Dirty Headlines: A Grumpy Boss Romance

She did.

She got me the mother of all leads.

“The Vice President, Brendan Creston, did what?” Kate sprayed her coffee all over her iPad in the conference room.

Judith Humphry was an ambitious little Chucks. She managed the workload of two people. Whenever anyone had a contact or a lead they didn’t want to chase—whether they were too lazy, too busy, or simply unsure if it would result in a dead end—they threw it her way.

“Brendan Creston leaked these compromising emails.” Jude nodded, typing away on her laptop. “Now people are saying the President knew, and they were meant to be leaked. If it’s true, it’s a game changer.”

“How do we find out?” Elijah scratched his head.

“Grill the spokesperson.” Jude’s eyes shone.

I saw the way Elijah looked at her, and I didn’t like it. It was the same way I did, like a jackpot he was eager to hit—hot, smart, ambitious, and compassionate.

“Jude, you’re a natural.” Kate drumrolled on the desk.

Jessica squealed next to Phoenix, and another male reporter next to Jude low-fived her. Everybody was rooting for the new kid.

And I was the one screwing her—both over and her pussy.

“All right, let’s not cream our pants because Judith can read text messages and follow simple leads.” I waved everyone back to work.

Four hours later, we wrapped up one of the most outrageous news shows we’d ever produced, with James Townley’s name blowing up on Twitter like he had a sex tape featuring three NFL stars and a circus clown.

Everyone was talking about #LeakGate.

Coincidentally, the top floor of LBC had never been quieter.

I knew Mathias had brought Jude to my newsroom to stir shit, and in a sick twist of fate, not only had she turned out to be immune to his nouveau riche charm, but she also left mouthwatering news at my office doorstep every single day like a loyal feline.

Granted, knowing my father, I was positive he had more tricks up his sleeve to try to shit all over my progress at LBC.

When I got back home, I scheduled a cab for Judith. Normally, I didn’t liaise with people, but I couldn’t exactly ask my PA to send my reporter back to my building. I still had time to burn, so I went down to the building’s gym, punched a bag, sat in the steam room, and then had a shower. I slid into a pair of dark jeans and a white V-neck shirt and decided I didn’t want Jude to be hungry, cranky, or distracted when I defiled her face and ass, so I figured it would be in my interest to feed her before I had my way.

That was my line of thought as I poured out onto my well-lit street.

Chinese? Didn’t feel like GMO breath all over my cock and sheets. Indian? Potential nut allergies. Greek? You could never go wrong with Mediterranean food, but Lily used to complain that the place took a fucking year to deliver. I briefly entertained the idea of texting Jude and asking, but ruled that out immediately. Last thing I needed was for her to think it was a date.

Instead, I walked the extra ten minutes to the nearest Italian place and ordered every pasta dish on the menu. I’d seen her eating it last night, in what certainly wasn’t one of my finer moments, so she must not be one of those no-gluten, no-flour, no-carbs, no-joy type of girls. Never mind that I was privy to this information because, apparently, I could add stalking to my list of traits.

By the way, picking food for Lily was akin to performing heart surgery on a jellyfish.

When I rounded to my street carrying the bags of food, Judith was already standing at the building’s entrance, tapping her foot and nodding to whatever she was listening to on her phone.

What are you listening to, Chucks?

I wiggled my wrist and glanced at my Rolex. Thirty minutes. It had taken me thirty fucking minutes to get food, during which time she’d been waiting outside the building door. I didn’t have to wonder why she hadn’t called. My phone was set to silent. Newspeople check their phones once a minute, so tolerating the added ping of every message and email was pure masochism.

The minute Judith spotted me, she shook her head and turned the other direction, walking away from me. “You’re a pig.”

Then I hope you like bacon, because I’m on the menu tonight, Chucks.

I didn’t bother defending myself. I was many things, but not a liar. Besides, she was even more gorgeous when she was mad—with her swollen pink lips and dark blond eyelashes and compact everything. She was halfway down my block when she turned around and waltzed back to me, like she’d remembered something. Her frown melted into a look of astonishment.

I stopped in front of her, my palms facing out, the white plastic bags hanging from my fingers dripping olive oil.

“What’s in the boxes?” She jutted her chin to the takeout.

“Body parts.”

“Always a charmer.”

“Can you ask that again, but dramatically, a la Brad Pitt in Seven?”

