“Yes, that lighthouse, Mr. White. I don’t think you own any other lighthouse, sir.”
Cocking my head to the side with my secretary’s curt remark, I choose to blow it off. The woman pacing around the reception area must be working her nerves as she’s never spoken to me like that before.
“I’m coming up but don’t tell her that,” I say as I use my key to get into my elevator. “What’s this trick’s name?”
“Elizabeth Cook.” Lane’s voice changes to a whisper. “And she is a feisty one, I can tell you that much. She has a very determined look on her face, sir.”
“Few people are as determined as I can be. Tell me, what color is her hair?”
“Blonde.”
“Light or dark?” I ask as I look up to see I’ve barely made it to the fifth floor. I’ll have to have maintenance check out this elevator, it’s going much too slow.
“A darker color, you know kind of like a golden color, skirting on the edge of brown,” she says.
“Short, long?” I ask.
“Long, past her shoulders,” she answers me.
“Pretty, ugly, fat, short, tall, tell me about her.” I watch the elevator slow to a crawl and get the feeling my ride on it will not take me all the way up.
“To be honest, I have to say she’s beautiful, sir. Pretty, dark green eyes, tall but not too tall, you know. Curvy, not rail thin. A real beautiful woman but let me tell you she has this look on her face like she means business. I don’t know exactly what it is she wants as she said she’s only going to tell you that but get ready to give it to her.”
“We both know when it comes to business, I don’t give in.” The elevator stops completely and luckily I’m on the eleventh floor and it didn’t stop in between them. “Call maintenance and have them see what the fuck is wrong with my personal elevator. It just completely crapped out on me. Now I have to come in through the front. Don’t greet me by my name when I come in. Call me by some other name and buzz me into my office. Act like I’m there with an appointment with me instead of me being me.”
I smile as I walk out of the elevator with my quick thinking. I can sidestep this broad for an eternity if I want to. Why bother with a conversation with her. I’m not about to give into whatever she’s wanting from me anyway.
Getting into another elevator, I end the call and place the cell phone into the inside pocket of my suit. It’s a new Saint Laurent virgin wool number in black and pretty expensive but she’ll never know that if she’s from Rhode Island. Two and two won’t be put together by the poor hick of a female.
A tremor of an emotion I hardly ever get runs through me as the elevator doors open when we stop on the top floor. Fear. For a second I wonder if the bloodhound, Meagan Saunders, is lurking about.
I’ve managed to evade her quite effectively since my mistake. I had to take one phone call. I told her I was sorry about everything. I never meant to use her and it would never happen again.
She replied that it would happen again and I needed to understand she’s out for more than a one-night stand. She wants me to be the father of her children, the yen to her yang, the groom to her bride.
She’s a very open book, that woman!
The amount of people on the elevator make it impossible to ease out of it and take in my surroundings for her. Meagan is thin and could be hiding behind the slimmest of furnishings.
A small tree limb moves in one of the planters near the office door. I hesitate then realize it was just the wind caused by a large man passing by it. Relief is expressed with a loud sigh and I realize my hands are balled into fists.
Shaking off my anxiety, I open the door and step inside the office. Looking back, I close the door behind me as Lane says, “Good afternoon, Mr. Dungareepore. You can go right into Mr. White’s office. He’s waiting for you.”
A smile moves over my lips with her over the top, made up last name. I give her a nod as I hear another woman say, “I thought you said he wasn’t here.” A hand touches my arm and I freeze. “Please, Mr. Dunga, Mr. Dung. Oh for Pete’s sake. What was your name again, sir? I’m so sorry, I didn’t get the whole thing when she said it.”
Without looking at her as her voice is soft, sweet, amazing, and sensual without her realizing it, I look at Lane and give her a look that says I can’t remember the entire made up, ridiculous name she came up with either.
“This is Mr. Dungareepoop. Pore.” Lane’s face turns red. “Dungareepore. And you can’t bother him, miss. He has important business to see to.” Lane gets up and comes to pry the woman’s hand off my arm.
“Please, sir, please,” she begs me as her grip tightens. “I only need a minute with him. I just have to ask. Please.”
I try not to look at the woman who’s begging me and holding my arm and sending some amazing feelings through me with her touch and the sound of her sweet voice. Something takes me over and I can’t help it. I turn to look at her.
She’s a nice height, maybe five eight or nine. The top of her head comes to my chin. Her dark green eyes look kind and are framed with not overly-mascaraed lashes. Her lips are stained pink and her bottom lip is plump. Her cheekbones are high and rose colored. Her hair hangs around her face, framing it with golden hues.
“Hey,” I say like some kind of a dork.
“Hello, sir.” She lets my arm go and steps back, making her, below the knee length, royal blue dress move like fluid around her calves. With her hand extended, she introduces herself. “I am, Elizabeth Cook. I’m from Chesapeake City, Rhode Island and I really need to talk to Mr. White. If I could borrow only a couple of minutes from your meeting I’d be so grateful, you have no idea.”
Well, shit! Now, what do I do?
Chapter 5
ELIZABETH
The man in front of me is the most handsome man I’ve ever seen in real life. He’s tall, broad in the shoulders and wearing a very nice suit that feels like it’s made out a fabric I’ve never felt before.
