“Red Plum Electronics, this is May speaking! How may I—”
“Simon, please.”
“Oh! I’m sorry, but Simon—”
“You will put Simon on the phone now or I will sue his God damn company into the fucking ground for breach of contract!” The speaker’s voice was deep and husky and sounded thoroughly annoyed.
Seriously? Ugh! Just great, what has my scatterbrained but well meaning cousin done now?
I inhaled then slowly released my breath striving for a calm, even tone of voice that wouldn’t show just how much this guy on the phone was scaring me.
“Simon is busy at the moment, but I assure you, Sir, that I will have him call you back within the next few minutes. Can I have—”
“He has ten minutes to call me back. He will know who I am.”
The call ended then without another word spoken, just the buzz of a disconnected phone line in my ear.
“Simon!” I shouted turning on my heel and storming away from the front desk in the direction of his office.
“Uh, hey. Hi! Mayhem you are looking exceptionally—”
“No,” I interrupted. I inhaled deeply and exhaled slowly again, pasting a smile on my face. Deep breaths were sort of my thing—especially when I spent much time around Simon, who could be so frustrating at times that he would likely drive a monk to anger.
“I just got off the phone with a very loud, very angry man who is threatening to sue you for breach of contract?” I sighed in frustration, my voice going soft and desperate. “What have you done now?”
Simon’s normally pasty complexion turned sallow and his Adam’s Apple bobbed as he audibly gulped.
“I, uh, well.” Simon cleared his throat, opened and closed his mouth a few times, then seemed to physically close in on his self. His hands came away from the keyboard of the laptop he’d been using and covered his face, his elbows resting on the desk of his heavy vintage oak office desk.
“I screwed up, Mayhem.” he mumbled.
Feeling sorry for my cousin I sat down in the guest chair in front of the desk but remembered what the guy on the phone had said. Simon had ten minutes to call him back, and that was already almost five minutes ago!
“Simon, this guy needs to hear from you within the next five minutes,” I gently said. At Simon’s whimper I added “Come on now, cuz, and let’s figure this out. What did you promise this guy?”
Simon muttered something into his hands but try as I did I couldn’t make out the words.
Anger surged through me as I replayed the call in my head causing me to leap out of my chair and slam my hands down on the desk.
“Look, Simon, I don’t know what the heck you promised this guy but if you signed a contract with him and haven’t fulfilled it yet, then you’ve gotta man up and face the consequences.” I stopped myself, struggling to remain calm. If I wanted Simon to calm down enough to talk things out with me then I had to handle him with rational calm. Not anger.
“How can I help?” I said striving for a patience I definitely didn’t feel.
“You can’t,” Simon whined miserably.
I mentally rolled my eyes but smiled anyway, coming around to the side of the desk to place a friendly hand on my cousin’s bony shoulder. “Come on, now, Si-Si! Tell cousin Mayhem what she can do to help!”
My cousin giggled at my use of his nickname, the reaction being just what I’d wanted.
But Simon’s look of boyish delight faded almost immediately. “I, um, well, I, um promised th-this guy that I would build him a robot.”
I frowned. What was so bad about that? Robots were Simon’s specialty! In fact, his lifelike robots were a big part of his business! He built them all his self, using parts he scavenged from old electronics, hobby stores, clothing retailers, and doll makers.
“A, um, well…a sex robot, to be exact.” Simon’s face turned bright pink and he pushed his wire rimmed glasses further up his nose.
Sex robot?
A sex robot?
What the heck was a sex robot?
I was no virgin, but I was also no sexual deviant or vamp or whatever, either. But I just couldn’t, for the life of me, imagine what the heck Simon meant by ‘sex robot!’
I was about to ask my cousin to explain when I heard the phone ring.
Aw, fudge!
I ran for the phone breathlessly saying “Red Plum Electronics, this is—”
“So you are as big of a liar as Simon is, hmm?”
It’s him!
It was the guy who had called (apparently) ten minutes ago.
“No!” I said sharply. “I-I mean no, I didn’t lie. I am talking to Simon right now and I swear he feels badly about—”
“I can see that this is something that I am going to need to handle in person rather than over the phone so expect me within the next…seventeen minutes. See you soon, Mayhem.”
With a damp, shaky palm I set the phone back on the receiver sitting down hard.
Oh. My. Goodness!
But wait! How did he know my name? I’d introduced myself as May, sure, but hadn’t given him my real first name!
Simon slowly and timidly stepped into view. “He’s coming, isn’t he?” he said in a quiet, sullen tone of voice.
I nodded dazedly.
“Well, I’m going to—”
“No!” I shook myself free from the phone call troubling me and noticed that Simon not only had his worn leather bomber jacket on but his keys and iPhone in his hands.
I shook my head. “You are going nowhere. That guy on the phone is very angry and Simon, I know you don’t like confrontation, but if you promised him something and signed a contract stating that you would deliver on said promise, then you have no choice but to face him.”
“But Mayhem! He’s scary! I-I only promised the, uh, sex robot because of how much he was willing to pay for it!” Simon’s thin lips turned down into a rather ugly pout.
I shook my head again but stood up closing the few feet between us and plucking the phone and keys out of my cousin’s hands and placing them in a drawer in the front desk.
“How close are you to finishing this—the thing you promised this guy?” I asked quietly.
Simon shrugged. “The robot part is built. That was a breeze!”
“Then what’s the problem?”
“I would like to know that myself,” a deep, intense voice said from the doorway to Simon’s business.
My eyes widened at the sight of the preppily dressed man with dark hair, eyes that were either a dark green or a deep brown, and whose skin was glowing with a healthy, earthy vitality that had me wondering how it tasted.
“You are Mayhem Elizabeth Hughes?” the man said.
I nodded mutely.
“Ares Mattias Gonzales but you are to address me as ‘Master Raw.’”
I nervously eyed his outstretched hand but shook it, not wanting to be rude.
The man briefly squeezed mine before immediately letting go and turning his attention to my literally shaking cousin.
“Let us speak—in private.”
I watched as the two headed for my cousin’s office wanting more than anything to follow them but somehow knowing that the action would only irritate Master Raw.
What kind of name is Master Raw, anyway? What’s wrong with his given name, Ares? Such an unusual and sexy name!
Heck! I couldn’t help but chuckle to myself. Everything about the man is sexy!
That thought had me freezing in place. I considered myself to be an average woman in her thirties who had needs and desires and wants, but honestly, I’d never given much thought to my sexual needs! And here, just seconds after meeting the guy who was threatening to sue my cousin, I was already thinking about sex!
“What is wrong with me?” I muttered to myself.
Needing a distraction, I buzzed around the building doing some tidying up while determinedly ignoring the yelling I could hear coming from Simon’s office. Well, the yelling coming from Master Raw, I should say. Simon, I could only imagine, would be a pale, stuttering, blubbering mess right about now.
The door to Simon’s office burst open and out stormed both men. One was sexily angry and the other looked petrified. “No! P-please! J-Just give m-me another few days and—”
“I have given you precisely three days past the time in which our contract expired and still I am being kept waiting!” Master Raw came to a sudden stop looming over my cousin who had followed him out. “I warned you from the beginning that I was not a man to mess with. That I would get what I wanted regardless of the effort.” Glowering angrily Master Raw took a few steps towards me, a considering look on his stony face.
“How old are you?” he said to me.
“Thirty-four.”
“Single? Kids? Pets?”
“Yes to the first, no to the other two. Why—”
Master Raw turned back to Simon. “Would you say that she is able to follow directions well?”
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