Unexpected love

The bane of existence, the scourge of every wonderful week, the downfall of emperors and kings, the doom to all over-stressed, over-dressed workaholics: Monday morning. One bleary eye blinked open to stare at the old-fashioned face of Johnny's antiquated clock. He'd never had to bother with an alarm clock, and so the small clock on his nightstand was all he'd ever needed.

However, his body's personal alarm clock had never had the distraction of having a rather handsome, warm, all-too appealing body curled next to him during the night. It had also never had the luck of hearing Ten mumble sleepy protest when Johnny had tried to get up. Which would explain why he should have been in the office two hours ago and why his phones, both the normal one and the mobile, were both ringing rather insistently.

Johnny yawned, tuning the phones out and turning his head to gaze down at Ten's sleeping face. The younger man was cuddled into his side, arms and legs wrapped around him, head resting gently on Johnny's ribs. With a smile and much gentle maneuvering, Johnny managed to slide out of the bed. He tucked his pillow into Ten's arms, waited a few minutes to make sure that the sleeping man was still asleep, and then went to answer the phone.

"Irene, don't say a word. I'll be into the office in a bit," he said into the phone, voice cold and biting. There was silence on the other end of the line, and he would have thought that no one was there if he hadn't known his assistant so well. "I need you to make a couple of arrangements, and make them quickly. Got it?" he added the last to make sure that Irene hadn't done something stupid, like fainted or hung up.

"Yes, sir!" his assistant answered quickly. "Before I make those arrangements though, sir, would you like me to kiss your ass?" she continued, her tone imitating his.

Johnny grinned. "No, thank you. I do need breakfast brought by the apartment, though. For one. I won't be here, but the delivery boy can knock. I'll let the guard downstairs know."

There was another pause on the other side, and he waited, smiling knowingly. However, true to form, Irene didn't question it. "Of course. Anything specific? Or just something short and quick?"

"Take your pick. Something more than I would normally eat, I think. Which is my next request: I need someone to go grocery shopping for things that are fairly easy to make. Enough for two people per meal. I also need someone to pick up some clothes, but I want to talk to you about that situation in person."

"Done," Irene said. There was a noise in the background, and then she said seriously, "Johnny, I expect full details when you get here in an hour."

"Who said anything about an hour?" Johnny said teasingly.

"Seo , you will be here in an hour, or I will personally be dragging you, and whoever you're with, out of bed."

"Gods, Irene, what side of the bed did you get out of today?" Johnny asked.

There was a snort from her end. "At least I got out of bed," she replied, sounding amused. "I'm sending the car for you now, so you have about twenty minutes. In one hour, you have a meeting with the board, and after that, you have lunch with the broker who's helping you buy up all that stock you wanted. Wear the gray suit with the blue tie, and don't forget to bring your wallet. I'm not buying another lunch for you."

"Yes, ma'am," Johnny said. "I love you, Irene. You're wonderful, you know that?"

The pause that time was longer. "Johnny, I don't know what the hell you're up to today. Just be ready in fifteen and we'll figure it out when you get here. Fifteen minutes."

"Got it," he said. He hung up the phone and went to get ready for work.

^*^*^*^*^

Dressed and as organized as he felt like getting, Johnny took his last five minutes to wake up Ten. He didn't have the time to wake him as he had the day before, so he simply shook Ten's shoulder, waited for brown eyes to blink open, and kissed the younger man soundly on the lips.

He pulled back, and brushed Ten's hair out of his eyes. "I have to go to work. It's almost ten thirty. I don't know what time you have class, but if you're late or you don't really want to go, go ahead and wait around here. Breakfast should be arriving in the next half hour, or so." He leaned in and kissed Ten's cheek. "I won't be back until this evening, but I'll bring dinner."

"Mm? 'Kay," Ten muttered sleepily. He raised himself up enough to press a kiss against Johnny's cheek in return. "I'll see you tonight." With that, he sank back onto the bed, curled himself around Johnny's pillow, and went back to sleep.

Johnny smiled bemusedly. A glance at his watch showed that his time was dwindling, so he took one last glance at Ten and left, tucking his briefcase under his arm and making sure that his keys were in his pocket as he walked to the door.

^*^*^*^*^

"Damn it, Johnny, you've only been in the office for ninety seconds. If you don't focus on me in the next thirty, I'm throwing you out the window, kidnapping the woman at your apartment, and taking over the world with my ballpoint pen," Irene said threateningly. She'd been standing in front of Johnny for at least three minutes, and the man continued to stare off into space.

Hazel eyes blinked back in her direction, scanning her face and eyes with a piercing look that was at odds with his inattention. "I'm perfectly fine, Irene. Stop nagging like a mother hen and update me on the Leechaiyapornkul report."

Irene smiled, taking a step back and going into full-business mode. Within fifteen minutes, they'd hashed out the last details, created a course of action for the next three days, and had managed to arrange everything so that, much to Johnny's delight, he had most of the following day off.

"And it's not for you to be gallivanting around with your latest conquest-" Irene stopped suddenly in mid-lecture, her eyes narrowing as she recalled something. "-In- your apartment?"
"Yup," he confirmed with a nod.

