The Buyout Read online

  Of course, if he got the promotion he was gunning for, he wouldn’t be able to date anyonefrom Anderson. He’d be everyone’s boss, except for his father and the board. And since the board was mostly made up of stodgy retired businessmen, he didn’t think it was likely he’d find anyone there who piqued his fancy. That would be one downside to the promotion—he wouldn’t have the chance to see if Mason was all talk.

  “Parker? I was asking you if you’d heard from Richard yet. I know you were here late.”

  Parker blinked, embarrassed at being lost in his musings.

  “No. He said it would probably be a few days. Seemed receptive, though.”

  It had been high praise from his father that he hadn’t just chucked Parker out of his office after the presentation. Parker had stayed and they’d gone through it, with Richard suggesting changes before the final presentation to the board. It had made Parker feel good about his chances until he’d left and seen Stephen lurking outside, his own presentation binders clutched in his hands. He’d given Parker a shit-eating grin before he’d been ushered into Richard’s inner sanctum. The memory made Parker’s jaw clench. God forbid he be given any advantage just because he was Richard Anderson’s son, even from the vaunted Richard Anderson himself.

  Luke looked at the hard drive again, shaking his head. “Guess I judged that one wrong,” he said, and Parker snorted with laughter when Luke gave him a manly fist bump before retreating to the outer office, closing the door behind himself.

  Parker squinted at the hard drive, his heart speeding a bit as he picked it up. It was surprising that Mason had beaten him in to the office; it must mean Mason lived close. He hadn’t gone quite so far as to Google the address in Mason’s file.

  Parker flipped over the small piece of plastic, grinning when he saw the Post-it note stuck to the bottom. There’s nothing floppy about my drive when it comes to you, Prince Parker.

  ParkerAnderson (08/15/2012 3:34 PM): I’ve heard your fingers are magic.

  MasonPike (08/15/2012 3:48 PM): That was much worse than mine.

  ParkerAnderson (08/15/2012 3:52 PM): I was referring to your self-appointed title. ParkerAnderson (08/15/2012 3:52 PM): What was it you said yesterday? “If I’m hitting on you, you’ll know?” Same goes for me. I wouldn’t waste time with something THAT ridiculous.

  MasonPike (08/15/2012 4:15 PM): Pulled my file, did you?

  ParkerAnderson (08/15/2012 4:42 PM): But of course. MasonPike (08/15/2012 4:45 PM): So do you think you can handle hooking the drive up yourself, or do you need me to come down?

  ParkerAnderson (08/15/2012 4:48 PM): I’ve inserted hard drives before, Mason. MasonPike (08/15/2012 4:49 PM): Is that so? ParkerAnderson (08/15/2012 5:07 PM): That is so.

  MasonPike (08/15/2012 5:25 PM): So have you booted it yet?

  ParkerAnderson (08/15/2012 5:58 PM): Trust me, if I’d booted your hard drive, you’d remember. MasonPike(08/15/2012 6:07 PM): I’m speechless. ParkerAnderson (08/15/2012 6:15 PM): That’s what they all say.

  “SO YOUknow him?”

  Parker tried to look nonchalant as he questioned Anna about Mason, but he knew he’d fallen short when his cousin’s perfectly manicured brows rose comically.

  “You have got to stop raiding R and D, honey. You chased off our best chemist, and the other two sulked for weeks after you ended things with them.”

  Parker glowered over his glass of Riesling. “I did not chase Clark off. He got a better offer from Adams & Lane. It’s why we broke up, for Christ’s sake! I could hardly keep sleeping withhim when he jumped ship.”

  “Oh, that’s right,” Anna purred, spearing a piece of broccoli delicately on her fork. “Your conquest working for Anderson is half the fun, isn’t it? You could hardly date someone from outside our little kingdom.”

  “I don’t know why I bother with you, Anna. I honestly don’t.” Anna looked a bit contrite at his exasperated tone, which made Parker nervous. Contrition wasn’t something he’d ever seen from her before. He’d practically grown up with her, dumped on her mother’s doorstep each summer from the time he was about six. His mother had died when he was five, and Richard had made a go of keeping him in New York with him for a while, but after a few months he’d abandoned him to tutors and nannies and fled back to the sanctuary of Anderson.

