Page 11 of Enemies with Benefits

The words might have been aimed at my elusive brother, but they resonated deep within me. Probably because Jasper and I had been playing a game for the better part of five years, ever since I walked into the boardroom at the internship fair and first experienced his dynamic magnetism. Heat flared up my body and I fought a squirm as total recall plunged me into that lustful state that never failed to materialise whenever I thought of him.

That searing, dangerous attraction had partly fuelled my decision to decline his internship offer. That and my family’s abiding hatred for everything attached to the Mortimer name.

I tossed the file away. I wasn’t ready to deal with him. Or the Mortimer Group. Nor did I want to think of how hard he’d made me come. How wanton he’d made me feel.

How much I’d craved a repeat performance ever since...

That madness in the maze was a shameful episode I’d intended to put out of my mind. If only it’d been that simple—

I jumped when the second office phone, positioned conveniently on the coffee table, rang. I didn’t want to picture my brother in this chair, drinking himself into a stupor when he should’ve been safeguarding our family. Unfortunately, so far all evidence pointed that way.

To stop thoughts of the brother I’d never really got on well with, despite my desire to, I snatched up the phone. ‘Hello?’ I said, then grimaced at the lack of professionalism. Must do better in future.

‘Congratulations on your official instatement as Acting CEO.’ The deep voice of the last person I wanted to talk to filtered through the handset.

Shock rippled through my body. ‘How do you know about that?’ The board meeting had only ended at ten. It was barely noon. ‘And how did you get my direct number?’

‘I have my ways,’ Jasper Mortimer said.

‘You mean you have a spy in my company,’ I deducted.

He chuckled, a rich, indulgent sound that threw me back to the maze. To his very male groans of satisfaction as I lost my mind. ‘Let’s not start our relationship with accusations.’

‘We don’t have a relationship.’

‘Yet,’ he countered smoothly.

‘We never will. I suggest you accept that now.’

‘Thanks for the suggestion. But how are we going to work together on this Morocco project if we don’t have even a basic rapport?’

My gaze flitted to the file I’d flung away. Something inside me shook. ‘Why are you calling me?’

‘To set up a meeting. The sooner the better.’ The lazy indulgence had left his voice to be replaced by a crisp, uncompromising tone. ‘Now that you’re officially the head of Bingham’s, we need to get this deal back on track.’

The ambitious deal that had, by all accounts, driven Perry over the edge. The thought hardened my resolve. ‘No.’

‘Excuse me?’

‘You heard me. The official Bingham position is that we won’t be going ahead with the Morocco deal. You’ll receive our official statement shortly.’ I hung up before he could reply. Then stared at the silent phone, my heart banging against my ribs.

After five minutes without it ringing, my stomach started churning.

Had I been too reckless? The board I’d battled to win over—the same board who’d expressed their wish to remain leaderless until Perry returned from his six-month rehab stint in Arizona—would love to be proven right that I wasn’t suitable for this position. Had I, with my very first act as CEO, played right into their hands? Tentatively, I reached out towards the phone. To do what? Admit to Jasper that I’d been too rash? Give him an opening to gloat? I snatched my hand back.

He’d waited for a week. He could wait another day.

Resolute, I opened the second file, putting thoughts of Jasper, his masterful fingers and wicked, orgasm-giving tongue out of my mind.

By five p.m. I’d resolved a third of the issues contained within the various files, and unfortunately received even further insight into Perry’s true state of decline—they’d been drastically neglected for months.

My chest tightened the more my thoughts dwelled on my brother. According to the family doctor who’d examined him, he’d been dangerously close to alcohol poisoning, a fact my mother had actively denied even though it’d been an open secret that Perry—like most Bingham men—had harboured a drinking problem for years.

And just like my father, Perry had refused to admit he even had a problem. The board had turned a blind eye to his addiction since he’d managed to keep Bingham Industries above the red line since stepping into Father’s shoes seven years ago.

My heart ached as I mourned our deteriorated relationship. Our interaction on the occasions we’d been forced to socialise had been stilted to the point where we’d been relieved to be largely out of each other’s orbit for the last three years. Still, his chilled silence when I’d accepted a junior marketing position at another firm had hurt.

Ultimately, he’d been as dismissive of my ambitions as my father had been; he’d fully supported my mother’s and aunts’ view that I should marry into some wealthy investment family, with guaranteed connections and endless resources, instead of striving to make my own way in the world.

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