“DAMNIT! WHERE THE HELL IS RUSSELL?!” Julian placed his hands on his desk as he stood and screamed at the top of his lungs.

He got up and walked over to the door furious. Julian swung it open. His secretary was trembling at her desk. She heard him from outside his office, and knew he wasn’t too happy, and when Julian Crane wasn’t too happy; everyone at Crane Industries wasn’t going to be “too happy”.

“Where the hell is that damn incompetent bozo?!” he began walking towards Tc’s office, when he met eyes with Dr. Eve Russell, Tc’s wife.

“What did you call him?” she glared at Julian.

Eve had never liked Julian Crane. And she always begged Tc to quit and get another job. Julian was always so demanding and hard on his employees, especially Tc.

Julian thought otherwise. The reason he was so hard on Tc was because Tc had been with CI for over ten years, and would still manage to screw up every account. Tc was also a lazy a**. One would practically have to light a fire underneath him to ever get him to do anything. Julian didn’t know why he just didn’t fire the man.

“I believe you heard me,” he looked her up and down, “I’m sorry for you, but your husband is worthless to Crane Industries!”

By this time, Ann, Julian’s secretary took off to run an errand on the other floor. She did not want to be anywhere near Julian once he got a hold of Tc Russell.

“You are the one that is worthless here! Tc tells me that he’s the one that keeps this company up and running…”

Julian began laughing uncontrollably. Eve just stared at him, wondering what he was laughing at. She hadn’t said anything funny; she was just speaking the truth.

“Is that so, dear?” Julian asked as he began walking towards Eve.

Her pompous expression soon changed into one of uncertainty.

“I’ll keep you ‘up and running’,” he grinned devilishly at her as his finger ran along the collar of her blouse down the middle where it revealed her cleavage.

She gasped and swatted his hand away, but Julian raised his hand again and followed the same route with his finger.

“How about it?” his index finger lingered in the valley of her breasts.

Julian then retrieved his hand and threw his head back and laughed as he walked away from Eve.

“Time to talk to Tc…to little single-digit I.Q. Tc,” he cackled.

Eve fumed! How dare Julian talk about Tc like that?! But was that the real reason why Eve was hot and angry? Was it because Julian had brought it out in her in just his mere touch? She had never known a man to be so arrogant and rude and vulgar.

That day, Tc Russell packed up his things and left Crane Industries for good. The minute Julian Crane had walked in, he terminated Tc.
---

It had been two weeks and Tc still hadn’t found another job. He spent most of his days lying around the house or he was off to the country club playing tennis.

Eve had just left the hospital and was now going to shop for groceries. Ever since Tc had been home, he ate everything that was in the house, and she had to make frequent trips to the store.

Eve was trying to reach for a cake mix that was on the top shelf, but was way in the back. She then decided to step on the bottom shelf to give her more of an advantage, but still, she could not reach it; so then Eve decided to step on the next one, but failed to see that it had been uneven, and so when she stepped on it, the shelf wobbled causing Eve to fall backwards into the arms of Julian Crane. One hand went to her lower back for support while the other rested just below her breasts.

“Get your hands off of me,” she wiggled, trying to get out of his arms.

“Are you okay?” his hand slid up, due to her movements.

She felt his thumb on the curve of her breast.

“I said get your hands off of me,” she punched him in the chest and left in the opposite direction with her shopping cart.

Julian rolled his eyes and went on with his shopping.

“Let’s see, what did Ivy want? Oh yes, ice cream,” he spoke aloud as he turned the corner and began walking down the freezer aisle.

And in the opposite direction came Eve. She didn’t see him, and he didn’t see her, well, not at first.

Julian walked past her and cleared his throat. She looked up and sighed.

Why was this man everywhere she went?

“It’s a bit nippy, wouldn’t you say,” he smiled as his eyes traveled down her face and to her chest.

Her mouth opened wide and she let out a huff as she gave him a disgusted look and decided to just go ahead and check out; anything to get away from Julian. Julian laughed. He didn’t know why, but giving Dr. Russell a hard time made him laugh. He just got a kick out of the facial expressions she’d put on.

Eve proceeded to lane number thirteen and began unloading her groceries onto the moving belt. The cashier greeted her and Eve began reading a magazine as she waited for the items to be totaled.

Julian saw Eve from afar, and decided to get in line behind her. She never noticed, since she was so caught up in the article she was reading.

“Ma’am, I’m afraid your debit card was declined,” the cashier said.

“Declined?” Eve said embarrassed.

“I’m afraid it was,” the cashier spoke and then got closer to Eve, “It appears that it’s insufficient funds.”

“But I just deposited money into my account just yesterday!” Eve began to get irate with the cashier as if it were her fault.

“Ma’am, I have no control over that…maybe you should call your bank?”

“I have money in there, I know I have money in there,” Eve continued as she began looking through her purse for a credit card, but she couldn’t find them.

“Miss, just ring us up together; I’ll pay for it,” Julian swiped his credit card through the machine.

“NO!” Eve argued.

“Don’t listen to her, she doesn’t know what’s happening,” Julian smiled and winked at the young girl.

She laughed a bit and then gave Eve a look of question. Eve shook her head.

“Ring us up together, or I’ll just tell the manager how poor the service is at this register,” he said nicely.

Just the idea of getting into trouble made Samantha start scanning Julian’s items.

Eve became enraged!

“I am not paying for those!”

“I know that, darling, I am,” he smiled.

“Well, then you keep them!” she yelled and left the store.

Samantha stopped scanning and looked to Julian.

“What do I do?”

“Keep going, I’ll have her groceries delivered to her house, dear.”

Julian had the groceries loaded up and made sure that his were separate from Eve’s. Julian pulled into Eve’s driveway, but no one was home. Great! Now how was he going to leave the groceries with her? He decided to knock next door and see if their neighbor had an extra key for emergencies, and when it appeared that they did, Julian coaxed the woman to allow him to use it so he could place the items inside of Eve’s home.

Julian finished, ran next door to give back the key, and then left for home. Twenty minutes later Eve arrived home and found brown paper sacks on her kitchen table and counters. She closed her eyes slowly and shook her head.

“Damn him!” she hissed.

Eve then unlocked the back door carried each bag out to her car. After the last bag was loaded up, she shut the door and then got into the driver’s seat. Her destination was the Crane Estates. As she drove, her thoughts strayed from her uncouth thoughts of Julian to Tc. Where the hell was Tc today?

Eve finally arrived at the Mansion, but since she was unable to get passed the gate to get inside, she parked her car just outside the gate and then got off. She walked to the back door, opened it up, and grabbed her bags. Eve then walked to the gate and tossed each bag that was delivered to her house over onto Crane property.

“THESE,” she tossed one bag, “AREN’T,” she tossed another, “MINE!” She smiled after the last one and then left.
---

There was a buzz from the guard quarters outside to inside the Crane Mansion.

“Uh, Mr. Crane?”

“Yes, Jeffrey, what is it now?” Julian yawned.

“I don’t know how it happened, but there are grocery bags everywhere in the yard.”

“What?” Julian looked confused.

“Just what I said, sir. Maybe you should come out here and take a look…”

Julian was out the front door before Jeffrey could finish, when he saw all the brown bags on the grass. He walked over to them and wondered where they came from. Julian then picked one up and looked at the contents inside. He shook his head and laughed. These were Eve’s groceries.

“Damn, ungrateful, b*tch,” he smiled, “Jeffrey get over here and clean this mess up!” Julian yelled as he walked back into the mansion.
---*~*1