  Parker was seven when he was sent away to boarding school, but he hadn’t felt sorry for himself. Most of his friends spent the summers there as well, attending the special camp sessions that were really little more than glorified babysitting for jet-setting parents who couldn’t be bothered. He’d at least had his Aunt Valerie and his cousins Anna and Margaret, even though the latter had done her best to make his life a living hell. They’d saved him from spending summers away at school, and instead he’d spent them running barefoot for months on end in middle-ofnowhere New Hampshire.

  “I suspect you pulled his file. What more can I tell you?” Parker eyed her suspiciously, taking another drink of his wine. He’d waited until halfway through their standing monthly dinner to bring up the subject of Mason, but apparently he hadn’t been casual enough. That or the Anderson rumor mill was already running full steam over his flirtation with the R & D programmer.

  “Just, I don’t know. You’re the chief information officer, Anna. He works for you.” Parker toyed with his veal, finding it hard to have an appetite with his stomach tied in knots. He and Mason had been flirting over office IM for two weeks, but he had yet to as much as run into him in the halls. Which wasn’t so unusual, since the research and development floors were nowhere near his own office, except that he’d manufactured reasons to troll the corridors down there and never once happened by Mason, even when he’d been right outside his office.

  “He’s a hard worker. Very talented, great instincts. Usually the last to leave, if he even does leave, and often one of the first ones in.” She gave Parker a pointed glance, and he looked down at his plate. “Personable, always quick with a joke or a story to fill the silences. A lot like someone else I know, actually.”

  Parker managed a small smile at the veiled compliment. Things had been a bit strained between him and Anna ever since she’d been appointed CIO several years back, a job he had openly wanted. His father hadn’t even let him apply, telling him his business degree wouldn’t do him a lick of good in research and development, especially not overseeing the software division.

  “I managed to glean all that from his employment record, thanks,” Parker said drily, cutting off a bite-sized portion of his veal. Instead of raising it to his mouth, though, he pushed it around the plate, ignoring the shocked look that flitted through Anna’s dark eyes. Parker usually had impeccable manners, and he knew his current distraction was much more telling than his words.

  Anna sat back, a smug smile replacing her shock. Parker could tell she was enjoying the moment. Anna had been six when his mother had died and Parker had become a semipermanent fixture around her house. Unlike Margaret, who had been fourteen at the time, Anna had welcomed him gladly as a pseudobrother. She’d been happy to have someone to dote on and look out for and he’d eaten up the attention. Even though neither of them would admit it, they were both as protective of each other now as they had been all those years ago.

  Parker knew Anna could tell how flustered Mason made him. In all the time they’d known each other, even when they’d had to make an effort to stay close by doing things like these monthly dinners, he’d never been quite so antsy. Parker hadn’t even been frazzled by Scott, the man Parker had asked to move in with him after a whirlwind threemonth courtship. That had ended badly when Parker found out Scott had lied about his past, and Parker had been leery of relationships ever since.

  The look of pity she gave him made it clear that Anna knew exactly how smitten Parker was. “He’s lovely. Funny and modest. He hates coffee and takes his tea extra strong,” Anna started, speaking softly while she stared at a button on Parker’s chest. He was grateful for that; eye contact would have made things even more
uncomfortable. “I don’t know much about his personal life. He’s very private. I know his father died when he was in college, and his mother lives in some sort of commune in Ohio. He spends most of his vacations there. He has a dragonfish named Falkor that he keeps in his office, since he’s there much more than his apartment. It’s disgustingly ugly. It has these awful teeth.”

  Parker’s lips curved up in a slight smile at Anna’s delicate shudder. From the little he knew about Mason, Parker had to agree he was the type to keep rare, ugly fish. He was sure it went well with his rare, ugly watch.

  “He and Alan—he’s a chemist in R and D, the one who replaced Clark?—live together.” Parker’s brows knit, but Anna continued on blithely. “Mason spends a lot of time at the office, but when he’s home, I think they probably do those role-playing games. Their sort always do.”

  Parker felt a white-hot bolt of jealously course through him. He wanted to find this Alan and—he didn’t even know what, after that. He wasn’t the sort who resorted to violence off the football field, but he felt his fist clench in his lap under the table. The last bit of Anna’s sentence caught up with him, making his stomach lurch. Role playing? Parker’s mind reeled at the thought of Mason dressed in leather and bound to a bed, his cock twitching in his trousers at the mental image.

