Page 6 of Return Billionaire to Sender

So now I have two too many sexual fantasies aboutsome country mouse I’ll never see again.

Or will I?

Who is she? What business does she have here? My business has a lot of different segments. Was she going to HR?

I pick up the papers on my desk. These are things I need to sign. There are tabs by the contract changes.

I grab my pen, imagining tracing my tongue along that coy curve of her nose.I imagine her sprawled beneath me, hair asandstone halo around her head, and she’s undone and panting, naked in my bed. Or naked except for the butterfly tie.

I swallow back the dryness in my mouth.

One of the admins comes in. “Oh, I’m sorry,” he says.He’s here for the contract.

“No, hold on.” I look at the changes and sign, hand it over. “Tell me, is HR conducting interviews today?”

“Interviews for what?” he asks.

“Interviews for hiring,” I say. “Find out.”

3

Noelle

The elevatorI’m allowed in only goes up to the second floor. I get out and step up to the desk. A woman on the phone there holds up a finger, signaling that I’m to wait. She has red hair tightly coiled into a bun on top of her head with a little braid woven in and out. According to the little sign, her name is Anya.

“Can I help you?”Anya asks.

“I need to see Mr. Blackberg, please.”

“Do you have an appointment with Mr. Blackberg?”

“I have something that I have to show to him,” I say. “Regarding a property.”

“Appointment?” she asks again.

“No,” I say.

“You can’t see him without an appointment. You’ll want to call the main line.”

I clutch my bag, feeling the outline of the iPad with the movie cued up. “I feel that he’ll want to see what I have.”

“You have to talk to his staff. The number’s on our site.”

“It’s time-sensitive. It pertains to 341 West Forty-fifth Street, a property he recently purchased.”

“In what way is it time sensitive?” Anya asks.

I suck in a breath. “In a way pertaining to the property. He needs to see it.”

“You’re going to have to give me more than that,” she says.

“Something for his eyes only,” I say. “Extremely important.”

She regards me for a bit. She picks up a phone. “I’ve got a woman with something about 341 West Forty-fifth,” she says, sizing me up. Then, “She won’t say. Mr. Blackberg’s eyes only? I don’t know. She thinks it’s urgent but she won’t say.”

She sets down the phone. “This way.” She leads me down a hall past a row of cubicles. We pass another elevator. This one, too, has a black pad. Do the black pad elevators lead to the offices above? Wearrive at a door bearing the name Janice West. The woman with the red bun knocks.

“Wait,” I say. “It’s Mr. Blackberg who I need to see. It has to be him.”

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