An Act of Persuasion

by Stephanie Doyle

  She stopped when she saw a picture of a breast in the book. Next to it he’d written, Increased Sensitivity?

  The seemingly innocuous question had her squirming and squeezing her legs together. In fact, her nipples and her breasts were more sensitive. If he were to touch them…

  Whoa. Enough of that. As hard as leaving him had been, as hard as trying to imagine her future life without him had been, remembering the sex…had been just as hard.

  Because she tried to imagine feeling that way with another man someday and it simply would not come. She certainly hadn’t felt that way with boyfriends she’d had before Ben.

  There had been that one disaster while she’d been working for him when she tried to make him jealous by dating a hot young guy. Not only had Ben not lifted an eyebrow, but also it turned out Kevin had shown up at the office once to pick her up for their date with no cash in his wallet. He’d actually asked Ben for the money and Ben had given it to him. Needless to say, she’d been mocked ruthlessly for her taste in potential mates.

  Poor Kevin. He didn’t stand a chance against what she felt for Ben. Even when she knew it wasn’t working with him and that she was dating him for the wrong reasons, she still tried a last desperate attempt to see if she could somehow use Kevin to get over Ben. Because wouldn’t that show her boss how over him she was?

  The sex had been lousy, she felt guilty as hell for using Kevin—although he really didn’t seem to mind—and, in the end, she’d realized how immature she’d been about the whole thing. She’d been playing silly girl games like she was a character on a sitcom. She had no doubt that Ben would have seen right through her scheme.

  If he’d bothered to care. Which he hadn’t.

  The next day she’d dumped Kevin, who seemed remarkably relieved at the time. It made her realize what a poor job she’d done at attempting to be someone else’s girlfriend when she was so clearly Ben’s…girl. Woman. Assistant. Employee. Devoted, love-sick idiot!

  It was some point after that when she’d realized that maybe their relationship would remain the same. She would love him and he would need her and it would be enough.

  But then he’d gotten sick and, in his weakness, he’d reached out to her.

  Now he was asking questions about her breast sensitivity. After she told him she loved him.

  After she told him they were over.

  “Here. I brought the soup and some lo mein if you’re hungry.”

  “My breasts are none of your business!”

  “Okay.”

  He set the bowls on the small table she had next to the kitchen. A table she never ate at when she was home. It was mostly used for setting down her grocery bags and the mail before things were sorted and put away.

  He’d even managed to find the one serving dish she owned and had filled it with the lo mein he’d recently microwaved to reheat. It was odd to watch him doing these things. These simple tasks she’d done for him for so long that he was doing for her.

  She sat at the table squirming a bit because of her breast declaration. He hadn’t known she’d been looking at the picture in the book when she said it. Heck, maybe he hadn’t even meant anything by the question. Maybe he was curious in a nonsexual way if her breasts were more sensitive.

  Yeah, right.

  He handed her a spoon and a paper towel to use as a napkin—because, really, what was the purpose of buying both—then he sat across from her.

  Not counting last night’s disaster, this was the first time they were sharing a meal together since she’d left him. It was exactly the thing she didn’t want to do because if she fell back into this pattern, she was afraid she would never break out of it.

  But she was feeling tired and the soup did smell really good. She took a few cautious sips and waited for junior to approve or disapprove. After a couple of minutes, she could tell the kid seemed satisfied with the selection. She had a suspicion the kid might even let her have the lo mein.

  “Are you angry I’m here?” he finally said after a few long moments of them silently eating.

  “I should be. I told you that there can’t be anything between us. Sitting here and having dinner after a long day is not exactly helping the situation.”

  “I brought books on the baby. That’s perfectly within the boundaries. Besides, you didn’t say there couldn’t be anything between us. You said you weren’t going to marry me or live with me.”

  “Yeah, so that basically covers a relationship.”

  “Not quite,” he said slowly. “There’s something you left out.”

  “What?”

  “Sex.”

  Anna’s stomach flipped over like fish on land and because she had just read it in the book he gave her, she knew it was too soon to blame the sensation on the baby moving.

  “Anna, I’m not sure how to say this but…I guess, I would like to make your breasts my business.”

  Oh, my. It probably wasn’t a good sign that her nipples suddenly got hard.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  “DID YOU JUST SAY SEX?”

  “I did. I would like to have it,” he said, then added, “With you.” In case that wasn’t clear.

  She dropped the spoon into the bowl and sat back staring at him. “Are you crazy?”

  Maybe, he wasn’t sure. He only knew he couldn’t stop thinking about her. Couldn’t stop fantasizing about her. He didn’t only want to have sex with her. He wanted to have sex with her as many times as his body was able. He wanted to sink into her until it became a common event. So that some night in the future, thoughts of it wouldn’t play in a continual loop in his mind, driving him to the brink of insanity.

  “Anna, I can’t be the first man to say he desired you sexually. I don’t see anything wrong with being honest about what I want.”

  “No. I mean, yes. I mean, we are so not there. You walk in here with Chinese food and a book with a picture of a breast highlighted and suddenly it’s okay to talk about sex? That you want it. What the hell am I supposed to do with that bombshell?”

  Suddenly irritated, he threw his napkin on the table. “What? You don’t care for surprising news being dropped in your lap? You told me last night that you loved me. Did you think I wouldn’t consider what you said, that I wouldn’t think about what it meant to me?”

  “I…uh…I don’t know.”

  “Well, I did. I thought it about it all night. What you said weren’t just words, Anna. Or were they?”

  “No. I was as honest with you as I could be.”

  “Then let me be honest with you. I don’t know if I love you. Hell, I can’t say for sure I know what love is. I’ve certainly never been so overcome with emotion or feeling for another person that it changed me fundamentally inside.”

  She shook her head. “I don’t believe that. You’ve told me about your parents. How it was growing up. They sounded like warm, lovely people. You must have loved them.”

  “Of course, yes.”

  They’d been older. A couple who had found each other later in life. His father was a successful plumber and his mother was a quiet, soft-spoken woman. Having him had been an unplanned event, so Ben’s childhood was more about him fitting into their worlds rather than them accommodating his.

  Fortunately, Ben had seemingly been born competent and mature so hadn’t required a lot of their attention and focus. His father was stern, but not harsh. He demanded discipline and he rewarded competence. