"Mr. Dickens, your 4:30 interview has arrived."
John Dickens looked at the clock on his desk. 4:30 exactly. Perfect. He pressed the intercom button.
"Thank you, Mrs. Harris. Would you please show her in?"
Dickens rose and walked to his office door to greet them.
It opened to reveal Mrs. Harris and a very short, slender young lady dressed in a loose-fitting, short black cocktail dress. In the right circumstances, the simple dress might have seemed acceptable attire in the staid office, outfitted with upholstered leather furniture and dark wood. But the patent leather red stiletto heels would never work.
Dickens smiled at the young lady, then at Mrs. Harris, and back to the young lady.
"Thank you, Mrs. Harris. Considering the late hour, you may go home. I'll show our visitor out when the time comes."
"As you wish, Sir."
Good old Mrs. Harris. Sixteen years of late-afternoon interviews and she'd never once offered to stay or inquired about the young ladies afterward, though they almost never returned, and none ever came to work for the firm.
"Miss Jamie McEvin," Dickens said as though announcing her arrival at a party. He gestured for her to enter the room and closed the door behind her. "You're very punctual. I like that. It conveys respect. May I call you Jamie?"
"Yes, that would be nice." She smiled. It was going well so far.
"Splendid. You may call me Mr. Dickens," he said. "Or Sir."
Her smile was more uncertain now. She liked his voice. Slightly deeper and huskier than it had sounded on the phone the night before when he called her for the interview. An unusually late hour it had been for a business call, but Jamie had been warned this firm was full of eccentrics. You can get away with that when you're the largest, most successful firm of your kind in the state.
"Please have a seat." Dickens gestured toward a large sofa, and as she moved toward it, his hand went to the perfect spot in her lower back, high enough so it didn't appear he was trying to touch her ass, and low enough to make her think he wanted to. She liked the tiny bit of pressure she felt from his fingers and the effortless way he guided her. Her breath quickened a bit, and when she sat, she crossed her legs. Dickens eased into the overstuffed chair facing her. His eyes lingered on her legs.
"Your resume says you are fluent in French. How long have you been practicing?"
"My father lives in France," Jamie said, thinking that the verb he'd used was an odd choice. "I visit him often. And, of course, I took four years at the university."
"The university," Dickens said, nodding knowingly. "Yes, your friend from the university, Jenny, has given you a wonderful recommendation."
Jenny had been Jamie's roommate through three years at the school. They'd had a lot of fun and kept a lot of each others' secrets, many of them involving faculty members -- married, of course -- even a dean.
Now Jennie was a housewife and a mother, with three children and a position in this firm. She'd put in a good work for Jamie when the time came and had given her a heads-up about the interview.
"Do whatever they ask," she'd said. "The pay here is phenomenal. They may ask you to do some things you don't understand at first. Just go along. You'll figure it out eventually. I just know you're going to fit in."
"I see you have some experience with Russian and Greek, as well," Dickens was saying. His eyes were still on her legs. Long, muscular. Jamie shifted on the couch and smoothed her skirt.
"Not very much. Just from my travels."
"A little exposure is better than none at all," Dickens said, looking directly into her face. "I'm mainly interested in French, but members of the Board come from a variety of backgrounds."
He gestured for her to stand, though he remained seated.
"I appreciate your wearing the outfit I requested. It's perfect. Silk?'
"Yes," Jamie said weakly. She felt her face beginning to flush and didn't understand why.
"Please turn around," Dickens said, "slowly."
She did as she was told, her feet unconsciously falling into the positions she had learned in the few weeks she'd taken modeling lessons in middle school. "It's just a show," she was thinking. "He wants a show." And she relaxed a bit, confident she could give him what he wanted.
"It drapes across you nicely," he said. He liked her legs and the way the dress showed off her tiny breasts without accentuating them. Without a bra, the fabric rubbed them slightly as she moved, just enough to stimulate the circulation and make the nipples grow a bit.
"Come," he said, rising suddenly. "Let's find out exactly how well you've followed my instructions.
He pressed a button on his desk and the wall behind them drew back, revealing another room, with a long marble table. There were five chairs on each side of the table, and one at the head. With his hand in that perfect spot in the small of her back, he guided her toward the end of the table without the chair. The touch of his fingers had the same effect on her as it had the first time, only stronger.
He wasn't particularly tall, but he had a commanding presence when he walked. And when he walked beside her, his hand on her back, she felt protected, yet under his control -- safe, but at his mercy. She couldn't help feeling aroused.
Under the end of the table was a dark box, made of the same marble as the table, it appeared. He pointed to it.
"Pull that out from under the table," he told her, "and open it up."
She moved to do so, bending from the waist. He was standing directly behind her as she bent over, making her feel vulnerable. She couldn't see him, but she imagined that his view was like what she'd seen at a zoo once, when a female ape bent over in front of a make, raising her ass high in the air and backing toward him, "presenting" herself.
The dress Jamie was wearing was short, and she wasn't sure how far it would ride up with her bending over. The box was heavy. She dragged it out slowly, thinking maybe she should squat down, but then thinking she'd look undignified in that position.
A flush came to her face again as she tugged at the heavy box, not from the exertion, but from knowing Mr. Dickens was enjoying his view.