"Breakfast? And clothes?"

"Yes, and yes again." His grin was turning into a smirk as her whole expression changed to one of utter shock. He had expected her to be surprised, and he wasn't disappointed. What he wasn't expecting was for her to haul off and hit him on the side of his head with the manila folders she was holding in her hands.

"Damn it all, Johnny. This is not the time to be letting your hormones get the best of you. We have three days before the deal with Leechaiyapornkul Corp. goes down, and we need you in top form on Thursday to deal with the elder Leechaiyapornkul so that all of our hard work is something more than a waste of time. Please tell me that it's some high-society, high-profile drama queen who's got enough social standing to be useful to us?"

"Relax, Irene. He's not a conquest, and he won't impede the negotiations. Everything is on schedule, and even ahead of it at the moment. I have everything under control. You must really be under a lot of stress if it took you all this time to make that connection, by the way."

Her eyes narrowed, and her normally beautiful face twisted into a scowl. "Seo , you will listen to me, and you will listen well. You say that you have everything under control, but you just drank a cup of my green tea without realizing that it wasn't your coffee, and you just referred to your latest bedmate as not only a 'non-conquest' but as a 'he'. Please tell me when I'm allowed to panic, if the time is not now. You have -rules-, Johnny. You're an established playboy with a past, and you just ignored the woman whom you assured me last Friday would be putty in your hands inside a week."

Johnny looked at her for a moment, looked backwards at the woman in question (who happened to be glaring at him rather bitchily from outside his office), down at the cup of light brown tea (complete with floating leaves) in his hand, and then back at his assistant. Her expression had softened now, and she was looking at him with a great deal of concern.

"You accused me of being slow, Seo, but I know better than to start with the questions before business is out of the way. You might still be able to function on a working level, but I have to wonder if you'll be able to enact your grand scheme on Thursday. It calls for a lot more than the higher functioning of your mind. We need your suavity, your charm, and your ability to let the punches fly with no regard to the repercussions. We need Johnny Seo in top form, and at the moment, that is something we don't have."

He gazed at her a moment longer and then straightened his shoulders. "Miss Bae, please follow me into my office. There is something I must discuss with you," he said, loudly and clearly.

She sighed. "Johnny, we are in your office. Why don't I shut the door, instead?" She followed action to words and shut the door, then turned back to face Johnny. "What is going on? Did this guy drug you, or something? Has he brainwashed you since Friday? A lot's hanging in the balance, and I can't even get you to focus on your surroundings. Talk to me. And if you tell me that it breaks one of your damn rules, I will gut you with my bare hands."

Johnny sighed and sat down. "I only met him on Saturday. I found him on the balcony next to mine."

"And you invited him in for coffee and crumpets?" she asked skeptically.

"No. I offered to let him in through my balcony after he yelled, rather loudly, about the questionable parentage of the people next door. Something about drugs and prostitution? Once he was in my apartment though..." He trailed off with a shrug, looking more like a confused little boy than the hard business man that he was.

"And what? What's so special about this guy that he's been camping out with you for two nights and has enough of a hold on your balls and guts to mess with your mind? Is he that good-looking? Is he really so great in bed? What has managed to capture Johnny Seo so completely?"

"Ten Leechaiyapornkul," he said, uttering the words fatalistically.

"The youngest Leechaiyapornkul boy? What does he have to do with anything?" she asked, her tone indicating that she already had a good idea what Johnny was going to say. There was a sense of dread bearing down on her as she waited for him to explain.

"He's in my apartment, -was- sleeping in my bed and may still be. I made him breakfast, Irene. I changed his tire and I kicked Jay out of my apartment because if I hadn't, I might have beaten the shit out of him for being a total prick to his cousin."

"You threw our contact out of your apartment? Are you nuts? What if he warned his uncle?"

"He won't," Johnny assured her before she could get herself too worked up. "He knows that his best prospects are in helping me gain control of his uncle's company."

"Why would you risk it, though? What is so important about the Leechaiyapornkul runt?" He narrowed his eyes at her, and she held up a hand defensively. "I'm sorry. Obviously, he isn't as much of a runt as we'd been lead to think. Is he helping us, then?"

"He hasn't a clue that I'm about to bring down his father's empire in the next three days. As far as he's concerned, he's someplace where he's wanted for the first time in his life. He's away from his cousins, safe from his father, and hopefully, lounging in my bed wearing nothing but the sheets."

Irene gazed at him, watching the wistful curve of his lips. "You've known him longer than since just Saturday, haven't you?"

He returned her gaze with a sad smile. "Remember three years ago, when I had that gala in Bangkok? Mr.Leechaiyapornkul and his whole clan was there. Ten stuck next to the wall. I ran into him in the hallway, but he never even raised his head to look at me. He reminded me of a kicked puppy, too scared to even try for his father's affection any longer. The old man never even bothered to introduce me to him."

His tone, sad and wistful, made her smile. "Johnny, you're more likely to be kicking puppies yourself than to be saving them. That still doesn't answer why you've taken such a shine to the boy."

