50 Shades of Drake 1 and 2

50SOD II: Chapter Twenty-Five

    "That man is Brian?" Carlos demanded the second the guest bedroom door was closed.

    "Yes," Destiny replied, heading over to the closet. She opened the door and squatted down to her overnight bag.

    Carlos remained near the door. "That beautiful man is the Brian?" He raised both hands to his temples. "Those two men are the ones fighting over you?"

    "They're not fighting over me, and keep your voice down," she said, glaring at him over her shoulder. "But yes that is the Brian."

    "My goodness." He stood staring at the door as if he had X-ray vision.

    She laughed. "You think he's that good-looking?"

    "You don't?"

    I do. I just won't admit it. It's easier not to admit it. Aubrey is the only man I see. Her hands were quick to unzip the overnight bag. "He's a nice-looking man."

    "There is no way anyone in the world can dispute the magnificence of that man out there," Carlos said emphatically. "He's perfection. Literal perfection. My god. And you work with him. You see him five days a week, for eight hours a day. I'm jealous. Green with envy."

    What she wanted to know was Brian's reason for being here. The sight of him had made her nervous instantly. She didn't know him well enough to predict his actions, whether or not he would just randomly show up in an attempt to seduce her. Thankfully, that had not been the case. He came here to see Aubrey, but why? What was urgent enough that he had to come here on a day that Aubrey called in?

    "I've been talking about his hotness for the past five minutes and you haven't been listening to one word I've been saying," Carlos muttered, wearing a look of disappointment.

    "I haven't been listening to one word you've been saying because you've been talking about nothing but his hotness for the past five minutes," she quipped, gathering her clothes into her arms and standing. "I need to get dressed and get back out there so I can see what Brian's visit is about. Wait here, okay?"

    "Like I'm a puppy dog or something," he muttered, flouncing on the bed with a pout.

    She laughed and left the bedroom. Aubrey's and Brian's voices carried to the hallway from where they sat together in the living room. Taking a deep breath, she turned and entered the master bedroom, where she hurriedly got dressed in a pair of jeans and a flowy, cotton candy pink top with short sleeves.

    When she entered the living room, Aubrey had a hand shaded over his eyes. He looked very stressed. "What's going on?"

    "You don't need to be here for this," he told her without looking up at her.

    Brian's brows drew together. "I beg to differ. She should be here for this."

    Aubrey arched a glance at him.

    "You were the one who wrote The Hilltop article, right?" Brian asked her. "The interview with Aubrey?"

    Her eyes flick back and forth between the two men. "Yes. Why?"

    "The politicians that Aubrey called out in that article are gunning for him," Brian explained to her. "One of them is in tight with the SEC and they are claiming that Graham Enterprises has participated in unethical accounting practices. They're trying to take the company down."

    She tucked a few strands of hair behind her ear. "So, let them conduct an audit. Prove them wrong. What's the problem?"

    "It's never that simple with things like this," Brian said. "The fact that they've even questioned Graham Enterprises' ethics is going to hit us. Hard. We have stockholders to worry about. This will affect our shares on the stock market. This will affect the company's image."

    She lowered herself into a white leather armchair and tucked one of her legs beneath her. "So...so we fight back against the politicians, then."

    "How?" Aubrey asked her, letting his hand fall in his lap.

    "Monitoring what they are saying about you, and responding with well-written publicity statements," she said, frowning in concentration. "And hitting them back with our own accusations."

    Brian's eyebrows rose at her audacity.

    She scratched her temple. "Only...we make sure that our accusations are legit, instead of the smoke screen they're putting out there in the press."

    Brian gave her a look of admiration. "Where did he find you?"

    She smiled. "A bakery."

~~~~~~

    Aubrey paced the length of the railing that stretched along the edge of his loft home office. He spoke rapidly into the phone he held to his ear. He was speaking to Oliver in hushed tones about the emergency situation at hand.

    Brian remained on the couch in the living room with his eyes anchored on Destiny. Wishing that he'd met her in another life or in an alternate universe where she wasn't involved with his superior. Even in a casual pink top and jeans, she was beautiful. Her brown skin glowed. Her smile was radiant, and her eyes sparkled in a way that was enchanting. He tried to bury the attraction that he felt for her. She was spoken for. Unavailable to him. He understood that and yet whenever he was around her, he ached to reach out and touch her. He longed to be the reason that she smiled, the reason that she laughed.

    She sat in the modern, white leather armchair, looking at everything in the room other than him. He got the impression that he made her nervous or anxious. That was probably because any attempts at veiling his attraction towards her were thin and half-assed at best.

    "He is very lucky to have you," he said after a few minutes of silence.

    "Thank you," she said softly.

    "You...you just graduated from college?"

    She nodded, keeping her eyes lowered.

    "You're very bright. My faith in the education system just might be restored."

    Those words caused her to look up at him.

    He winked at her and grinned.

    That wink and that grin caused her to look away again.

    Aubrey leaned over the railing, still holding his cell phone to his ear. "Which politician was it?" he called down to Brian.

    "Harry Palmer," Brian called back up to him.

    Destiny giggled behind her hand.

    Brian's brows furrowed. "What's so funny?"

    "I'm sorry," she said through her giggles. "The name Harry Palmer sounds like a punchline."

    Never one to waste a good masturbation joke, he burst out laughing with her. "Touche."

    When she tried to stop giggling, the giggling only became worse. She covered her face with her hands.

    His laughter died down, but hers continued. While watching her laugh, he tried to stop himself from falling in love with her. He could feel Aubrey's eyes on him long before he lifted his gaze to confirm.