Nights of Fantasy

by Sherelle Green

  Jaleen stepped out of his car, taken aback by the chilly night air. He hadn’t been in Miami long enough to forget about the extremely cold spring days in Chicago, but he’d forgotten that even in the spring, it felt like there was always a chance of snow.

  “Funny you should say that because I’m actually leaving for Barcelona tomorrow.”

  “Oh, really? For business?”

  “More for pleasure than business.”

  “With a special someone perhaps?”

  Jaleen didn’t answer right away. “Perhaps.”

  “Well, I won’t coax it out of you right now, but next time we talk, I expect you to tell me more.”

  After ending the call, he made his way into Bare Sophistication. He had a feeling Danni was still there helping Winter and Autumn with the semiannual sale.

  He went to open the door, surprised that it was locked. “I guess it is really late,” he said as he glanced at his watch. This was definitely not the night he had planned. He was just stepping away when he saw Danni come to the front of the store to get boxes. Damn. Even after a long day’s work, she still looked beautiful. Her sleeveless white blouse was tucked into a fitted peach skirt and her hair was pinned in a clip. He knocked on the window until he got her attention.

  “Jaleen, what are you doing here?” she asked as she unlocked the door, then locked it again after he entered the boutique. “I thought we were meeting at your place?”

  “We were, but my meeting finally got out and I figured you’d be here since the sale was still going on.”

  “The sale ended a couple hours ago and I told Winter and Autumn I’d close up shop. A couple of employees are still here counting inventory in the back.”

  He glanced down at a few boxes on the ground. “Do you need help with these?”

  “Actually, help would be great. I was restocking the displays, but these boxes have to go back in storage. There are about five boxes in the back of the store off to the side, as well.”

  “Just point me in the right direction,” he said, lifting two boxes at a time. Usually after a business meeting with his family, working out would help him blow off his frustration, so he welcomed the easy labor. It took him less than ten minutes to clear the boxes off the floor. He then assisted Danni with straightening the racks of lingerie and dusting off the shelves before the other two employees came to help. Thirty minutes after his arrival, the store looked in tip-top shape.

  “We’ll head out through the back door,” Danni said as she let the two associates out and turned off the lights. “Let me just turn on the alarm.”

  “Okay.” Jaleen went to grab his discarded blazer and Danni’s coat when he tripped over a box. “Are these boxes supposed to be behind the register or in storage?”

  Danni walked around the counter and opened the boxes. “No, these are pieces from the latest collection, so they definitely need to be in storage.”

  Danni picked up his blazer and her coat as he grabbed a box and brought it to the storage.

  “Do you want me to organize these boxes?” he yelled, noticing how unorganized it had gotten after the associates had done inventory.

  “I can do that,” Danni said, entering the storage room. “Can you grab the last of the boxes?”

  “Sure.” He made a couple more trips. “This is the last one.” He went to drop it on top of the others, not noticing that Danni had placed one of the boxes on the floor. Hitting the door that had been propped open was the only thing to catch his fall.

  “Sorry,” Danni said, turning her head. “I thought you’d see the box on the floor.” All the color from her face drained.

  “What’s wrong?”

  She pointed to the door. “Please tell me you unlatched the security lock before you let the door close.”

  Jaleen looked at the closed door. “I didn’t unlatch anything. I hadn’t planned to fall back on the door.”

  “Oh, crap,” she said, running to the door. She pulled the handle and the door didn’t budge. “Did you happen to grab my purse?”

  “No, I didn’t even see your purse.”

  “Shoot, I must have pushed it under the register when I went to look through those boxes.” Danni tried to open the door with more force.

  “Let me try.” Jaleen grabbed the handle with even more force. “Why does this lock on the inside?”

  “It’s a security feature that’s on a lot of storage doors. If you enable the security latch—sort of like a child’s safety lock in a car—it will lock from the inside, trapping the intruder. Or in this case, us.”

  “There’s no way we’re trapped in here.” Jaleen tried the handle again. “When does the store open tomorrow?”

  “They may open at eight a.m. because of the sale, but I’m not sure. I didn’t ask.”

  “Wouldn’t they check on the store if they don’t hear from you tonight?”

  “Maybe, but it’s hard to say since I never checked in with them when I closed the store before moving to Miami with Summer.”

  Jaleen squeezed the bridge of his nose as he felt a headache brewing. Being trapped in a storage room with Danni wasn’t the worse thing to happen today, but the situation wasn’t ideal. Usually he’d focus more on everything he could accomplish while being trapped with a beautiful woman, but he wasn’t his normal self. He had entirely too much on his mind.

  His current situation didn’t have anything to do with JW, but it felt like, somehow, the universe was warning him not to play with fire because when it came to arguing with JW, one was sure to get burned. His mom felt like it was his time to stand up to his father. His brothers felt it was best for him to just leave well enough alone and fall into line. Whereas, he didn’t know what the hell he was supposed to do.

  “We have to get out of here. Our flight leaves tomorrow afternoon for Barcelona and even though they will probably find us in time, we can’t stay here all night.” The worry lines were evident on Danni’s face. “Do you have your phone? We could call Winter or Autumn to let us out.”

