able to walk all over me and use me as he does every other woman in our social circle. I’m pretty sure when I stood my ground earlier today it rattled him a bit, showing him that perhaps he’s met his match with me.

“So, Ms. Buchanan, how do you like the job so far?” The deep voice beside me asks.

I turn toward Jack Sutherland, who I’ve quickly learned is one of the attorneys for the King Corporation and second in line for the biggest manwhore in Manhattan, behind none other than Alexander King. I can see why women throw themselves at Jack. Like Alexander, he’s beautiful with his curly brown hair, hazel eyes, and adorable crooked grin. Though it seems to be a running theme that all well-polished men with model faces and insanely hot bodies are assholes. I swear there’s a handbook somewhere that all attractive men are given, teaching them it’s a must to be an egotistical womanizer who jump when any opportunity to stick their dick in something comes their way regardless of the consequences.

My mother constantly accuses me of trying to be the female version of Robin Hood. She thinks that I look for ways to punish men like these two for the sake of all womankind. I, on the other hand, always correct her and tell her that I simply won’t allow jerks like Alexander King to gain the upper hand with me.

I will never allow a man to use me again. Once was enough of that bullshit.

Besides, someone needs to put these guys in their place from time to time.

I give Jack my most flirty smile, doing the best I can to win him over. God knows I don’t need him breathing down my neck for being here like Alexander did earlier. “It’s been a real eye-opening experience. There’s obviously a lot for me to learn since this is my first job, but I tend to catch on to things very quickly.”

Jack’s eyes dart down to my mouth for a split second before he reconnects his gaze with mine, and he grins. “I love a woman who’s a quick study. Where did you graduate?”

“Harvard,” I answer, and it causes him to raise his eyebrows.

“Really? Wow. That’s impressive. What was your major?”

“I double majored in finance and pre-law and graduated with honors. I wanted to keep my options open.”

“Wow. I must say, Ms. Buchanan, that’s amazing. Old King here had better be on his toes when it comes to you. You seem like a highly intelligent woman.” I revel in his compliments as I thank him because I’m damn proud of my education. I earned that completely on my own merit.

I love my mother to pieces, but I never wanted to be like her when I got older. She’s beautiful, which is exactly what caught my father’s eye years ago. My mother married into wealth, became accustomed to the lifestyle, and when my father divorced her, she was desperate to find another wealthy man to take his place. I always told myself that I wanted to be a woman who stood on her own two feet—a woman who didn’t need a man to complete her or her bank account.

And believe it or not, in this day and age, a determined woman intimidates the shit out of most men.

My deep-seated drive to succeed came out in full force today. It gave me the courage to rattle the unshakable Alexander King this morning. Of course I knew the little show he put on for me with the skanky bottle-blond hooker was meant to send me running for the hills, and while it turned my stomach to see such a disgusting display, I decided I wasn’t going to make getting rid of me so easy for him.

“Do you think you’ll make a permanent home with us at King, or are you using the position as a mode to gain experience?” Jack asks, jerking me away from my thoughts.

I glance over at Alexander, who is watching me intently as if he’s studying his prey. It’s as if he’s just waiting for me to say the wrong thing so he can attack.

“So far I love how kind everyone has been to me. This would be an amazing company to work for long-term. I guess we’ll have to wait to see if I screw up around here before I can make any predictions on how long I’ll stay. Mr. King may fire me.”

Jack chuckles. “I doubt he’ll be allowing you to go anywhere anytime soon. You’re already far too important for him to ever entertain the idea of letting you go over simple on-the-job mistakes.”

“That’s very kind of you,” I tell him as I glance over at Alexander again. “Hopefully, he decides to keep me around for a while.”

The cool smile playing on Alexander’s lips is difficult to read, but if I had to guess from our previous conversation, that annoyingly charming expression only reiterates his feelings from earlier. He won’t get rid of me, but he’s going to do his damnedest to make sure I leave on my own. Well, I have news for him.

Game on, motherfucker.

