Page 5 of Until You’re Breathless (Insatiable #1)

Bowie

I decide it’s best to do this at the office.

That way the son of a bitch can’t make a scene.

That way he can’t fucking scream and make himself look like ten times more of a dick for screaming at me, which he’s never done in the office.

We’ve always maintained a strict code of respect within these walls.

And we’re both one hundred percent committed to doing everything for this company, minus his unfortunate indiscretion.

After I send him a meeting invite for a personal meeting, so that nobody else knows about it, he confirms it, and I grease my wheels, counting down the minutes.

Listening to the recording is enlightening to say the least. And I can’t wait to see the look on his face when he gets to listen to it, if it comes to that.

Half of me hopes that he’s smart enough to just admit that he fucked up bad.

Boston Kruger doesn’t fuck around when it comes to this company, and if he thinks ahead a little farther than the length of his dick, he might realize that I’m one step ahead of him.

This was a foolish move on his part. We agreed years ago, as a personal vow to each other, instead of making vows under an altar, to be honest about everything.

If one of us or both wants out of this relationship at any time, we say so, and we part ways amicably, not letting Kruger Manufacturing suffer, and not jeopardizing either of our stakes in it, either.

Boston has nothing to complain about. As far as I’m concerned, I’m the one that’s made all the personal sacrifices.

From turning the other cheek at a lukewarm sex life, to the lack of personal time that we spend together, to giving him the largest office, and so on.

I could be petty about it, sure. But none of those things made any difference to me.

Until now. The minute that rat bastard decided to bastardize his loyalty to me, he made the mistake of his life, and he’ll pay for it dearly.

Now I hold the reigns. Now he’s got to answer to me.

Hell, I even let him name the fucking company, and I let him use his own fucking name, too.

There was nothing stopping us from naming the company Ritter Manufacturing, after me, but Boston’s rationale behind that one was money.

He had it. I didn’t. And his family name holds more water with the banks because of it.

As I step down the hall to our offices, and I approach his, I close the door behind me. “Hey.” He says, lifting his head from his laptop for a moment. “That meeting was bullshit, huh.”

Oh, so he thinks that this is a breakout session. Wrong. Try again. “It was, but that’s not why I’m here.”

He closes the lid on his laptop. Point for him. “What’s up, babe?”

His face changes, but then his phone rings, and we both know that he has to look to at least see who it is. “It’s Jefferson. I have to take it.” He says, referring to our lead consultant, who is conducting important research for us, so that we can tackle a hurdle that we’re dealing with.

As he picks up the call, I rise and walk to the window, which overlooks a man-made pond. Boston got the better office, too, the bastard. And as I look at the birds flying over the water, my minds drifts back in time...

“Like the artist?” The boy with the quirky smile asks.

“Yeah. My parents are huge seventies music fans, go figure.”

He smiles again. “Well, you’ll love this then.”

“What.” I grin at the boy that just walked into my tenth-grade math class.

“My name’s Jagger.”

“You’re full of it.”

“I swear.” He chuckles. “Some people call me Jag for short, but my legal name is Jagger.”

“Riiiiight.”

He laughs. “I’m serious. Here, go check the attendance sheet. I’ll bet you twenty bucks I’m telling the truth.”

I smirk. “I don’t have twenty bucks, and I hate Mr. Sproul, so I’ll take your word for it. But if I see you in the hall and you don’t answer when I call you Jagger, you’re meat.” I tease, pointing at him, feeling flirty. He’s really cute.

He winks at me and I’m not sure if he’s pulling my leg, or what.

“So, do you mind if I sit here? That guy over there looks like he’ll eat me alive if I sit in the empty spot in front of him.

” He points to this guy with a real miserable look on his face.

He’s handsome, but he looks like the dog ate his homework or something.

“Sure. Nobody sits here.”

“Cool. So, this Sproul...is he a ballbuster?”

“Yeah. He marks really hard, and he doesn’t take any assignments unless they have a proper cover sheet.”

Jagger looks him up and down. “He looks like a dipshit.”

I like him. He doesn’t have a filter. “Where did you come from? Are you new here?”

“No, I’ve been around. I was taking another math class, but I need the academic level if I want to go to university. The guidance counsellor screwed me over in the summer with my schedule and they just fixed it this morning. So, what did I miss the last few days?”

