#Forbes - Management
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Little like minds fanart 🎀
#what am i doing with my life#nigel x alex#alex forbes#like minds#nigel colbie#like minds fanart#like minds 2006#forbie#my art#I finally managed to draw alex yay 😍👍
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Alex absolutely needs prescription glasses but never wears them because he thinks they make him look stupid so he continuously bumps into things and anytime he actually does put his glasses on he’s fascinated that he can actually see individual leaves on the trees and can read the street signs
#is this coming from a place of experience? perhaps.#no I’m actually wearing my glasses because I’m fucking blind without them but a few years ago I’d take them off at any opportunity I got#-and just went about my day half blind. no idea how I managed to not walk into traffic or something#like minds 2006#like minds#alex forbes#murderous intent#eddie redmayne#nigel colbie
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#no one has ever been cuntier about groomed into a psychotic killer than alex forbes#everyone say ‘well done nigel colbie.’ you took the most stubborn dickhead in yorkshire and managed to make a devout murderer out of him#like minds#murderous intent#nigel colbie#alex forbes#like minds 2006#(is this the quiet part that you shouldn’t say out loud?)
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I love how antis use the "klaroline wasn't suppose to happen" card as an insult.
The fans saw them in a scene together and after that everyone was like "yeah, get them together, rn".
so many people shipped them together after ONE scene that they managed to change the writer's idea.
The chemistry between Joseph and Candice (Klaus and Caroline) was so perfect that they literally changed the script due to it.
AND YOU'RE USING THIS AS AN INSULT????
I'm sorry this just...makes me giggle.
#this will never not be funny to me#one of the character of your ship was created just for the other one#and you still have the guts to hate on klaroline#who managed to became one of the most popular tvdu ship even if it wasn't scripted#klaroline#the vampire diaries#tvd#klaus mikaelson#the originals#caroline forbes
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This is OLDER! Nigel Colbie, admiring Alex's work: The vicious red marks littered across his chest, painting him with such vibrant hues of blackened reds and hot-ish maroons: the prominent teeth marks on his neck and the strong smell of Alex lingers on his skin, stuck to him like it's his own.
#murderous intent#like minds 2006#alex forbes#nigel colbie#like minds#The ACTUAL ending of this movie is when Alex discarded the gun to kiss Nigel VIGOROUSLY. They then robbed Nigel's parents off their fortune#After that they packed — even if they're all like wet chicks from the midnight rain. AND RAN AWAY!!#I believe that Nigel's parents' money had managed to make it to Paris#Paris is their destination and that's where History began for the two of them.#Alex continued his studies and became a history professor with an impeccable expertise.#Nigel believes that he has all the things he needs to know: It's all in his mind. He doesn't need any prior knowledge anymore.#So he became a mortician#A great one at that.#They also adopted two kids: Helena and Susie.#((Notice anything suspicious with the names?????))#(((You will just think)))#Also a stray cat named Knight/Midnight.#I RAMBLED AKSJWIWA
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MileApo and Bible highlighted in Forbes (!!!) on their piece about Venture Management

our babies are sooooo famous. A-listers 💅😍😘 that's right
me: I will not talk about EMV anymore
Forbes and Nichapat: don't worry we will!
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Defending Caroline Forbes online isn't enough- I need vervain grenades
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I am once again amazed at how people use the internet without ad block
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harrison morgan + caroline forbes; when we go crashing down, we come back every time, 'cause we never go out of 𝓈𝓉𝓎𝓁𝑒 . . . .
an exploration of two muses who were never supposed to find each other, but did. a vampire and a werewolf. a cop and a journalist. a hero and a sidekick. a boy and a girl. each other's twin flame, in every universe they find themselves in together. written and loved by lia ( @seesgood ) + dee ( @awalkoflife )
© @multi-royalty <3 !
#seesgood#when it's your rp soulmate / cancerian soul sister's birthday but you can't make your own edits and a lovely human offers to do it for you.#these incredible graphics were made by maddie ( a fellow caroline forbes enthusiast. )#she managed to make this the MOST carrison coded without having any prior knowledge of them and i'm just in awe.#i hope you have an amazing day lia and that this makes you smile. may the force be with you always.#HAPPY BIRTHDAY (LIA'S VERSION) !!!!! <3#( marked me like a blood stain: seesgood / carrison. )#( visage: harrison )
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ADDING TO MY LAST POST ABOUT AGGGTM AND TAYLOR SWIFT I've officially decided mine and Stanley's Taylor swift song is Our Song 1000% and me and him would sing and dance to it all the time AND do the Our Song car trend
#Also I did manage to actually get a bit of sleep tonight even though I slept all day but now im gonna try to go back to sleep#because its still kinda early#emphasis on try#f/o#self ship#self shipping#s/i#self ship community#self shipping community#romantic f/o#agggtm#stanley forbes
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nothing like hearing someone behind you on the street very confidently speak about something you’re very knowledgable in with the worst/wrong opinions 
#as someone who has only ever worked retail and is getting increasingly in the management/business part of it#I don’t think you know what you’re talking anout when you say ‘they just need to open stores people will go to!!’#wow!!!! I wish someone thot of that !!!! someone call forbes I got someone to put on their 30 under 30 list
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Dall’antica saggezza al futuro dell’impresa: Business Leaders Summit e CEO Italian Summit & Awards. Roma. Milano
Fiera Milano ispira i top manager con i grandi maestri del passato e strategie innovative per affrontare le sfide del futuro.
Fiera Milano ispira i top manager con i grandi maestri del passato e strategie innovative per affrontare le sfide del futuro. Due eventi d’eccellenza per il top management italianoRoma, 26-27 novembre 2024 | Milano, 4 dicembre 2024 – Con il Business Leaders Summit a Roma e il CEO Italian Summit & Awards a Milano, Fiera Milano, attraverso la sua divisione Business International, offre due…
#Aldo Cazzullo#Alessandria today#amministratori delegati#Business International#Business Leaders Summit#C-level#capitale umano#CEO Awards#CEO Italian Summit & Awards#conoscenza e cultura#creatività e disciplina#Cyrille Schwellnus#driver di crescita#economia italiana#eventi business Italia#eventi Fiera Milano#Fiera Milano#Forbes Italia#formazione manageriale#Frecce Tricolori#futuro del management#Google News#Hotel Principe di Savoia#impresa contemporanea#Innovazione#Innovazione sostenibile#integrazione processi aziendali#italianewsmedia.com#Italo Calvino#Leadership
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sugar coated, lies unfolded
pairing: CEO harry castillo x exec. assistant f! reader
summary: you try to stay away, to do the right thing, but somehow, you end up back in your boss’ bed... well, your boss and his wife’s bed.
part 1 here
tags/warning: +18, mdni. harry castillo is 48 and married. reader is 25 and has a boyfriend. age gap. cheating. f!reader. partners dissing. oral sex (f! receiving). unprotected piv. anal fingering. she does stuff to him while his wife is on the phone i’m sorry.
w/c: 10k
Someone is talking about the ripple effects of the Forbes cover on New York’s business scene, explaining how the new feature on Harry Castillo will influence decisions made by investors and agents, especially now that Castillo & Co. is expanding operations in Asia.