A
lexander

Sitting across from Dan Buchanan in this upscale restaurant, I take in his stern expression that’s intended to intimidate me and smile. Buchanan means to display worldly knowledge with his gray hair and multitude of wrinkles, but I know better. This man may have been a shrewd businessman at one time in his life, but not anymore. Being the sole contractor for building mini-bird helicopters for the U.S. military, he’s allowed the wealth he’s earned over the years to cloud his sound judgment making in both his personal and business finances, which is exactly what landed him with a company that’s about to fold. I’ve done my homework on him, just like I do on all my targets. It makes the kill that much easier when I know their weaknesses.

Jack slides the contract across the table to Buchanan. “Here’s the contract of sale, as requested. I figured we’d get the paperwork exchange out of the way so we can enjoy lunch.”

Buchanan’s weasel-dick attorney, Seth James, picks up the document and examines a few lines of it. “We’ll look over it and let you know.”

“Keep in mind,” I interject, “that I already own nearly half the stock in Buchanan Industries. I’m close to being a majority shareholder, and I assure you that will help sway the board in my favor when they see my plan of action to save this sinking ship of a business.”

Buchanan slams his fist down on the table. “Selling our technologies to another country is out of the question.”

I lean forward, resting an elbow on the table. “Regardless of your personal feelings in the matter, selling parts of the business is what’s best, and that is exactly what’s going to happen.”

“No,” he growls. “I won’t allow that to happen. I’ll find a way to buy my stock back from you.”

I set my gaze on him. “That’s not going to happen. You can’t afford it and you’ve already exhausted all your lines of credit to keep the company running long enough to fill the last order you received from the Navy for mini choppers. Face it, Mr. Buchanan. It’s over. Your fate now rests in my hands.”

Buchanan and I continue to stare each other down. I love the challenge in his eyes. Neither of us saying a word while our colleagues, plus his daughter, watch us intently—all of them feeling the tension too. Buchanan absolutely loathes me. I can tell, and I fucking love it.

He doesn’t want to let his baby go. I get that. It’s been his company for a very long time now, but he needs to understand that it cannot be saved. He’s in far too much debt, and he just needs to come to the realization that I’m going to end up with it to do as I please.

This is the most tense lunch I’ve ever attended even though Jack lectured me about keeping this meeting social.

“Good afternoon,” the male waiter dressed in a fitted black suit greets us when he approaches the table. “I am Gerald, and I’ll be your waiter this afternoon. May I start you off with some drinks?”

“Scotch on the rocks for me,” I say when he directs his attention to me.

“Water, please,” Margo answers when the waiter’s eyes expectantly zero in on her.

“I’ll have a scotch as well, and be sure to bring out bread with lots of butter,” Buchanan orders and then dismisses the waiter after everyone else has requested their beverages.

“Daddy!” Margo complains. “You know what the doctor said. Diabetics need to lay off the bread.”

Buchanan gives his daughter a half-sided smile, and it immediately brings the tension around us down a notch. Perhaps it wasn’t a bad idea to bring her along after all. “I know, darling, and I have been, but a man needs to splurge every now and again. It keeps us sane.”

Margo rolls those magnetic blue eyes of hers and sighs. “I really don’t get why you men always want to do things that are so bad for you.”

“It’s in our nature,” he lectures. “All men have their own way of cutting loose.”

Her gaze darts over to me. “Isn’t that the truth.”

It’s hard not to laugh like a schoolgirl with the pure satisfaction I feel knowing that I’m getting to her, but I try to remain stoic without much luck. A ghost of a smile hints at my lips.

“Alexander, did you see this?” Jack asks as he slides his phone over to me.

An email from Yamada Enterprises’ president sits on the screen. My eyes race over the words, knowing Jack wouldn’t be showing me this now if it weren’t important since this is our interested buyer in the Buchanan deal.

