The Girlfriend (The Boss) (16 page)

I got into bed and rolled onto my side to face him, the way he was facing me. He raised his arm and dropped one hand on my hip, squeezing my flesh through my panties.

“Did you have a good Christmas?” I asked him, as he massaged in wide circles. His thumb skimmed over the dip between my hip and my tummy, and my breath caught.

“I was happier than I have been in a very long time,” he told me, lowering his mouth over my nipple.

“I thought you said you were tired,” I reminded him, my voice a shaky murmur.

“I remember saying no such thing,” He scolded. “How dare you. I might have to take you over my knee.”

And, I am very happy to report, he did.

CHAPTER NINE

Neil’s house in London was in an area called Belgravia. The neighborhood was filled with a lot of very serious looking black sedans and tall, pristine white stucco mansions. And it was just a hop, skip, and a jump from Buckingham Palace.

Which wasn’t weird
at all
.

We left his house in Somerset the day after Christmas and travelled by car to London. It was a three-hour drive made totally bearable by the comfort of the Maybach and Neil’s company. Despite his daughter’s engagement, he was in great spirits when we arrived.

At least this place looked more like a townhouse— albeit a very, very posh townhouse— than Hogwarts. It was a white stucco mansion in a row of white stucco mansions. There weren’t many cars parked along the street, but the ones that were parked there definitely matched the neighborhood’s price range. One long black sedan parked had flags I didn’t recognize on the front.

“Is that an ambassador’s house or something?” I asked, poking Neil in the side as we went up the walkway.

“Hmm?” He looked up, frowning. “I have no idea. It’s likely. I hardly know anyone in the neighborhood anymore. A lot of the neighbors don’t live here full time.”

Neil opened the door onto an entrance hall with pristine white walls and a mosaic tile floor in greens and blues. A staircase with a single, l-shaped bend rose gracefully toward the ceiling. Aroyal blue runner edged with a gold border covered the width of each step, to the mahogany railing. Under the stairs was a plain, square fireplace, and two Queen Anne wing chairs in gray-blue.

“Very masculine,” I said in appreciation as I stepped cautiously through the space.

“Elizabeth thought so. We could change it, if you like.” Neil sounded embarrassed. He shrugged off his coat and opened a wide door— all of them had ornamental lintels with scrollwork arched above them— and pulled out a gleaming wood hanger. “I won’t be much help in the decorating department, I’m afraid, other than to plead with you to keep some blue—”
 

“Nope, nope, no. I am not going to redecorate your house.” I slipped out of my coat and handed it to him. “No butler here?”

He smiled to himself as he hung up my coat. “Don’t need one. This house is much smaller. I have the chef, of course, he’ll be here after the third, and a housekeeping staff of five. It doesn’t take much to run this place.”

“A little more than your apartment in New York,” I observed. “More than I ever needed for
my
apartment...”

“You’ll never get used to the idea of other people cooking your meals and cleaning up after you, will you?”

“That’s not true. I go to restaurants. I have my clothes dry cleaned.” I tried not to sound too sarcastic. “As much fun as it would be to argue with you over cultural class differences and our disparate incomes, I wanted to see the rest of yet another Neil Elwood owned property. Show me around.”

The main floor had a half-bath, a formal reception room, the kitchen and dining room. There was also an elevator, and though Neil hated them, he used it today.

“The holiday took a toll on me, I think,” he said quietly as we rode down to the basement level. “I would hate to postpone Paris—”
 

“If we have to postpone Paris, we postpone Paris.” We’d been running around so much that missing another whirlwind trip wouldn’t hurt my feelings any. “All I’m really looking forward to there is fucking you, and I can do that just as well here. Oh my god, we could do it in this elevator!”

“I would rather not. I don’t need to combine one of my biggest phobias with my favorite activity.”

We stepped out of the elevator into a short hall. At one end was a utility door, at the other a gold chrome and glass door.

“Laundry,” Neil said, pointing to the plain one. Swinging his finger toward the other, he added, “And pool.”

“You have a pool?” I squeaked. “
Inside
your house?”

“We have indoor plumbing as well, will that excite you?”