"True enough. There really isn't an answer to that, either. I sat across from him at dinner and he wouldn't look at me. His other cousin, not Jay, the other one, was seated next to him, and every time he decided that Ten was eating too quickly, he would reach down and pinch his arm. And Ten sat there and accepted it. Later that night, he had managed to sneak out, and I left the ballroom to find him, but I was too late. His father had him down by their limo and was berating him for being so unsocial."

"Okay, so he's the original kicked puppy, and you felt sorry for him. Is that why we've gone after Leechaiyapornkul so hard the last two years? You waited a while to start moving, if that's the case."

"It wasn't just that. Six months later, I was invited to a brunch at the Leechaiyapornkul estate, part of the privilege of being myself and of being friends with Jay. It was all very civilized, and it came complete with the daughters being thrown at me and a game of tennis. Ten wasn't there at lunch, which was probably better for him. Afterwards, his father and his oldest two cousins invited me into the study for cigars and a 'chat'. On the way, we crossed paths with Ten."

He paused and smiled at some memory, and Irene had to tap his shin with her toe to get him to continue.

"Anyway. His father had already gone ahead, and it was only the cousins and I at that time. Ten was soaking wet from head to toe, and of course Hyun, that's the other cousin, decided that I was close enough to the family by that time that he could go ahead and lash out. He's too much like his uncle, in that regard. Jay, at least, shows some control and keeps it verbal. Not that that's really better, but-Hyun grabbed him by the arm and started laying into him about how they have a guest and how angry his father was that Ten wasn't there at lunchtime.

"Ten yanked his arm away and got this very hard look on his face. Hyun and Jay were both surprised. And then he stood up, very tall, and gave them each this imperious look, something which I imagine he learned from them, and informed them that they could go to hell, and they could take his father with them. He was so very regal in that moment, so strong. I felt very proud, for some reason.

"And then, in the next moment, Hyun backhanded him. Sent him sprawling to the floor with a bloody lip. His father returned at that point and told Ten to go to his room, and then the other three carried on as if nothing had happened."

Irene nodded sadly. "He's Cinderella in the flesh, huh? So, here comes Johnny, the playboy, in all of his tarnished armor to save the day."

He laughed mirthlessly. "I had this idea that if I could get his father out of power, I could take him away and keep him safe forever. I did my research the first couple of months; kept it quiet while we finished up the Delaney project. I finally figured out the quickest way to go about it, and started Operation Leechaiyapornkul two years ago."

"Operation Leechaiyapornkul, which has as much to do with wooing the youngest prince as it does stealing the kingdom from the father. I must admit, Johnny, that I'm surprised. I've worked with you for six years, and I have never, until this moment, seen you do anything for altruistic motives. I thought you just wanted the company to increase your own holdings."

"To paraphrase you, my dear Irene, it has less to do with my gain than it does with Leechaiyapornkul's loss. I'm going to rip everything right out from under him, and at the top of my empire I'm going to place his mistreated son."

"You're a fool, Johnny" Irene said suddenly cold. He looked at her in surprise. "You've gone about this whole thing the wrong way, and you're going to end up making things worse before they're better. You love this young man? You want to keep him and be with him? If so, then you owe him honesty, and you owe it to him now. Otherwise, when he finds out, he's going to look on these past few days as nothing more than a sham. And in a worst-case scenario, he'll mark himself off as your latest conquest and disappear."

"It won't happen. He knows I love him. I'll tell him everything before he gets hurt, and he can stand beside me while I combine my business with his father's. Happy ending, complete with a romantic ride in my limo into the sunset."

"If you hurt this man, Johnny, I will be coming after you myself. You give me this horrible story of how he's treated, and then you sit here and tell me that he's very happy sitting in the dark while you destroy his father's dream. You say he has no idea about any of this, right? So it's safe to assume that he doesn't know that you've been after him for a while, right? How is he going to feel, knowing that you've played him into your hands, just like you've played everyone else?"

"I haven't played him!" Johnny said defensively. "I took the opportunity that was presented to me. I found the love of my life, the first person that I've ever cared about more than myself, on a balcony, Irene. I took him in, gave him everything I could think of-"

"Except the truth," she interrupted, cutting him off. "And in the end, what do you think is more important to him?"

"You don't understand."

"You're right, I don't. I only hope that you get your head out of your ass in the next three days, or you'll ruin everything with your obsession. I'm trusting you, Johnny. I'm giving you my faith, which is something I don't put into anyone's hands, and I'm telling you now that if anything goes wrong because you're a stubborn asshole, that I will come after you with a personal vendetta."

"Understood, Irene," he said softly, not looking at her. "And for now, Irene, you're excused. I want the brokers on the phone now. Let's close up the last of the details. And call Jay. Get him down here so that I know where he is and what he's doing."

"Yes, sir, Mr. Seo. And the board?"

"You deal with them. You have my full authority. If you've placed your faith in me, then I'll return the favor. I need you with me on this. I'll take full blame if it all goes to hell, but you're damn well going to work for half the credit when everything goes smoothly."

"I wouldn't expect anything less, Johnny." She smiled slightly and left, her back straight and her head held high in the image of professionalism.

Notes