Content Note
Adults only. This is fictional workplace erotica intended for readers 18+. Contains sexual tension, power dynamics, and explicit themes in future installments.
Reminder! This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and events are products of my imagination or are used in a made-up way. Any likeness to real people, living or dead, or actual events is totally coincidental.
An After Hours Installment:
Susan Lewis
Beacon Hill looks different at night, the kind of pretty that thinks it’s better than you. The red-bricked townhomes stand shoulder to shoulder in their black trim and polished shutters, all old money and locked doors, pretending they don’t have secrets sweating behind their windows. Streetlamps drag long shadows over the brick and ironwork, making the whole narrow street feel like a throat closing. Perfect place for Miss Vale to hide, if she didn’t have someone like me watching.
I was responsible for her initial employment onboarding. Address, personal phone number, emergency contact, tax forms, direct deposit paperwork, building badge, parking pass: all the puzzle pieces of a person a company collects before deciding they’re useful. I didn’t need to be clever. I only needed to be the woman no one noticed sitting behind a desk, filing everyone else’s lives away. The work is boring, sure, but secrets have a pulse if you know where to press your fingers. The thrill is what keeps me clocking in, day after day, smiling at people who have no idea how much of them I keep.
Today was my luckiest day of sleuthing to date, and honey, I don’t believe in luck. Luck is what pretty girls call it when the world bends over and opens every door for them. Women like me have to notice details. We have to collect scraps. Earlier this evening, I noticed how close Anatolia and Cassian stood beside each other, close enough to make the space between them feel deliberate. They barely spoke, but that was the filthy little beauty of it. One look between them told me everything: those two were waiting for the office to empty.
What are you two going to talk about after hours, this dreadfully late on a Friday night?
Tim’s office shares a line with Cassian’s through some old routing glitch IT still hasn’t fixed. I can catch echoes of Cassian’s private calls and, occasionally, conversations through the speaker. It depends on how close he stands to his desk. One of the girls in IT told me about it over lunch months ago, explaining the technical crap in painful detail. I forgot most of it. I only remembered the part that mattered.
When I overheard Cassian talking with Anatolia, I had to clasp a hand over my mouth to stop myself from squealing. I finally had the chance to catch the two of them together. I don’t know exactly what they talked about, but the two pieces must be connected. The gossip alone was worth risking my job. I only have Anatolia’s address. Now I just need to pray that Cassian is visiting her, and not some other lady of the night. I’ve worked for executives like him before. They think they’re slick, but they all get careless eventually. All it takes is one misplaced phone call on an office line instead of a cell, one name spoken too softly behind a closed door, one address repeated when they think no one important is listening.
The taxi drops me two houses down from her townhome. I pay in cash and leave a crumpled twenty on the seat before stepping out into the cold.
I watch the driver pull away, tires hissing softly over the street as he turns toward the city center to pick up another fare.
One of her neighbor’s lights is out, so that side is safer. I slip through the narrow space between the brick wall and a dense set of bushes near the entryway. From the sidewalk, the shrubs look thick and impenetrable, but inside, the branches hollow out just enough for a woman to crouch, breathe quietly, and see what she needs to see.
And now, we wait.
~
Near the hour mark, a silver vehicle with tinted windows turns the same corner the taxi disappeared around. I can’t identify the driver yet.
When I see that it’s Cassian, I tuck my binoculars away, careful to avoid catching any light on the lenses and giving myself up.
~
Once he’s inside, I lift them again.
Anatolia’s red velvet slip hugs her body in all the right places, emphasizing her natural hourglass figure. I envy how easily it all comes to her. I remember what it felt like to be held in a man’s gaze, to have his hands touch my body, back when I cared about love. Love isn’t real. That’s what a business like ours does: packages up the idea that love is attainable, for a price.
Through the binoculars, I mentally catalog her soft breasts, narrow waist, and shapely legs, every pretty little detail that Cassian will most certainly ruin himself over. I can see why he’d be attracted to her. But I never thought the two of them would end up together. It’s too late now. Fate’s red thread has been cut. It feels good to be on the victorious side for once, instead of choking on my own victimhood.
Anatolia collapses onto Cassian’s chest, her own chest rapidly rising and falling. Then the two of them disappear below the window ledge, leaving me with a perfect view of her staircase and nothing else.
Wrong angle. Time to make my move.
Just like the videos showed me.
I tuck the binoculars away and crawl closer, keeping low below the black shutters. The brick scrapes my shoulder as I reposition myself under the window, close enough now to hear the faint shift of movement inside. I use my thumb to wind the disposable camera’s film wheel. No flash. I’m not stupid. Steadying the camera with both hands, I take a risk and rise just high enough to clear the window ledge, hoping Anatolia is still leaning against Cassian. I center them in the viewfinder, snap a picture, then drop like a jackrabbit and stuff the camera under my shirt, dampening the obscene sound as best as I can.
There’s no way he’ll be able to ignore me after this. I’ll have him like putty in my hands when he sees what I have on him, especially since I’m bringing all this delicious evidence with me. A forbidden photo of him and his love. Tsk. Tsk. Cassian, you messy man. Look at you. A boss and his underling. All the big heads will be at the funeral, so he can’t misbehave. And when he’s backed into a corner, who will he fall back on? Yes. Me. The one with the naughty evidence. The only person close enough to hurt him.
I’ve been due a promotion for ten years now. I’m getting older, and I don’t have the time or patience to take any more shit from this company. The work keeps piling on, especially with this new idiot, Tim, making every problem ten times bigger than it needs to be. My HOA dues jumped from $200 a month to $800 a month, and to make matters worse, I can’t afford them. Not without a decent promotion. My house is being foreclosed on, and ever since the foreclosure summons arrived, my life has been in shambles. My fear of homelessness grows with each passing day, with no financial relief in sight.
It wasn’t always like this. I used to have money in my bank account. An annual Hawaii vacation. A well-maintained, tight little body. Frequent sex. Sometimes with my husband, but not always. Then it all changed. How did it get this bad in just a matter of months? My grip on life feels like a fool’s errand. The tighter I squeeze the sand, the faster it slips through my fingers.
Fuck Cassian Rhodes. He has power, money, and status. He can share some of his treasure with us peons, can’t he?
I don’t have much choice. It’s bankruptcy or blackmail.
I’ve come too far to turn back now.
~
It doesn’t take long to get the photo processed at a film lab on Washington Street. Places like that still smell faintly of chemicals and old paper, but for enough money, even strangers know how to keep their eyes down and hurry.
I hold it up against the light.
There they are: Cassian and Anatolia, enveloped in a loving embrace, both of them flushed and messy, caught in the soft, damning aftermath. Sweat beads along their skin. Thankfully, her dim hallway lighting is just enough to bring the right details to the surface.
You watch yourself at the office, Cassian. Because there will always be another set of eyes on you, recording your every move.
I practice my speech in front of the mirror.
Allow me to introduce myself properly, Mr. Rhodes. My name is Susan Lewis. I’m Tim Abbot’s secretary, and you’ve never once said good morning to me. I have a list of demands I believe you’ll be inclined to follow because, otherwise, you and your lover will become the kind of scandal no advertising agency in Boston will touch.
My dear readers, you haven't met this character yet. I truly hope you enjoy this week's episode. xoxo Ozanna Wilder