  “Yeah.” He grabbed his blazer and pulled out his phone. “And I still have more than fifty-percent battery.”

  “Great! Your phone should work in here, though the reception is horrible.” Jaleen froze as he looked at his service bars.

  “Don’t tell me.” Danni crossed her arms over her chest. “You don’t have service.”

  He leaned against a couple of boxes. “Okay, then I won’t tell you.”

  Chapter 7

  After fifty-five minutes, it was evident that the night was not going to go by fast. Jaleen was leaning against the wall with his eyes closed. He’d been in that position for the past thirty minutes. Danni didn’t want to admit it to herself, but she was a little surprised that he hadn’t made a move on her yet. She figured being trapped with a playboy like Jaleen would give him the green light to try whatever moves he had, which she knew was a lot because she’d seen him in action. Not only had he not tried anything, they hadn’t spoken since they learned his phone didn’t have service.

  “We used to joke that it would be funny if someone got trapped in here,” Danni said, breaking the silence. “But that’s never been an actual concern.”

  “Yeah, well, leave it to me to be the cause of something happening that was once only a joke between employees.” His eyes remained closed as he spoke. Although the lighting in the storage room was dim, she noticed him clench and unclench his jaw. Something’s bothering him. She’d felt it the minute he’d walked into the boutique, although he’d tried to disguise it by helping her fulfill the duties needed to close the shop.

  She walked toward his direction and leaned next to him on the wall. Even now, she could feel the tension emanating throughout his body. He still looked sexy as usual, but his facial features seemed tense, like he had the weight of the world on his
shoulders.

  “Is there a reason you’re staring at me?”

  She gasped when he spoke. “How did you know? You haven’t opened your eyes in a while.”

  He opened his eyes then and turned to her. “Whenever we are in the same room, I am acutely aware of everything about you. Which side of the room you’re on. If you’re observing me or observing our friends. If you’re uncomfortable, I can tell. If you’re tense, I can tell.”

  She smiled. “Kind of like I can tell that you’re tense right now.” She studied his eyes. “What’s wrong? Did your meeting not go as planned?”

  The underlying irritation was evident. “No, it went exactly how I thought it would go.”

  “Do you want to talk about it?”

  He looked away and blew out a frustrated breath. They didn’t really have the type of friendship where they talked about their feelings. They’d had serious conversations before but, for the most part, those conversations had been kept light.

  “As you may recall, my family’s business, Walker Realty Partner, specializes in flipping real estate, among other things. I guess you can say that the past few years have been difficult for us and a lot is riding on my current project in South Beach.” He sighed. “Unfortunately that’s the least of my worries considering, after the completion of this project, I have even more obligations to fulfill for the company.”

  “I’m sure you can handle it,” Danni said as she placed a supportive hand on his shoulder. “You’re Jaleen Walker. There’s nothing you can’t do.”

  Her goal was to get him to laugh and she was rewarded by a hearty one. “I wish that were true.” His face grew serious. “But this is a situation that I’m not sure I can get out of. My father is making it extremely difficult. I can’t go into all the details, but he’s the type of man that everyone listens to when he speaks. My brothers and uncle all listen to him, and even my mom does in some ways. If I disregard his wishes, the consequences of my decisions won’t just affect him. They will affect the rest of the family and the business my grandfather built. Walker Partner Realty is our legacy. Besides their families, it’s all my brothers live for right now. I’m not sure I could do that to them.”

  “But what about you?” She stepped closer to him. “What do you want?”

  He closed his eyes again and leaned the back of his head against the wall. “I’d thought about it for years, and I think that the company as we know it is not going to last. We need to start over. We need to remember the foundations on which the company was started in the first place, rebuild our reputation and rebrand ourselves. If it were up to me, instead of trying to continue to prove to other competitors and businesses in the real-estate industry that we’re the best, we’d admit failure and start over.”

  Danni ran the back of her hand over his cheek, enjoying the stubble that was starting to peek through. She’d always sensed that Jaleen had a lot of layers, but she was starting to realize there was so much more depth to him than she’d originally realized. He always closes his eyes when he needs to get a handle on his frustration. She hadn’t seen him upset too many times but, looking back, she could recall several times when he’d come to a group outing after a business meeting and she’d caught him closing his eyes longer than necessary.

  “In the past, I always thought that maybe you were tired when you would join the group for drinks or dinner after a work meeting.” She placed a quick kiss on his cheek. “But, looking back, it was your way of trying to control your frustration, right? We all know you as Jaleen the Jokester. Or Jaleen the Life of the Party. Even Jaleen the Man Who Never Takes Life Too Seriously. Now I see that all those times, it was your way of masking what was really going on.”

  He opened his eyes again, making her breath catch. “I wish I could tell you everything. And, if I’m being completely honest, I’m worried we’ll lose our closeness if I do. There are some things about me that you don’t know. Things no one really knows and wouldn’t understand. I’m not sure you’ll understand yet, either, and I don’t want to risk that.”

  What could he possibly say that would make me turn my back on him? She wanted to ask, but she had secrets, too. Secrets she wasn’t ready to share with anyone, even Jaleen.

