BRENDA
"You wanted to see me?"
Brenda Addison looked up from behind her desk. The young woman who had spoken -- Charlotte -- stood in the office doorway, eyebrows raised.
"Yes, please. Come in. And shut the door."
"Of course." The blonde woman complied, closing the door behind her.
"So. Take a seat."
"Thanks." Charlotte sat down, brushing a stray lock of blonde hair from her face.
Ms. Addison tiled her head, watching closely. It was odd. She hadn't really noticed before just how beautiful the young accountant was. Not that she was sexually attracted to her, or anything. Of course not. But, with what she now knew...
"So?" Charlotte looked across the desk at the older woman. "Ms. Addison? What can I do for you?"
Ms. Addison cleared her throat and refocused. "You've been with the firm for what, six years now?"
"Six and a half," Charlotte answered proudly. "Ever since I received my professional designation."
"Yes, of course. I had forgotten, you were hired right out of college."
The older woman looked across the desk at the young accountant. She had, of course, not forgotten the circumstances under which Charlotte had been hired. After all, it had been her decision to hire her. At the time, it had been a real catch. Diversity was the new watchword in the hiring committee and landing a young woman... an extremely competent and qualified young woman... had been a notable coup. At the time. For many years, under Ms. Addison's mentoring eye, Charlotte had been on the fast track to partner. Ms. Addison considered the young, almost, to be a protégé.
But then, several months ago, something had changed.
Ms. Addison had never been able to put her finger on it, exactly, but Charlotte's work had somehow become less... competent. Less focussed. The young woman often seemed distracted on the job, leaving early... failing to attend weekend meetings... even turning in sloppy work, something she would never have done previously and something the older woman could not abide. While nothing official had occurred, Ms. Addison had mentally removed Charlotte from the partnership track and was considering changing her to a contract hire.
If that.
It had been a mystery to Ms. Addison, what exactly had happened to the promising young accountant she had been trying to mentor.
Until yesterday.
"I receive a report from our IT department yesterday." The older woman gave a small frown. "Apparently, a site you were visiting on the work server raised a flag. They brought the matter to me."
Charlotte's eyes went wide. They were, Ms. Addison noted for the first time, the most amazing shade of blue. "What? I never... I never used my work computer for... uhm... ..."
She trailed off.
Ms. Addison just shook her head. The older woman picked up her phone and opened an app. "Not your work computer. Just the work server. I assume you were using the firm's wireless network." She leaned forward, turning the phone outward. "Look..."
CHARLOTTE
Charlotte looked down at her boss's phone. She felt a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach as the familiar pink and white "F4F" flashed across the screen and then faded onto a personals site.
Her site.
And there it was. On her boss's phone. The original pictures she had taken all those months ago in her bathroom... the overdone, sexy outfit and the caption that had been oh so exciting to write at the time: ""Hey hey, submissive 25F here, blonde, blue eyes, 5'7, 121lb, 38B, looking for kinky stuff, if you're the type who doesn't ask but demands... hit me up. :) Xx"
Afterward, she had desperately wanted to change the site... to hide her face in the pictures, but Angela wouldn't hear of it. "If it ain't broke," she had quipped, with that awful smirk of hers. And it wasn't... wasn't broke.
Unfortunately.
With Angela's unwanted assistance and encouragement -- the domineering woman had insisted on adding a calendar for booking "erotic encounters" and a public comments page - Charlotte's F4F site was extremely popular. In addition to the 9.5 / 10 rating, her site now featured one humiliating review after another:
"... best tongue ever..."
"... really is a submissive little dyke..."
"... loves to be abused..."
Charlotte felt her face turn red as her boss scrolled slowly through her embarrassing site. This was it, an absolute low point in her life. She was going to be fired for sure. She wished she had never posted on that damn site all those months ago. If only she had known...
"My policy," Ms. Addison said, looking up, "is that what my employees do on their own time is their own business."
Charlotte held her breath, waiting for the "but...".
"I confess," the older woman continued, "I'm a bit... surprised to learn about your er... extracurricular activities, but, as I said, what you do on your own time is your own business, as long as it does not affect your work here."
Charlotte exhaled. Was it possible her career going to survive this?
"I ask two things. Firstly, do not access this site while at work. I do not what this... business of your spilling over into your professional life."
"Yes, of course. I..."
"Secondly, you must remove any pictures which show your face. We cannot have you named in any scandal or identified by a client of the firm." She gave her next words some bite. "Am I clear?"
"Yes, Ms. Addison." Charlotte fought to keep the look of relief from her face. She wasn't going to be fired! "I understand."
"Good." The older woman placed her phone back on her desk. "I consider this matter closed. Now, back to work."
"Yes, Ms. Addison."
BRENDA
She shook her head as the young blonde woman scurried out of her office and closed the door. Perhaps she should have fired her on the spot, but Charlotte had shown so much promise, once. She had expected great things of her. It was such a shame that...
The buzzer on her intercom sounded. "Ms. Addison." It was her assistant. "I have Ms. Parker on the phone for you."
Ms. Addison grimaced. Her immediate instinct was to say that she was not available. Melissa Parker was swiftly becoming her most difficult, and time consuming, client. There was no financial or accounting problem so small that the obnoxious woman wouldn't insist on the managing partner's immediate and undivided attention! The file really was more trouble than it was worth, particularly given the nature of the client's business. She should really...
Then she remembered, all those rumors she'd heard at the time she picked up the Parker contract... that the CEO's interest in the company business was something more than professional. Maybe...
She reached forward and his the transmit button on her intercom. "I'll take the call, Vanessa. Put her through."
Would it work?
MELISSA
"... and, if you review the projections over the next three fiscal years, you'll see that the cumulative effect of our recommended tax planning will increase, year to year. Of course, the interim balance sheets will have to be revised and updated on an ongoing basis, to ensure that..."
Melissa Parker leaned back in the boardroom chair and sighed, running a bored hand through her short, brown hair, as the accountant-speak washed over her. The blonde girl... Charlotte... she really did have the most amazing blue eyes. That old bitch Brenda hadn't been lying about that. Or about the woman's appearance generally. Melissa would give her that. The girl was stunning.
"... ongoing regulatory compliance, of course, is mandated for all tax planning of this nature, so we would have to file..."
She had wondered whether Brenda had been lying about that... that other stuff. But, when Melissa had seen the online personal for herself, well...
"... the appropriate forms, in triplicate, with the applicable government agencies, together with..."
... she had been convinced. Hence, this meeting.
The brunette spoke up. "That's all very interesting, but do you know what we do here, Charlotte? At Parker Publishing?"
The blonde girl looked up from the laptop, where she had been reading from a colorful list of government forms and Powerpoint pie charts.
"I'm sorry? What you do?"
"The company." Melissa shifted forward in her seat and rested her elbows on the boardroom table. "What our business is." She brought a hand up to her chin. "Brenda must have told you something about the company."
"Uhm... not in any detail," the blonde woman answered, frowning. "I mean, I read the file and I know the company is involved in some kind of subscription based online publishing. I assumed that meant web services." She turned back to the computer screen. "That's why I was recommending that..."
"Pornography."
"What?"
Melissa grinned. That got the accountant's attention, sure enough. "Nudes. Porn. Erotica. Whatever you want to call it. We host networks for online erotica and produce our own material as well."
"Oh." The blonde woman appeared at a loss for words. "I uh... I didn't..."
"Does that change your recommendations?" Melissa gestured at the laptop screen, sitting open on the boardroom table. "Tax planning and all that? The fact that we sell and produce porn?"
Melissa was amused to see the young woman's face turning red. For such a kinky little thing -- if her online profile was to be believed -- she was awfully prudish. Maybe it was time to cut to the chase.
"I... I don't think so," the blonde stammered, looking down. "I'd have to uh... check and see if..."
"You shouldn't act so surprised," Melissa interrupted. "I've heard that you have your own little online erotica venture going."'
The young accountant's eyes went wide. "What?!?"
The businesswoman put her phone on the table, screen open, and slid it towards the blonde woman. "F4F," she said, drawing out each syllable, as if it was a separate word. "Not one of our sites, but I'm familiar with it."
The blonde woman fell silent, staring at the picture on the screen... the image of her, wearing that slinky dress... smiling for the camera... "I uhm..."