I punched him lightly in the shoulder. “Sorry, some of us grew up with rinky-dink inflatable pools in our back yards.”

“This one isn’t Olympic-sized,” he said in his own defense. “But it is rather nice.”

He was right. Besides the marble-lined pool with its elegant terraced steps, there was a sauna, spa, fully equipped gym, and a lovely area with lounges and towels, surrounded by tall Grecian columns. There was a skylight with frosted glass, and I realized it was ground level.

“I didn’t bring my suit,” I said, disappointment crashing over me.

He looked down at me then nodded back to the water. “You don’t need one. Although, I would so desperately love to see you in a bikini.”

I giggled.

That only egged him on more. “So I could strip it off your body with my teeth.”

“Is there a single room in this house that you haven’t had sex in?” I asked, arching an eyebrow.

His smirk gave me the answer before his voice did. “The elevator. But we’ve already discussed that.”

“We’ll just have to make our own memories then, I guess,” I said, sticking my tongue out at him playfully.

The second floor of the house held a large living room in more blues and pale gold, and Neil’s den— a room with a ridiculously large plasma television, dark wood and brown leather furniture, a needlessly complicated surround sound and lighting system, and the faint smell of cigar smoke. There was a snooker table, as well, and he sheepishly explained that sometimes he liked to have a “gents night” and he hoped I wouldn’t be offended.

“I’m not going to demand you give up your whole life to entertain me. I’m going to need my own space to do things, too. Maybe while you’re having a ‘gents night’ I’ll spend all kinds of quality naked time in that hot tub downstairs.” The very thought of relaxing in blissfully hot, churning water curled my toes. I might even do that tonight, though my two-week restriction wasn’t quite up yet.

He backed me into the wall, his hands capturing mine and pinning them beside my head. I laughed and hoped none of the five housekeepers happened along while Neil had me up against a wall with his knee between my thighs. I ground against him with a little whimper, and he bent his head to nibble my neck.

“How would I be able to enjoy myself with my friends if all I can think about is you, naked and wet downstairs?” he murmured against my skin.

I pushed him away and got my breath. “Okay. I’ll wear my froggy pjs and read a book then.”

His office was on the second floor, too, adjoining the library. Though there was nothing remarkable about the library— not after I’d seen the one at Langhurst Court— I was pretty surprised by his office. I’d expected it to be neat, controlled and organized. Instead, it looked like an accountant’s office on April 12
th
. Papers spilled from the desk and onto the floor, and the stacks of folders nearly as tall as the iMac on the desktop seemed far too structurally unsound to support themselves.

“Holy shit, don’t you have a secretary?” I gasped, staring around the too-bright room with its butter-yellow walls.

“I have a personal assistant, but he works out of the company office at Canary Warf, I don’t make him come here.” Neil quickly closed the door, cutting off my view. “I hate the color in there. Elizabeth said it would be calming, but all I can think of is cake. I do as little work as possible in there, throw everything on the floor, and run.”

A kernel of a plan began to form in my mind. If he was okay with me redecorating the house, maybe he would let me redecorate his office. Or at least clean it. I had the time on my hands, and I had been his assistant before. Maybe he could pay me hourly until Fax Mountain had been successfully leveled.

There were bedrooms on the third floor, as well as a wide terrace with another pool— this one a small, square infinity pool that was covered over for the winter—, and a dining area with a wet bar. Though we didn’t take the stairs, I did have to check out the stairwells as we walked the hallways; the long flights crisscrossed past each other dizzyingly, and the entire ceiling over the stairwell was a giant, peaked skylight. Natural light was a big deal in this house. That was going to be awesome for my seasonal affective disorder.

The master bedroom and bathroom took up most of the fourth floor, and I was pleasantly surprised to see that Neil’s bedroom in London looked a lot like the one in New York, but with light blue walls and gray carpet. It was comfy and cozy, and there was a flat-screen TV above the fireplace that I could easily imagine enjoying from the huge bed.

“Oh my gosh, I’ll feel so at home in here!” I clapped my hands and spun in a circle. “Look, you’ve even got the neat dressing room between the bathroom and bedroom thing going on!”

