"Snap your fingers in my face again and see what happens," I shot out reflexively, stunning her and myself.
Damnit!
That'd been Black Southern Amani, and Jessica couldn't handle her. "It's, like, really rude," I soothed with a small smile.
"Um," she dithered, biting her lip nervously. "You looked kinda lost there."
"Thinking about the Harrold account," I replied smoothly, grateful for the plopping noise that sounded from my computer, making me aware of a new notification. "Work calls."
"Oh, come on! A couple more—" She glanced down at her phone screen before scrambling up and shoving her mason jar into her purse. "Damn, I'm about to be late for a meeting with Pierce."
"Another one?"
"He does love his face time," she muttered around a grimace, already at the door. She paused, looking over her shoulder at me. "We still on for happy hour at Pells?"
"Absolutely!" I assured before shifting back to my computer and the deluge of emails.
I lasted a whole two minutes before I caved. My skin felt too hot and tight. A clawing need sunk into my flesh, infuriating me beyond rationality. Sex drives were healthy things; orgasms a great stress reliever. But there were lines—real, distinct boundaries you
did not
cross.
Bringing a vibrator to work.
Using that vibrator in your office.
Cumming against your office couch and having to wipe the leather clean.
"God, I'm a mess," I groaned, pushing up from my chair and going to the door to lock it. I moved to the windows to close my blinds. Striding back to my desk, I snatched up the bright aqua vibrator hidden in my purse and stomped over to my couch.
I barely breathed as I unzipped my pants and forced them down to my ankles, then pushed up my blouse and bra. My clit was swollen, hot to the touch, painful. Slick painted my pussy and thighs, and nothing was enough. Not my teeth in the leather or the seizing jerk of my body as another orgasm curled my toes and arched my back. Frustration nipped at my heels because it didn't
feel
right—not my fingers grazing my nipples or my thumb strumming my clit as I ground down on six, thick inches of disappointment.
The orgasm was quick and dirty. Fucking useless. There was only the shallowest hint of satisfaction, like eating a sugar-free candy on a diet.
"Ugh," I groaned into the stiff arm of my office couch, yanking the vibrator from between my legs and clicking it off. "How the fuck do I feel worse?"
My phone rang from my desk, the noise jarring me into action and I stepped back over the line I should have never crossed. Pants and panties went up, bra and blouse went down, and I shaped my face into something other than flushed horny anger.
Clearing my throat, I strode to my desk, settled into my chair, and answered the receiver, "Amani Johnson speaking."
The day flew by after that in a series of meetings, email chains, never ending chat threads which always seemed to need immediate attention, and client account reviews. By the time Jessica knocked on my door jamb, eyebrows raised in silent question, I'd been re-reading the same email for 15 minutes, trying to make sense of the legalese and failing.
"Let me just wrap this up," I mumbled.
"Take your time," she said politely, stepping into the room and planting herself on the chair across from my desk.
"No, I need to get out of here." I fired off some version of an "I'll get back to you" email, set a reminder for myself, and quickly typed up a list of my morning tasks before switching off the monitor. Grabbing my purse, and stuffing my feet into the slip-on shoes under my desk, I was out of my chair in the next second. "Let's go."
"Someone's eager," Jessica chuckled, popping up from the chair. "That means you're drinking, right?"
"Heavily."
"Ooh!" Her eyes widened. "What's the occasion?"
"Surviving the week," I laughed, moving out of my office and toward the bank of elevators. "Is there ever another reason?"
"For heavy drinking?" she demurred, bobbing her head. "Work, partners, and family. That's about it."
I chose to skirt right past that pronouncement, instead climbing into the elevator and asking, "Are you drinking?"
"'Am I drinking?' she asks," Jessica mimicked, cackling in some parody of the Wicked Witch of the West. "We're doing shots!"
A chill went up my spine at the glint in her eyes. Jessica was a private school legacy kid who'd rushed a sorority in her freshman semester and grew up with three brothers who all went on to military careers. It didn't take more than two drinks and two shots for me to crown the winner in our duo. Too bad it didn't stop there.
Which is how I found myself planted at Pell's weathered bar, with a heavily tattooed bartender smirking at me as she shook he head and poured me another shot. I threw back tequila that went down so smooth it was
criminal
not to have another, and I realized I was not happy enough for this hour. Happy Drunk Amani could be trusted with her phone but Viciously Horny Drunk Amani with unsupervised phone time equaled cyber-stalking two sexy men with the information on the business card they'd given her, uh, me.
Fuck.
Creepy Amani got led me to a U.S. based non-profit that worked specifically to help LGBTQA youth across some major cities: Miami, New York, D.C. Chicago, L.A, and Houston. It didn't take more than a click to know who Alex and Dominic were: lottery winners that had taken a few million, invested it wisely, and turned it into
lots
of millions they used to be wealthy philanthropists. Because of course they were.
Didn't help that there was an ungodly amount of shirtless pics. Pictures of them sweating while helping with construction of the centers. Pictures of them kissing—some chaste and some downright pornographic.
I clung to the memory of them showing up at the diner with bloody fingernails, willing my desire-drenched head to remember how fucking not okay that had been—contines to be. But then my eyes strayed back to the photos, thumb swiping unconsciously to the next one with those abs and honest-to-God cum gutters.
"Ooh! They're hot!" Jessica piped up over my shoulder, startling me out of a rabbit hole that either ended with a broken vibrator or ruined vagina.
Maybe both.
She plopped down onto the stool next to mine, her voice one notch above acceptable but not yet obnoxious. Pells boosted good alcohol at reasonable prices and the type of gastropub fare that a person craved after sixty plus hours at a desk. "Are they new clients?"
"Somethin' like that," I slurred, trying to put my phone away and failing miserably as it slipped through my fingers and landed on the grimy, tiled floor. "No, no, no—Oh thank God!" I stroked over the intact screen, feeling tears well up as I crouched beside the stool.
"Hey, hey," Jessica murmured sloppily trying to wrap an arm around me and only managing to drape herself over me. "Wus wrong?"
"Nothin'," I mumbled because it
couldn't
be anything. If I let myself get mixed up with Dominic and Alex then God only knew what'd happen to my life. My parents were accepting to a point, which included my cousin Deadra moving in with her long time girlfriend but not marriage. They supported gay rights but not gay pride. They were okay with two men holding hands in public, but a child with two fathers was crossing the line.
My parents were arbitrary and didn't make a lot of sense, but they were also mine. I wasn't sure I could handle not having them and not being accepted by them because I wanted to fool around with some rich gay men. These men lived in the public eye—if their profiles said anything—and it was only a miracle of fate that kept us from being photographed that night.
Plus, it wasn't like I kept a low profile anyway. You couldn't be a Black woman in a management position at a Fortune-500 company and not have a few articles written about you and the "struggle" you endured to get to your position. I knew the weight of my sex and my color and what and who I represented; there was no way I was going to risk myself—
my reputation and career
—for a fantastic fuck.
"Jus' PMS," I mumbled, absently clicking through my phone applications with more muscle memory than true intention. I was just drunk enough to make a dumb choice. Just stupid enough to announce my unicorn status to Jessica and declare how very not awkward it was to figure out what went where in a three way with two gay men. Two men whose most recent location drop on their social showed them at a nightclub in D.C., 40 minutes away from me by car. And my GPS was nice enough to tell me traffic was light. "I need another drink."