In the Boss's Bed

The morning sun filters through unfamiliar slatted blinds, casting harsh lines of light across the floor. Celine Winslow regains consciousness with a heavy head. Her eyelids flutter open to the sight of a strange, opulent bedroom. Silk sheets tangle around her bare legs. A deep, lingering soreness radiates from between her thighs. She presses the heels of her hands against her pounding temples. The hazy, alcohol-soaked memories of the previous night’s raucous department dinner snap into a razor-sharp, horrifying focus. The memory hits her with the force of a physical blow. Echoes of deep, breathless groans fill her head. She remembers the undeniable friction of bare skin sliding against bare skin, the slick heat of sweat, the relentless thrusting of a man who claimed her virginity without hesitation.

Panic spikes her heart rate, sending a rush of adrenaline through her veins. Desperate to flee the scene of her drunken mistake, she scrambles out of the tangled sheets. Her bare feet hit the cold hardwood floor. She looks down at the mess of luxurious linens and spots her white blouse discarded on the rug. She reaches down and picks it up. The delicate fabric is ruined, torn down the middle with the buttons missing. There is no way she can wear it out of this place. Her hands shake as she drops the ruined garment back onto the floor. In its place, she spots a crisp, professional skirt suit deliberate laid out for her on a pristine leather armchair in the corner of the room. She rushes to throw it on, pulling the stiff fabric over her tender, aching body.

Approaching the expansive vanity mirror, she inspects her reflection with a rising sense of dread. She leans in close, her breath fogging the polished glass. Thankfully, her slender neck remains flawless and clear, unblemished by the night's feral activities. Not a single mark mars the golden skin of her throat. However, the moment her gaze drops lower, she is greeted by a sprawling, colorful canvas. Dark purple bruises and bright red bite marks paint a fierce trail across her collarbone and the swell of her breasts, disappearing beneath the neckline of the borrowed suit. The hickeys are a stark testament to the sheer physical intensity of the encounter. He sucked and bit her skin with the ravenous hunger of a starved animal. She lets out a shaky breath, her fingers trembling as she buttons the suit jacket all the way to the top to hide the damage.

Stepping cautiously out of the bedroom, Celine moves into a massive, meticulously clean, cold, and lifeless living room. The space feels more like a high-end museum exhibit than a home. She freezes in her tracks, the blood draining from her face.

Lounging on the expensive, white leather couch is her boss, Vance Sterling. The notorious, unapproachable CEO of Sterling Boutique sits before her in black loungewear. A sleek laptop balances on a velvet pillow resting on his lap. He wears a pair of wireless headphones. This is the man rumored to be a strict ascetic, a corporate titan who never engages in office romances and fires anyone who crosses professional boundaries. Yet, based on his ravenous, unyielding physical performance during the night, he is anything but the detached iceberg he portrays to the world.

When he hears her footsteps, he looks up. His intense, dark eyes lock onto her frozen form.

"I am in a meeting."

His voice is a low, rough gravel that sends a sharp shiver down her spine. Celine snaps her mouth shut. Without breaking his stoic facade, he reaches out with a large hand. He pushes a tall glass of milk and a steaming plate of food across the surface of the glass coffee table.

"Come here and eat breakfast."

He commands her with effortless authority. Celine swallows the lump of terror in her throat. She walks over on weak legs and sits down on the very edge of the sofa. The cushion sinks beneath her weight. When Vance leans forward to adjust the angle of his laptop screen, the prominent, unmistakable hickeys she left all over his neck are displayed in plain view. Every single high-ranking executive on his video call gets a crystal-clear view of the dark, bruised suction marks covering his throat.

Celine feels her face flush a deep, burning crimson. She is mortified to her core. Those marks belong to her. She had no idea her drunken mouth inflicted such visible, aggressive damage on his skin. She sips her milk, her eyes darting away to the sterile walls of the penthouse. She wishes she could spontaneous combust and disappear into a pile of ashes. She regrets the moment she stumbled out of the restaurant and into the wrong car. The silence in the room stretches on, punctuated only by the faint, muffled voices of the executives speaking through Vance's headphones. Celine forces herself to take a small bite of the sandwich sitting on the plate in front of her. The sandwich consists of toasted bread, crisp lettuce, and thick slices of ham, yet it feels like ash on her tongue. She keeps her gaze fixed on the glass table, praying for the floor to swallow her whole.

Fifteen agonizing minutes pass. Vance reaches out and clicks his laptop shut, wrapping up his corporate meeting. He pulls the headphones from his ears and tosses them aside. He begins to eat his breakfast with a casual, leisurely pace, chewing his food slowly while Celine sits frozen beside him.

"Sorry, I didn't know it was your first time. I was a little rough."

He addresses the glaring elephant in the room with a chilling deadpan delivery. His face remains devoid of any emotion, as if he discusses a minor clerical error rather than the fact that he roughly took her virginity.

Celine chokes on the milk in her mouth. She coughs into her fist, her face burning anew with sheer humiliation. She had just managed to get her racing heart under control, and now he brings up the physical details of their sex.

"The family doctor will be here soon. Wait until after you see him before you go."