I sigh heavily. “Gentlemen, it seems that you’ll have a bit of an extension in reviewing the contract. My business contact for the deal has requested that I meet with him face to face while he is in the states vacationing in Las Vegas. Mr. Sutherland and I will be leaving at the end of the week and will return on Monday—”

“I can’t do that, Alexander,” Jack says next to me. “It’s my . . . cousin’s wedding and I just can’t miss it.”

My lips twist. This isn’t like Jack. First off, he’s never interrupted me in the middle of something, and second, when did he start giving a fuck about some random cousin who he’s never talked about until now?

“Who cares,” I say. “I’m missing my sister’s twenty-fourth birthday party. This is business. Skip it.”

Jack frowns. “I can’t. There’s no way I can get out of this one.”

Before I have a chance to fire off more reasons of why Jack should stop being a pussy and go to this meeting, Margo’s voice cuts between us. “I’ll go with you. I am your assistant, after all.”

My eyes widen. The thought of being alone in Vegas, of all fucking places, with this woman, causes my dick to twitch. I can’t be around her that long and not fuck her. It’ll drive me out of my mind.

“That’s a great idea, Margo,” Buchanan chimes in. “You can make sure whoever is getting this company is worthy. It would be nice for you to make a few contacts.”

I hold up my hand. “Wait, just a minute. This is my deal, and I don’t think—”

“It’ll still be your baby,” Margo purrs next to me. “I promise not to interfere in any way. I just want to learn. After all, you’re known around this city for being able to charm the pants off anyone you set your sights on. I think I can learn a lot by watching you in action.”

“Oh, you’ll see me in action, all right.” I purse my lips and cut myself off, not wanting to say crude things to her in front of her father and fuck up this deal.

Fuck.

I sigh while both Margo and her father watch me intently, waiting for me to give in and take the enemy along with me. The information Margo could gain from this trip could be devastating to the deal, but I doubt they’ll be able to negotiate a better deal for Buchanan Industries with Yamada Enterprises. I have nothing to worry about by allowing her to tag along, and it’ll make Buchanan still feel comfortable that he has gained the upper hand on me because his sweet ball-breaking daughter is his little spy.

“Fine,” I concede. “Margo can go, but once we get back, we put this deal to bed. Agreed?”

Buchanan nods. “Agreed. I’ll have my answer for you by then.”

I roll my shoulders and relax a bit in my chair. Spend the weekend with Margo in Sin City—no problem. I can get through this.

M
argo

Why couldn’t Alexander King be a pudgy, fifty-something, bald man with bad breath? It would make it a whole lot easier to pretend that I don’t feel the weight of his stare on me every time I go into his office if he were hideously ugly. As it stands now, it’s hard for my body not to respond to him. It’s like I have this visceral reaction to him whenever I’m in his presence, and that scares the shit out of me.

His advances had backed off a bit from a couple of days ago when I caught the hooker blowing him in his office. Thank God. But I can tell he’s ready to make good on his promise to have me beg him to fuck me. He thinks fucking him will break me—that I’m some little twit who wears her heart on her sleeve—and that pisses me off.
He
pisses me off.

The countdown to Vegas is on. In just one day, I’ll be on a private plane heading across the country to the biggest adult playground in the world. I don’t know how being alone with him for an entire weekend is going to go. He was probably right. I’ll want to either fuck him or kill him with my own bare hands, but I guess it will be the latter.

“Margo?” Alexander’s voice rings through the intercom sitting on my desk.

“Yes, Mr. King,” I answer with as much professionalism as I can muster.

He quickly rattles off a list of tasks for me. “I need the daily stock report on Buchanan Industries, a dinner reservation for two at Per Se for seven tonight, and my coffee cup is empty.”

Out of all the things that he asks me to do, getting his coffee irritates me the most. Why in the hell do I have to fetch it? Are his legs fucking broken?

I sigh before plastering on a huge smile that will come through in the tone of my voice as I press the speaker button. “Right away, sir.”

The stock report and coffee are the easy things on the list, but securing a table at Per Se took some finagling. After I had disclosed exactly which Mr. King was requesting the table, it went rather smoothly. Seems his name has quite the pull.

