Bonds of Attraction (Full Length Erotic Romance Novel) (9 page)

I was covered in sweat again. My breathing
was heavy and labored and I felt like I could have passed out. The orgasm had been
so intense that it felt as though my muscles had endured another painful
workout. Every muscle was now completely spent; there were no reserves.

It took a great effort to get off the couch
and fix the damage that I had caused while in the throes of my fantasy. I had
kicked over the table entirely when I came and the candles, thankfully unlit,
were tossed all along my carpet. The empty wine glass and cleaned plate were
upside down on the ground, the wine glass broken. I gathered the pieces of
glass carefully, still feeling the faint remnants of my orgasm between my legs.
Everything pulsed and throbbed, but I felt so satisfied that I could only let
out little laughs at I cleaned up the broken wine glass.

I managed to drag myself into the shower. I
ran the water scorching hot and got in, cleaning the sweat and stress of the
day off of my skin. My mind had quieted since my orgasm and I had been almost
without any trains of thought. Now, in the shower and calmed down, thoughts
began to creep back into my mind.

Shame was the first emotion that I felt. Not
over masturbating or having such a vivid fantasy, I felt no shame for being a
sexual woman, but that I had blatantly broken one of my own professional rules.
Fantasies were fine, sometimes I even sprinkled some pornography in with them,
but I had entered dangerous waters by fantasizing about a current client.

I was a professional. I had always acted
professionally and I always obeyed the rules that had led me to being so
successful. Yet I had never met anybody who gotten into my head the way that
Leon had. It was like he had implanted something in my mind that was insidious
and demanded attention. Even as I turned off the water and began toweling
myself off, I couldn’t quite get the image of him smiling out of my head.

That smile, that carnivorous smile of a man
who feeds his hunger without abashment or restrain. It stayed with you long
after it disappeared from your vision.

I rested my head against my pillow and closed
my eyes, determined to sleep. The sheets felt wonderful against my naked skin
and wrapped in them, I felt the exhaustion of the day catch up to me. Soon
enough, I was overtaken by a deep, dreamless sleep.

At the office, I sat at my desk and pored
over files before me. I had allocated the entire day to finding Leon
Christensen a match. Once I found him a match, he would no longer be my client.
Once Leon Christensen was no longer a client, I didn’t have to worry myself
with him anymore and he could fade into the file cabinet with the rest of my
past clients.

With Leon Christensen happy and in love, I
could smirk at him and know that I was as good as I claimed to be. He would be
my greatest triumph. I threw every bit of my professional ability in trying to
find him a match that even he, this man who did not believe in love, could not
contest. I was determined to be professional, last night’s fantasy
notwithstanding.

April had arranged a pile of every female
client that we had between the ages of twenty-four and forty. I opened up the first
case and began reading.

Her name was Lauren Sinclair, thirty-three
years old, never married, a relatively new client. I remembered her interview
well. She was a tall, gorgeous brunette who was a highly successful lawyer. She
had come across my services from a regular client of hers who was now happily
married. When she came in to our meeting, she had been a little reserved, but I
could tell that she was eager to find a partner.

“It’s very difficult being a single,
successful woman. I don’t have the time to go carousing bars for Mr. Right and
even if I did have time, I wouldn’t go about it that way. Many men are
threatened by a woman like me, so I would need a man who could look at me as an
equal and treat me as such,” Lauren Sinclair had said.

I imagined how she would react when Leon
brought out a whip and a dog collar. I laughed loudly in the open room and
tossed the folder into a pile that I designated as prospective matches. Even an
independent woman demanding respect might like a little submission. More than
likely, however, Lauren Sinclair didn’t seem the type.

I picked her folder back up and moved it to a
different pile. The rejected pile.

Mandy Harbringer, twenty-nine, married one
time, yoga instructor. Her divorce had hit her hard; her husband had cheated on
her with her best friend and the two had eloped. When she recounted the story,
she fought back tears even as she told me she was over it. Her father had a
dozen patents related to rocket propulsion technology and they were incredibly
wealthy as a result.

Mandy had a graduate degree in psychology,
but didn’t follow through to practice. Yoga had called her and she ended up
opening up her own studio, a modest establishment that only took donations. Her
blond hair had been tied back and it looked as though she was without a single
ounce of fat on her body.

