by Katie Dowe
He put her away from him forcibly. He wanted to take her right there! Christ! What was going on with him? “Are you busy later?” he asked her hoarsely, rubbing his fingers over his face.
Chapter 8
“Darling, you did not come for Christmas and I understood that you had to spend time with that gorgeous man you are in love with, but I am insisting on you coming by this weekend.” Leesa said firmly. “It is just family this time, so there will not be a crowd. My husband is threatening to leave me if I do not cut back on these parties.”
“As if that would ever happen.” Gina said with an indelicate snort.
“I know,” she said with her usual tinkling laugh. “The children are asking for their ‘Aunt Gina’ as well. You made quite an impression.”
“They made an impression on me as well. Okay Leesa, you twisted my arm.”
“How is it with Paul?”
“We are actually making progress. He came to the center last Tuesday and asked to come over,” she still shuddered to think of the way he had hauled her into his arms and kissed her. She had quickly gone home that evening and grabbed some clothes telling her dad where she was going and drove straight there. He had been waiting for her and he had pulled her into his arms and they had made love right there in the living room. She had been going over by him almost every day. “I am practically living with the guy and yet he does not open up with me.” She sighed.
“Start the conversation.” Leesa suggested.
“I am afraid of hearing what I don’t want to hear.”
“Darling, the only way you are going to dispense with the uncertainties is if you ask him outright.”
“I guess you are right.” Gina said. “I am seeing him tomorrow and I am going to insist that we go out in town. It’s Friday and I want to go out to dinner.”
“Good for you.” Leesa said approvingly. “Come on over Saturday morning and we will have breakfast waiting.”
*******
Paul inspected the image on his computer for a minute and then reached for the phone on his desk. “We are supposed to have the offices ready for the third week in January. What’s the hold up?” he asked impatiently.
He listened for a moment and then hung up the phone. He placed another call and spoke to the team who was doing the remodeling of the high-rise building. He had scrapped the entire plaza where the rec center was and had found one a few blocks away from it, the building abandoned and partially gutted out. He had negotiated with the owners and had gotten for a very good price because of their haste to get rid of it. Work had started immediately but had slowed down because the contractors had taken a break for the holiday. He let them know that he expected them to be working overtime on the project from now on until it was finished. The sleepy little town of Bells River was starting to show some signs of being inhabited and showing signs that it was also productive.
He had a meeting with the CFO in twenty minutes but he needed to hear her voice. “I was just thinking about you,” her voice had the ability to make him hard and he had stopped wondering about that.
“What are you doing?” he asked like a foolish school boy with his first crush.
“Just leaving the home. I was thinking that we should go out to a very nice restaurant later and have dinner.” She waited to hear what he would say.
“We could order in.”
“No. If we are not going out, Paul, then I am not coming over. When are you going to come out of the closet with our relationship?”
“We are not in a relationship,” the words lipped out of his mouth before he realized it.
“Damn you, Paul!” she cried and hung up on him.
He closed his eyes for a moment and dialed back her number but she did not answer. He called several times and it went straight to voicemail. He sat behind his desk and buried his face in his hands. He had hurt her and had not meant to do so!
“Paul, they are waiting for you,” his secretary’s coolly professional voice came over intercom.
“I will be there in a minute.”
*****
“What’s wrong?” Milton asked her as soon as she came over that evening.
“Stop doing that,” she told him grimly as she took her coat. She had intended to swing by Milton and do the books, then head over to his apartment but now she was not going anywhere.
“Doing what?” he asked her mildly as he wheeled the chair and followed her into his office. She had not been coming over as often as she had in the past and he was suspecting that she was seeing someone.
“Try to think that you know me more than you think you do.” She dragged the laptop over to where she sat and booted it up.
“You are not yourself and I am your friend. I have a right to know.” He went around to his desk and sat facing her.
She looked over at him. “I am not in a good mood and I just need to get this out of the way.”
“He is not working out?” he asked her lightly.
She looked at him sharply. “I have no idea what you are talking about.”
“I thought we were friends.”
“We are and I am telling you as a friend that it is none of your business.”
He was silent for a little bit and waited until she was deep into the figures she was calculating. “Who is he Gina?”
She looked up at him. “He is someone I have been seeing, but I don’t know where it’s going.”
He felt his heart shifted and break a little bit. He had seen the changes on her face and the way she was always in a hurry to leave and knew that something was happening. “Anyone I know?”
“Paul Brady.”
Milton felt the anger and despair flooding him so much that he could hardly breathe.
She looked up at him and caught the agonized expression he was trying so valiantly to hide. “You knew there was never anything between us but friendship Milton,” she said softly.
“He is going to break your heart,” he said hoarsely just wanting to be alone.
“Or we are going to get married and live happily ever after,” she said with a grim look on her face.
