Sometimes, when everything is quiet, and I don't have much going on, I'll crack open a cold beer and sit and stare up at the stars in the night sky. It's at moments like that when memories come back to tease me. I had not thought about this encounter in years. I think I had tried to compartmentalize it and flag it as "do not remember." I failed.
As I recollected on the event, I felt a little pang of guilt at some of my involvement in it. It was one of those things that you know you shouldn't have done and you regret it after the fact. In the grand scheme of things, it was probably not all that big of a deal. I did it. I enjoyed it. But, looking back, I do cringe a little bit.
I was a partner at a boutique web development agency in Austin, Texas. Our firm had been growing by leaps and bounds over our first four years of operation. I was living large and loving it. It seemed that everything we touched turned to gold and I was on the brink of significant wealth. I was married to a beautiful wife, with two incredible kids, a dog, two BMWs, a large house overlooking Lake Travis and a salary in the high six figures.
I was living in a bubble.
It was the annual Christmas and end-of-the-year profit sharing party. Each year, we closed out the books, divided up the profit and rewarded the partners and employees with sizable bonuses. These parties were always epic events, and the rumors were that we had pulled out all the stops this year.
We had rented out a beautiful, lakeside country club and turned it into Las Vegas. We had a well-appointed casino with craps, roulette, blackjack, and Texas hold 'em tables set up in the ballroom and had hired professional dealers. Everyone was given Monopoly money to play with so that they could live it up without any risk.
It was touted as an event to dress up in suits & tuxedos, fancy gowns, and cocktail dresses. There we numerous bars with no limits and a wide selection of fine spirits. To allow people to drink as much as they wanted, we provided a babysitting service and free rooms at the adjacent hotel. One of Austin's best fine-dining restaurants catered the food in an extensive buffet.
My wife and I had left our kids to sleep-over at a neighbors house and had booked a suite at the resort-style hotel for the night. She was dressed to kill in a slinky red cocktail dress that was low cut to show off her 38D breasts and slit up the side to reveal her slender, well-toned thighs. She was drinking champagne and was handling it pretty well. I made sure to bring her glasses of water periodically and to make sure that she ate throughout the night.
That is when we saw each other. Being a partner, I had responsibilities to socialize and mingle. Sometimes she accompanied me and other times I needed to be on my own. She was smart enough to know the difference and shrewd enough to handle herself so that I had the freedom to do as I needed. There was a certain amount of hobnobbing required with the other partners, as well as schmoozing of investors. I also had to entertain my direct reports and their spouses as well as their subordinates. It was essential to spend the time to make everyone feel that they were a vital and critical part of our rapidly growing team.
My wife Antonia, or Toni as the people closest to her called her, was the perfect executive's wife. She was beautiful, intelligent, knew how to carry herself and was independent. Toni could be eye candy attached to my arm at one moment or attending to a bored investor in another. She also did a fantastic job of relating to and spending time with the wives of many of our employees.
This meant that we spent periods of the party away from each other. I kept loose tabs on where Toni was throughout the night and would periodically wander by to check on her, give her a hug or a kiss, maybe a dance here and there and to let her know that she was loved. She likewise never seemed to complain or come across as needy. She gave me the space I needed and reveled in her role as a partner's wife. We trusted each other fully, and neither of us had ever crossed the line from flirtation into infidelity.
Fairly early in the evening, Toni and I were standing near the entrance, welcoming our employees and their guests as they arrived. I was dressed in a fancy, black, French tuxedo with a purple paisley vest and matching purple bow tie and handkerchief in the chest pocket.
"You need to be very nice to this one," I whispered to Toni, as a distinguished looking, older gentleman and his much younger wife entered. "That's Jacob Sanders, of Sanders Pharmaceuticals. He's a new investor we're trying to convince to give us about twenty million in new funds."
Toni nodded slowly, smiling brightly and whispered back, "Just how nice?"
Before I could answer Jacob stepped forward and shook my hand, vigorously, "Well, hello Mark, good to see you. And who is this beautiful flower on your arm?"
Jacob was approaching seventy, from what I could tell. The hair that he had remaining was white, his face tanned and wrinkled. His wife was easily twenty-five years younger than he was. She had long, flowing red hair, was also dressed in a red gown, that hugged her ample curves. She was a larger woman and seemed demure, almost shy next to the boisterous potential investor.
"This is my wife, Antonia," I replied, gesturing to my wife. She smiled and extended her hand slowly, tilting her head to the side to greet Jacob with a sly grin on her face. Antonia was a beautifully exotic mix of Italian and Korean, with long dark hair, dark eyes and a smoking, alluring look that had been known to melt steel. She was raised and educated in Europe and spoke perfect English, with a hint of an unknown accent that only made her seem mysterious.
"It's my pleasure to meet you, Mr. Sanders," she greeted him, using her most sultry of voices, "Mark has told me so much about you." It was a lie, as I had never once mentioned him to her, but she knew how to feed into his overinflated ego. He ate it up.
He took her hand and kissed it, "Enchanted, my dear, simply enchanted. Please, call me Jake."
He didn't introduce his wife, and she did not attempt to introduce herself. I felt sorry for her, so I smiled and extended my hand. "You must be Mrs. Sanders," I said, not knowing her first name, "I am Mark Miller, and this is my wife, Antonia. Welcome to our Christmas party."
She took my hand and shook it briefly. She didn't smile. "I'm Linda," was all she said.
"Please help yourselves to something to drink. We have an amazing buffet prepared as well. There's a nightclub set up in one of the ballrooms and a full casino in the other."
I couldn't tell if she was even listening to me. I turned back to Jacob, and he was busily chatting very quietly with my wife. "Oh, and Jacob, we have a Torcedores from Cuba who is hand rolling cigars for us."
"Excellent," he replied. "I was asking your lovely wife if she might join me for drinks in the casino. You don't mind if I drag her away for a while do you?" I noticed that he did not say "we" or include his wife in the statement.
I looked at Toni. She was smiling brightly and looking completely elegant. "Of course not," I answered him, "I'm sure she would love the company." I kissed her on the cheek, and she immediately began speaking to the Sanders and telling them more about the amenities the party offered as she led them to the casino room.
She was the perfect executive's wife, indeed. I was fortunate.
I greeted several more attendees, all employees. A few minutes later, I saw Danny Martinez entering. He had on a simple dark suit and looked extremely uncomfortable in it. Danny was a recent addition to the team. He was a developer on one of my new project teams, helping us to develop a new marketing application. I had never seen him in anything other than jeans and a t-shirt. He had interned with us as he completed his graduate degree. He was hungry for advancement. I liked that in employees.
He was helping the woman take off her fake-fur coat. When the couple stepped forward, I was speechless and stood to stare in complete and utter dismay. Next to Danny was one of the most stunningly beautiful women I had ever seen in my life. She had long blonde hair, blue eyes and pale skin, like soft porcelain. She was taller than Danny at around five-foot-nine-inches tall, with a slender frame and perfect, perky breasts that had to have been in the neighborhood of 36 C's. She had the looks of a Hollywood actress, the body of a dancer and the smile of an angel.
"Ahem," Danny said, pretending to clear his throat. I realized, with a slight blush, that I had been staring at his wife without speaking, my eyes moving slowly up and down her body.