His eyes are a mixture of greens and browns, a hazel color I’ve never seen quite the same before. His smile is nice. Not soft, not hard, just nice, really nice.
Too bad his last name is so jacked-up!
“So what do you say, Mr. Dungapoo?” I ask.
“White,” he says.
Feeling confused by his answer, I frown as I ask, “Huh?”
The secretary who was tugging at me stops and walks back to her seat behind the large reception desk. “I knew it,” she mumbles.
The hot man takes the hand I was holding out to shake his and turns it over. As he brings it to his lips which are the nicest color of caramel, I watch them touch the top of my hand and my knees go very weak.
His other hand moves through his dark hair that’s just long enough to lose your fingers in when they go through it. It looks soft as silk and I bet it smells great too.
“I was trying to avoid you, Miss Cook. I am Zane White. The man you’ve been looking for.” His voice is deep and flows like satin when he speaks.
“The man I’ve been looking for,” I repeat.
And maybe he is that man!
With my weak knees, my right ankle twists a bit and the high heel makes me kind of fall a little. His strong arm is right there to stop me. “Oops!” he says with a laugh. His arm goes around my waist to hold me up and he looks over his shoulder at the secretary. “Hold my calls will you, Lane?”
“Of course, sir,” she says as she pulls her glasses down and looks at him over them and shakes her head.
He smells so expensive he should charge women to breathe in his scent. I can’t even explain the smell as it has to be things I’ve never even heard of before. The best way to describe it is, money. Tons and tons of it. Because that’s what it would take to get this perfect mixture of sin, pleasure, and fantasy rolled into one smell.
The sound of a beep makes me look up as I’ve been watching my feet. They feel as if I’m floating but I am taking a step at a time. My black, heel covered feet walk next to his black, f
ancy shoe covered feet. Just walking next to him like this makes me feel poor as a church mouse. His attire alone probably costs more than the car I drive.
Opening the door to his office, his hand moves to the small of my back. “I’m so sorry about how this all started. I’ve had some issues lately. Please accept my apology, Miss Cook.”
His hand stays on me as we glide over the black carpeting. His office is a mixture of blacks, deep browns with some reds here and there. Masculine to the max.
“With the company name of Sandstone, I thought your office might be more of a neutral color. How wrong I was,” I say as he keeps his hand on my back all the way until I sit in the soft leather, black chair with tons of cushion in the back and the seat.
“I like dark colors. Sandstone came from the stone I chiseled for my father’s marker.” He moves around me to lean on the front of his large, dark wood desk that has not one thing on top of it.
“Marker?” I ask as I have no idea what the hell he’s talking about.
“He died when I was nineteen. He had cancer.” His eyes stay on mine and show no sign of pain in them at all which is amazing to me as he talks about his dead daddy.
“I’m so sorry,” I say. “I certainly didn’t mean to bring up anything so hurtful.”
He shakes his head a little and unbuttons the two buttons on his black suit jacket then leans back, using his hands to hold himself up. I can see the muscles of a six or eight pack of abs bulging under the white button down shirt. My mouth waters and so do other parts of my female anatomy.
“That was a very long time ago. No reason to be sorry.” He repositions himself to stretch out his long as hell legs that swell as his upper thighs give the fabric of the pants a workout.
I swallow hard as I watch them ripple a little. “You work out?”
His smile beams radiantly. “Yes. Do you?”
I shake my head. “No, sir. I mean, I walk a lot. All the time, actually. But I detest exercise. It’s boring to me. You know, too repetitious. I prefer walking and taking in the sights, over going to gyms.”
“Rhode Island offers you a lot of outdoor time, doesn’t it? You look fresh. Sun-kissed,” he says as his eyes roam over me.
I feel very odd with his gaze and try to recall why the hell I’m here. Here with this gorgeous man who’s looking at me with such an expression I can’t recall any other man ever looking at me with.
“The lighthouse on the property you purchased. It’s special to me,” I blurt out like a person with no social skills what so ever. I might as well be Frankenstein with all the diplomacy I used to say those words.
“How so?” he asks as his arms cross over that wide chest of his. It makes his biceps knot and the heat that’s been building inside of me goes two degrees higher. Five more and I most likely will spontaneously combust!
“My grandfather took me there when I was a kid. I watched a thunderstorm once from it.” I stop myself as my words are coming out all choppy and I just can’t think straight with the way he’s looking at me and smelling so great and looking so damn fine it ought to be illegal. “How’d you get so fucking rich?”
Oh shit!
The way he moves is like a cat. He leans forward and when his hand touches my chin, I shiver. “I work very hard, Miss Cook.”
Hard, now that’s a word I would definitely use to describe this man. I bet he does everything very hard. And now I’m sweating. Three, two, one. Am I on fire yet?
“I’m sure you do. So do I, Mr. White. You see, my grandfather and I have spent years trying to get that lighthouse under the protection of the historical society of our town. But we’ve never been able to. And that was okay, until you bought the property and now it’s just not okay to get rid of the memories my grandfather created for me there.”