“Aside from yoga, what are some of your
interests?” I had asked her.

“I really feel a calling towards animals. I’m
a vegan and volunteer at the local ASPCA,” she had said brightly.

Leon Christensen and a vegan yoga instructor,
the prospects didn’t look good. I tossed the folder into the rejected pile.
Plus, Leon seemed the type to want a girl with more of a figure, not the thin
and sinewy type.

I sorted through a few more folders with clients
that were all horrible mismatches. One woman had three cats and was unwilling
to part with any of them. Leon seemed more like a dog type of guy. Another was
looking to have kids within one year and settle down in a house outside of the
city. I could just imagine her crawling along the floor with a huge baby bump
dragging along the carpet.

I tossed folder after folder into the
rejected pile. After lunch, I walked over the massive pile to April to be
reorganized and filed. I returned to my office and read through more files. I
even read through old files of clients that had ceased to use our services,
hoping to find any lead.

I went home without finding anyone. My brain
was focused in on the goal at hand, and my lustful thoughts abated for the
evening. I was able to relax, but my mind kept returning to the task of setting
up Leon Christensen and I gave myself at least a few gray hairs trying to
figure out just what type of partner would be best suited for him.

The next day, I reached the end of the pile.
I was not to be defeated though. I pulled up the numbers of other matchmaking
companies that we were on good terms with. Often, we would turn to each other
for especially difficult clients in hopes of finishing the contract. There was
a commission paid to the other company, and both clients were satisfied.

I rang Beating Hearts Matchmakers and when
the receptionist answered, I had her patch me through to Amanda Rand, the head
of the company.

“Amanda, how are you?” I asked.

“I’m well, Julie. I take it you’ve got a
difficult one on your hands?” she asked, laughing.

“Something like that, can you fax me over
your female clients between the ages of twenty-four and forty. You can weed out
the gold diggers and baby boomers right off the bat. I’ll pay normal commission,
of course.”

“You’ve got it, Julie. You wanna do drinks
soon?”

We agreed to meet for drinks the following
week and exchanged a few more words before I hung up. Amanda was an old friend
of mine and I had even given her some tips when she started her business. Her
rates were lower than my own, so her clients were of a different financial
bracket and we weren’t really in competition.

By the end of the day, April had arranged and
presented me with the files that had been faxed over from a few other agencies.
April had called the other companies for me; I had only made the personal call
to Amanda since I enjoyed talking to her. With the pile before me, I decided to
start fresh the next day.

The following day was exactly like the
previous forays in studying the clients.

A professional thirty-nine year old brunette
who didn’t like Thai food. Her file found its way into the rejected pile.

A stunningly beautiful model who traveled
extensively for her work. Leon was too grounded in his nightclub operations for
that. Rejected.

One client was a teetotaler. The rejected
pile grew higher.

Another woman, a twenty-six year old
entrepreneur who specialized in nightclub promotion and blogging caught my eye.
But when I read over her folder, there was just something about her that gave
me a feeling that she wasn’t right for Leon Christensen. Sure, her favorite
foods were Thai and she worked in nightclubs, but there was much more to a
relationship than that. Plus, she was a little too thin. Leon needed a woman with
curves.

Day three of the search for Leon
Christensen’s partner ended without any kind of lead. I had even resorted to
calling ex-clients and asking them if they knew anybody who would want to come
in for a consultation, free of charge. There were a few leads and appointments
were made, but I was still staring at piles of folders that seemed to have
mixed in with each other to the point that I couldn’t differentiate which pile
was which.

I was being extremely picky, sure, but it was
only because I needed to nail this one. There couldn’t be the slightest margin
of error. Satisfied that I had rejected all of these women for the right
reasons, I left the office, my head aching from reading so many files so many
times. When I went to bed that night, images of various women swam in my head,
making it nearly impossible to fall asleep.

I woke up from a restless sleep, feeling like
the gravity in my bedroom was thicker than normal. I felt hung over, despite
having not had one drink the previous night. As a younger woman, I could drink
all night and sleep for a few hours and as long as I had a greasy breakfast, I
bounced back within an hour. Now, if I went to sleep with something on my mind
I woke up feeling as if I just got off a two day bender.

