Author's note: I apologize for the long delay. I hope this conclusion satisfies. Confession: I might be slightly obsessed with Melora Hardin in aviators. -dkc
When Jacqueline Carlyle walked into a room the world stopped. When she barked out an order her staff jumped to oblige. It was unmistakably sexy the way she commanded a room.
Jane felt a nudge and realized she was gawking. Kat was laughing under her breath.
In an exceptionally tight leather skirt, the blonde was showing off every last inch of her legs. And they were glorious.
Taking a deep breath and a seat at her desk, the writer prepared herself for the morning meeting. If she had stayed the night at Jacqueline's she would have seen that tight black leather sliding up those seductive legs. This was certainly not the thought to be having minutes before a meeting. She hadn't spent the night after they had talked. And not spending the night felt okay—for both of them.
"Good morning!" Jacqueline was beaming as she continued her path through the bullpen. Her staff hadn't seen her chipper in days. Many sets of eyes followed the boss until she reached her office.
The writer had pulled her phone out of her bag and typed out a message. She was quite glad Kat had left her and was not reading over her shoulder.
You are a masterpiece in that skirt.
She watched as her boss picked up her phone, clicked, smiled and then glanced the way of its sender. Jacqueline was confident. She was not arrogant. However, the grin Jane received was decidedly cocky. She wanted to laugh aloud, but instead muttered under her breath as she resumed reviewing notes for her latest article pitch.
"It's time," Jacqueline announced as she walked out her door and the few strides to the conference room door, Andrew in tow with coffee and her iPad.
The writers gathered in the conference room. Usually their first pitch meeting for an issue would exclude editors as it was more or less a brainstorming session. However, this meeting included writers, editors, photographers, department heads and the entire social media team. Everyone seemed a bit confused by the number of people packed into the conference room, but the confident woman at the head of the table had no such qualms.
"'Let's talk about sex, baby,'" the editor-in-chief was obviously quoting the great philosophers of spice, but using that to open the meeting upended Jane's stomach. She couldn't look up. "The hookup apps issue was fantastic. Great work everyone."
The brunette was still avoiding eye contact. It was her contribution to this particular Scarlet issue that put the train on the track—the sometimes runaway, sometimes derailed train that was her affair with Jacqueline. It occurred to her right then that it was no longer an affair, at least not of the extramarital variety. Of all the feelings in her stomach at that moment, the pit that had existed there for some time was missing.
"Before I hear your pitches for the sex positivity issue, we need to address something. It's time we find balance between digital and print. This week I want to meet with each of you writers one-on-one. You each bring different talents and perspectives that draw readers. It's time we address this head on. Some of you have great stats, but let's try to sort out whether it's because of your lane. Sage, for example, has a popular column for obvious reasons. Men and women like to read about sex. Some of you have stats that reflect a certain piece's popularity. Jane's orgasm—" Jacqueline's sentence was interrupted by Jane choking on her coffee at the very word 'orgasm' coming out of the mouth of the woman with considerable skills at coaxing actual orgasms out of the writer. Jacqueline may have had a similar thought because her hand seemed to have clamped down on the table's edge for dear life. "—article was popular while her gun article wasn't. Alex hit Scarlet records when he wrote about the travails of young men looking for friends in the city. We all know how well his attempt at understanding why women would want to join a women-only gym went."
Everyone around the table laughed. Scarlet was still receiving feedback about how clueless Alex was.
"Ha-ha-ha," Alex rolled his eyes.
While the staff was focused on Alex, Jacqueline looked at Jane and offered a terse, but knowing smile. The boss's mind had indeed gone to a similar place with her mention of the orgasm piece. She loved that it had caught Jane off guard. Jacqueline was Jane's weakness and the same could be said for the older woman. Jane had unnerved her from day one.
"Jane, you will submit to me. Not to Lauren. Not to our, as of now, unnamed digital editor. That was a mistake. You're mine," the boss said, leaving the writer speechless. She was barely able to refrain from turning into one of those cartoon characters whose tongue rolls out like a red carpet as their eyes bug out of their head.
Jaqueline didn't lose a beat as she continued on with commentary on digital and the coming issue. After a brief silence the editor-in-chief clapped her hands once.
"Alright, people. Questions? No?" she looked around. "Let's meet one-on-one before the end of the day. In my office."
Taking her iPad from Andrew without so much as looking at him, the editor exited the room with her next task already garnering her attention. A certain writer's attention, however, was incapable of attaching itself to anything but that leather skirt as it accentuated stunning curves that she had begun to memorize both with her mind and in the dark with her hands.
Jacqueline really was a masterpiece.
...
Knowing she was now writing specifically for Jacqueline had left Jane with a terrible case of writer's block.
