Suspiciously Obedient (11 page)

Aim higher, Lydia.

The billion-dollar question. Everyone knew about Michael Bournham's quest for his billion-dollar empire. Everyone. From mail room guys to senior vice-presidents, the austerity measures at Bournham Industries over the past eighteen months had been all about
him
. A contract signed in his blood, practically, with the board of directors had made headlines for weeks, garnering stories in
The Economist
,
Wall Street Journal—
even
Rolling Stone
had done a feature on him and his ballsy move.

What part did she play in this race to drive profits high enough to win his bet? A viral sex tape might smear his reputation, but in the end he'd just be labeled a bad boy, another renegade playboy rolling in more money than God. Publicity, though—that was gold. Getting the Bournham name in the news, on YouTube (
hell, YouPorn
), increasing branding by a social media factor of hundreds—the value of fucking her on camera was, well…

Priceless.

Priceless precisely because she had no price tag. What he had done happened with her full consent—the physical act, that is.

The taping?

That violated her to the bone.

“I am so, so sorry,” he rasped, voice shaking with emotion. Not nervous; guys like Michael Bournham were never nervous. They were in complete control every fucking second of their lives, right? Letting them get “caught” on tape was all about micromanaging every second of his time with her. Fake, fake, fake—it had all been a giant ruse, Matt Jones’ attraction to her, his intensity in the elevator, those warm arms around her in the supply closet, hot mouth on her clit, his rod driving her open and pounding her to ecstasy. What else was on tape? In some editing room in LA was an assistant splicing together more film of their intimate encounters, ready to run on the E! channel? Would she be the subject of a Tosh monologue? Or was she going to be
The Daily Show’
s Moment of Zen?

Sorry?
He was
sorry
? If Michael Bournham had used her to ride a social media wave so great she would be “sex-tape girl” well into her golden years, the subject of ridicule on Fark, SomethingAwful, Reddit and beyond, then she really only had one choice, as he watched her, eyes hawk like and predatory, clearly here with one purpose: to win her over.

Her choice, though, was to stay the course. What she needed to do was to follow his final order as her boss.

To maliciously obey.

“Did you get what you wanted?” she asked, struck by how different he was from Matt Jones—and yet, this was the same man.

“Get what I wanted?” he asked, pretending to be confused. As if Michael Bournham would ever be confused.

“Quit playing games. You know exactly what I’m talking about,” she said.

“What I want is you.”

“No. What you want is money.” He flinched. She continued. “Everyone knows that.
Everyone
, Mr. Bournham. From the guy who cleans the shit off the toilets to your executive assistant and everyone in between, and I’m one of the in-betweens.” She felt her face stretch in an angry, bitter smile. “Your deal with the board; your deadline is coming up, so everyone’s known that all these stupid cost-cutting measures for the past eighteen months—all of the ‘we can’t afford to give you raises,’ ‘we can’t afford to give you bonuses,’ ‘we can’t afford to give you regular toilet paper that’s not made in Poland’—all of it so you could make your goal with the board, your bet. So apparently, I’m part of the wager?”

“You’re part of nothing.”

“Nothing,” she said. Now she was pissed. “I’m part of
nothing
.” She nodded and smiled, a cynical grin. “That’s right. I’m
nothing
to you. I’m actually less than nothing, aren’t I?”

He tried to interrupt her, but she held out a palm. “I’m less than nothing because you used me. You knew those cameras were rolling. You let me make love to Matt Jones in the office. You teased, you taunted, you seduced, you led me on and I broke. I
broke
,” she said, shrugging, sighing deeply and shaking her head.

And then she looked him straight in the eye. “I broke. I fell for someone you created, I fell for a guy I thought was smart and funny and intelligent and caring, and who actually might give a damn about me and treat me like an equal with respect and with mutual attraction.”

She looked him over, top to bottom. “Same guy, same body, but it turns out you spun that out of thin air so you could gain your notoriety and get the name of Bournham Industries all over every web platform, every media outlet, and boost your profits, huh?”

His eyes widened. “You think that?”

“Oh, I’m right, aren’t I?”

“God, no,” he gasped, the sound unnerving her. Michael Bournham didn't show this kind of authenticity, this vulnerability. Who in the hell was standing before her? That was what made this all so terrifying, the betrayal so cruel.

Because she had no idea who she had fallen in love with.

“Of course I am. You did it,” she scoffed, trying to bury the tears that threatened to come forth in a righteous anger that was in all-too-abundant supply. “You seduced me. I let you. I'm no victim here, though,” she said, cutting off his attempt to speak. Pacing in the living room, very aware of her frumpy blue jammies, she decided to go for it. Just say it all. Why not? Matt Jones was dead.

The man before her wasn't Matt Jones, right?

Right?

“Congratufuckinglations, Mike. Can I call you Mike? Do your friends call you Mike?” Her laugh was sharp and bitter. “You got fucked on video and now a billion people get to watch me go as bare and raw and real as I've ever been with a man. Call it a deflowering of sorts. You popped my sex-tape cherry.”

Wild and furious, in love and hating it, she let him have the full wrath of all her emotions. Grandma and Krysta might be in the next room but she didn't give a shit anymore. Let the world hear it all.

Might as well, right? They'd seen it already.

“I started to fall for you, Matt—Mike.
Fuck!
” she screamed. “I don't even know what to call you.”

“Asshole would be a good start, it would appear,” he said dryly.

A laugh bubbled up to the surface, unwelcome and involuntary. God damn it. It made it harder to be angry. How could she remain pissed when he had chased her down, tried to catch her, and now he really was here, taking it all like a man, and…what?

