When the rustling of fabric and sounds of sliding zippers ceased, and the overhead light illuminated the car once more, Penny pointed to a bottle of champagne jutting from an ice bucket. "Want some?"
Lifting the open bottle from the ice, Ryan noticed it was half-empty. "Looks like you got started without me."
"I needed it for courage," she admitted. "Now I just need to be drunk." Taking the bottle from his hand, she tipped it to her mouth and took a hefty swig.
"Sounds like a decent idea," he said. She passed the bottle back and he swallowed a long drink, too, then spoke uncertainly. "I guess I should, uh, tell the driver to take me to the parking garage."
Her slight hesitation made him wonder if maybe she didn't want him to go, if maybe she actually wanted to drink and commiserate together, but it was not to be. "Um, yeah," she said with a definite degree of finality.
Looking over his shoulder, Ryan opened the privacy panel and gave the driver directions to where he parked his car. He grew suddenly embarrassed on Penny's behalf, wondering if the guy had heard anything.
Thankfully, though, the driver's eyes betrayed nothing, and Ryan shut the panel, leaving him and Penny awkwardly alone again. As the limo continued winding through the downtown streets, they stayed quiet, simply passing the champagne back and forth until he offered her the bottle one final time with the words, "Last drink?" She took it, emptied it, then chucked it back in the ice bucket.
She looked so despondent. Ryan wanted to hug her, tell her again it was all right, but this time do it while peering into her eyes and maybe stroking her hair.
But she was practically engaged to his boss, for God's sake-or at least that's what he thought she'd said-and things were horrible enough already without him doing something stupid, such as being tender with her.
As the long black car finally glided across the echoing garage toward the only vehicle still there, Ryan leaned forward and met her gaze. Despite this being what she wanted, and despite the fact that she belonged to his brand-new boss, he felt bad leaving her after what they'd done together. "Are you gonna be all right?" he asked, and this time he did touch her knee.
She started to tremble-he felt it beneath his fingertips-and, taking a deep breath, she lifted her gaze. "Yeah. I guess."
But when he reached for the door handle and began to step out of the car, she grabbed his wrist. He glanced back to find her eyes looking frantic again. "You won't tell Martin about this?"
Tell his boss he'd just had wild sex with his girlfriend? "No, definitely not. It'll stay just between us. Promise."
"Thank you."
Not bothering to point out that she wasn't the only one with something to lose, he exited the limo, took one last look at her sitting there wearing her sexy dress and a distressed expression, then closed the door.
* * *
Ryan sat down behind Martin's desk early the next morning, although even sitting in the man's chair felt intrusive now, as if he were trespassing. He vowed not to think about that, though, since he'd come here to work. The office lay desolate on a Saturday morning, but it was just as well; it would help him concentrate, stay focused. All this work would get him firmly entrenched in Schuster Systems' operations, and it also seemed his only hope of getting his mind off what had happened last night, since hours of tossing and turning in bed hadn't done it.
He shook his head as the unsettling truth assaulted him once more. Already this felt like another disaster in the making, another fist with a choke hold on his career. Unfortunately, this wasn't the first mistake Ryan had ever made.
Only two months ago, he'd lost his job at ComData in Chicago, for missing a client meeting of all things. A missed meeting was an embarrassing faux pas, definitely, but he hadn't believed it would earn him a pink slip until it had happened.
It had all occurred innocently enough. He'd planned to have dinner with a woman he'd recently met, then hook up afterward with David Collins and Roger Borcherding, the top guys at Fischer International, in their hotel lounge for drinks around nine. Ryan had been assigned to manage their system conversion and the two executives had suggested touching base that evening after their flight arrived.
Ryan had picked up his date, Maggie, at her office after work, planning to eat and return her to her car by eight-thirty, but he'd been having so much fun that the first time he'd looked at his watch, it was quarter to nine.
Then, after hurriedly paying the bill and racing back to Maggie's car, they discovered it had a flat tire.
Maggie encouraged him to go ahead, but Ryan refused to leave her there alone in the dark, waiting for help to come. After assuring her that staying wouldn't be a problem, he called the hotel and asked to have a message delivered to the two men waiting in the bar. Then he changed the tire, and followed Maggie home to make sure she was okay.
When he finally reached the hotel around ten-thirty, however, he discovered that not only had his message never made it to the lounge, but Collins and Borcherding were angry. He knew he'd cut it too close on time in the first place, but he'd been sure they'd understand the position he'd been in with Maggie's car, sure that any decent guy would've handled it the same way.
All they could see, however, was that he'd stood them up, wasted their time, and proven himself irresponsible. It had made such a bad impression that Fischer International had ultimately dropped ComData and gone elsewhere for its software needs, and in the process pretty much made Ryan out to be the devil incarnate.
He still remembered standing in Mr. Lever's office, numb, trying to absorb the unbelievable results of that night. "We can't afford these kinds of screwups, Ryan," Lever had said. "And we can't afford to have someone on our team who doesn't put us first. It's nothing personal, but we have to let you go."
Ryan propped his elbows on the desk in Martin's office, then began to rub his temples as he recalled the incident.
The job loss had been devastating financially-he'd had a mortgage on a high-rise condo overlooking Lake Michigan, and he sent money home to his elderly parents in rural Indiana every month, money they needed to make ends meet.
And the job loss had also devastated him personally. He recalled standing there thinking, This isn't the kind of guy I am, the kind of guy who gets fired from jobs; this isn't how things are supposed to be. And it had happened all because he'd been having too much fun flirting with a woman to keep an eye on the clock. He didn't think he'd ever made such a bonehead move.
But then, the truth was, even before the fiasco at ComData, his social life had gotten him into trouble. He'd been the best and the brightest young system designer on his team at Futureware, also in Chicago, yet he'd also been fresh out of college and frat life. He'd lasted five years there, but too many late nights had led to too many late mornings. He'd always been the guy who came straggling into meetings long after they'd started, his tie crooked, his eyes bloodshot. He'd been young and stupid and careless.
That job he'd eventually chosen to leave on his own, but only after he'd been passed over for promotions numerous times. The fault was his, but he'd decided he just needed a new start. And things had been going great at ComData until that one tragic night. The job loss had been made even worse when Mr. Lever told Ryan he couldn't in good conscience give him any recommendations, which made it feel pretty damn personal, no matter what the guy said. And in fact, when Ryan had started applying for other system design jobs, he'd discovered that news of his blunder at ComData had already made the rounds in the WindyCity, and no one wanted to hire a guy who lost big accounts. He'd effectively been blackballed in Chicago.
So … that left him with Cincinnati. Another new start. A smaller, more conservative city where he'd been sure he could buckle down, act responsibly, and finally reap the rewards of being damn good at his chosen profession. A fresh, young company with a solid track record. A nice condo with a river view. And a scantily clad girl in a dark limo who'd turned out to be his new boss's fiancée.
Ryan buried his head in his hands a little deeper, then thrust himself up out of the chair. Coffee. He needed coffee.
After making his way to the coffee machine, then digging in the pocket of his blue jeans for change, he reflected on the unbelievable events of the previous evening as the hot liquid trickled into the white cup below. He'd been terribly sorry to find out Penny belonged to Martin, and the more Ryan thought about it, the more it grated on him. Because the guy was his boss, and he would surely lose this job, too, if she started feeling guilty enough to tell. And also because he couldn't deny loving what had happened between them once he pushed all the weirdness aside.