I expected her to roll her eyes at me like Lily did every time I teased her for being overdramatic. Instead, Jude turned around, giving me her back, then spun theatrically.

“What’s in the boxes!” She pretended to point a gun at me, and for the first time in years—yes, years—I actually laughed. Full-blown fucking cackled. It felt weird on my face, in my chest, in my lungs.

“Italian.”

“Blech. Anticlimactic.” But her smile didn’t waver.

She really wanted to be pussy-slapped with all this sass.

I put down one of the bags to punch in the security code. She picked it up like it was the most natural thing in the world. Lily would’ve died in the hands of sadists before helping me carry leaky takeout home.

Speaking of Lily, as we walked toward the elevators, I considered that my ex might be here, dropping by for another unwanted visit. She knew I was seeing other people, but I never went as far as bringing anyone to my apartment.

Judith, however, wasn’t just a fuck. She was the fuck. I could keep her for years, if it wasn’t for the fact that girls like Jude would never settle. This was a lapse in her judgment. She would come on my dick, and then around, and then realize she deserved so much better.

Upstairs we tore into the bags and ate pasta and pizza in front of the news, exchanging thoughts and opinions. After she ate her weight in carbs, Jude asked where the bathroom was. I pointed to the end of the hallway, then gathered all the empty containers and bags, throwing them in the trash. I stared down at my hands. They were still shaking from the taxi incident this morning. I knocked back a shot of vodka, chasing it with an Advil. Then I realized the shower in the main bathroom had been turned on.

What the fuck?

I padded barefoot down the hallway, knocking on the door.

“Everything good?”

“Yes!” she shrieked. “Fine. Great. Splendid. I’ll think of more synonyms in a second.”

“Are you taking a shower?” It was out of character for Jude to do anything without permission. She was straight as a ruler, which was why bending her over was my favorite pastime.

“Actually…”

“I’ll join you.” There had been a lot of eating and talking and not enough fucking this evening, and I think she’d had her quota of wining and dining. I’d been fantasizing about shoving my cock between her legs every minute during our workday. Waiting longer was pointless.

“I’d rather you not.” She cleared her throat.

A slow grin spread on my face.

“Chucks, are you…?”

“No!” she screeched, knocking something over. A shampoo, maybe. “Of course not. Jesus Christ. I would never…”

“Take a shit? Yes, you would. Otherwise you’d die of constipation. Tell me why you can’t open the door or I’ll kick it down.”

She turned off the water, and I heard her shuffling in the room before she opened the door. Her dress was bunched up around her waist, and she was gloriously panty-less. She stared at me with strawberry-red face, her Cupid’s bow lips pressed into a scowl I shouldn’t have found so goddamn adorable.

“Need your diaper changed?” I leaned a shoulder against the doorframe. She was somewhat younger than me, but not enough for me to give a fuck.

Her fingers looped together, and she stared down at them. “I just wanted to make sure I’d freshened up down there before you…”

It was my second time to laugh today, and that must’ve been some sort of record. My body was rejecting the laugh, though, I swear, because I actually coughed. “Carry on. Finish the sentence.”

“Well, in case you wanted to…I don’t know, perform oral. It’s been a long day. I didn’t want to smell bad.”

I took a step inside and cupped both her cheeks, angling her face up to look at me. Her eyes were a wild shade of hazel, green, and suddenly sterling gray. Like the universe had wrapped around her pupils—lizard-like, really. She bit her lower lip and stared up at my mouth.

“I called you here because I want to eat your pussy and fuck your brains out. And I want your pussy to smell and taste like a pussy, not like soap.”

Her tongue swiped over her lower lip, pink chasing more and more of her skin as her blush deepened.

“You talk dirty.”

“I fuck dirtier, kid. Now, if you want to take a shower, you’re welcome to. But first, I need my dessert.” I cupped her bare pussy, my palm pressed against her mound, my fingers already grazing her entrance. My other hand wrapped around her waist and jerked her to my erect cock. She quivered against my body as the rough pads of my fingers dragged along her slit, dripping like honey.

“Soaked,” I hissed into her mouth, pinching her clit, then plunging three fingers deep inside her and curling them to hit her G-spot. “And delicious.”

“Jesu…” she started, then clamped her mouth shut.

I lifted an eyebrow in question. She laughed, biting down on that lip again.

One day I will bite it off for you, Chucks.