“It’s an unbelievable feat to be on the cover of Forbes twice in just twenty months,” the public relations manager is saying.
You jot down the word unbelievable on your iPad before the rest of the sentence drowns in flashbacks from the night before, flooding your brain like quicksand made of memories, tastes, and touches.
You shift in your chair, wishing you were anywhere but a conference room at eight-thirty in the morning, and your gaze, though fixed on your tablet screen, starts to blur around the edges.
Between your legs is tender, deliciously sore in all the right ways after being claimed by the thick length of Harry until almost two in the morning, when he finally dropped you off at home.
You didn’t even make it to the bed in his Lenox Hill apartment. You had sex on the white oak floor in the living room, on top of a blanket, desperate, and everything on you is sensitive today.
You slept with your boss. You actually slept with your boss.
God. Harry has such a filthy mouth.
Someone calls your name.
“Do you think he’d want that?”
Your eyes meet those of Harry’s personal PR manager, who has one brow raised. You like her. She’s sharp and direct and doesn’t have time to waste, a trait that’s written all over the look she’s giving you now.
“Sorry, I didn’t catch that,” you admit. “What was the question?”
An impatient sigh.
“I asked if you think Harry would want to talk about his career journey.”
“No,” you say immediately. “He covered that in the last interview, and he’ll kill someone if he has to answer the same questions again.”
The intern to your left scrambles to erase something from her own iPad.
When you leave the meeting, it’s settled that Harry’s next interview will be with Forbes, set to be edited and published on a rush schedule. Now you need to inform him, schedule the interview, send ten thousand emails.
You press the elevator button and wait. When the doors finally open on your floor—Media, Marketing, and Advertising—there are three people inside, and your boss is one of them.
Your first instinct is to stay put, but one of the men is holding the door open for you, and Harry is looking at you with an unreadable expression. Everyone knows the two of you get along well, so you can’t exactly not step in.
“Good morning,” you say as you enter, greeted politely by the other two men. You stop beside Harry, both of you facing forward, side by side. “Good morning, Harry.”
“Morning.”
His tone is polite and to the point, as it always is when other people are around.
The doors close. The elevator screen shows stops on the fifth and seventh floors before heading to the fifteenth, where Harry’s office is. Background music resumes while you focus on breathing mechanically, because even that feels too tense right now.
Is he thinking about how he practically begged to come inside you twice?
The elevator stops. One of the men steps out, exchanging good mornings.
At some point last night, he brought up your boyfriend while he was still inside you, and you wanted to kill him for it, because your body was torn between being turned on by the wrongness of it all and feeling sorry for your partner, who was probably asleep at that hour, completely unaware of how his name was being dragged through the situation. But then the irrational possessiveness bug bit Harry and he made you admit your boyfriend didn’t fuck you nearly as well.
The elevator stops again. The last person exits, leaving just you and Harry in the confined space. The music starts up again.
Harry speaks first.
“Did I hurt you?” he asks quietly, still looking ahead.
“What do…” you start to say, then remember how, toward the end of the night, you told him you were so sensitive between your legs, something Harry then soothed with his own tongue. “No, you didn’t hurt me.”
“You complained.”
“I made an observation,” you clarify. “Because it’s true. You and my boyfriend are different. And with you, it was hours.”
He says nothing.
“We said we wouldn’t talk about this at work,” you remind him. “Last night didn’t happen.”
The doors open on your floor, and Harry, without addressing your last comment, holds them open for you to exit first. You both begin walking to your respective places — your desk, his office — and you slip back into your executive assistant persona. The one who doesn’t know what his sweaty skin smells like, how his kiss tastes, or the sound of that deep groan when whispered into your ear.
“I need to talk to you about the Forbes interview,” you call after him. “Can we schedule a meeting at three?”
“Yes. Put it on the calendar, please,” he says without slowing down or looking back.
He enters his office and shuts the door behind him, which means: do not disturb.
So you don’t.
You and Harry are good actors. That you gotta admit.
For the next three weeks, nothing happens. He’s your boss, you’re his assistant, and that’s the only dynamic that exists between you. The world keeps spinning. And you don’t get fired, which was a very real possibility in the mental report you filed the morning after that night.
You start arriving earlier so you don’t have to stay late, which means you don’t have to be alone with him. Harry stops sending cryptic messages about his meetings. He also stops emerging from his office when you walk in wearing the red dress he once said he loved.
Three weeks later, on a Friday at four p.m., Harry steps out of his office and walks over to your desk.
You look up from the Excel spreadsheet where you’re logging his personal expenses and ask politely,
“Can I help you, Harry?”
“Are you going to the cocktail party?”
He’s talking about the Castillo & Co. event tomorrow night, celebrating the release of the Forbes issue featuring his new interview.
“Yes, of course. Do you need something?”
“I need you to come with me to the tailor and take the suit to my apartment. I’ve got something at six, won’t have time to go back to my house.”
“Okay. Now?”
“Now.”
You nod, like the good assistant you are, and save the file before shutting down your computer.
In silence, you both head down to the parking garage and slide into the back seat of Harry’s car. His driver is already behind the wheel. Harry immediately crosses one leg over the other, foot bouncing, and pulls out his phone. You turn toward the window as the car leaves the underground lot.
This is the first time you two are in a car together after that night, that had felt so different.
Harry had dismissed the driver, so he was the one behind the wheel. The silence back then was heavy with anticipation, tension, and the electric certainty that something was going to happen. When he stopped at a red light, he leaned across the console to kiss you and slid a hand under your skirt, pressing against you through your underwear in a way that made you feel completely, undeniably his.
You squeeze your thighs together and close your eyes, steadying your breath.
The moment shatters with the sound of your phone. You glance down and see “baby” on the screen — your boyfriend. You’d asked him to call to plan dinner.
Shit. Perfect timing.
“Hey, babe,” you say softly. In your peripheral vision, you catch Harry’s foot stilling. Your boyfriend is cheerful, loud enough that Harry can probably hear every word. He asks if you’re still at the office. “No, I’m heading to the tailor with Harry, then I’ll go straight to your place. Is that okay?”
He says it is. Says he bought a special bottle of wine because the pink label reminded him of you—your favorite color—and the ache in your chest tightens.
“You’re so sweet to me,” you say, and maybe it’s just in your head, but your voice sounds too guilty. He tells you that you deserve it. You don’t know what to say, so you ask, “Do you want me to pick anything up for dinner?”