  “You’re not ready to open up to me about certain things, either,” he said as if reading her mind. “Am I right?”

  She nodded her head. “Like you said, I’m not sure you’ll understand yet. We only just began growing our friendship in a way that doesn’t include bickering all the time or taking punches at each other.”

  “Is that all this is?” he asked. “A friendship?”

  Her heart was screaming for her to tell him that she felt like it was more than a friendship. That she wasn’t sure if the type of chemistry they had could be defined as a friendship or something a lot deeper than that. But her mind was warning her to tread lightly. Despite how close they were getting, she still had to be careful. There was so much about her life that she still had to figure out. Important decisions she still had to make. However, in this moment, she didn’t want to think too hard anymore. All she wanted to do was something she’d been wanting to do for weeks, years even.

  Slowly her hand moved from his cheek to the back of his head. All she had to do was to lift up on her toes and tilt her head to his. The next steps seemed so simple, yet her nerves were getting the best of her. Luckily, Jaleen didn’t seem to be going through the same inner struggle as she was. His arms wrapped around her waist and he pulled her to him.

  Danni expected him to kiss her right away but instead he leaned his forehead to hers and took a deep breath before placing a soft kiss on her lips. Even though the kiss was tender, her arms prickled in goose bumps at the fact that she was finally kissing him after all this time.

  When her other hand went around his neck, Jaleen slipped his tongue into her mouth and deepened the kiss. Kissing was something Danni had always enjoyed but never got enough of. Her problem in past relationships was the fact that she’d always enjoyed kissing much more than the person she was dating. Then again, none of them had ever had lips like Jaleen’s. Soft yet firm. Sweet yet masculine. He knew when to apply pressure. He knew when to give more tongue. He knew when to pull back, enticing her to pull his head even closer.

  When she moaned into his mouth, he pulled back. “When was the last time you were thoroughly kissed?”

  She could barely stand let alone gather enough brain function to answer his question. “Are you seriously asking me this now?”

  “I need to know,” he said, brushing a few strands of hair out of her face that had escaped her clip. “You’ll see why soon.”

  “Um.” She scrunched her forehead. “I guess it’s been a while. Years even.”

  He studied her face. “The night of the bachelor and bachelorette party, you asked me to kiss you. You said that I was on your list.”

  Her eyes widened. “I told you about my list?”

  “Maybe,” he said with a smirk. “You don’t have to tell me more right now. Just elaborate on the part that includes me kissing you.”

  She tilted her head to the side. She wasn’t surprised she’d mentioned her list. It seemed like she’d talked a lot that night. “Full disclosure?”

  “Full disclosure.”

  She looked into his trusting eyes. “I’ve always enjoyed the art of kissing. The way that the perfect kiss can change the course of a relationship. To me, a kiss is more important than having sex with a person. Without a good kiss, it’s harder for me to connect with my significant other.” She briefly dropped her eyes to his lips. “In the past, I’ve been in relationships with men who didn’t enjoy kissing like I enjoyed kissing. To them, it was more of a chore than a form of foreplay.”

  “That’s unfortunate because all I’ve been thinking about since we met is how you taste.”

  She glanced away at the in
tensity of his stare. He lifted her chin so he could continue to gaze into her eyes. “So how exactly did I make this list?”

  “I guess it was in the way your mouth moved when you talked.”

  “Really?” he asked with one upturned eyebrow. “The way I talked?”

  “Yeah,” she said sheepishly. “I guess you can say that part of the reason why I always enjoyed bickering with you is because I became enthralled with the way your mouth moved. The way it curved into a side smile. The secrets behind the way your lips moved. I felt like your lips were the type of lips that were made for kissing. The type of lips that a woman could get lost in. I guess you could say that the reason you made my list as the person I wanted to thoroughly kiss was because when I was concocting my list, there was no other name—no other pair of lips—that came to mind...but yours.”

  His deep brown eyes darkened to a shade she hadn’t yet seen. “Let’s see if I can live up to your expectations.” She wanted to tell him that he already had. That their first kiss had already been extremely more satisfying than all the kisses she’d previously had. However, she didn’t get the chance. He pulled her back into his embrace and braced one hand on her thigh. Their lips intertwined in a passionate kiss as his other hand tangled in her hair. On their own accord, her legs lifted off the floor and Jaleen was right there to catch her.

  He gently placed her on the nearby boxes, never disconnecting their lips. I was right, she thought. Lips like his were made for kissing. The way he explored her mouth was intoxicating. She felt each nip of his teeth and lick of his tongue deep within her core.

  Slowly she widened her thighs so that he could adjust himself between her legs. His hands left her hair and inched underneath her skirt, caressing her thighs. Jaleen kissed her as if they had all the time in the world, which, technically, she supposed they did since they were locked in the storage room. Unlike the kisses in her past that were uneventful, Jaleen’s kisses seemed to tell a story. Within his kisses, she felt his frustration from the day he’d had. She felt his desire to confide in her more, as well as the restrictions he’d placed on himself to try to hold back so that he wouldn’t scare her away. She couldn’t uncover his secrets, but she felt the weight they placed on his heart.