“I promised Jesus I’d stop using his name in vain when you and I are together.”

“You’re one weird girl, Judith Humphry.”

“But a good Christian.” She winked.

She wasn’t going to stick around for long, and I knew it. Some asshole who was available, handsome, and not fucking engaged was going to whisk her away. And I wouldn’t be able to say shit about it, because I was promised to another. I plunged my fingers into her pussy again and brought them to my lips, tasting her. “In the shower,” I growled.

She climbed up the elegant, gray stone steps to the glass shower door and opened it. The floor was made of real pebbles, and she wiggled her toes at the weird texture, a snicker escaping her lips. I lived in a three-bedroom apartment in the most expensive part of the city, while she was struggling to make ends meet and pay the bills on her shitty, old shoebox in an up-and-coming neighborhood. Yet this was the first time she’d reacted to any of the fancy shit in my place.

She stared at me expectantly, wondering if I’d join her. I tucked one hand into my jeans and leaned against the sink.

“Take off your dress.”

She did. She wore a simple, cotton bra underneath it. Her first mistake.

I squeezed my cock through my briefs lazily. “I said no bra. That’s your first pussy spank. Turn the shower on.”

She did, with quivering fingers. She disconnected the sprayer from its hub and pressed it against her tits and stomach, closing her eyes and enjoying the warm streams of water.

“Lower,” I commanded.

She lowered the sprayer to her navel.

“I wouldn’t test me, Chucks.”

She groaned, sliding it down and pressing it against her sweet, tight pussy, which was mostly shaved, just a landing strip of fair, blond hair leading to my final destination.

My dick throbbed, aching with primal need, and now I was full-blown stroking myself, fascinated by how different she was in the office than when we fucked.

“Inside.”

The sprayer was less than the size of an iPod because I had eight of them in this shower pointing from different directions. She could easily fit it into her cunt and even take a few of my fingers in, too.

She stared at me defiantly, her nipples puckering into little pebbles. “No,” she moaned.

“That’s your second pussy slap.”

Jude smirked. I knew she’d be into it, but I’d expected her to be more sheepish about it. At any rate, this playlist-building, dirty-headlines-finding girl was going to get screwed extra hard tonight.

“Put it in now, or you’ll be getting more surprises I’m not entirely sure you’re ready for,” I said, squeezing my cock until it pushed back into my hand involuntarily, begging for release.

Working on it, junior.

Jude slipped the sprayer into her pussy and shuddered at the invasion.

“Now fuck yourself with it, and beg me to be the one doing this to you.”

She moved the sprayer in and out, trembling at the pleasure of the fast stream coating her walls, and I was just about ready to die here against the sink and let her inherit all of my shit. The girl was a lioness at work and a lamb in bed, the perfect combination for a predator like me. I wanted to fight her when we were in the office and fuck her when we were anywhere else. But it was the in-between part that worried me. Because I wanted to monopolize every second of her life, even when we weren’t doing either.

“Oh, God,” she moaned.

“Célian,” I corrected. “Call me by my name. Tell me what you want me to do.”

“I want you to screw me.” She whimpered into her own shoulder, squeezing her eyes shut, her orgasm brewing, making her legs shake. I wished I wasn’t such a bastard in this moment.

“Stop.” But I was.

“W-what?” she stuttered, still masturbating with the sprayer.

I was so hard now I could barely think clearly. All my blood had rushed to my dick, and if you’d asked me for my own name I’d have had trouble answering.

“Stop right now.” A raspy growl slithered between my lips.

She opened her eyes, confused, but slowly removed the sprayer from her pussy.

“Turn it off, and get to my bedroom. Don’t dry yourself off.” I turned around and walked away.

I perched on the edge of my bed, pushing my sleeves up and tapping my thigh. She appeared at my door seconds later, dripping water all over my floor, her hair wet and her eyes wide as she scanned my black and gray accented bedroom and gold silk comforter. Maman had brought it over from her last trip to Paris. Her friend Isabelle had gifted it to me, and my mother had been about to faint she’d been so proud of her wonderful son, who’d left such a great impression on her friend all those years ago when she’d visited us in Nantucket.

I’d spared my mother the fact that Isabelle was so fond of me because she’d popped my cherry when I was fourteen—while they were both drunk and Maman had stumbled off to make sure Mathias wasn’t fucking any more of the staff. Such was my life. A great, colossal mess.