He says no. Says he just wants one thing from you. You lower your voice.
“What do you want?”
The car is dead silent. Your phone volume is up too high when he says, “I want you on the kitchen counter, wearing nothing but your panties, while I cook.” That’s your assignment, he adds.
You let out an awkward little laugh, praying Harry didn’t catch it.
“Deal,” you say. “See you tonight.”
When you hang up, Harry isn’t on his phone anymore. He’s just staring out the window, unreadable.
You arrive at the tailor and the driver opens your door. Harry joins you on the sidewalk and, for the first time in nearly a month, places a guiding hand at the base of your back as you walk inside. He used to do that all the time, but apparently that kind of touch was banned after what happened between you.
The receptionist greets you and leads you to one of the private fitting rooms. Three of the walls are mirrors and two velvet couches sit in the corner. There’s a tray with water and candied orange peels, and, In the center of it all, is the raised circular platform where Harry usually stands during fittings.
She shows him the suit, neatly arranged on two hangers, and tells him to try it on. Then she leaves, shutting the door behind her.
You head straight for one of the couches, which makes Harry’s hand fall away from your back.
“Want me to wait outside?” you ask, out of habit, as you sit down. You’ve done this a dozen times.
“Nothing you haven’t seen,” he says, pulling off his shoes.
You resist the urge to roll your eyes.
Off comes the blazer, placed on the rack. Then the watch and the cufflinks are dropped into the tray. Then come the buttons—first the sleeves, then the collar, all the way down…
You clear your throat and open your phone, responding to emails, not looking at him.
“So your boyfriend cooks for you,” Harry says casually.
And just like that, you know he heard everything.
Half his chest is exposed. He’s not even looking at you as he untucks his shirt and slides it off, standing shirtless in front of you, wearing only slacks.
“Yeah, he likes to cook.”
“Is it a special occasion?”
“Does it have to be?” you counter, eyes glued to your screen.
“Just asking.”
He unbuttons his pants, and you lock your gaze on your phone.
“Anniversary,” you finally say, which makes you realize that you’ll need new lingerie for tonight.
“What if he proposes again? Will you say yes?”
“Harry,” you say firmly, lifting your gaze now that he’s put on the dress pants. “That’s none of your business. You pay me to manage your life, but that doesn’t mean you get to know everything about mine.”
“I love how passive-aggressive you get when I bring up your relationship. You hate it.”
“I don’t hate my boyfriend.”
“I didn’t say you hate your boyfriend. I said you hate your relationship.”
He starts buttoning the newly fitted shirt, and his tone is so maddeningly casual you feel heat rising in your chest.
“You just want me to hate my relationship so you can feel a little better,” you say, holding your fingers up, barely apart, “just this much better, about the fact that you hate yours too.”
“I don’t need to feel better about it. I know the truth. If we didn’t hate our relationships, we wouldn’t have had sex.”
“We agreed not to talk about it.”
“Oh, that again. Has it helped? Not talking about it has made you think about it any less?”
You lock your phone and set it aside. Adjust yourself on the couch and look directly at him. Your voice stays quiet, but sharp.
“Of course not, but what do you want me to do? I’m in a relationship, you’re married, we have lives, and I need my job. And even if I do think about that night, I can’t do anything about it. So yeah, it’s better to pretend.”
“So you do think about it.”
“If that’s what strokes your ego, then fine, yes. I think about it. There hasn’t been a single damn day since that night that I haven’t remembered it. It haunts me.”
Harry finishes buttoning his shirt, tucks it in, then slips on the blazer. The suit fits like a glove. Every seam perfect, every line flattering.
“I told you I had morals,” Harry says quietly after a beat. “But I put them aside for you. And now, here I am, with none, asking you to keep going.”
Your heart stumbles.
“Keep going what?”
“What started that night in my office. I’m not going to ask you to break up with your boyfriend, and I won’t promise I’ll divorce my wife. I can sign a five-year job security agreement if that’s what it takes to make you feel safe. But I want you.”
“This won’t work.”
“Do you want it?”
What a stupid question. You nearly die a little every day from how much you want him.
But your answer never comes, because the tailor opens the door and walks in, greeting Harry cheerfully.
And now you can’t stop thinking
You think about it as you head to Harry’s apartment to drop off his suit, ignoring the pair of gold hoops on the entryway table that make it painfully obvious he’s a married man. You think about it later, when you go to your boyfriend’s place and undress for him. And even later, in the shower, when you notice the mark he left near your breast while you were having sex.
This has absolutely no chance of ending well, and you’ve never been the kind of person who lets irrational impulses get in the way of your career. But for the first time… you’re tempted.
And the worst part? You can’t tell anyone. Maybe your therapist, but she’ll just say again how unhealthy this dynamic is, and you don’t want to hear that. And you don’t trust her that much with this kind of secret.
You think about it as you get ready for Harry’s cocktail party, aching to see him and hoping for permission to touch him.
Your boyfriend approaches, eyes wide when he sees you in the strapless red gown, and lets out a whistle.
“Are you sure I’m even allowed to be seen with you tonight?” he teases, wrapping his arms around you from behind and kissing your neck. “You look gorgeous. Stunning dress.”
“Harry gave it to me. Well, he gave me the money and his personal shopper bought it,” you say, because there’s no way you could afford a Schiaparelli, and your boyfriend is used to hearing about the things Harry buys you whenever there’s an event.
All so you look presentable as Harry Castillo’s executive assistant, of course.
“Of course he did,” your boyfriend says, rolling his eyes. “Ready?”
When you arrive at Castillo & Co.’s event hall, hand in hand with your boyfriend, you realize that, no, you’re not ready. The decor is tasteful and elegant in shades of fawn, black, and ice white and everyone is in black-tie. At the back of the room, a digital display showcases the Forbes cover. Harry looks amazing in the photo, completely fitting for the role he holds, but the headline reads: From Concrete to the Top of the World.
He must’ve hated that.
“Do we have fancy whiskey?” your boyfriend asks as you start to cross the room. “And shrimp cocktail?”
The questions are rhetorical. Before you can answer, he plants a loud kiss on your lips and heads off toward the food tables. You watch him walk away, wishing he stayed with you, but then a waiter offers you a glass of champagne and you accept. You walk toward the edge of the room, and sip while scanning the space.
People are gathered in polished little clusters, all impeccably dressed and beaming. But there’s a larger group crowded around one person, and the reason is Harry, who’s speaking with ease and commanding the social scene with effortless charm, looking absolutely delicious in a tux.
Your view is partially blocked when his wife appears beside him, placing a hand on his forearm, looking radiant in a white off-shoulder draped gown. Without stopping his sentence or glancing her way, Harry slips an arm around her waist.
She seems to glow under his touch. You understand the feeling, despite the hundred-pound weight settling in your stomach.
How ridiculous, to feel jealous of the wife. You are the wrong one, not her. And how twisted is it that, beneath the jealousy, there’s a flicker of satisfaction because Harry wants you, not just her?
Harry laughs at something one of the men says. He scans the room briefly, and that’s when he sees you. Your stomach twists, and nearly melts, when his eyes sweep over you from head to toe, so subtly that no one else would notice.
Smoothly, he turns back to the conversation, as if his attention had never strayed.
Your own attention is pulled back by your boyfriend returning.
“There’s so much food,” he says, his excitement making you laugh. He laughs too, but insists, “Seriously. It’s insane. Have you eaten?”
You shake your head, and he grabs your hand, guiding you toward the buffet tables. There are a million options, and you let yourself get distracted by them so you don’t start looking for Harry, which doesn’t work, because ten minutes later, he’s the one who finds you.
His wife is with him.
“Darling,” she says, leaning in to kiss your cheek. “That dress is stunning. It’s Schiaparelli, isn’t it?”
“It is,” you reply, and she keeps looking at you like she’s waiting for an explanation. You add, “A loan from Harry, so I wouldn’t embarrass him.”
“It’s not a loan. It’s yours,” Harry says, leaning in to greet you with a kiss on the cheek. His smell, what the fuck. He extends a hand to your boyfriend. “So you’re the boyfriend.”
“So you’re the boss,” your boyfriend jokes as they shake hands. “Nice to meet you, Mr. Castillo.”
“Likewise,” Harry says, though the tone is anything but warm. Then to you: “My PR rep asked for a few photos of us. Can you do that now?”
“Sure,” you reply, accepting his offered arm.
Harry kisses his wife lightly and says he’ll be right back. You do the same with your boyfriend. Together, you walk toward the PR team, and once you’re far enough from the crowd, Harry speaks, eyes still forward.
“Have you thought about it?”
“Do I have a deadline?”
“So you’re considering it.”
That shuts you up. Yes, you are considering it.
“If we were to do this,” you murmur to Harry, smiling politely at one of his business partners entering your field of vision, who’s always courteous to you, “I’d want that job security agreement.”
“I’ll call my lawyer right now and have him draft the contract.”
The conversation pauses as you reach Harry’s publicist—a tall man who always wears eccentric suits, whether because of the patterns or the bold colors. Tonight, he’s in blood-red with round glasses and greets you with a giant smile.
“Stunning,” he says, kissing both of your cheeks. “What an honor for Harry to be seen with such a beautiful woman.”
You shoot him a look.
“Besides Mrs. Castillo, of course!” he adds quickly, and you decide not to check your boss’s face. “Shall we?”
You and Harry pose in front of a wide LED panel bearing the Castillo Construction & Co. logo. He places a hand on your waist without a hint of a smile, and you fall into your executive posture: back straight, polite, demure smile.
Photos are taken with instructions from both the photographer and the publicist. When it’s over, but before you and Harry can step apart, he leans in, under the guise of a polite hug, and whispers in your ear:
“She’s traveling for work tonight. If the answer is yes, you know where I live.”
Then he disappears into the sea of people who can’t wait to be near him.
By sheer luck, you don’t see Harry again during the next two hours you remain at the cocktail party. Your boyfriend indulges in the expensive whiskey, and you sip two more glasses of champagne, but there’s an anticipation humming beneath everything you do, like something is lurking.
Like the night won’t end at your home, in your bed, with your boyfriend.
You leave around nine, and you practically have to guide your boyfriend into the Uber waiting at the curb. He’s nearly unconscious on the ride back to his apartment, just awake enough to walk on his own. You help him inside, stay with him while he showers, and then watch over him as he collapses into bed.
A glass of water and two aspirins on the nightstand. A kiss on the forehead. And then he’s snoring, totally out.
You close the door gently behind you and, leaning your back against it, pick up your phone.
You open your chat with Harry. The last message is a simple “ok” you sent after he asked to reschedule a meeting.
There’s no telling how long you stand there, staring at the screen and imagining a thousand different scenarios, but when you finally type something, it’s:
“Let the front desk know I’m cleared to come up.”
Because even though your name is on the list of people with access to his apartment, the building has strict policies about non-residents after 8 p.m.
Harry replies ten minutes later:
“Done.”
The doorman, an older gentleman who’s always polite, greets you as always: with a gentle tone, a compliment (this time about your dress), and a polite question about whether Harry’s being a decent boss. But you catch the slight wrinkle between his brows, the subtle confusion in his smile. It says: What the hell are you doing here at this hour?
You see the same look from the security guards, and from the person at the front desk. But you lift your chin, square your shoulders, and pretend your reason for being here is purely professional.
You build a whole story in your mind as you walk across the marble lobby, your heels clicking with each step, just to make it easier to face. Harry needs a report for Monday morning, and he’s paying you overtime for it, but the source documents are physical, and he can’t scan them.
He took them home because he planned to work on them tonight, but the cocktail party took over his evening.
You step into the elevator and enter the code for Harry’s apartment.
And he remembered the report at the event, of course he did, because the partner he’s meeting on Monday mentioned looking forward to the negotiations. So you, ever the good employee, offered to stop by and grab the documents.
The elevator doors close, taking you toward the penthouse duplex, and you shut your eyes, erasing the fake narrative.
Now, it’s just you and your conscience.
There’s no report. No meeting. No overtime. Now it’s just Harry and you, both willingly choosing to do this and hurt your partners in exchange for nothing more than physical satisfaction.
The doors open into the private foyer of the penthouse, warmly lit and lined with framed art. Harry is standing in the doorway of the apartment, barefoot, blazer gone, bowtie undone and hanging loose at his collar.
You take one step forward, leaving the elevator.
“How was the rest of the party?” you ask, trying to sound casual through your nerves.
“Good. They liked the feature.”
You stop a few feet away, feeling his eyes on you. You twist your clutch in your hands.
“We left early because she had to catch the flight,” Harry adds, answering the question you hadn’t asked. “Want to come in? I think I still have some champagne.”
You nod, agreeing, and step inside as Harry closes the door behind you. The long hallway leading into the living room, all decorated in earth tones and golden light, greets you like a witness.
“There are some things I’m assuming based on the fact that you’re here,” Harry says behind you. You turn to face him. “But obviously, I need you to say it.”
“I don’t know if I can say it out loud.”
He watches you for a beat, reading your face.
“Morals?”
“It’s called having a heart.”
He smiles, and it’s far too sensual for the subject at hand.
“Speaking of hearts… what excuse did you give your boyfriend?”
He walks past you, heading down the hallway, and you follow. The two of you move into the living room, and you settle onto the couch, watching as Harry disappears for a few seconds and reemerges with an unopened bottle of Bollinger and two flutes in his hands. He sits beside you, and within moments, the bottle is open and champagne is flowing into both glasses.
You slip off your heels. Harry tosses his bow tie onto the coffee table. And only after you’ve taken your first sip of champagne do you finally answer.
“I didn’t need an excuse. He was asleep,” you say, referring to your boyfriend. “I think he had a lot of whiskey.”
“That’s a shame. He could’ve spent the night with you, but he chose to drink,” Harry replies, settling in beside you as he clicks his tongue. “Rookie mistake.”
“You think it’s exciting to sleep with me because it only happened once and it’s forbidden. After three years, he doesn’t think like that anymore.”
“There isn’t a universe where I don’t find having you in my bed exciting.”
That makes you blink slowly at him, then at the ring on his finger, while the champagne tastes suddenly bitter on your tongue.
He notices where your eyes have landed.
“Does it bother you?” he asks, gesturing to the ring.
You don’t even need to think, which probably bumps you up twenty points on the I’m-A-Terrible-Person scale.
“No,” you say, because it’s true. “Did you feel guilty?”
“Tonight?” you nod, and he draws in a long breath. He seems to test a million possible words before landing on: “No. I didn’t. I was angry at your boyfriend, and then I felt like an asshole for that.”
When you don’t respond, Harry throws the question back at you.
“Did you?”
You take another sip of champagne, gaze fixed on the massive TV mounted across from the sofa.
“I wish I had. It would be easier to deal with all this if I felt guilty.”
Harry reaches over and takes a lock of your hair that had fallen over your chest, twirling it around his finger before brushing it over your shoulder. He does the same with the others, gently moving each strand behind you, letting it fall down your back.
Before anything else, he places his glass on the coffee table beside the bottle and settles into the cushions.
“Come here.”
The way he pulls you brings your body into his, with your back partially resting against his chest and your legs tucked beneath you.
“I usually have answers for everything,” Harry says. “But for this? I don’t.”
You tilt your head just enough to hear the rhythmic beat of his heart beneath your ear, and you intertwine your fingers with his. His arm rests over your right shoulder.
“It’s okay… I don’t need comfort. I’m here because I want to be.”
Harry makes a low sound, like agreement, and presses his hand flat against your chest. He can probably feel the same quick heartbeat under his palm.
He changes the subject because that’s the smarter choice.
“You look beautiful in that dress,” he says near your ear, his voice more intimate now, more private. You close your eyes and savor the sound like it’s dessert. “Everyone was looking at you and envying your boyfriend.”
His hand drifts lower, cupping your breast over the smooth silk of your gown, his touch feather-light. Your skin prickles.
“But I’m the one they should envy, right?” Harry keeps whispering. The dress has a slit that’s just wide enough for him to slip his hand underneath and cup your breast. “I was trying to think of a way to make that obvious.”
“That you’re cheating on your wife with me?”
His soft thumb finds your hardened nipple, and a wave of heat rolls between your legs as he circles it.
“That I got what all those wide-eyed bastards wanted.”
“You’re awfully possessive for someone who’s the other man.”
He laughs, and you feel it more than you hear it, the vibration under your cheek against his chest. You smile, and the smile stays as Harry reaches for the small zipper on the side of your dress and slowly, slowly pulls it down.
The fabric loosens with each inch the zipper drops, and you’re the one who slides the top of the dress down to your waist, exposing your breasts. His hands cover them one at a time, squeezing gently, and you push them toward his palms.
Soon, it’s his mouth on your neck, lips parted over your sensitive skin. You have to tighten your grip around the champagne flute just to keep from dropping it as Harry kisses and bites your neck, his beard scraping and tickling in a way that leaves your whole body weak.
“Turn around and kiss me,” he says, taking the glass from your hand and placing it on the coffee table.
When he leans back into the couch again, you kneel on the seat beside him, just like that first night in his office, and meet his mouth. Harry holds your face with both hands but lets you set the pace, following your movements. And you devour it, because you’ve thought about this too much. His kiss, his taste, the way he leads without ever needing to be rough.
Your mouths part wider, undoing all the restraint that’s built up over the last three weeks. Harry slides one hand down to finish unzipping the dress completely and pushes it off your hips, leaving you in nothing but panties.
You’ve barely thrown the dress to the floor before his hand is already inside your underwear, and your knees weaken. He finds the slickness there and mutters a curse under his breath before sitting up straighter to get a better angle as he rubs slow circles over your clit.
The blood is pounding so hard in your ears that you barely register the phone ringing.
Both of you freeze, breaths and hearts racing. You meet Harry’s gaze, seeking some sort of shelter in it, and he looks back at you, lips red, before glancing toward the coffee table.
Before he can move, you kiss him again. Screw the phone. Harry immediately sinks back into the kiss, and the middle finger still inside your panties traces slowly from your clit down to your dripping entrance. It doesn’t take long before he slips it inside, and you swing a leg over his lap, settling into him.
The phone stops ringing.
Harry moves slowly, probably remembering how sensitive you were last time. He takes his time with just one finger, working you open, making you wetter. Your clit is practically throbbing, and he starts to speak—
—but the words are swallowed up by the phone ring again.
“Fuck’s sake,” Harry mutters, clearly annoyed, pulling his hand from your panties and gripping your waist. With you still in his lap, he leans forward and grabs the phone. You feel his whole body tense beneath you when he sees the screen.
“What is it?” you ask.
“My wife,” he says.
You want to be a bitch and tell him not to answer, to hang up, but you can’t. Even though you know he might actually listen if you said it.
“Answer. It could be important.”
Harry squeezes your waist as you try to move off his lap.
“Stay,” he says, and clears his throat before answering. “Hi, darling. Everything okay?”
“Hey, babe. Why didn’t you pick up the first time?”
You can hear her voice clearly because she’s speaking loudly and because of how close the two of you are, but you stay quiet and still, as if moving might somehow make her see you.
The lie rolls off his tongue effortlessly.
“Sorry. I was on a video call with some investors in Japan. I didn’t see the phone ring.”
You keep your eyes on his as your hand reaches the button on his pants. You undo it silently, then ease the zipper down.
Harry doesn’t stop you.
“I’m at the airport,” his wife is saying. “I upgraded to business class, but for some reason they need you to authorize the purchase on your bank app.”
“That’s strange. They’ve never needed confirmation before.”
With the zipper all the way down, you slide your hand into his underwear and pull out his hard cock. Your mouth practically waters.
“I said the same thing!” she laughs. “I think I’m just going to cancel and try using my own card… Not the joint account.”
Harry opens his mouth to answer, but it’s exactly when you lick your hand and wrap it around him. His jaw tightens and his eyes flutter shut. He pulls the phone away from his face to suck in a sharp breath.
“Harry?”
“I can authorize it from here,” he says into the phone, eyes glancing down to follow the motion of your hand. “Up to you.”
“Hmm… no worries, I’ll just use mine.” A pause. “My flight boards in thirty minutes and you know what I can’t stop thinking about?”
“What?”
You remove your hand from his cock only to quietly slip out of your panties. His gaze drops, devouring the space between your legs, and you sit back down on his thigh, not caring in the slightest if you leave a wet mark on his pants.
She says,
“The way you fingered me in the car after the party.”
Your hands freeze. You raise an eyebrow at Harry, and he gives you a small, crooked smile before replying to his wife,
“You liked that?”
“Mhm. Too bad I couldn’t make you come, too.”
You narrow your eyes and squirm with jealousy. You tighten your grip and focus on the swollen tip. Harry tries to stop you, but you challenge him and keep going, watching his expression break. You want her to hear.
“I didn’t need to,” he manages to say. “That was for you.”
Harry moves the phone away completely, whispering a curse just as her voice returns on the other end.
“But I miss sleeping with you.” Her tone is overly sweet, but there’s a hint of real sadness buried beneath it.
The smile that threatens to curl your lips is cruel and selfish, and you don’t dig too deep into what it means. Probably something about how you’re about to have what she wants. Which is awfully childish, you know that.
But part of you feels for her. That’s what you think as you lift yourself onto your knees, placing one over Harry’s thigh to get the angle right, and guide his erection to the slick heat between your legs.
You’d feel that way, too, if you were married to a man like Harry and he didn’t want you.
Harry leans his head back on the couch, avoiding your eyes. He stares at the ceiling, the knuckles of the hand holding the phone pale and strained.
“Sorry. A lot on my mind,” he says, just as you sink down on him.
His chest tightens in a heavy breath. His free hand clutches your hip, his thighs tense beneath you, a vein in his neck practically pulsing. He’s a vision of self-restraint, and you revel in it, grinding down onto him and biting your lip hard enough to nearly break skin just to keep quiet.
“I get it,” she says. “I just wanted you to know.”
“Darling, I need—”
“Promise me we’ll try harder.”
You lean forward as he stretches you, kissing the side of his damp neck while your fingers work on the buttons of his shirt, your tongue tracing the line of that vein. He shudders.
“I promise,” Harry says, his nails digging into your waist as you begin to rock in his lap, moaning against his skin. “I… I really need to go. Have to finish some documents. But text me when you land, okay?”
You don’t even register their goodbye. All you know is that Harry practically throws his phone onto the coffee table.
“Brat,” he mutters against your mouth as he pulls your hair, tugging off his shirt in one fluid motion. “Can’t believe the phone didn’t pick up the sound of this wet pussy.”
“Lucky you,” you say. “So Harry Castillo isn’t fucking his wife? What a shame.”
He tightens his grip around you and stands, pulling a gasp from your mouth as he slips out of you.
“You’re too old to be lifting like that,” you say, even as your thighs wrap around his hips. “Your physical therapist’s gonna be rich.”
“And you still want this old man?”
You nod, and Harry gives a smug little smile. Men are so easy to please.
He carries you through the hallway into the master bedroom. Your wide-eyed gaze meets his a moment before he sets you down on the enormous, messy bed. One glance to the side and you see the open door of his wife’s closet, purses and heels in view, just before Harry flips you onto your stomach and raises your hips.
You brace on your elbows, spine arching.
Two pillows rest at the head of the bed. One nightstand holds a book, a pair of glasses, and a man’s watch. The other has hand cream, a gold bracelet, a bottle of vitamins, and a pink hair clip.
It’s literally the most intimate part of a couple’s life, and this bedroom embodies that, exactly why you used to think, and agree, it was a line not to be crossed. But not for Harry, apparently, who climbs onto the bed behind you and slides into you again.
Your head drops forward, blocking your vision, fingers clutching the sheets as he sinks in fully.
Harry leans over your back, his fingers finding your pulsing clit, stroking in slow circles that make your whole body melt.
“Harry—”
“Come on my cock and I’ll fuck you.”
You writhe beneath him as his fingers move faster, smaller, tighter circles. You roll your hips forward and back in short, needy thrusts, just enough friction to push you toward the edge.
Your mouth dries, eyes squeezing shut as the tension coils in your belly. When Harry switches to horizontal strokes, rubbing directly across your clit, you come so hard it borders on painful, then dissolves into something warm and all-consuming, like being lowered into a hot bath.
“Just like that,” he whispers against your moans, slowing his movements so you can ride out every last wave. “I’m going to fuck you now.”
You nod, even though your ears are still buzzing. You nearly miss the weight of his body when he pulls back, but then one hand presses between your shoulder blades and the other grabs your hip, and he starts to thrust.
It’s almost too much. You’re still sensitive, your clit sparking with each slap of his balls, but it’s so good. You hear his grunts, low and rough, and you spread your knees wider, gripping the sheets. Your eyes land on his wife’s nightstand at the same moment Harry says,
“This what you wanted? Climbing on top of me while I was on the phone? Almost making me lose it?”
You nod. Harry pulls your left leg, then your right, laying you flat. He lies on top of you, keeping your legs tight between his, and thrusts again.
“Say it out loud.”
He kisses your neck, brushing your hair away. Your skin tingles.
“For a second, I wanted her to hear,” you admit, grateful you’re not facing him.
Harry breathes against your temple.
“Yeah?”
“I wanted her to know that what she wants…” You can’t finish before he speeds up, and you have to grit your teeth. With your legs squeezed together, every thrust hits deeper. “You’re giving it to me. And you’re so, so hard for me…”
There. You said it. This time, you break the rule about not talking about the others. And you can’t regret it, not when Harry wraps a hand around your throat, bites your shoulder, and fucks you, the slap of skin clashing with the wet sounds of his cock inside you, again and again, until he growls a curse.
He pulls out and flips you onto your back. Harry climbs over you, stroking himself, eyes roving over your body—your breasts, the space between your thighs. You touch yourself too, unable not to, watching his face tighten as he gets close.
And when he comes, it’s on your belly, whispering your name as the hot ropes of cum cover your skin.
“Open your legs,” he says, voice hoarse and skin sweaty. You fold your knees and spread your thighs. “You’re already close again… Look how you’re throbbing.”
This time it’s the tip of his cock that presses against your swollen clit, massaging it, smearing his cum across your skin as he strokes. His softening head glides over you in slow, steady movements. With his free hand, Harry uses his fingers to open you wider, and when he finds the exact spot again, he presses.
Your next orgasm isn’t as explosive as the first, but just as overwhelming. When it hits, you can’t take anymore. You clamp your legs shut and push his hand away.
He gets it. He lies down beside you, pulls you into his arms, and holds you while you catch your breath.
As your senses return, you notice the only light in the room is coming from the open closet. The bedroom is softly decorated, the sheets far too luxurious to have been chosen by a man, even one like Harry Castillo.
“Why did we have sex in here?” you ask.
“Hm?”
“You must have ten guest rooms in this penthouse. Why this one?”
He stays silent, stroking your back.
“Because doing something wrong turns you on?” you ask, turning to look at him. Harry meets your eyes, saying nothing, and his hand goes still on your ribs. “I get it. I think I got wetter when I realized where you brought me.”
Before he can reply, you ask,
“Will you think of me when you’re here with her?”
“I already do,” he says. “The difference is now I’ll have memories. Not just imagination.”
You lean in to kiss him, and Harry welcomes it.
Even so, the two of you sleep in the guest bedroom, because you don’t want to use her pillow or wrap yourself in the same sheets she does.
Harry takes you to the end of the hallway, into a room that seems like it’s never been used, even though the sheets smell like fabric softener.
The bed is bigger than yours, and after a quick shower, the two of you tangle up together, naked, beneath the covers. It’s the first time you’re actually about to fall asleep with him, and he behaves exactly as you expected: he wraps himself around you, throws a leg over yours, and presses you tightly to his body. You’re surrounded by Harry—in your skin, in your sweat, in the sheets, in the house, in the scent that wraps around you.
And just like that, sleep comes easy.
Maybe it’s the unfamiliar space, or the furnace that is Harry’s body, or the emotional chaos, but you wake up in the middle of the night.
He’s completely asleep, his legs trapping yours, and you try to fall back asleep for a few more minutes, but it doesn’t work. Slowly, you untangle yourself from his body and tiptoe out of the room to get your phone, which you’d left in your bag on the coffee table.
You sit on the couch to check for any unread messages, but the moment makes you feel exposed. The champagne bottle and flutes still sitting there give you a headache. You lower the brightness on your phone and go back to the guest room.
Harry hasn’t moved.
There’s a small loveseat by the window, and you curl up there, turning your phone screen back on. The first unread message is from your boyfriend, sent about an hour ago. He’s thanking you for taking care of him. Says you should’ve stayed at his place so he could wake you up with breakfast.
You deserve it for looking after me, he writes and you let out a humorless laugh, because you definitely don’t deserve anything.
There’s a message from your mom, a photo of her, and a few from your friends who saw your picture with Harry on Forbes’s Instagram. You click the link, and it takes you to the post.
Harry Castillo, CEO of Castillo Construction & Co., and his executive assistant, is the caption.
You both look good. You make a striking image.
Harry’s sleepy voice pulls your attention back.
“Can’t sleep?”
He’s rubbing his eyes, propped up on one elbow to look at you.
“Think it’s just the unfamiliar bed. I can’t fall back asleep.”
“That really all it is?”
You chew on your bottom lip, hugging your knees and resting your chin on them after leaving your phone aside. Even though you’re completely naked, you don’t feel uncomfortable around Harry, which is saying something.
“What now?” you ask instead, feeling sorry for him, seeing as he just woke up and is being struck with this emotional turbulence. “Are we something?”
“That was the proposal.”
“We’re gonna have to get really good at lying. You know that, right? At some point, ‘I need to stay late at the office’ won’t cut it anymore.” A headache pulses at your temples. You laugh. “This is crazy.”
“What is?”
“When I started working at the office, I was obsessed with you. I practically drooled when you walked by, watched all your interviews, melted whenever you talked to me. And then you got married, so I made it a point to find someone, or anyone, to date, just to get you out of my system.”
Harry looks at you in a way you don’t like.
“Don’t look at me like that,” you groan, rolling your eyes. “I’m not some virgin girl doing this because I’m in love. You fuck me well, and I like it. That’s all.”
Harry gets out of bed and grabs a pillow. He walks over to you and, without a word, places it on the floor in front of the chair. Then he kneels, and you fall silent at the sight of Harry Castillo on his knees before you, his hair tousled from sleep.
He lifts your left ankle, holding your leg halfway out to kiss from your ankle to your knee, taking his time. The moonlight from outside casts a soft glow over his profile.
You watch, heart pounding.
“I remember your first day at work,” Harry murmurs, sleep-rough voice breaking the silence as he parts his lips to kiss the inside of your thigh. Your stomach twists with nerves and anticipation. “You were wearing a white dress. Your hair was tied up. And you widened your eyes at everyone who came near, like a damn deer.”
Your own eyes are probably wide now as he rests your right leg on his shoulder, stretching your left again to repeat the same trail of kisses. You grip the edge of the seat.
He remembers what you wore your first day, four years ago.
“You came into my office,” he continues, and lifts your left leg to join the other on his shoulders, his face now nestled between your thighs as he places open-mouthed kisses along your skin. “Asked if I needed help with anything specific, and when I told you to sit beside me so I could show you how to open my encrypted report, you tripped over the edge of the rug. In that exact moment, I wanted you.”
He says the last words right before he opens his mouth over your pussy, the heat of his breath making you arch into the chair and clutch his hair.
He looks up at you, mouth still busy, and God… if you could capture a single moment in a photo, it would be this.
You slide your legs off his shoulders just to grab his face and pull him up so you can kiss him. Harry kisses back eagerly, and there’s nothing tender about the way he licks into your mouth. There’s nothing tender about the way he breaks the kiss either just to place your legs back over his shoulders and bury his face between them again. One hand presses down on your lower belly to keep you in place as his mouth seals around your clit and starts to suck.
You hold his face with both hands, pressing him harder against you, watching him, watching the way his cock hardens just from tasting you.
“So good,” you whisper, your fingers on his jaw. “You have no idea how good it feels to have Harry Castillo on his knees for me.”
He doesn’t pull away, but you swear, if he could, he’d be smiling.
What he does instead is lower his mouth until his tongue is inside you. Your eyes flutter closed. Moans echo in the room, along with the wet sounds of his mouth, and you lose yourself in all of it, until his thumb slides inside you. But just as quickly, it leaves, and instead, glides down.
You open your eyes with a jolt just in time to see Harry sucking your clit while his thumb starts circling your other entrance.
It’s different. Strange. Not unpleasant.
“You’ve done this before?” he asks, likely meaning anal.
You shake your head.
“Well, look at that,” Harry says, overly pleased, rubbing in slow circles. “So, in a way, you’re still a virgin. Can I?”
There are very few things you wouldn’t give Harry if he asked.
“Just the finger. Just one. Slowly.”
“Always, baby.”
And he goes slowly.
He waits until you’re melting under his tongue, licking his thumb before returning it to your tight rim and gently pushing in the tip. It doesn’t hurt—not with just the tip—but it’s unlike anything you’ve done, something you never even tried with your boyfriend, even though he asked.
“Relax for me, sweetheart,” Harry whispers. “Breathe. Let me in.”
You don’t know how much time passes before your breathing calms and something in you releases. You feel safer.
Harry plunges his tongue into your pussy and brings his other thumb to your clit, and you’re surrounded by him in every possible way when, slowly, he slips his lubricated thumb into your ass, pulling a deep moan from your chest. The build-up of sensitivity throughout the night, paired with the newness of it all, crashes into you, and you come in his mouth, pulsing around his fingers in both places.
He doesn’t stop, even when you try to push him away and close your legs. Harry keeps sucking your clit harder, and you shake beneath him, overstimulated. He brings you to the edge again with his mouth and hands, and just as you’re about to fall, he stops and tells you to ride him.
You do, on the floor of the guest room. Apparently, you two have a thing for sex on the floor, because it’s rawer, messier, heavier with tension. You kiss the whole time, grabbing at whatever part of him you can reach, and the two of you come together.
Harry, inside you.
You, wrapped around him.
Hardly a word between you.
The next morning, Harry drives you home in his car, without a driver.
You’re wearing one of his T-shirts over your dress, your hair still wet and your face free of makeup, and you probably look ridiculous. A charitable act from the CEO of CCC.
The good news is that the street is empty. It’s still nine a.m. on a Sunday, so there are fewer witnesses to your disastrous state. A few brave souls pass by in running clothes, others look like they rolled out of bed five seconds ago, forced outside by the physiological needs of the small dogs following on their leashes.
Harry parks in front of your building and turns off the engine.
“Too cliché if I thank you for the night?” he asks, leaning back in his seat.
“I’m not going to thank you for the orgasms, because yes, I think that’s cliché, but” you raise your index finger, watching the smug smile take over his face. “solid performance for a senior citizen. Forbes would love to know about the five orgasms.”
“Six,” he corrects, ignoring the comment about the ‘senior citizen.’ “Two this morning. One in bed and one in the shower.”
Oh, right.
“Six,” you agree. “High performance, Mr. Castillo.”
“Glad you approve,” he says. “I suppose I can’t kiss you here.”
You shake your head.
“Not here.” You exchange one last look, entirely charged. “See you tomorrow.”
“See you.” Harry says, and you force yourself to open the passenger door. You place one foot out of the car, but before you can get out, Harry places his palm on the back of your neck and makes you look at him.
“Thank you for tonight and for accepting my proposal.”
You turn just enough to place a kiss on Harry’s wrist and get out of the car, shutting the door behind you.
When you turn toward your building’s entrance, you find another gaze on you.
That gaze runs over you from head to toe, taking in the clothes from the night before, the wet hair, the bare face, and then shifts to Harry’s Mercedes.
A freezing terror takes hold of your entire body, paralyzing you where you stand.
And then your boyfriend’s cold eyes meet yours.
#harry castillo#harry castillo x reader#harry castillo imagine#pedro pascal#pedro pascal x reader#pedro pascal imagine#pedro pascal fanfiction#god if karma really exists i’m fucked#mine
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Understanding Real Estate Cycles: Timing the Market for Success
Real estate markets are cyclical, characterized by periods of expansion, peak, contraction, and trough. Understanding these cycles and their impact on property values, rental rates, and investment opportunities is crucial for real estate investors and stakeholders. In this blog post, we’ll delve into the concept of real estate cycles, explore the key phases of the cycle, and discuss strategies…
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#Entrepreneur: Latest Technology Startups Articles#Entrepreneurship#Forbes - Management#Management#Real Estate#snowboard
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In the Willamette Valley of Oregon, the long study of a butterfly once thought extinct has led to a chain reaction of conservation in a long-cultivated region.
The conservation work, along with helping other species, has been so successful that the Fender’s blue butterfly is slated to be downlisted from Endangered to Threatened on the Endangered Species List—only the second time an insect has made such a recovery.
[Note: "the second time" is as of the article publication in November 2022.]
To live out its nectar-drinking existence in the upland prairie ecosystem in northwest Oregon, Fender’s blue relies on the help of other species, including humans, but also ants, and a particular species of lupine.
After Fender’s blue was rediscovered in the 1980s, 50 years after being declared extinct, scientists realized that the net had to be cast wide to ensure its continued survival; work which is now restoring these upland ecosystems to their pre-colonial state, welcoming indigenous knowledge back onto the land, and spreading the Kincaid lupine around the Willamette Valley.
First collected in 1929 [more like "first formally documented by Western scientists"], Fender’s blue disappeared for decades. By the time it was rediscovered only 3,400 or so were estimated to exist, while much of the Willamette Valley that was its home had been turned over to farming on the lowland prairie, and grazing on the slopes and buttes.

Pictured: Female and male Fender’s blue butterflies.
Now its numbers have quadrupled, largely due to a recovery plan enacted by the Fish and Wildlife Service that targeted the revival at scale of Kincaid’s lupine, a perennial flower of equal rarity. Grown en-masse by inmates of correctional facility programs that teach green-thumb skills for when they rejoin society, these finicky flowers have also exploded in numbers.
[Note: Okay, I looked it up, and this is NOT a new kind of shitty greenwashing prison labor. This is in partnership with the Sustainability in Prisons Project, which honestly sounds like pretty good/genuine organization/program to me. These programs specifically offer incarcerated people college credits and professional training/certifications, and many of the courses are written and/or taught by incarcerated individuals, in addition to the substantial mental health benefits (see x, x, x) associated with contact with nature.]
The lupines needed the kind of upland prairie that’s now hard to find in the valley where they once flourished because of the native Kalapuya people’s regular cultural burning of the meadows.
While it sounds counterintuitive to burn a meadow to increase numbers of flowers and butterflies, grasses and forbs [a.k.a. herbs] become too dense in the absence of such disturbances, while their fine soil building eventually creates ideal terrain for woody shrubs, trees, and thus the end of the grassland altogether.
Fender’s blue caterpillars produce a little bit of nectar, which nearby ants eat. This has led over evolutionary time to a co-dependent relationship, where the ants actively protect the caterpillars. High grasses and woody shrubs however prevent the ants from finding the caterpillars, who are then preyed on by other insects.
Now the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde are being welcomed back onto these prairie landscapes to apply their [traditional burning practices], after the FWS discovered that actively managing the grasslands by removing invasive species and keeping the grass short allowed the lupines to flourish.
By restoring the lupines with sweat and fire, the butterflies have returned. There are now more than 10,000 found on the buttes of the Willamette Valley."
-via Good News Network, November 28, 2022
#butterflies#butterfly#endangered species#conservation#ecosystem restoration#ecosystem#ecology#environment#older news but still v relevant!#fire#fire ecology#indigenous#traditional knowledge#indigenous knowledge#lupine#wild flowers#plants#botany#lepidoptera#lepidopterology#entomology#insects#good news#hope
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