“I am here and have always been here for you and never noticed me,” he whispered. “I would have loved you–”
“Stop!” she jumped up from her seat. “If you say it you are going to ruin a friendship that I have always considered to be beautiful.” She moved agitatedly away to the window to look outside at the piles of snow on the ground. A few months ago, her life was uncomplicated and fulfilling, but now she was caught between two men she cared about. One that she had come to love with her entire being and one she cared about so much that she did not want to lose. “I love you, Milton, but I am not in love with you.” Her expression softened as she looked at him sitting there. “You are a wonderful man and your friendship means the world to me, but if you continue to think of me of more than just a friend I will have to stop coming by.”
“And I would not want that.” He clenched his fists on his useless legs. “It’s times like these that the accident had killed me, too.”
“Please, don’t say that,” she walked over to him and knelt before him. “You know I don’t tolerate self-pity and I will not allow you to wallow in it. I am not going to desert you no matter who I am seeing, but I cannot be in love with you.”
He lifted a hand and touched her thick curls. “You are a beautiful and a wonderful woman who deserves the best. I hope you find it.”
She took his hand and laid it against her cheek. “Let’s get back to work.”
******
“I am driving down tonight, Leesa, I hope you don’t mind.”
“Okay darling, I will send someone to meet you out front. The snow is thick on the grounds because it has been falling pretty heavily since this morning.”
“I will drive slowly, don’t worry.”
She had not taken the calls from Paul and had decided to just get away from it all. If she stayed at home, she was probably going to cave and go over to his apartmen
t or spend the time moping around the house. She had left Milton’s place after she had finished with a heavy heart, knowing that things would never be the same with them again. She needed a girlfriend’s ears and had decided that the best one was Leesa. So she had packed her bag and told her father where she was going and headed out.
Leesa’s place was a good several miles away but she relished the drive, taking the scenic route and admiring the lights that were still on several houses. The snow was piled up onto the sidewalks and glistened white in the lights coming from the street lamps. She made the turn off to the private road that would take her up to the mansion that belonged to the Wellington’s and smiled as she saw that they had not taken down their light either.
She saw a SUV parked out at the edge of the driveway and the person blinked their lights at her. She drove up nearer and Bradley Wellington came out and waved at her. His blonde hair glinted in the lights and he was bundled up in a thick parka coat. He nodded and went back into his vehicle guiding the way up to the house. She had admired how achingly beautiful the place was. The leaves were covered with snow, but it was the kind of white that hurts the eyes.
Her boots made crunching noises as she got out of her vehicle at the front of the house.
“How are you?” Brad asked her warmly as soon as he came up alongside her.
“I am good,” she clasped his hands briefly.
“My wife has been driving us crazy into making everything perfect because you are coming,” he said with a twinkle in his green eyes.
“I can hardly believe that,” she said with a laugh as she preceded him into the magnificent hall with the dazzling chandeliers and the curving staircase.
“Darling, finally!” Leesa practically flew down the stairs and pulled her in for a hug. “You must be hungry. The children are up in their rooms waiting to see you before they get ready for bed.” She looked over to her husband. “Shoo darling and leave us girls alone.” She left Gina for a moment and went to kiss her husband full on the lips.
“See you in the morning, Gina,” Brad said with a wave as he bounded upstairs. Leesa stood there watching him run up the stairs and sighed.
“That man has the power to turn me into liquid.”
“That’s wonderful considering that you guys have been married for some years and with children.” Gina told her with a laugh.
“I agree,” Leesa linked her arm with hers. “Okay, we have the kitchen to ourselves because Marjorie retired early as well as the rest of the staff. “We have chunks of roast beef and different types of salad and also fried chicken.” She looked at Gina’s slim curves quizzically. “You are going to be slim until you are old and grey, so let’s eat.”
They ate and drank Cabernet until late in the night before they went up to see the children who were still awake and waiting for them. Afterwards, they went into the rose and peach bedroom she had stayed in that time she had been there and Leesa sat on the side of the bed while she went to bathroom to freshen up and put her nightgown on.
“Okay darling, my Brad will be waiting up for me because for some reason the man cannot sleep if I am not in his arms,” she said rolling her dark brown eyes. “We will talk in the morning.” She hesitated at the doorway. “Thank you for coming into my life.”
“I feel the same way,” Gina told her softly.
With a wave, she left and closed the door behind her. Gina reached for her phone and turned it back on and then with a slight hesitation she called him.
“Where are you?” his voice was hoarse.
“I am at Leesa’s for the weekend. We are not in a relationship, remember?”
“Stop it, Gina.” He bit out. “I called you so many times and I even went around to your place and your dad told me that you were not there. You are driving me crazy!”
“Can you just imagine what you are doing to me?” she felt her heart pounding at his words.
“I need to see you.” He told her.
“What do you want from me Paul?”
“What do I want–” he swore beneath his breath. “I cannot sleep without–” he stopped again. “I need to see you.”