“I can give you my notes to copy.” I frown, opening my binder.

“Thanks.” He takes them and starts copying them onto a loose sheaf of paper.

He’s got a spare sheet of paper and he’s doing double time, taking notes as the teacher conducts the lesson, and copying my notes.

It’s nice to meet someone that takes math seriously.

I’m a math geek and sometimes I feel like I'm the only one. When he’s finished, he turns back to me. “Did he give out any assignments?”

I nod and show him what I wrote down in my day planner, as I listen to the lesson. The teacher leaves the room for a moment, and Jagger looks up the assignment that he missed. He starts working on it and I see him struggling. “You need help?”

“Yeah. I always get stuck on this stuff.”

“Here.” I say, gesturing for him to turn around. I explain the problem and help him figure it out.

“Hey, thanks.” He licks his lips. “Hey, do you want to work together? Like...study together and shit? I can help you and you can help me type thing? I promise I’ll keep my hands to myself.”

I smile. My eyes go to his lips, and he smiles back. I realize that I have a crush on him. “Sure.”

“Cool. Do you want to work on this assignment after school?”

“Okay.”

“Cool. You want to go out by that pond after class? Since this is the last period?”

“Sounds good.”

He pays close attention during class, and he doesn’t nod off or doodle, or get distracted by anything, either. I’m half intrigued, but half disappointed that he’s not paying any attention to me. He follows me to my locker after class. “Do you need to put something in here for now?”

“Na, thanks.” He waves, and I notice that he isn’t ogling any of the pretty girls that are walking down the hallway. I start to wonder if maybe he’s gay, but I don’t think so, seeing as he keeps looking at my lips.

We walk down to the back of the school, where there is a small pond.

It’s a big pit of erosion, from a small pocket of soil that has weakened over time.

Water collects in it all the time and the school board never closes it off, so we usually sit in the grass that surrounds it.

And when it’s hot out, sometimes we take our shoes and socks off, and wade around in it.

I take my jean jacket off and place it down on the grass and then sit on it.

Jagger doesn’t have a jacket, so he just sits down.

“What do you want to do after high school?” He asks me.

“I don’t know. I know that I want to go to university. My family doesn’t have any money and I sure as hell don’t want to end up like that.”

“Oh yeah? What do you like to do?”

I turn to him, feeling like he’s going to talk all about me, and I hate that. “What do you like to do?”

“I love cars. I’m saving up for one now. I figure when I’m old enough to get my license, that I’ll have enough money for one by then.”

“I love cars, too. Some girls think that I’m gay or something, but it’s just what I like to talk about. Combustion engines and electrical systems, basically anything that makes the car make noise, I like to check it out.”

He’s impressed. “Yeah? That’s pretty cool, actually. Most of the girls that I know that like cars just want to sit on them and look like a fucking hood ornament.”

“Do your parents care that you swear?”

“Na, not really. Yours?”

“No. My friend Jinny...her mom...encourages it. She says it helps with stress.”

“Yeah? My buddy says that sex helps with stress.” He snuffles.

My face drops. “Oh.” My eyes bulge.

His face sobers. “Oh, shit. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to offend you.”

“It’s okay.” I gasp, embarrassed at my own reaction to the word ‘sex’. I’ve never heard the word used by such a cute boy before, and given that I’m inexperienced, and clearly he’s not, it feels like it drives a wedge between us.

“God, I feel like your face just fell down. And you have such a nice smile.”

“You think so?”

“Yeah, you do.” He licks his lips. “Are you like a Mormon or something?”

“No, why?”

“I just...you really don’t like that 's' word. You reacted better when I said ‘shit’.”

It comes out before I can stop it. “I’m a virgin.”

He speaks like it’s no big deal. “So am I. And I didn’t take you for a slut, so I figured you were. There’s just...do your parents make you feel like it’s dirty or something?”

I’m shocked. First, to find out that he’s also a virgin, and second, to speak so openly about this. I don’t even know how to answer. I just met this boy. “No. I just...never mind...it’s silly, and you might be embarrassed. I’ll be embarrassed.”

“No, tell me. I promise neither of us will be embarrassed. If you’re straight up and don’t fuck around, there’s no need to be embarrassed.”

“Alright.” I concede, feeling so nervous. “I think I...I think I like you.”

