Page 52 of Peppermint Bark

“I think you’re in heat,” Kate taunted.

Victoria’s calculating gray eyes narrowed. My mouth snapped shut. Her heel tapped twice. My chin lifted. Her arms crossed, power cord dangling from her fingertips.

“Hola, Cobrita,” Cruz said smoothly, approaching with open palms to break our nonverbal negotiation.

Oh shit, I couldn’t wait for her reaction to him interrupting her intimidation stare with a cutesy nickname. Victoria had been raised so formally that nicknames were an insult, never allowing her to be a Vickie or a Tori … God help the men who called her 'Ginger' or ‘Red.’

I didn’t know what the hell a ‘Cobrita’ was, but based on Victoria’s sour expression, she did. She closed her eyes, a hurricane gaining speed for maximum destruction upon landfall. When her eyes opened and landed on Cruz’s face, I expected one of her infamous ball-withering glares.

But when her eyes opened, the storm cooled unexpectedly.

“Can’t you see I’m in the middle of something?”

“With all due respect, I was in the middle of something first,” he said, gesturing around the studio to the class that she’d interrupted, then pointed to the power cord. “And you disrespected the Foo Fighters.”

“What the hell is a Foo Fighter?” When he scrubbed his hand over his face, she sniped, “Nevermind, I don’t have time for this.”

She swiveled back to me, cheeks flushed. “Your disappearing act set things back. Negotiations restart tomorrow in Manhattan. If you’re not there …”

If I was at fault for this deal crumbling, my career was over.

And if I hadn’t gone MIA for three days, she wouldn’t have had to consult my phone’s location then pick up my truant ass on a Sunday to force me to do the job for which I was exorbitantly paid.

“Now, Alexander.”

I reached for a stiff hug from Grace. When she felt me swallow back my frustration, she whispered into my ear, “It’s ok, Alex. Go.”

I breathed in the scent of her hair and whispered my thanks.

Victoria tapped her nude pump impatiently.

When I released Grace, Victoria dropped the power cord and walked out, heels clacking against the wood floors, and I followed like a chastised child.

I could run this negotiation in my sleep.

I’d spent weeks pouring over these documents, they were flawless. For days, a dozen people bartered around this bland Midtown hotel conference room eating soggy catered sandwiches. We were trapped in negotiation purgatory, overlooking Manhattan’s skyscrapers, insulated from the snowfall outside the floor-to-ceiling glass. I was pretty sure Christmas hadn’t passed because the food table would have been more festive. The only sign of the impending holiday was hearing that cheesy Mariah Carey song every time I took a piss … but hey, at least it wasn’t ‘Feliz Navidad.’

Knowing that I’d left San Francisco in a rush, Victoria packed several of my business suits. After two weeks without them, the ties felt like they were choking me. The trousers were uncomfortably tight — maybe I’d enjoyed the pies and burritos too much.

I found myself longing for the sweatpants upstairs in my hotel room, counting down the minutes until these papers were finally fucking signed.

This deal should have closed last week, but these assholes wanted their egos stroked … and they weren’t the only ones who wanted my stroking.

Across the walnut table, the target company’s merger specialist licked her lips and arched her back, making it clear how she wanted to celebrate her clients’ inevitable submission. Victoria’s response was more subtle: a claiming hand on my forearm, a lingering whisper in my ear.

Normally this was foreplay. When the deal was signed, I’d take the more convincing one back to my hotel room.

Spoiler: It was always the cunning redhead.

A decade ago, we didn’t need legal foreplay. Victoria and I lived together in law school, commuting from our Palo Alto apartment to classes, studying all evening, having exhausted mediocre sex, and then restarting the cycle. Over those summers, Nick crashed in our second bedroom while working at the San Jose Shakespeare Festival. He'd force us to take a break, climbing onto the roof deck to drink cheap beer under the stars.

Then Victoria brought me as a date to a family wedding, and a drunken rant from her grandfather's trophy wife revealed Victoria was the heiress to a real estate empire. Her wealth hadn't shocked me — her boarding school stories and name brand clothing had given away her background.

The true betrayal was the effort she’d put into hiding her grandfather’s fame. She apologized the only way she knew, with expensive gifts like high-end luggage, silk ties, and my gold watch.

I broke up with her and moved out of her place … into the apartment across the hall. She’d covertly bought the building and offered me rent so low that my wallet won out over my pride. It wasn't easy, living and working so closely with my ex-girlfriend, but I didn’t have the luxury to cut her out of my life. She’d pulled strings to get me this prestigious job, and I didn’t have the connections to leverage into a different firm without a huge pay cut.

After she realized I wasn’t exiling her, she relaxed — if Victoria ever ‘relaxed.’ She stopped hiding the business skills she’d gleaned from her strategic father, molding me into a world-class negotiator, second only to her.

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