On His Desk by Mia Faye

Chapter 16

MICHAEL

From the back pew where I’m seated, I can only see the top of Elly’s head. I half-listen to the man reading a bible verse. Several people have already spoken, from people who had worked with Charles to his friends, people I’m not familiar with.

Amusing anecdotes were told, and I chuckled along with everyone else as I recognized some of Charles’ personality traits. When the service is over, I feel oddly unburdened and guilt-free from our years of estrangement. Oliver and I get in the line for offering condolences to the family.

Apprehension comes over me at the prospect of coming face to face with my six-year-old daughter. We get to the front of the line and I shake Paige’s hand.

“Thank you for coming,” Paige says, her huge dark sunglasses shielding her eyes. “Do you want to see Elly? She’s in the car at the front with Charles’ parents and sisters.”

I shake my head. This is not the time and place. There will be time enough for that when the DNA results are back. I’ve already had my samples taken in a lab organized by my lawyers. I assume that Paige has done the same for herself and Elly.

“I hate funerals!” Oliver says when we are back in the car.

“Why did you come?” I ask him genuinely puzzled. I hadn’t asked him to, and he and Charles had not known each other.

“That’s what friends do,” Oliver says. “They do things for each other even when they don’t like to do them. Especially when they don’t like to do them.”

Something forms in my throat. I clap Oliver’s shoulder. We are silent for most of the way as we return to the office.

“What are you going to do now?” Oliver asks me quietly.

I haven’t thought of Lavish cosmetics since the day Paige told me that Elly was my daughter. Legally, the company belongs to her and Paige and the thought of going through with my plans now makes me nauseous.

“I’ll buy it from Hyperion investments,” I say to Oliver.

We are not in the business of investing in companies and running them ourselves. In the case of Lavish cosmetics, I feel a moral obligation to make it profitable again for the sake of Paige and Elly. That means hiring professionals to manage it and keeping an overall eye without being personally involved.

I don’t want Paige to know that I own a large share of it. If she did, she would know that I had planned to steal Charles’ company from him. I don’t know why I suddenly care about her opinion. Even if she finds out, she has no moral authority to have an opinion on it. She dumped me for my best friend and failed to tell me about the existence of my daughter.

My worry is Elly. She will not remain a child and I would hate her to know that piece of history. Charles is the dad she has known for the first six years of her life and I’m sure she would not want to know that I had intended to destroy him.

No, it is better if Paige does not know my involvement with Lavish cosmetics.

“Thanks, man,” I tell Oliver as we part ways in the elevator.

As soon as I step out of the elevator, I’m wrapped in Ava’s sweet fruity scent. It makes me smile and I take longer strides to her office. She looks up and smiles when she sees me. I lean across her desk and kiss her on the mouth and then collapse in the chair by her desk.

“That bad, huh?” she says, a concerned look on her face.

“It was tough,” I say to her. “If you’d once told me that my friendship with Charles would come to an end, I’d have laughed in your face.”

“It’s terrible to lose an old friend. I can’t imagine Miley and I not being in each other’s lives. We’ve known each other since we were kids,” Ava says.

“That’s how it was with Charles and me. We were more than best friends. We were brothers. Why would he have picked Paige over our friendship?”

If I’d had a chance to have an honest conversation with him, that’s the one thing I’d have wanted to know. I’d never have gone after a woman that he was interested in, let alone date her.

“Men can be weak that way,” Ava says. “They hop from woman to woman without a second thought.” Something in the tone of her voice makes me suspect that she’s not talking about Paige or Charles anymore.

“What happened with your last relationship?” I say.

A pained look comes over her features, but it quickly disappears. My heart squeezes and an urge to protect her comes over me.

“The usual. He met someone else and proposed to her. We were supposed to get married this year,” she says, her voice even.

“Bastard!” I say with feeling.

She bursts out laughing. “Bastard?”

“He is! There’s no other word for a man who lies to a woman. There’s no need for it. If you don’t have feelings for her, just tell her. It’s less painful for everyone in the long run.”

“Lucky for us, we don’t have to worry about feelings,” Ava says.

A couple of weeks earlier I would have replied with confidence. Now, I take a moment before saying anything. I like Ava. A lot. I love her body and her company. I’m just not sure about my feelings for her. I want to keep it light so that neither of us gets hurt.

“That’s right,” I tell her. “And on that note, how about you come here and give this hungry man a kiss.”

She grins. “Now you’re talking.” She gets up and comes around to where I’m seated. However, instead of sitting on my lap to kiss me, she slides to the floor and knees between my legs. “I think you need a little more than a kiss,” Ava says and brings down my zipper.

“I think you’re right,” I tell her my voice husky as I anticipate having her full lips wrapped around my cock. It is the perfect way to release my confused feelings after the funeral service.

I let my head fall back on the chair and close my eyes. All my senses are attuned to every movement that Ava makes. I wait for the first lick to my cock, instead, she licks the insides of my thighs and my balls.

Her tongue and hands are everywhere except my cock and it’s driving me insane. My cock jerks about in protest and Ava laughs softly.

“So, you like teasing, is that it?” I growl.

“I wouldn’t call it teasing,” she says and grips the base of my cock.

Ah…her touch sends a trail of burning fire. Ava uses her mouth and her tongue in ways no other woman ever has on me.

“What would you call it?” I manage to say. I barely keep up with the string of conversation.

“I’d call it a preamble.”

I chuckle at that. My laughter dies in my throat when without warning, she takes the whole of my cock in her mouth.

“Fuck, Ava!” I growl.

Out of their own violation, my hands go to the back of her head to hold her in place as if there’s a risk she’ll stop what she’s doing and leave me hanging. She sucks me furiously and I grunt and groan like a caveman.

Her mouth is hot and combined with a tongue that curls around my cock, I begin to feel an orgasm building up.

Ava stops sucking my cock long enough to issue last-minute instructions. “I want you to come in my mouth.”

Fuck! How can a man control himself after such an invitation? I rock my hips against her, and my cock goes deeper into her mouth. My body goes rigid and moments later hot seed sprouts from my cock straight into her mouth. I make strangled noises as I come and the let out a loud sigh.

How did I ever manage without Ava? I cannot remember life without her. In a few short weeks, she’s become indispensable.