  “What do you mean ‘their sort’?” he asked, a hint of anger in his voice. Anna had never had a problem with his sexual orientation before. His father viewed his interest in men as a passing phase, though he’d been coming around to the realization that it wasn’t. But Anna—he’d thought Anna understood.

  Anna waved her arm lazily, wrapping the fingers of her other hand around the stem of her wineglass and taking a small sip.

  “You know. Science geeks.”

  Parker felt a little bit of the tension in his chest loosen.

  “Like you?” Parker absently made his spoon dance along his knuckles with tiny movements, knowing how much it annoyed Anna. It was one of his nervous tells, and she’d given him more than one dressing down for doing it with his pen during board meetings when his father was berating him.

  “I’ll have you know that I studied business just like you did, Parker Anderson,” she said with mock indignation. She cast a quick look around for the waiter or maître d’. Finding that they were quite alone in the small alcove they always requested, Anna picked up her uneaten roll and chucked it at Parker’s chest. It bounced off his chin, rattling the cutlery on the table when it fell. “Not all of us are cretins who couldn’t manage a rigorous natural science degree in addition to their MBA.”

  Parker looked at her in shocked silence for a moment before throwing his head back and laughing. A moment later Anna joined in, adding her tinkling, melodious laugh to his. They hadn’t let go like that together in years, and it made Parker ridiculously happy. Even in the semiprivate alcove, their laughter drew the attention of the other patrons, who peered curiously at them.

  “Do Madame and Monsieur have good news to celebrate?” The maître d’ appeared out of nowhere, his lilting accent softening the hard edge to his words. He’d clearly come over to warn them to retain their composure. Instead, his arrival sent Parker and Anna into more gales of laughter, louder than the last.

  “If you would like, I can have Guillaume bring the dessert cart,” he said, looking pointedly at the two of them. Parker waved him off, wiping a stray tear from the corner of his eye.

  “Just the check, please.” They went for ice cream after, since Parker found he actually did have an appetite. They sat in companionable silence, enjoying the treat in front of a small fountain that was filled with more coins from passing tourists than water.

  “So, Mason,” Parker started, clearing this throat. He tossed his half-eaten ice cream in a nearby trash can, licking at the tracks of melted chocolate it left on his fingers. “He and this Alan. They live together?”

  “They have for a few years, at least. Mason was the one to recommend him for the job. I think they grew up together.”

  Parker nodded, the tight knot in his stomach returning. A committed relationship, then. But why had Mason been so quick to flirt with him? Had he misjudged everything? Maybe it had just been some harmless banter. He racked his brain, going over their IMs and the few e-mails they’d sent over the past few weeks. Had most of the innuendo been his, and Mason had just gone along with it? He felt horrified.

  “They’re as close as brothers,” Anna continued, and Parker arched an eyebrow. That was an odd way to describe people in a relationship. “Though Mason says some things don’t need to be shared, which is why he spends a fair amount of his time sleeping in his office. Apparently Alan likes to bring home screamers.”

  Parker sputtered, indignant on Mason’s behalf. “He brings home people to fuck? And Mason lets him?”

  Anna cast him a sidelong glance, as if surprised at his vehemence.

  “Well, yes. Why shouldn’t he? It’s his apartment too. Though I told Alan the other day, after hearing them argue in the staff room, that he really ought to be more considerate. He could have the decency not to bring them home during the week or at least be quieter.”

  “Quieter? Anna! Don’t tell me you of all people approve of what he’s doing.” Anna’s father, Ambrose, had been an absolute louse, cheating on her mother dozens of times over. He’d died in a car accident when Anna was ten and Parker was nine. He recalled being called to the headmaster’s office and finding his father there, face grim as he told him about his uncle. It had been winter, and Parker remembered finding Aunt Valerie and Anna curled up in bed when he got there, while Margaret threw things and ranted downstairs. His uncle hadn’t been driving; his current mistress had been. Richard had raged about the damage Ambrose’s infidelity had caused the family, but Parker had tuned him out, focusing on his Aunt Valerie’s sobs and Anna’s quiet, burning anger.

  “Alan isn’t married. He can do as he pleases. Though I certainly wouldn’t touch him. God only knows where he’s been,” she said, wrinkling her nose.