Writing for Jacqueline was not the same as writing for anyone else. Jane didn't care what Lauren thought of her. She never had. She had always cared what Jacqueline thought of her. She cared what she thought of her before she was even writing for her. How much she cared what Jacqueline Carlyle thought of her became a monster when Jane became a writer under her. It killed her when she chose to leave Scarlet. She didn't care what people thought of her flame out at Incite or why she had ended up there in the first place. But when she started having feelings for Jacqueline or at least was looking at her boss in a different light, she really cared what the editor thought of her. Now Jane existed in a place where she couldn't believe there was a second chance before her, both to write directly for Jacqueline again—she still believed herself to be the reason Jacqueline was fired from digital—and to have something personal with her boss again. What that might become, she had no idea. The possibilities made her entire body tingle.
She stared at her monitor willing words to appear. Her fingers hovered over the keyboard.
"Struggling writing for someone other than the wunderkind?" she looked up at Alex who had a smirk on his face.
"Hardly," Jane gave him a look that made him laugh.
"Ah, I know what it is," he leaned against her desk. "You're under the Carlyle spell."
"And what is that? A spell of fear and intimidation?" Jane said.
Tilting his head and placing a hand on her wrist, Alex had a face that was empathetic and often sly.
"You're living your dream, Jane. Dreaming your dream, even. And you know I'm not talking about writing for Scarlet."
Jane went completely still when he winked at her. She was glancing at her fingertips on the keyboard. She looked up and saw something reflected in his dark eyes that was reassuring and safe. He knew her secret and there was nothing to worry about.
'Thanks, Alex," she smiled bashfully.
"If I might make a suggestion?" he said. "Start at the beginning. Write what you know and remember your audience is young women. Not a certain editor."
Alex showed her that gorgeous smile of his and left her to stare at her monitor.
…
Jane stood in the hotel lobby with a perfect view as Jacqueline stepped out of her town car, taking the valet's offered hand. She was in impossibly high heels and yet remained as poised and balanced as if she were barefoot. She offered the valet a smile, a smile Jane could see from her angle, but the reaction to which she couldn't see. She would have liked to see the guy's face. Jacqueline had a way about her that left those around her offering up silent prayers that they wouldn't make a fool of themselves in her presence.
Jacqueline walked through the doors of the Four Seasons, her aviators still on as she nodded at the concierge. She stopped moving entirely when she saw Jane. Jane, who was holding a bouquet of long-stemmed roses that were nearly as big as she was, stood in the middle of the space with her eyes on the blonde. The multicolored bouquet was breathtaking, but the woman holding it made Jacqueline wonder what she had done right in her life to have found Jane.
She slowly slipped off her aviators and nervously put the end of one arm into her mouth where she toyed with it.
"Hi," Jane smiled.
This made Jacqueline melt. Folding the sunglasses and dropping them into her bag, she stepped forward, placed a hand on Jane's hip and leaned in. Fully expecting a kiss on the cheek, the writer was taken aback when Jacqueline planted a firm kiss on her mouth. They nearly smashed the bouquet between their bodies. She seemed not at all concerned with the eyes on them as people entered and exited the hotel.
"You, my dear, are my greatest weakness," she whispered to Jane before taking her by the hand and leading her to the elevator.
They stood hand in hand in the elevator without ever once glancing at the other. Jane had an absurd smile on her face while Jacqueline was playing it cool. When they reached Jacqueline's suite the flowers were handed over, inspected appreciatively and then placed on the small console table.
"Water?" Jane wondered. She should have got a bouquet with a vase, but the thought hadn't occurred to her.
"They'll be okay for a bit," Jacqueline had dropped her bag and was now totally absorbed in Jane. "Come here."
Jane needn't be told twice. She stepped forward and was wrapped into a warm embrace. It had only been the night before when she arrived here with no clue as to the reason and no hope for a future with this woman. It hadn't been twenty-four hours since she outright sobbed in Jacqueline's arms. The thought that she might have lived the rest of her life without ever finding this kind of love, desire and comfort made her grateful for whatever it was in her application that brought her to Scarlet.
"This skirt is not safe for work," Jane hummed as her hands slipped lower on Jacqueline's hips.
"Oh?" Jacqueline's mouth was near Jane's ear, the vibration of the question tickling the lobe.
"God, your legs look amazing in it."
Jacqueline's mouth latched onto Jane's earlobe and went to work showering it with attention. A deep, needy moan escaped the brunette's lips.
"Jac," she breathed.
The taller woman reached a hand out and swept dark strands of hair back behind the very ear her lips had been assaulting. It was in these little things Jacqueline did that Jane found the most beauty. Taking that hand, encircling it with her own, Jane led Jacqueline to what she knew must be the bedroom.
Standing before her, Jacqueline was an offering for Jane. She unzipped her own skirt, slipping down her tantalizing legs. Stepping out of her heels, Jane could feel her armor dropping. Once in nothing but her intimate items, Jacqueline's body was examined from every angle. The eyes on her were wet with happiness.
It wasn't long before they were naked in the hotel bed. Getting out of that bed would be easier said than done.
-finis-