Ty’s mind wandered to his leather overnight bag, where the yellow pads and pens he’d stowed were waiting to be filled with the second chapter of his novel. He wouldn’t be writing on this trip, he knew; he was too tired, too wrung out, too concerned he was about to get the sack when Middleton told Johnno what he’d done to her in his hotel room.
Daddy. I like sucking your cock, Daddy.
The spokeswoman for flex panels spoke on and on about their benefits. Ty tried to get his mind out of the gutter and concentrate but that phrase kept coming back to him, repeating itself in his head like a mantra. He was about to go outside for some fresh air when all the hairs on the back of his neck stood up. He turned and sure enough, a mere thirty minutes after the seminar had started, Middleton was here . Ty returned his eyes to the stage, trying to keep his breathing even. She wouldn’t come over and sit with him. Ever since the lemon-curd meringue incident she’d gone out of her way to avoid him, a state of affairs he’d encouraged at every turn.
“Middleton!” Dutchy raised a hand and waved her over, drawing the eye of all the people around them. “Over here, come sit with us!”
Ty considered giving Dutchy a dead-leg, but it was already too late. Middleton had caught sight of him and was walking their way. Ty studied her out of the corner of his eye. What he saw did nothing to improve his mood. She looked fresh-faced and perky; even more so than usual. Her waist-length hair was loose around her shoulders and her skin was all but glowing. She’d forgone her usual bulky dress for skinny jeans and a singlet top that exposed her pale shoulders. She was also holding a trendy coffee cup, which meant she was late not because she’d rolled out of bed, exhausted from thinking about their encounter, but because she’d treated herself to a barista-made-latte. Anger rose in Ty’s blood like mercury.
“Never seen her in jeans before,” Dutchy muttered. “She’s got good legs, doesn’t she?”
Ty had splintered a hand mirror when he was a kid, smashed it on the driveway just because he wanted to see what it would look like. Who knew the seven years of bad luck his mum warned him about would concentrate itself into this single business trip?
Middleton sat down beside Dutchy. “Hey guys, did I miss anything?”
“Nothing too important.” Dutchy tapped her coffee cup. “Any good?”
“Yeah, amazing. It’s from the Bluebird café on Main Street. Want me to show you where it is later?”
“Fuck yeah, I’m dying for—”
Ty cleared his throat.
Dutchy went red. “Sorry, boss.”
Ty waited for Middleton to apologise, but she just pulled a notepad from her bag and began taking notes. She was wearing pink ankle boots with a pattern of roses on them. Why did everything about her have to be so fucking cutesy? And why could he smell her from two seats away? That strawberry-pie scent that had lingered on his bed sheets long after she was gone.
Ty’s overwrought genitals stiffened, and he remembered her weight in his lap, the way she’d squirmed and sighed as he fingered her. He’d been so close to feeling her come, her wet pussy clenching down on his hand as her saliva dried on his cock…
Ty swore under his breath, forcing his attention back toward the woman giving the presentation, repeating her words back in his brain. By 2022 we anticipate that seventy percent of all households will—
“Where did you end up last night?” Dutchy muttered to Middleton. “I couldn’t see you when I left the pub.”
“I was playing the pinball machine,” she whispered back. “I left at eleven.”
“No, you didn’t. I didn’t hear you come into your hotel room until two. You’re in the room next to me, remember? So where’d you go?”
Brass bands constricted themselves around Ty’s chest. Dutchy had a longer nose for gossip than any woman Ty had ever met and Middleton blushed like a milkmaid whenever anyone said anything remotely sexual. If she stumbled now, said the wrong thing, their entire encounter would be revealed.
The end of his career flashed before his eyes. He saw himself carrying a box of his stuff from the GGS building amidst whispers of ‘such a fucking cliché.’
Middleton took a sip of her fancy coffee. “That wasn’t me. I was in bed. You must have heard the person on the other side of you.”
Her voice was smooth, her expression bland as boiled rice. It wasn’t just a convincing lie, it was a perfect lie.
Dutchy frowned. “But I heard you. I know I did.”
Middleton giggled. It sounded like a wind chime being buffeted by a breeze. “Seriously, I wish I was doing something more exciting, but I was watching Scrubs.”
“Oh.” Dutchy looked disappointed. “I thought you might have gone wild for once.”
Another crystal-clinking giggle. “I wish.”
Ty stared at Middleton. He had been with her in the small hours of the morning, had blown a load in her mouth, and for a second, he, himself wondered if it had all been a crazy dream. If he’d invented the whole thing in his mind. Then her milk-chocolate gaze locked on his and she winked.
Winked.
She winked at him.
The next few hours passed in a haze. Ty stopped pretending to concentrate on the seminars, his entire focus was taken up by the fact that Little Miss Sunshine had fooled him. He’d thought there was nothing beyond the sweetness and he was wrong. No girl who lied as effortlessly as she did was new to dishonesty. No girl who could suck off her boss, then wink at him was as shy as she’d pretended to be.