  “But Mason—”

  Anna gave him a sharp look, and Parker trailed off.

  “Mason is a grown man. If he wants to tell his roommate not to bring women home, he will. I don’t see how it’s any of our business who Alan sleeps with. Though I have heard rumors about him and a tech doing inappropriate things in the lab. If I ever catch him at it, that’ll be the end of him, no matter how good he is at his job.”

  Parker swallowed.

  “Roommate?” “What—Parker?” Anna’s eyes twinkled merrily as she started to laugh. “Oh, Parker. No. Honey, really. I’d have told you if it was like that.”

  “So he’s not seeing anyone?” Parker grimaced at the question, but he had to ask. “Not that I know of, but like I said, Mason’s pretty private about personal things. You’ll have to find out the oldfashioned way, I’m afraid.”

  Parker frowned, confused. “I mean ask him, you nitwit.” Anna cuffed him on the back of the head, setting both of them off into a round of laughter. Parker put his arm around her, and Anna rested her head against his shoulder, just like old times.

  Chapter Three

  IN THE end, getting a date with Mason was exceedingly simple, even if it did come about entirely by accident and involved Parker’s abject humiliation in front of his father.

  ParkerAnderson (09/08/2012 8:22 AM): Would you like to tell me anything?

  MasonPike (09/08/2012 8:23 AM): Don’t take offense, but pink is definitely not your color. ParkerAnderson (09/08/2012 8:24 AM): Mason! MasonPike (09/08/2012 8:27 AM): Sheesh. I had

  no idea you were so attached to pink. Fine. But stick to cool tones. I think you’re a winter. ParkerAnderson (09/08/2012 8:31 AM): I’m not even going to ask how you know what color combinations work for a winter complexion. But I was talking about my AVATAR. You know who pointed it out to me, Mason?

  MasonPike (09/08/2012 8:32 AM): So you agree you’re a winter? Have you ever had your colors done? Because my mom is brilliant at it.r />
  ParkerAnderson (09/08/2012 8:34 AM): Mason. MasonPike (09/08/2012 8:40 AM): It takes a minute to hack into the server, you know.

  ParkerAnderson (09/08/2012 8:41 AM): Hack the SERVER?!?

  MasonPike (09/08/2012 8:42 AM): Yes. MasonPike (09/08/2012 8:42 AM): And BTW, your father was wrong. I think you’d look LOVELY in a grass skirt. The coconut bra might have been a bit much, though.

  ParkerAnderson (09/08/2012 8:45 AM): Why am I not surprised you can access the interoffice chat logs? I mean, you obviously have no morals if you HACKED MY ACCOUNT AND CHANGED MY AVATAR INTO A GODDAMN WOMAN.

  MasonPike (09/08/2012 8:50 AM): Two things. MasonPike (09/08/2012 8:50 AM): A) Your use of

  caps lock is, frankly, annoying. And don’t make hacking sound so negative. “Crack” is the term that means cause harm. Hacking is harmless. I hate it when people misuse the word hack.

  MasonPike (09/08/2012 8:52 AM): B) I did not turn your avatar into a woman. I simply dressed your male avatar in women’s clothing. That’s called cross-dressing. At best, I turned your avatar into a transvestite.

  ParkerAnderson (09/08/2012 9:01 AM): Semantics. Let’s focus on the real issue here: YOU PUT ME IN A GODDAMN COCONUT BRA

  MasonPike (09/08/2012 9:24 AM): To be fair, your father saw the humor in it. ParkerAnderson (09/08/2012 9:27 AM): WHAT? I thought you read the chat log.

  MasonPike (09/08/2012 9:31 AM): RichardAnderson (09/08/2012 8:01 AM): I’d ask if you lost your mind as well as your trousers, but the answer is clear. Fix it and get to work.

  MasonPike (09/08/2012 9:31 AM): And didn’t we just talk about this caps lock thing? ParkerAnderson (09/08/2012 9:34 AM): …. MasonPike (09/08/2012 9:45 AM): Parker?

  MasonPike (09/08/2012 10:11 AM): Fine, be that way. *I* still say it was funny.

  MasonPike (09/08/2012 5:09 PM): All right, why have I had six people stop by my office in the last five minutes to compliment my legs? And why do I just KNOW you are responsible?