I drank too much coffee in an attempt to
compensate for my fatigue and my stomach felt acrid with the overflow of black
coffee. On my way into work, I drove in silence as my mind raced on, trying to
figure out how to solve this problem of finding Leon Christensen a partner.

Why was I so determined to find him a partner
immediately? Wouldn’t it be better to give it a few days, let some former
clients get back to me with some new leads while I went over my female case
files one more time? Surely I may have been a little too harsh on some of the
prospective clients.

Perhaps one or two of them deserve to be
called in for an interview. Yet when I thought about any of them actually going
on a date with Leon, his good looks melting their hearts along with his
irresistible charm spreading their legs, I felt a wave of apprehension. I would
interview them again, yes, but it was too premature to set up any sort of
meeting or date.

At my desk, the stress of finding Leon
Christensen a partner lessened, but a new feeling of hopelessness filled the
void it left. Leon was a unique case that was proving much harder than any of
my other clients. Within the first week I usually had at least one or two
prospective partners to match a client with. With Leon, I had none.

I checked emails. I made some phone calls to
some other clients about their cases. For two hours I did any and all work that
was unrelated to Leon Christensen. I called the hotel chain heir to find out
how the first date went, but he didn’t pick up so I left a voicemail. It was short
and polite, asking that he return my phone call at his earliest convenience,
but that it really was no urgent matter, just a simple follow-up call. I was a
bit curious to see how the date went, but it didn’t eat away at me. The hotel
chain heir was a very nice guy and I really did want to help him, but it didn’t
fill me with the panic that Leon Christensen did.

The outer office door opened and a female’s
voice caught my attention. I leaned over to look into the office to see what
was going on.

A brunette stood before April’s desk,
politely talking to her. I rose from my desk and walked towards my office door,
studying her closely. She was strikingly pretty. Her features were soft, yet
somehow the shape of her face was sharp. She had a womanly figure of curves
that would make any straight man look twice, at least twice, when she passed
by, although she was slightly skinnier than me, but not by much. She saw me
looking at her and smiled wide. Her teeth glimmered white.

I opened my office door. “Good afternoon,” I
said. “How may we help you?”

“Good afternoon to you!” The mysterious woman
said brightly. Her voice was high and bubbly. She was in her mid to late
twenties, definitely no older than twenty seven. “You must be Julie! Rebecca’s
my cousin!” Every sentence she spoke ended with her voice rising an octave and
turning even mousier than it had sounded at first.

I racked my brain for a Rebecca.

“My name’s Marilyn Benedict, but everyone
calls me Marilyn. Rebecca told me you called her looking for single ladies she
knows. I’m a single lady!”

Understanding dawned on me in an instant.
“Oh, that Rebecca,” I lied, still not remembering calling any Rebecca, but
knowing that it was highly likely that I had. “Please, come in. Would you like
anything to drink?”

Marilyn looked back at April and smiled wide
again and shook my hand as she walked into my office on tall black stilettos.
She wore expensive dress pants and a blouse that showed off just enough
cleavage to still be considered classy, but sexy as well. Her breasts were full
and round, they no doubt caught the eye of many, if not all, men.

“No, thank you,” she said brightly. I pulled
out a chair before my desk and she sat down, crossing her legs as she did. I
had a brief flash of the image of Leon crossing his legs when he sat in the
exact chair.

“So,” Marilyn said, lowering her voice
conspiratorially. “You are looking for a good match for a male client?”

I sat down behind my desk and took out a
notepad. “Yes, I’m trying to find a partner for a particularly tricky client of
mine. You should know that normally I charge for both men and women, but as you
are coming here on my request, there will be no charge, naturally.”

Marilyn sat in the chair, her eyes focused on
me. I looked at her and wondered if she had blinked since she came in. Her
mannerisms were friendly and warm, but there was something a little off about
her. I wondered if she was nervous and if she knew that I was picking up on it.

“So, we’ll begin with you just telling me
about yourself.”

“Ok, what do you want to know?” Marilyn
asked, shrugging her shoulders in a very animated way when she said it.

“I’d just like to know some of your
interests, basic stuff. Like what your favorite foods are, what you do in your
free time, that kind of stuff.”