I wait a few minutes to see what might happen. Then I open the union chat and write:
Ruby:
you guys doing okay?
Sarah:
we were getting somewhere
there are people from all the departments we haven’t reached yet in this mixer
Carol:
but then Mark Winterson showed up
Greg:
yeah, he’s just hanging out? making weird small talk
Steve:
he must know he’s cock blocking
Morgan:
Steve! Gross
This would be a great time to create a diversion. I take out my phone and text Mark Winterson:
Ruby:
wow these sessions are a grind!
could use some of that stress relief you were talking about
meet you upstairs?
I peer up at the fourth floor again, leg jiggling with nerves. And lo and behold, Mark Winterson emerges from the conference room, smiling at his phone.
So I run for the elevator, heading to the fifth floor.
When I enter room 505, Mark Winterson is reading on his phone again, lying on the bed in his shirtsleeves and navy suit pants, wiggling his black-dress-socked feet. His jacket and tie are thrown over the back of a chair in the corner.
“There she is,” he says, putting his phone on the nightstand face down and extending an arm out toward me. “Come here.”
I climb onto the bed beside him, and while I’m still balanced on my knees, he reaches for my waist and tugs me close—and in the process of trying to maintain my balance, I end up straddling him.
My sensible A-line work skirt strains, bare knees pressed into the cool hotel duvet beneath us. The laminated card at the end of my conference lanyard whacks him in the face, and he laughs as I mumble “Sorry” and toss it back over my shoulder.
From this angle he looks soft and vulnerable, gazing up at me all dopey and content. It makes me dizzy, the way mental revulsion and sexual attraction get all twined up in each other when I’m around him these days.
His hands are on my hips, keeping me in place, and his fingers drum idly along my lower back. “Ruby, I need to talk to you about something.”
My stomach clenches, bracing for him to ask me why I’m spying on him for an unrecognized union.
I slide off him and lie on my side, propped on one elbow. “Sure! Anything. Shoot.”
He rolls onto his back, staring at the ceiling. “The first time we had lunch, I was kind of using you.”
