For His Pleasure

35

I had blocked Ben out of my mind completely, or at least attempted to. He wasn't sitting anywhere in sight, but I knew he was hearing every single thing we spoke.

Tony was smiling gently at me, head tilted a little to one side as he waited for me to speak.

"I've never told you about what I actually do at Capra Corp. Tony, I seduce competitors for information, something else important or just to lure them to a specific location," with a heavy heart I told him this, "you're—"

"I know, Sofia," he nodded solemnly, cutting me off and making my eyes widen.

"That's not possible," I began shaking my head after a moment of silence. There was no way Tony had any idea about what I did for a living.

"I'm very careful about who I'm in contact with, you know that. I wouldn't have let you in my life without a very extensive background check and so forth. I knew," he assured me, the lights of the intimate restaurant leaving us in our own world.

"Oh," I was very taken aback, "you never said anything..."

Tony chuckled and shook his head, "if you couldn't tell me, why would I put you in a position where you had to know that I knew?"

I frowned at the realisation of how different Ben and Tony were. In Tony's position Ben would have forced it out of me.

"Yes, well..." I gathered myself and returned to the actual matter at hand, "you're my client for tonight, Tony. Mr Capra Sr said he would help me with this but I doubt he can. His son may be trying to get rid of you."

"You look terrified," Tony observed after a moment, reaching his hand across the small table to take a hold of mine to comfort me.

"I don't want anything bad to happen to you. I love you as a dear friend and I can't lose you," I spoke, wanting Ben to hear the emotion in my voice and call whatever he was planning off.

"I have everything handled," he offered me a smile then, "nothing's going to happen to me. Sofia, I —"

"How?"

He chuckled again and leaned closer, "almost half the people in this restaurant are my people. I'll be fine."

"Alright.." I forced myself to trust him. Tony was the single most careful person I knew, despite him having gotten that other woman pregnant.

"Thank you for telling me, though. It means a lot to know you still care," he smiled a meaningful smile and gazed at me in an adoring way, "there's something I have to tell you."

"What is it?" I was very restless, not up for any kind of smalltalk. I was frightened of what Ben now thought of me after I'd come clean to Tony.

"Caroline from marketing isn't pregnant with my child. I fired her for pretending it was mine," he told me, about to tell me something I couldn't hear right now. I knew he wanted to reignite our relationship.

A shaky breath left my lips and I closed my eyes for a moment.

"I can't, Tony," I told him quietly and with regret, "I care about you, but I never loved you. I can't—"

"No more open relationship stuff, Sofia. Just you and me," he gave me an excited smile, clearly very set on this.

I shook my head and glanced away, giving him my final answer.

"I get that, I'm sorry," he squeezed my hand gently, not sounding at all fed up.

"It means so much to me to have your friendship," I told him after a moment, "truly."

"Ditto, love," his signature smile tugged the sides of his lips up once our eyes met again, our hands still together atop the table.

"There's something I need to ask you," I shifted on my seat uncomfortably, feeling very awkward to be asking this of him, "you can say no, it's honestly fine."