Why was he here?

“Why’re you really here?” she asked.

Michael Bournham paused. She couldn’t call him Mike in her head and she certainly couldn’t think of him as Matt any longer. Rolling his tongue between his cheek and his gums, his jaw tensed and he was so accessible in that moment, yet so distant. Her apartment felt like a dungeon, knowing that her grandma and Krysta were in the back room whispering furiously with each other, though giving them the privacy that they needed, she felt self-conscious.

Just over a day. He'd left her apartment in the middle of the night and just over a day later her life had exploded. She’d rested in his arms, cuddled up to him after the most exquisite lovemaking of her life. The video poisoned everything. She’d never sleep in that bed without thinking about his touch, his arms. How had he changed so quickly? Her eyes raked over him. The green eyes were gone, now blue. Brown hair—gone. Now it was a strange silver color, not quite the shade the famous Michael Bournham wore, but rather a strange, odd combination of his real hair and his identity as Matt. The man had physically changed himself to deceive. How could she know that he wouldn’t emotionally change himself to commit a far greater betrayal?

Finally, he rallied and seemed to think of something to say. Taking two shockingly tentative steps toward her, his hands seem to tremble and finally he planted them on his hips, one leg bent, the gesture uncertain. “I’m here first of all to say that I’m sorry.”

“You said that already,” she snapped.

“I can’t say it enough,” he said quietly.

Silence hung between them like a condemned man, suspended from a hangman’s noose. There was a kind of death in the air, a ragged, jutted feeling that this rift between them could never be mended. Yet he was here, she had to give him credit for that.

“The second reason I’m here,” he stated bluntly, “is because I never expected to feel what I feel for you, Lydia.”

She opened her mouth to speak and he took one step closer and gently laid his fingertips against her lips. She pulled back as if he had shocked her with an electric bolt.

“Let me speak.” That was more the Michael Bournham she had seen from afar, and on rare occasion, up close. “I’ll give you plenty of time, I assure you,” he explained. “I most certainly did not join this reality TV show so that I could intentionally make love with the most stunning woman I have ever met in my entire life and then have it caught on video tape, so that it would go viral and ruin the one true thing that I most want.”

Although he hadn’t touched her again, it was as if someone had snapped a circuit breaker and jolted her with thousands and thousands of volts, burning deep into her brain. She stared at him, completely transfixed, his words pouring over and around her, and yet somehow also sinking in.

He ran a frantic hand through his hair and began to pace. “Lydia, here was the deal—you were never part of the deal.” A wry grin in his eyes floated up to the ceiling as he stopped and massaged the center of his forehead, as if in physical agony. “The producers of
Meet the Hidden Boss
came to me and explained that sales spike when CEOs do this sort of thing. I have, as you know, a deal with the board.
Had
, I suppose I should start to speak of that in the past tense, too, shouldn’t I?” he said bitterly. “I had a bargain, and I thought that this would be part of my strategy, that I would…” he said with a cadence that made it clear that he needed to speak his entire story. It made her less interested in interrupting and more attentive. He said that she would get her say, right? For now then, she would at least get the full story, even if she would never get that happily ever after that she had so carefully studied in her marketing proposal.

“When Jonah, Jonah Moore, the producer, proposed the idea, I was to become a middle manager.”

“Hence, Matt Jones,” she said flatly.

“Yes.”

“Director of social media.”

“Yes.”

“So, you took the job in order to—”

“Yes,” he cut her off, “I think you get the picture.”

“Oh, I do,” she said with extraordinary derision.

“It sounds so ridiculous now, but it is what it is and I have to make peace with it. I’ve never been one to flinch from reality.”

“Or reality TV shows,” she shot back.

“Touché,” he said, those sapphire eyes boring into hers. The skin underneath his eyes tucked up as he cocked his head and proceeded to explain. “I played the part, but you were there on day one. Day one,” he laughed, “in the parking lot, reading that damn book, in that tiny little red car of yours, all curves, and divine, and lush, and everything that I remembered you were two years ago.”

“Two years ago?” she rasped. Her hand went to the base of her collarbone, her fingers fluttering there in surprise. She cleared her throat. “Two years ago, what are you talking about?”

“Employee orientation,” he confessed.

“You
remember
me?” she gasped.

“You remember
me
?” he inquired. At a standoff, they just stared. “My God, what a fool I’ve been,” he said, closing his eyes, tipping his face up to the ceiling, and making her want him even more. God damn it.

Staying silent, she let her arms down, her hands loose at her sides, brushing against her hips. Listening to him was her only option at this point, short of storming out of the room. What good would that accomplish? At least now she got to understand more about why he did what he did.

“I have no justification for what happened.” He made a dismissive noise with his lips. “Has it really been just over twenty-four hours?”

“Yes.”

He nodded, pursing his lips. “It has, hasn’t it? So much has happened.”

“To you and me, both,” she said.

“Not yet,” he objected, though his tone was pensive.

“What do you mean, not yet?” Now the anger bubbled up to the surface. “Millions of people have already seen that by now. For God’s sake, my grandmother has seen it.” She gestured toward the back of the apartment.

He held a palm up to her in deference. “Whoa, whoa, whoa,” he said, “hold on. All I mean is that you haven’t been identified yet.”

“As if that isn’t going to happen within the next few minutes,” she sputtered. “It’s already happening. People are going to figure out pretty damn quickly who I am, and when they do…” Oh, god, she hadn’t really thought through the implications of this. “And when they do, I’m ruined.”