“I won’t be back until Monday.”
“No!” the word tore from him. “Please.”
“I promised Leesa that I would stay the entire weekend,” she said, her body weakening.
“I am driving up in the morning.” He told her.
“Paul–”
“Don’t ask me anything, Gina, please. I am trying to work things out in my head and somehow it does not make sense to me. Please just - I just want to see you.”
“I will tell Leesa.”
“I miss you,” he said raggedly.
“I miss you, too, you thick-headed moron.” She scolded him.
He laughed in spite of the situation. “Go to sleep.”
“As I can now.”
“I won’t be able to either.”
******
“Darling, of course I don’t mind,” Leesa told her quickly as she related the fact that Paul was coming by. They were sitting in the living room drinking hot chocolate and watching the children and their dad build a gigantic snowman. They had eaten breakfast at nine and then sit around the blazing fire in the living room before the kids had decided that they wanted another snowman. Gina told her that they had fought about going out in public and she also told her about Milton.
“What are you going to do about Milton?”
Gina shrugged and wrapped her hands around the cup. “He has been my friend since I came back and I am kind of the closest person he has.”
“That’s not fair to you, darling. You have a life separate from him and he needs to realize that.”
“I think he is beginning to,” Gina sipped her coffee. “I want it all.” She said suddenly. “Marriage and kids and a home with him. I want to make a life with him and I am selfish enough to want all of him.”
“That’s not being selfish,” Leesa touched her hand briefly. “That’s being human. Force him to open up to you. Men like my husband and Paul are so used to having things their way that it has become a part of them. Talk to him.”
******
He arrived shortly after eleven, the wheels of his Range Rover crunching on the snow. He spoke briefly to Brad who met him outside and walked in with him. Leesa gave him a hug, and without waiting she directed them to a sitting room to the east of the building with brightly colored rugs and love seats all around the room. She instructed a maid to bring a tray filled with tiny sandwiches and slices of cakes and a pot of coffee. He waited impatiently for the maid to leave before pulling her onto his lap and taking her lips with his hungrily. Gina clung to his knitted sweater and returned the kiss with an ardor that left them shaken and insanely aroused. He pulled the sweater up over her head and cupped her small breasts. “Paul, the maids–”
“I don’t care,” he bent his head and took a nipple inside his mouth. Gina moaned arching her back as he pulled the nipple inside his mouth. She had on a loose skirt and he
pushed it up feeling for her warm skin. He moved the sides of the panties and thrust two fingers inside her. Gina erupted! Writhing her body, she moved against his fingers, her body spinning! She came with a sob escaping her and buried her head in his chest. He removed his fingers and held her close to him, his body restless and aching with a desperate need.
He lifted her head and stared down at her, his grey eyes stormy. “I want to sink my dick inside you but I am afraid that I won’t be able to stop.” He felt liberated saying something like that to her when he had never been able to say it to Linda!
“We have all night.” She whispered, combing her fingers through his hair. “You are staying, right?”
“I am not leaving without you.”
“Can we talk?”
He moved beneath her restlessly. “Not while you are sitting on my lap.” He told her shakily.
“I don’t want to move.”
“What do you want to know?”
&nb
sp; “I am in love with you.” He did not stiffen this time so that was a good sign. “I know you feel something for me. Please tell me why you are afraid to admit it.”
He bent his forehead to hers and took a deep breath. “I married Linda when we were both pretty young,” he told her as he lifted his head. “She gave her all to me and I was not really there for her; I was busy making a fortune.” He looked at her and looked away. “The sex life was not good and I always felt like I was pressuring her. There was something lacking. She was not like you,” he smiled fleetingly. “You are so full of life that you tend to stand out in a crowd, but she faded in the background. I felt guilty about her being so different and I resented her a little bit for not wanting what I wanted. I have never met anyone like you and the way you make me feel–” he broke off.
“I love you and I just want to know that I have a chance of being in your life.” Gina told him softly.
“I cannot be without you,” he told her raggedly before he took her lips with his.
*****
Milton sat in his chair in his bedroom and tared moodily out on the darkened night. He had been drinking steadily for the past several hours and yet he had not passed out into drunken oblivion yet. It must be that the scotch is too watered down, he thought with a sick grin. He had lost her! He thought in despair. He had told himself that he was going to keep his feelings to himself and not let her know, but he had to open his big mouth! And now things were never going to be the same! She was in love with Brady! The very thought made him want to find the man and beat the crap out of him, but he could not even do that! Even if he were to get close to such a powerful man, he did not have the use of the lower part of his body to put up a fight. He had seen the man in the papers and on the internet and seen the look of confidence and arrogance that a whole load of money afforded. Gina had fallen for him! He felt as if his heart was breaking in small pieces as he drank the rest of the liquor and smashed the glass in the corner of the room.