It took him a long time to untangle why that pissed him off so much. Part of it was ego; he prided himself on being able to see people for what they were; who didn’t? Everyone wanted to think they were a good judge of character. But it wasn’t just that. He felt disappointed. He’d taken some selfish pride in the fact that he’d corrupted the pure and bubbly Middleton last night—tarnished her just a little. But that was stupid. He’d been beyond irritated by the girl Middleton was pretending to be and he had no right to judge. He was the golden boy with the guitar case full of handwritten pornography, he knew all about concealing the things you didn’t want other people to see.
At lunch he waved away invitations to join this group of executives or that cluster of GGS employees to sit by himself and ask the all-important question—could he and Middleton 2.0 take this further? They had chemistry after all, and Ty could admit he’d been fascinated by her for a long time, if in an exasperated ‘is there a real person beneath that canary yellow blouse or just a very chipper robot?’ way.
But it wasn’t that simple. The daddy-daughter dynamic had two major facets; hard and soft, punishment and cherishing. Ty had always understood the first and never had much use for the second, but Middleton was so delicate it was difficult not to want to protect her. Last night he’d given her plenty of hard, but he’d also found his mind wandering to the soft. He’d wanted to shower with her once they were done, sleep with her tucked into his side, kiss her and make sure she knew what a good girl she was. That disturbed him almost as much as the fact that he’d touched her at all. Wanting to fuck his pretty employee was biology, wanting to cherish her was something else. Something worse.
He glanced at where Middleton was sitting, so fucking young in contrast with the other engineers, like a schoolgirl who’d been brought to a sustainability convention by a time-strapped mother. There were twenty years between them, but side-by-side, people might have easily guessed twenty-five or even thirty. Ty had never wanted to be a dirty old man, parading younger women around, so everyone knew his dick worked. He’d never planned on being single in his forties, but since he had no choice, he could at least avoid looking like a tacky piece of shit.
Forget it. Forget it ever happened and be grateful she hasn’t run to Johnno to say she’s suing you.
After lunch came a presentation from a hipster RMIT professor who appeared to be suffering from the same Benjamin Button’s disease as Middleton. Despite looking seventeen, he was a pretty good sp
eaker, using slides and incorporating music and humor into his talk with something approaching flair.
Middleton, Ty noticed, was laughing at all of his jokes. She was sitting on the other side of the hall, her long caramel-coloured hair swept over one shoulder like a mermaid’s. He remembered how that hair felt bunched in his fist while she swallowed his cock, and swore. Suppressing painful hard-ons was going to become a big part of his working life for a while.
Once the boy professor was done talking, the hall filled with excited muttering. The next and final speaker was Manning Turner, former coach of the West Coast Eagles Football Team. What his talk had to do with sustainability, Ty had no fucking clue, but he didn’t care, and neither did any of the men around him. As Turner climbed the podium, Ty settled in, knowing that at least for the next forty-five minutes he wouldn’t have to think about—
Dutchy nudged his side. “Look, Middleton’s made a friend.”
Inwardly cursing Jake Holland and the country he’d been named after, Ty glanced over to see Middleton talking to Benjamin Button. She was smiling and tossing her hair the way she had when she’d stood flirting with that big stupid lug last night, only this time Ty didn’t have the mercy of alcohol to take the edge off.
None of your business, he told himself. None of your business, she can flirt with whatever gawky, four-eyed motherfucker she—
“Is she hitting on him?” Dutchy asked.
“I don’t give a shit. Shut up, will you?”
But despite his words, ignoring her was impossible after that. Ty’s gaze keep veering to where she stood whispering and laughing and at one point touching the Boy Professor’s shoulder. Turner droned on about premierships and clubrooms and all Ty could think about was the way he’d left Middleton high and dry last night. What if she was still horny and wanted this Goonies-looking prick to finish what he’d started? The idea had his buffet lunch petitioning to return to the outside world. When Middleton pulled out her notepad and started scribbling on it, Ty stood up. “I’m going to have a talk with that girl.”
“About?” Dutchy asked.
“Speaking while people are giving a presentation.”
The corners of Dutchy’s mouth pulled down. “Don’t go too hard on her. She’s just a—”
“She’s not a kid. She’s twenty-five, and she ’s here representing our company. Be back soon.”
He left before Dutchy could say anything along the lines of ‘why the fuck do you care if she’s talking? We’re talking.’
Middleton with her back to him, didn’t see him coming, but the boy professor did. He gave Ty a nervous grin that said he looked exactly as angry as he felt. “Can I help you?”
“Not particularly.” For the second time in twenty-four hours Ty tapped Middleton on the shoulder. “I need a word with you.”
She turned, and her box-of-fireworks smile exploded out at him.
“Sure,” she said in the honeycomb voice that had, mere hours ago, moaned that his cock was so big. “What about?”
“About talking during someone else’s presentation.”
“Oh.” Middleton’s face changed subtly. He couldn’t pinpoint how; but it was as though she’d raised an eyebrow one-hundredth of an inch. As though without uttering a word she’d said ‘is that really what you’re mad about Mr Henderson, or are you mad because this boy professor might fuck me and you can’t?’
Ty looked at Middleton, and Middleton looked at him. Her smile said butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth but Ty knew better. Satan himself would melt in that mouth.