I carry the report and coffee into his office. He holds his hand out for the paper as I set the mug on his desk.

I hope he fucking chokes on it.

I begin to turn away, but his voice quickly halts me. “I didn’t dismiss you yet, Margo.”

My nostrils flare as I spin back around to face him. “Will there be anything else, sir?”

Alexander pushes himself out of the chair and smoothes his red tie, attracting my attention to the definition hiding behind that blue buttoned-down dress shirt. I’ve noticed that when he’s working in his office, he removes his jacket. It almost makes him appear casual and more approachable, but I know better. He’s still an uptight asshole with or without the jacket.

He walks around the desk and stops in front of me before leaning back against the expensive-looking mahogany desk. “Are you all prepared for our trip to Vegas?”

I nod. “Yes. I mean, I will be once I finish packing—”

He shakes his head and a strand of dark hair falls across his forehead. My fingers itch to reach up and shove it back into place. I wonder if it’s as soft as it looks.

Stop it! You cannot be thinking about touching this man. He is the enemy and a complete asshole. Get a hold of yourself. Don’t allow hormones to take control.

“I don’t mean your personal items, Margo. I meant do you have all of the necessary tasks designated to the support staff to cover in our absence.”

I bite the inside of my lower lip as it occurs to me that doing that hadn’t crossed my mind. “I didn’t think that was necessary since tomorrow is Friday. We’ll be back in the office by Tuesday, so I just planned to return calls then.”

Alexander studies me intently as he taps his index finger against the smooth wood of his desk. “Time is always of the essence—it’s even more valuable in my line of work. One missed tip on an investment could cost billions.”

I swallow hard as the complexity of my mistake becomes clear. “I’ll make sure Jack’s secretary fields all of my calls and notifies me if something is urgent.”

I have to keep shit together and up my game. While working for King Enterprises isn’t my real career aspiration, I can still learn a lot while I’m here—things that can help me once I’ve found my job niche.

He straightens the cuff of his shirt. “Have a car pick you up tomorrow promptly at eight. The private jet leaves at nine. Apparently the Yamada family has requested my presence at a pool party at the Hard Rock at two, and I’ll expect you to accompany me.”

My eyes widen. “You can’t possibly expect me to attend a meeting in a swimsuit! That’s . . . no . . . it’s ridiculous.”

“It’s not up for discussion.” His voice rings with authority. “You want this job—you play the fucking game and be a good fucking sport while we meet with my business contacts.”

I open my mouth to lash out and tell him that there’s no way on God’s green earth that I’ll be parading around in front of him in a bikini, but the moment he arches his eyebrow, I quickly decide against it. My father will be so pissed if I screw this up. He’s counting on me to schmooze this contact of Alexander’s so that they’ll go to my father directly and make a deal for whatever part of Buchanan Industries they’re after.

“Fine, but just don’t expect me to become one of your paid whores while we’re there. This is just business.”

A playful smirk flirts across his full lips. “I like this tough act of yours—the way you’re fighting against me. It will make the moment your lips are wrapped around my cock that much more enjoyable, Margo.”

I release a bitter laugh, and it fills the inside of his office. “Those suave lines may work on the women you’re used to dealing with, but I assure you, it’ll take more than a few pretty words and a bunch of heady stares to turn my head. I don’t date assholes.”

“But do you fuck ’em? That’s the question of the hour, isn’t it? I don’t ever remember promising you that we’d date. I said we’d fuck. Dating versus fucking is two very distinctly different things.”

I narrow my gaze. “That’s never going to happen.”

“We’ll see.”

We stand there staring at one another. Neither one of us says a word. I don’t know what it is about this man, but he brings out the competitive nature in me like no other. We are at an impasse—both wanting our ways. I need information to help my father, and he wants to destroy me with sex, causing me to tuck my tail between my legs in embarrassment. I don’t see either one of us conceding, so the best that I can hope for is whatever happens in Vegas to tip the scales in my favor and allow me to get the inside advantage that I need.