He issues the order with a matter-of-fact tone, not even bothering to look at her as he takes another bite of his sandwich.

Celine grips the condensation-covered glass of water next to her plate.

"Mr. Sterling, I can manage to get home on my own. It is no trouble at all."

She speaks with a quick, desperate breath, eager to escape the suffocating atmosphere of his penthouse.

Vance stops chewing. He slowly turns his head and looks up at her, his dark eyes piercing right through her defenses. A sudden flicker of hurt crosses his stoic features, softening the hard lines of his jaw for just a fraction of a second.

"Are you saying I didn't perform well enough last night?"

Celine parts her lips, but no sound comes out. Her mind goes blank. She is steamrolled by his blunt interrogation. Her heart pounds a frantic rhythm against her ribs. She is rendered speechless. How is she supposed to argue with a statement like that? If he were anyone else, she would curse him out and storm out the front door. But he is her terrifying boss, the man who controls her career.

An older maid steps into the living room, breaking the heavy tension hovering over the sofa.

"Mr. Sterling, Dr. Webb is here."

Vance does not say a word to the maid. He keeps his gaze locked on Celine, quietly taking in her appearance. She possesses smooth, sun-kissed skin and beautiful golden hair. She is a stunning mixed-race woman with an incredible body, the kind of figure that makes men jealous of whoever she dates. His intense stare makes her skin heat up all over again. He lets out a faint sigh through his nose, a subtle sound that barely registers in the quiet room.

"Come with me."

Forced to follow his orders, Celine stands up and trails behind him. They walk back down the wide hallway and return to the very bedroom where they spent the night having aggressive sex. The maids have already stripped the bed and replaced the tangled, stained sheets with fresh, spotless linens. Celine's palms grow sweaty just looking at the massive mattress.

A female doctor enters the room carrying a black medical bag. Vance steps out into the hallway and shuts the solid oak door behind him. Celine braces herself for the ordeal. The metallic click of the medical bag unzipping echoes in the quiet room, sounding like a death knell to her remaining pride. She endures a mortifying session with the doctor. She is forced to strip off her borrowed skirt and underwear, spread her legs on the edge of the bed, and allow the doctor to physically examine her sore vagina. The doctor inspects the torn, swollen tissues resulting from Vance's heavy thrusting and carefully applies a soothing medical ointment to ease her lingering soreness. Celine covers her burning face with both hands the entire time, wishing for a quick, painless death to end her embarrassment.

When the examination concludes and Celine emerges from the bedroom, Vance is gone from the penthouse. The vast living room is empty. She takes the private elevator down to the ground floor parking garage. The descent takes only a few moments, but it feels like an eternity as she stands alone in the mirrored box, unable to look at her own reflection. Waiting downstairs by a sleek black luxury car is Nolan Kensington, Vance’s assistant. Nolan is her age, twenty-two. They graduated from the same university, interviewed at the same time, and started working at Sterling Boutique on the exact same day.

Celine approaches the vehicle. She feels as though her dignity is shattered into a million unrecoverable pieces, scattered across the concrete floor. She opens the door, slides into the plush passenger seat, and stares blankly out the tinted window.

"I got into the wrong car last night, didn't I?"

She mutters the words under her breath, dreading the inevitable confirmation.

"Yep, future Mrs. Sterling."

Nolan flashes a massive, teasing grin from the driver's seat, recounting the disaster of the previous night. He starts the engine, and the car purrs to life.

"I have known you for a while now, Celine, and I have never seen you drink that much. Not even at our graduation parties. You got in the wrong car, stumbled right into the back seat, threw your arms around Mr. Sterling, and called him Baymax. Then you aggressively attacked his mouth."

Celine squeezes her eyes shut. She wants to throw herself out of the moving vehicle and roll into traffic.

"Last night, Mr. Sterling had been drinking a little too, but he didn't even dare move. You know he has that extreme germaphobic thing going on. Well, you ripped his shirt wide open. Buttons went flying everywhere across the leather seats."

Nolan laughs, clearly enjoying her misery as he steers the car out of the parking garage and onto the sunlit city streets.

"We were going to take you straight home, but since you live alone, Mr. Sterling worried about you being alone in such a messy state. He brought you back to his place instead."

"Ha."

Celine forces a dry, hollow laugh from her throat.

Nolan glances over at her, his eyes scanning her appearance from the driver's seat.

"So, you and Mr. Sterling..."

He trails off, noticing her unmarked neck rising above the collar of the suit jacket. He raises an eyebrow in genuine surprise.

"I guess Mr. Sterling was being a gentleman after all."

Celine turns her head to look at Nolan. She gestures to her clear skin with a stiff flick of her wrist, her lips curling into a cynical, bitter line. She thinks about the sprawling canvas of dark purple bruises and bright red bite marks hidden beneath her clothes.

"Exactly what you are thinking."

She rolls her eyes toward the roof of the car. She silently decides that her cold, intimidating boss is nothing more than a fake gentleman putting on a calculated act. He left her neck clear merely to save his own reputation in the corporate world, while painting the rest of her body with the aggressive evidence of his insatiable lust.