“The talking’s my fault,” the boy professor interjected. “Kate and I got a bit carried away talking about nerd stuff. I’m Patrick Sloan, by the way.”
“Tyler Henderson, good talk before.” Ty shook the boy professor’s hand without taking his gaze from Middleton’s. “You ready for that word?”
She blinked at him. “I’m sorry Mr Henderson, but if you don’t want us to talk during the football speech, Patrick and I can just go outside?”
Don’t you say his name to me, little girl. “It’s not just that, there are some things we need to straighten out, Midd—Kate.”
Her name sounded strange in his mouth, like a rough chip of wood.
Middleton’s sugary smile grew wider. “Sure thing. Lead the way.”
Patrick Sloan looked a little put out. “I’ll come and find you later and we can keep chatting?” he said, his smile hopeful.
“Maybe when someone else isn’t giving a talk,” Ty suggested, and the boy professor blushed. A few workers scraped food scraps into ecologically friendly waste bags as they walked through the dining hall but none of them paid him and Middleton any attention. Just a manager and his subordinate, on their way to do official business.
“Where are we going?” she asked.
Ty gestured to a small office left free for upper-level executives like himself to make calls and do work. It was, as he suspected it would be, empty. “Over here.”
Middleton stared at him and Ty knew she was wondering what was coming next. He saw the instant she decided she didn’t care, turning and striding toward the empty office without another word. Ty watched her go, her pert ass swaying from side to side in her jeans.
Inside the office the blinds were drawn, casting the space into a premature twilight that reminded Ty of the night before. Middleton sat on the desk, her long legs crossed. “What did you want to talk about, Mr Henderson?”
Ty’s stomach was heavy, his cock stiffening against his thigh. She knew exactly what she was doing, the beautiful infuriating brat. He pulled the door closed and twisted the lock on the knob. His palms were damp, his fingers shaking.
“Is everything okay?” Middleton’s forehead wrinkled like an inquisitive pug’s, and though it was entirely out of place, Ty wanted to smile. It couldn’t be entirely fake, the sweetness. She was too good at it, she made it feel too real. She must distort what was already there, angling it like a shonky mirror, so it was the only thing you paid attention to.
“Everything’s fine, Middleton.” Ty walked toward her and was gratified to see her confidence in her sexy pose falter.
She hunched a little and swiped her pink tongue over her lower lip. “Then why did you want to—”
“Talk? Because I have a question for you. Why were you flirting with the boy professor right where you knew I’d see you?”
In an acting manual Middleton’s expression would have been labelled ‘lovely confusion.’ “I wasn’t.”
He had always been interested in her, there was no denying that, but now he was downright intrigued. Watching her lie so efficiently felt like someone had dropped a thirtieth Hemmingway novel in front of him, its spine un-creased, its pages fresh with the new book smell he found almost sexual. “I thought maybe you were flirting with him to try and push me into doing something.”
“Like what?” She made that face again. None of her features moved, but suddenly he felt stupid, oafish, like he was making a mistake.
Fascinating.
Ty decided to change tact. “Okay, so you weren’t trying to push me. The question remains; what are we going to do about this?”
She laughed her twinkly wind chime laugh. “About what?”
“About the fact that I fucked your mouth last night.”
And there it was. Middleton’s air of delicate naïvety dissolved like sugar in hot water. Her lips parted, and her cheeks went bright red. “I um…I don’t…”
A smile creased his cheeks, the sensation so unfamiliar it felt as though they’d been cast in clay. “You do remember that, don’t you? You remember that you sucked my cock?”
He hadn’t thought her blush could intensify any further but somehow it did.
“I…erm…” Middleton looked down at her feet. “Yes?”
“Good.” Ty took a couple of meandering steps forward. “I thought maybe we should talk about it.”
She looked up at him, her eyes were w
ide and he knew she was trying to recover her aura of dizzy misunderstanding. “What would we say?”
“We could talk about you calling me ‘daddy.’ That was interesting.”
If it were possible for someone’s head to explode as the result of having too much blood in their cheeks, Middleton would be six feet under. “It’s not like that,” she said quickly. “It’s not about wanting—”
“I know.”
“I know that you know.” Middleton’s eyes were very bright. “You liked it.”
A quote Ty couldn’t place came into his mind, something about how when you look into a deep, dark place the place also looks into you. He made himself step closer. “I was the first man you ever called ‘daddy’, wasn’t I?”
She glanced away.
“I’m not trying to tease you. I’m not going to hold it against you. I just want to know if I was the first.”
“Yes,” she told the office wall. “You were.”
“Have you thought about me that way for a while?”
Middleton’s lower lip continued to quiver, but she said nothing.
Ty thought about the day they met. He’d been sitting hungover and miserable in the staff kitchen. Veronica’s ring was burning a hole in his breast pocket and he was trying to come up with reasons why he shouldn’t go upstairs and pour a couple of shots of whiskey into his coffee. Then Middleton—though she was months from acquiring that nickname—appeared in the doorway. She looked like an angel, a pure manifestation of innocence, all done up in a pink dress and knee socks. Ty had never, in his life, had such a visceral reaction to a female before, he’d gotten hard right under the scratched IKEA dining table.