“In my lap.” I slapped my hard thigh. She began to walk over to me, but I shook my head gravely before she got too far.

“Crawl.”

She stopped, hesitated, and flashed me a feral look I’d never seen on her face before. It was somehow both rebellious and submissive. She knew she should say no, but her body was more than ready to comply.

“It will mean nothing outside this bedroom. I’m still your equal, Célian.”

“I never said you weren’t.”

“I want to make sure you don’t think that, either. Just because I like being bossed around in bed—”

“By me,” I stopped her. “You like to be bossed around by me. Not by just any fucker on the street. On your knees, Judith.”

And there it was, the most beautiful sight known to man: a lethally attractive, insanely intelligent woman begging to be fucked. She lowered herself, advancing toward me on her knees, her tits dangling between her arms. She stopped, her face level with my cock. I patted my thigh again.

“Up. With your mouth wrapped around my cock and your ass high in the air.”

I lowered my jeans and briefs and watched as her lips wrapped around my veiny cock, barely taking my girth. I slapped her bare ass without warning. It was playful, but still did the trick. A few drops of cum escaped just from the intense pleasure of having her there, catering to my every whim, wanting everything I gave her, including the painful shit I would never share with anyone else, much less a one-night stand.

“Hmmph,” she whimpered quietly, her mouth full of my erection.

Just to make sure she liked it, I slid my fingers into her pussy and found it dripping all over her inner thighs.

Yes. Pussy-slapping and Jude were a match made in my kinky brain’s heaven.

“When I tell you to get rid of your bra before you get here, you get rid of your bra.”

The next slap wasn’t so playful anymore, but still nowhere near the hardcore shit. She was just getting used to moving her lips along my shaft and clutching the base. She moaned into my cock, and again I sneaked my hand down and borrowed some of the wetness dripping along her leg and over the golden comforter, rubbing it over her ass cheek to soothe the pain away.

“And this is for uttering the word no during foreplay. What else? I’m sure we can find reasons to punish you if we try.”

She unlatched her mouth from my cock and looked up, grinning at me with her mouth so swollen and red, I couldn’t help but sneak in a dirty kiss.

“One day, when you made Brianna cry, I hid your laptop in the conference room.”

That had been her? I’d looked for that thing for three hours. My open palm landed on her ass cheek again. She whimpered, her knees quivering with lust, and the smell of sex was so heavy in the air, we both got drunk on it.

She looked back up. I stole another kiss, my dick throbbing between her tits.

“Sometimes when I get off by myself, I think about Noah from IT.”

I had no idea who Noah from IT was; I just knew he was newly unemployed. I slapped her ass again, and this time bit her earlobe—not gently—for good measure.

“Give me his full name,” I growled.

She laughed, throwing her head back. “There’s no Noah in IT. I mean, maybe there is. But I don’t know him.”

“Tell me more.” I began to gather the wetness in her pussy and play with her asshole. This time, I added some extra pressure and slid my index finger in and out every once in a while, keeping her engaged the whole time.

“I did give a guy my number the other day. At a diner, when I went to get coffee for Gray and Ava.”

My jaw twitched, and I slapped her ass again. “Not funny.”

“It wasn’t supposed to be.”

I knew there was nothing I could do about that information, not unless I was willing to make some major changes in my life. I slipped two fingers into her asshole, and she tensed around them. I could already feel how perfect she’d be once my fat cock was buried deep in her backside.

“You’re wasting your time. No one can beat this, and you know it.”

“I’m willing to try,” she moaned, pushing her ass toward my hand, begging for more. More fingers. More pressure. More us.

I stood up and let her fall on my bed, headfirst. I slapped the side of her ass and pushed my knee between her hamstrings, signaling her to lift it up in the air. She complied, biting my sheets, her eyes squeezed shut. I pushed my cock between her ass cheeks and looped her long, wavy locks around my fist, pulling her head up so I could whisper in her ear, “You’re going to change your number when we’re done here.”

She laughed erotically, her neck extended, long and delicate. I let go of her hair to squeeze it just a little, fingering her anus again to make sure it was lubricated enough with her juices.

“I think I’m going to give him a chance, actually. He seems like a nice guy. Available, too.”

I thrust into her all at once, knowing it was wrong. Knowing it was a punishment, not a reward—a mixture of pleasure, agony, and guilt making my abs tighten against the mound of her ass. She was Mine. With a capital M.

It wasn’t a request, a plea, or a hope, but a simple fact. Her eyes confirmed it, her body sang it, and if she thought I was in the business of sharing, she obviously needed a sore reminder that I wasn’t.

She lurched forward from my thrust, standing on all fours, and purred as I pounded into her tight asshole, so impossibly snug I could feel it milking the orgasm out of me with a vise-like grip. I slipped my hand down her stomach to find her swollen clit. She quivered under my arm.

“Fuck.” I bit the tip of her ear. “Fuck, Judith, fuck.”

She groaned, her ass meeting my hipbones again and again, challenging me thrust for thrust, push for push, touch for touch. Just another day in the newsroom. Me pushing. Her pulling. Both of us chasing the feeling only the other person could give.

Fuck the guy who’d gotten her phone number. Fuck him and all the other men in New York.

“I need to quit you,” she mumbled to herself.

I need to own you.

Her body convulsed under me, cresting and tipping deeper into oblivion with every plunge, and I couldn’t help it, I had to do it, I bit the back of her neck like an animal—a savage, a delinquent—and plastered a palm over her throat, bringing her up so we were both standing on our knees as I shot my load inside her perfect, milky-white ass. She let out a scream that echoed inside my mostly empty bedroom as we both climaxed.

A few seconds later, she collapsed on my bed, spineless and thoroughly fucked. I fell next to her, facing the opposite wall. My default strategy was to pussy-block pillow talk and avoid eye contact. It wasn’t personal. I’d done that to Lily, too, back when we were together.

I planked, just turning around to look at her face, when the words left her mouth.

“I should go.”

“I’ll call a cab.” My ego was fucking me harder than I’d fucked her, and that said a lot about its stamina.

“It’s okay. I…”

“I’ll drive you.” I changed my mind.

She hated me spending money on her, but giving her a ride didn’t cost shit. Of course, it did require me to move my car from the garage for the first time in a fucking decade.

She nodded, her face solemn. I’d never really entertained the idea of having a woman stay over. The one and only time I’d done some actual sleeping with a woman in the past year was, oddly, with Jude, at the hotel suite. That time was different, because I knew she didn’t want to go back to wherever she was supposed to be and didn’t take it personally.

Besides, we’d hardly cuddled and whispered sweet nothings in each other’s ears. I’d just crashed, and by the time I woke up with a raging hard-on and a mission in mind to fuck her into a coma, she was already gone.

“You know, I caught my boyfriend cheating on me, too. It made me feel like the world was ending.”

I clasped a lock of her hair and fingered it. Pure gold. I went through the same shit, maybe even ten times worse, seeing as the guy who was fucking my girl was very familiar to me. “Did it?”

She chuckled. “I’m still here, aren’t I?”

“Doesn’t necessarily mean shit. Have you talked to him since?”

“No. Not since that call. I have zero tolerance toward cheaters. Unlike some people I know.”

I deserved that.

“You can stay over.” I ignored her jab. “The daily trip to Brooklyn is bullshit. I can give you the spare key.”

Am I fucking high? What was in that pasta? I only had one shot. Still, I couldn’t find it in myself to take any of those words back.

Judith tucked her yellow hair behind her ears and ran her pearly whites over her lower lip. She seemed to consider it.

It was a relief not to get shut down immediately, since the suggestion in itself was ludicrous.

“That’s not a good idea.” She paused, flipping on her cellphone and checking the time. It was well after eleven. “I will take that ride back home, though, if it’s still on the table.”

“It is.”

“Let me get my dress and wash my face.” She hopped out of the bed, all business, like we were back at work. I watched her perky white ass jiggling in my hallway.

I closed my eyes. A gust of air with the scent of her shampoo and body lotion caressed my nose, and I took a deep, greedy breath.

Not good. Not good. Not good.

Her phone was between the sheets, beeping with new text messages.

Brianna: Thanks for helping me with the filing today! xoxo

Grayson: If I were a Victoria’s Secret model, which one would I be?

Ava: Going to get my nipple pierced this weekend. Wish me luck. Did that cute guy call you yet?

I grabbed it, took out the SIM and split it in half before inserting it back into her phone and smashing the whole thing against the floor.

If that guy wanted Judith, he’d have to look for her the old-fashioned way, among the eight million residents of New York.

Break a leg, buddy.