Smiling, he took me into his arms. “I like that. You’re going to feel at home here because it reminds you of my apartment in New York, where you apparently felt at home already.”

“I feel at home pretty much everywhere you are.” My heart did a little flip-flop as I realized the truth of my statement. I really did feel at home with him, no matter where we were. And I
was
at home. I blinked up at him. “Oh my god. I... live here. This is where I live.”

“And I’m so glad.” He dipped his head to kiss me, and I held onto the front of his shirt and melted against him.

He pulled away reluctantly. “Hang on. I have no qualms about ripping off your clothes and ravishing you within the limits of your medical restrictions, but there’s one more thing I want to show you.”

He led me into the hallway again, to the back of the house, which was slightly truncated to make room for another terrace. This one didn’t overhang or impede the one below it, but it did have two peaks of roof on either side of it, so the neighbors couldn’t see over.

“Let me guess. We’re going to have outdoor sex here this summer?” I laughed as I stuck my head out the door and into the brisk London December.

When I stepped back, Neil hadn’t said anything. No flirty quip. No lascivious implication. He was standing there quietly, with an odd look on his face.

And I realized what he was thinking.

“I... very much hope so,” he said, and cleared his throat.

“Oh, baby. I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking.” I went to his side and put my arms around him, and he returned my embrace stiffly.

“It’s all right. I just blindsided myself there a moment.” He forced the most fake smile anyone has ever smiled in the history of smiles and said, “So... hot tub? Suit optional, of course?”

If he wanted to ignore the sad, strange little turn his mood had taken, I was more than happy to.

* * * *

The next morning, we reported to Royal Marsden hospital, only about ten minutes from Neil’s house. Neil would be receiving treatment from the hospital’s wing for privately funded patients, and his oncologist’s offices were located there.

Dr. Grant was a kind, but serious man in his fifties, with a long face and brown hair. He reminded me of a cross between Sam the Eagle and Guy Smiley. I held about a thousand
Jurassic Park
jokes inside while we made our introductions. Though he was very personable, I could tell right off the bat that any American cinema jokes would go over his head.

We sat in the two tall-backed black chairs in front of his desk while he pulled up Neil’s chart on the computer. The doctor read for a moment, his face giving nothing away as his eyes flicked across the screen. “Hmm. I’m not sure I’m pleased at the delay in treatment.”

That was a great way to start off the meeting.

Neil nodded. “I discussed this with the oncologist on staff at Presbyterian. He was of the same opinion as you.”

“Then perhaps you should have listened to him.” Dr. Grant’s bushy eyebrows rose.

I don’t think I’d ever heard anyone actually scold Neil before. Well, besides his daughter, and me.

“Well, there’s nothing to be done for it. You can have at me on January third, and not an hour before,” Neil responded in easy humor.

Dr. Grant raised an eyebrow. “Your condition is nothing to be glib about, Mr. Elwood. The cancer cells have become resistant to the Imatinib, you didn’t respond well to the Nilotinib before, and I don’t believe we have time to try you out on it again. The last blood test you had in New York on the twenty-first suggests that your condition is rapidly accelerating. I’ll have another draw done before you leave the office today, but at this junction I feel your best hope will be chemotherapy, followed by a stem cell transplant.”

“Stem cells?” the word pricked my ears. That phrase was very controversial and political back at home in the states.

“Cells from bone marrow— either from a matching relative or from Mr. Elwood himself, if we can get close to remission— can be transplanted after high dose chemotherapy to kill off the remaining cells. A bit like demolishing the building and creating new cells from the ground up.”

“Isn’t that dangerous?” I looked from Neil’s grim expression to the doctor’s.

“There are different risks for both procedures. With donor cells there can be a potentially fatal reaction known as Graft-Versus-Host Disease. If we aim for the autologous transplant and your condition worsens during chemotherapy, the chances of a desirable outcome become more slim.” He paused. “I understand that you don’t wish to start treatment until after the first of the year. That will give you some time to consider your options, and time for me to review your case with my colleagues to see what course they recommend.”