“I think I like you, too. See? That wasn’t embarrassing, was it?”

“No.” I smile. “You’re nice. And you’re cute.”

“You’re both, too. I never met a chick like you. My sister, she’s a pain in my ass, and all her friends just bug me. And girls in this school are either sluts or too stupid for their own good. But you, you I could hang around with.”

“Yeah?”

He nods. “For sure.”

I look at him and he looks at me, and once again, it comes out before I can stop it. “Have you ever kissed a girl before?”

“No. You?”

“No.”

“Have you ever wanted to?”

“No. You?”

Kids are far enough away from us that they can’t see us. The bussed in kids are already gone and there are no sports playing tonight, so it’s like we’re all alone. “Not....not until now.”

He looks at me, searching my eyes. “God, you are so brave. It would take me a year to work up the courage to say that to you.” He licks his lips. “Do you want to kiss me?”

I nod. “Yeah. Do you want to kiss me?”

“Yeah. Wait, do you mean, like, a French kiss, or just a regular one?”

“I don’t know. I’ve never done either. What about you?”

“Me neither. But I just thought I better check, you know? I don’t want to try to stick my tongue in your mouth and make you gag or something.”

I snort a laugh. “You’re funny.”

“So are you.” He licks his lips, eyes on my lips. “So, do you want to try it?”

“Do you?”

“Yeah. Kinda.”

The warmth coming from him next to me is making my thighs ache.

I’m dying to kiss him. To know what his lips feel like on mine.

They look so soft and full. We start to lean in and he parts his lips, so I part mine, and the next thing I know it’s like we’re in a movie.

What was supposed to be an innocent first kiss turns into the hottest kiss I could ever imagine.

His tongue tickles mine, his lips suck mine, like we’ve done this a thousand times before.

His hand moves into my hair and my hand grasps the hair at the nape of his neck.

My insides are quivering, my private area is pulsing and wet, and all I can think about is straddling him, but I don’t.

He pulls back. Both of us are breathless. “Man, that was hot.” He breathes.

I lick my lips, still tasting him. “It was.”

“Do you want to be my girlfriend?”

“Definitely.”

Boston ends the call as he walks up to me, as I stand by the window, a million miles away. My skin immediately crawls as I turn around and see him. I try like hell not to show it, but I see the look on his face change, and I know that he’s read me right.

“Something’s wrong.” He guesses.

I get straight to the point. “I’m giving you one chance to tell me the truth, Boston. We made a promise to each other in the beginning to be transparent, and I believe that you haven’t kept your end of the bargain.”

For a split second I think that he’s going to refute.

The flash in his eyes comes and goes as quickly.

Then he looks at the floor and swallows.

He says nothing. He’s calculating. He’s bargaining with himself.

I decide it’s been too long and he’s going to come up with something to make this worse.

But then he speaks. “Look, I did it because I got spooked. It was a long time ago and I’ll put the money back if you want. ”

A ‘v’ forms between my eyes. Something tells me that I should just let him talk and see what else the fucker will confess to. So, I say nothing. I just stand there glaring at him, and I can feel my nostrils flaring. He glances up at me to see if I’m satisfied with his response. “Keep trying.”

“What do you want me to say...I’m sorry?

Well, I am. I was going to tell you about a year after I did it, but the money was growing exponentially, and I figured I’d keep it from you so that when we retire, we’ll have some hidden money.

Or in case the business flopped and then we would have some money left. ”

I speak through gritted teeth. “You’re reaching.”

He rakes a hand through his hair. “I’ll get on the phone right now and put it back with the rest of our money.”

“God, you are such an asshole.” I practically growl. “Why don’t you tell me about Rita Lindsay.”

His eyes close tightly and then they open again, as he tilts his head, defeated. “Fuck.” He mutters.

“No, that’s what you did. You fucked up . You fucked up so bad you need to invent a new word for it.”

He draws in a deep breath and releases it. “Fine. I fucked up.” He says it like this is less offensive than him hoarding money dishonestly. “What do you want to do about it?”

Stunned. I’m utterly stunned. I blink twice slowly, trying to comprehend what he just said and how he said it.

Like he didn’t just throw away a fifteen-year relationship and make irreparable damage to the business that we’ve built together in said fifteen years.

“We’ve already got a contingency plan for this, Boston. And you just bought it.”