Sinful

by Marie Rochelle

  “I’m still not sure if we could handle being around each other on an actual date,” she admitted. “You know how we are with each other. Sparks just seem to fly when we least expect it.”

  Leaning closer, he got right in her face. “I can’t deny I like our fireworks, so why not take it out on the road. I’m more than up for it, but if you’re nervous I’ll understand and let it go.”

  Maymi laughed. A soft, sexy sound that made him hornier than he already was. “Fine, I’ll go out on a date with you.”

  “How about tonight?” Jensen asked. He wasn’t going to give her any time to think about it more and have another chance to change her mind.

  “I can’t tonight,” she said, placing her hand in the center of his chest pushing him back. “I already have plans after work. How about Friday? I’m closing the bakery early, probably around noon.”

  He wanted to push for tonight since everything was going so well between them, but he wouldn’t. This date was a test to see if he could get a second date with her. Maymi possessed a lot more substance than any other woman who had been in his life.

  Jensen knew the only way to get her to let her ‘keep Jensen away’ barriers down was to do it in a neutral environment like a date or walk through the park. He was hungry to discover more about what made her tick.

  She had already given him hints about what treasures lay deep within her. It fascinated him even more when he watched how open she was around other people but him.

  “Friday is good for me. I can wait until I get to see you in something besides jeans and a Sinful t-shirt,” he admitted, staring into Maymi’s eyes almost getting lost in the beauty of them.

  “I could tell you the same thing,” she flirted back. The tension in the room started getting thicker and hotter the more they continued staring at each other. “I’m wondering how your body is going to look all dressed up for our date.”

  Taking a step closer and then another one until he could feel Maymi’s chest touching his, he stared at her without breaking eye contact. “If you weren’t so stubborn and decided to make me wait until Friday you would get to see how good I look in a suit.”

  “I think I’ll be able to handle the wait. Patience is a virtue, so it will give me something to look forward to this weekend,” she said, running her finger down the center of his chest.

  Grabbing her by the hips, he yanked Maymi completely against him. “Keep tempting me and I won’t be able to keep from doing what I want to do.”

  There was an eagerness in her eyes he hadn’t noticed before when she looked at him, but he wouldn’t mind seeing again. Yet, he had to get her out of his office before things went too far, more than he allowed in the work place.

  “You better go before I forget I’m a gentleman and kiss the hell out of that beautiful mouth of yours,” Jensen admitted. He was losing control fast and Maymi was the only reason for his lack of concentration.

  “Alright, I do need to get out of here. I need to call Tatum to recheck out plans for tonight,” she said, touching the side of his cheek.

  “Who is Tatum?” How many men did she have falling around her? First, his brother and now some guy named Tatum. Was he ever going to get a chance to get her alone and away from everyone else?

  “Tatum is one of my best friends. We try to get together at least twice a month. So I’m not canceling my plans with her.”

  Tatum was a female...he couldn’t believe it, but he wasn’t about to let Maymi know he thought she was a he. He didn’t want to admit he might have been jealous of someone else. It was bad enough he had gotten the green eyed monster with Casper.

  “I guess I can let you go out with Tatum, but you have to do one thing for me before you leave.”

  Her left eyebrow raised a fraction as she continued watching him. “I’m afraid to ask what you might want, Mr. Lowe,” she teased.

  “It’s nothing that will hurt,” Jensen whispered, lowering his head until their lips were a breath apart. “All I want is this.”

  Reclaiming her mouth, he slid his hand through her hair holding, Maymi still while he got lost in the sweetness of her mouth. God! He never got this disoriented in kissing any other woman like he did with her. He could kiss Maymi for hours and never get tired.

  Jensen wanted to continue but the moan of ecstasy that slipped for Maymi’s lips brought him back. Shit! He hadn’t made out with a female like this since college and Sarah Willis was his steady girlfriend until she dumped him for her professor.

  “Why are you making it so hard on me to let you leave?” he whispered against her cheek.

  “I want to give you something to keep you on your toes until our date,” Maymi said before pushing him away from her. “Now I really need to go now. I’ve been gone way too long. I know I’ve baked goodies I need to make. I can drop my address off after work.” She started to walk away from him, but he grabbed her by the arm.

  “No, wait. Let me give you my phone number and you can text me your information.” Moving away from Maymi, Jensen grabbed a small piece of paper off his desk and wrote down his number. “Here you go.” He spun back around and handed her the sheet of paper.

  “Thank you,” Maymi said. She took the paper from his hand and slipped it into the front pocket of her jeans. “I hope you’re ready to blow me away on Friday. I haven’t been impressed in a long time.”

  “You didn’t go out with me, so anything I do Friday will be better than everything any other man has done for you,” Jensen replied with confidence.

  “Let me be the judge of that,” Maymi tossed back. Turning away from him, she walked over to his office door and went out without looking back.

  Leaning against his desk, Jensen looked at the open door, oblivious to the smile of his face. Maymi intrigued him since he laid eyes on her. He was finally ready to admit that he might see a tiny bit of himself in her.

  It could be one of the reasons they went at it so well with each other. Each one knew actually what button to push on the other one, but he wouldn’t be sure until their date on Friday. Today was only Wednesday. Could he make it through another day until he finally got Maymi alone?

  Well, he agreed to wait and that is what he would do as much as he didn’t want to do it. Moving away from his desk, Jensen walked around and took a seat behind it. He couldn’t let his entire day consist of thinking about his upcoming date with her. Friday would be here soon enough.

  Besides, the pile of please call slips on his desk weren’t going to answer themselves. However, he had to make one call before the rest. He knew he hadn’t heard from Jack, so he would have to contact him. His business goals still had to keep moving forward until he finally got all of his ducks in a row, and gaining the Health Pro’s building was now at the top of his list.

  Picking up the telephone at his left, Jensen started calling Jack’s phone number when suddenly a knock on his office door stopped him. Turning his head, he was surprised to see Jack standing there in the doorway.

  “Do you have a minute?” he asked. “I need to talk to you.”

  Wondering what was going on, Jensen placed the phone back down and he waved Jack into his office. He hoped he wasn’t going to ask for more money because Health Pro wasn’t worth more than he offered him. If he did then this deal would be over.

  “Sure, I was just about to call you. Come on in and shut the door,” Jensen said secretly hoping this guy was ready to sign on the dotted line.

  “I’ve a few things I want to go over first,” Jack said, closing the door.

  “Have a seat and I’ll see what I can do for you.”

  Whatever the reason Jack showed up here at Fitness 24, he wasn’t about to let on how much he wanted his failing business. He would let him talk and see what his terms were before he completely shut anything down.

  ****

  As she drove home from Sinful after spending the past ten hours working on getting out two surprise cupcakes orders, Maymi finally allowed her mind to wander back to her kissing sess
ion with Jensen. She wondered if the heat from her ovens had finally caused her to lose her mind.

  Something had to be wrong up there in that brain of hers to make her agree to a date with him. She should have turned Jensen down flat, but once she gazed into those brown eyes of his she got lost and then once he kissed her again she was a goner and they both knew it.

  Damn...why hadn’t she listened to her first instinct and kept from going over to Fitness 24 in the first place? Why was she even bothering thinking about this when she already knew the answer? She wanted to have the last word.

  The way Jensen had demanded for Casper not to waste a lot of time with her hadn’t sat right, so after he left instead of letting it go and moving on with her day she had to take her butt over there thinking she would get the upper hand.

  However, Jensen kissed that idea out of her head and seduced her into agreeing to a date with him. Thank God, she was quick enough to at least think of a lie and get it pushed back into Friday. She didn’t have plans with Tatum because her girlfriend was out of town of business. She might be able to think of an excuse not to go by then.

  Are you scared of what you might do? The question entered her head and left just as fast.

  No! Maymi wasn’t afraid of going out on one little date with Jensen Lowe. She would be able to handle this like anything else he tried tossing her way. She was unbreakable, but hell, she still needed one of her girlfriends to vent with about this new situation.

  Why wasn’t Jazmaine answering her stupid phone? She had already called her twice and got her voice mail. She had even left two text messages for her. She needed her other best friend right now to unload on and she wasn’t anywhere around. What was going on with Jazmaine?

  Chapter Nineteen

  Jazmaine read Maymi’s text message while she waited for Mr. Akito Mashiro’s assistant to show up to finalize the last of the paperwork to hire him. Mr. Kent wanted him as the graphic novel writer/artist for their upcoming series, but this was getting on her nerves.

  For the past five months they had been going back and forth trying to please Mr. Mashiro’s every demand, but if she had one more complaint from him. She would take herself off this deal and someone else at the office could handle it from this point on.

  Working all of these long hours just to stroke this guy’s ego was getting way out of hand for her liking. She hadn’t been able to do anything else with her free time but take care of this man’s every whim. Especially when it came to tiny details in the multi-million dollar contracts Mr. Kent needed signed, yet she wouldn’t actually quit because her boss was counting on her to get everything done.

  Getting Mr. Mashiro to even agree to think about doing a four book graphic novel deal with them was huge. So she understood why her boss was bending over backwards to give him everything he wanted but bending to all of his demands was a little crazy!

  Yeah, he might be the hottest graphic artist out there but no one was worth all of the hassle she was going through. She deserved a life outside of these four walls. Taking another glance at her watch, Jazmaine noticed she had been waiting almost forty-five minutes for Mr. Mashiro’s assistant to show up and she was done.

  If Mr. Kent wanted these contracts finalized it would be done by someone else at the office, but it wouldn’t be here. She was finished waiting on these people while they did as they pleased and kept her here for no good reason. She did have other things that had to be dealt with besides this nonsense.

  Jazmaine grabbed the two files off the conference room table, along with her cell phone and purse. She was out of here and nothing was going to stop her from leaving this time. If Julie Kim wanted to blow up her cell phone complaining about how she left, she would get the answering machine until tomorrow morning.

  Shoving the files inside her purse, Jazmaine dialed Maymi’s cell phone number as she stormed around the table. Hopefully, her girlfriend was still up for a couple of drinks and girl’s talk. Tatum was out of town of business, so she couldn’t call her up and drag her out for nachos and beer. She cursed under her breath when Maymi’s voice mail picked up on the other end and she waited to leave a message.

  “Hey. Leave me a message and I’ll get back to you.”

  “Maymi, it’s me Jazmaine. I’m headed home. Call me if you still want to go out for drinks or you can just come over to my place. I’ll fix up some snacks and we can gossip. I got stood up by Mr. Mashiro’s assistant, so I’m done waiting for her and dealing with that jerk for the night,” She opened the conference room door and then ran into a hard chest on the other side.

  “Oh my God,” Jazmaine screamed catching her phone before it hit the floor. “You scared the hell out of me.” She looked up and her heart literally stopped in her chest at the sight of the man staring down at her.

  Her eyes froze on his long, lean form because he was absolutely handsome with his captivating dark eyes. She had never seen anyone who looked like him before in her life. His smooth olive skin stretched over high cheekbones as he smiled at her showing off strikingly white teeth.

  She noticed his hair was black and thick styled with a few spiked hairs on the top just enough to give him a bad boy look. She had never looked at a Japanese man before but she couldn’t take her eyes off of him. She was completely fascinated by the aura surrounding him.

  “I’m sorry. I wasn’t expecting you to open the door,” he apologized in a slight British accent.

  “No, I should have been paying attention to where I was going. I’m Jazmaine Ramey. Can I help you with something Mr.—”

  “Mr. Akito Mashiro,” he said, shocking her. “I’m sorry I’m late but my plane just arrived about twenty minutes ago from London. I made it here as fast as my driver could get me.”

  She blinked a couple of times trying to get her thoughts together. Jazmaine crossed her fingers that he hadn’t heard the tail end of her conversation on the phone. If Mr. Mashiro had, then all of the hard work she’d put in up to now was ruined and Mr. Kent would lose all of his investments he put into this deal.

  “Mr. Mashiro, I wasn’t expecting to see you. I thought your assistant Ms. Kim was coming to take care of the final paperwork for our deal,” she admitted.

  Mr. Mashiro gave her a long, searching look and she started to believe he might have heard her call him a jerk on the phone. “Ms. Kim did her job up to now but I wanted to look at the final paperwork myself. I’m the one who’s making this agreement with your boss. I’m the graphic artist, not her. Can you stay and go over it with me?” he asked. “I’ve a few questions about a couple of things.”

  The word no was on the tip of her tongue. This guy may be hot but he still hadn’t done anything but make her life a living hell for the past several months. Jazmaine wanted to tell him where he could go, yet she swallowed it down and smiled instead.

  “I’ll be glad to help you,” she said, stepping back into the conference room. “Mr. Kent and I want to make this transition as easy as possible for you.”

  Following her inside, Mr. Mashiro flashed her a grin that made her stomach flip flop, but she held it together like a professional. “Please all me Akito. My father is Mr. Mashiro.”

  “I think I should keep it professional, don’t you?”

  “So, does that mean I can’t call you Jazmaine,” he asked in his perfect accent. “It’s such a beautiful name.”

  Baby, you can call me anything you want with that sexy voice of yours.

  “Ms. Ramey will be better,” Jazmaine answered ignoring the compliment Mr. Mashiro gave her. She took a seat at the table and then pulled the files out of her purse placing them in front of her.

  “I’ll have to work on getting rid of all of this proper manner for you,” Akito said, joining her.

  Without commenting to Mr. Mashiro, she watched as he laid a briefcase down and opened it up. He pulled out several files along with one of his graphic novels that he placed on top. Jazmaine was surprised she hadn’t noticed the briefcase until now. She had gotten taken b
y surprise finding him on the other side of the door but she still should have seen a gray metal briefcase in his hand. It wasn’t like her to ignore something in plain sight.

  Jazmaine got her drifting thoughts under better control as her eyes landed on one of his famous graphic novels. She had seen them before but never had the chance to hold one in her hand.

  “Do you mind if I look at your work?” she asked, pointing towards the book..

  “Please do,” Akito replied, watching as she picked it up.

  The novel had a much sturdier feel in her hands than the comic books she was used to holding. No wonder they lasted longer and could be re-read without getting ruined as easily. The colorful designed artwork on the cover stood out to her as well. Akito Mashiro did amazingly beautiful work. No wonder his gifted hands and mind were in such a high demand overseas as well as in the United States.

  His work with Manga characters was brilliant with his detail to their distinctive features with large oversized eyes, small noses and a line for a mouth. Some Japanese artists didn’t follow this style, but he did and that’s what drew her boss to the man sitting across from her.

  Jazmaine flipped through the pages before sliding it back across the table. “Your work is really outstanding, the best I have ever seen,” she praised. “Mr. Kent is very excited about making you a part of his team over here.”

  “Ms. Ramey, thank you for the compliment,” he told her. Picking up the novel, he placed it back into his briefcase. “I was very impressed by the way you handled my assistant Julie. She can be a bit of a headache to some people, but she informed me how you always kept your cool.”

  She listened to Mr. Mashiro talk while trying not to get lost in the darkness of his eyes. A man with a good-looking face and a killer accent was always her down fall when it came to dating. Her pickiness could be one of the causes she was thirty-four years old and still single. She’d made up her mind four years ago to stop dating guys who weren’t worthy of her.