His fingers leave my chin and I swear it burns! He moves back then his back turns to me as he gets up and goes to sit in his massive, black leather chair with a very tall back. He sits and laces his long, thick as shit, fingers together as he looks at me with those brown, green eyes which have gone dark. “You do understand the nature of business, don’t you, Miss Cook?”
“I do,” I say as I fidget in my seat. “But you understand the nature of memories and love, don’t you, Mr. White?”
He turns his head to the left and mumbles, “The nature of love isn’t a thing I know much about. My father was my only family and he left this world what seems like a lifetime ago, leaving me alone.” His eyes are dark as night as he looks back at me. “All I know is the nature of business. And business dictates that lighthouse has to go. One way or another, it has to go, Miss Cook.”
Well, what the fuck do I do now?
Chapter 6
ZANE
Her mouth hangs the slightest bit ajar as she looks at me then past me then back at me again. Now there’s a glimmer in her green eyes and she narrows them a little as she says, “Would you sell the lighthouse to the city or better yet, donate it? I mean, if you’d pay to have it demolished then why not give it away?”
“Why would the city want it?” I ask as I lean back in my chair and watch her fidget in hers. She’s completely adorable as she’s trying to look all business-like but she doesn’t realize the sun shining through the window behind me is making golden strands of her long hair glisten. It’s mesmerizing.
“Because it’s a lighthouse,” her eyes roll to the right. “Who wouldn’t want it?”
“Do you have any idea how much it costs to move buildings, Miss Cook?” I ask and find myself straining to see more of her legs as she crosses them, making her dress hitch up a bit more.
Her calves are just the right amount of slender and plump. Her skin is a creamy color, like a very light latte. I wonder how she tastes.
“You have lots of money, Mr. White.” She licks her lips for some reason and my eyes dart to her mouth to see her little red tongue move over those luscious pink lips. “It should be no problem for you to have it moved. It would give you a leg up in the community and help you sell those condos you’re going to build.”
“I don’t need a leg up or any kind of help selling those condos. The fact is I have a handful of them that will be filled immediately after they’re finished. So I’m not into this idea of me having the expense of moving this old, dilapidated lighthouse.” Leaning forward, I lean my arm on the desk. “Have you spoken to the city about this thing you’re asking of me, Miss Cook?”
She shakes her head. I watch a lock of her golden hair flow back and forth over one very perky breasts. “No. The truth is I have no idea if they’d even want it. You see, this is about me and my memories. My grandfather passed away last year. That place is special to me. It holds tons of memories and.” She stops and looks all around before she continues, “I need it. Mr. White, I need to be able to look out the window of my bedroom each morning and see the thing. It’s all I have left. Can’t you build your condos somewhere else?”
Her sentimentality is sweet. “This is purely business. I don’t let things like sentiments get in the way of making practical decisions. I’d still be poor as a church mouse if I handled business decisions that way. Surely, you understand, Miss Cook.”
Getting up out of the chair she begins pacing back and forth in front of my desk as she wrings her hands in front of her. “Business is business, I get it.” She stops and looks at me with one wrinkle on her otherwise wrinkle-free forehead. I assume that means she’s very distraught. “But you have more money than most or I wouldn’t even ask this of you. Please just think about leaving the lighthouse where it is and building your condos somewhere else.”
“No,” I say and feel a little bit bad about having to say it. But only a little. I don’t cloud business with emotions. Not ever!
“No?” she asks with a deep frown. “Just, no? Not a, let me think about it? Not a, we can take some time and see? Just a simple, no?”
With a nod, I answer her, “No, just a simple word that lets you know I will not be doing as you have asked.”
Placing her hands firmly on my desk, she leans on them and her eyes go all shiny with unshed tears. “Please, Mr. White. I’ve never begged for anything and I am begging you to at least consider leaving the lighthouse where it is and build elsewhere. Please, sir.”
“You’ve never begged for anything?” I ask as I can see she’s not used to asking for anything more than once, obviously.
She’s very beautiful. I assume she always gets what she wants. How sad I have to be the first to end her run of getting what she wants. But someone has to be that person. The one who crushes one of her dreams. I wonder how many dreams she’s had that have gone uncrushed.
“I have never wanted anything this badly before. If you knew how my heart aches with the thought that I’ll never be able to go back inside of that place again you’d have more compassion for me.” One hand moves over her heart and inadvertently, her breast that has the blue fabric of her dress pulled tight over it.
I wonder how that breast would feel in my mouth.
“You say you’ve never wanted anything as badly as you want this building. And you want this building to stay where it is, really. You don’t want it to be moved into some city park. You want things to stay exactly the same way as you’ve always known them. But that can’t happen. Things change. Life goes on. The absence of that lighthouse isn’t a thing that should mean that damn much to you.”
“But it does,” she says as she moves her hand off her heart and down to her side. “It really does.”
“Then you really need more of a life, my dear young woman. Because most people wouldn’t put that much energy into a material object. You do know some force of nature could come in and remove that building, don’t you? I’m not the only threat to its existence. Yet I am the only one who you are pleading to.” I tap the desktop as I watch her mind working.
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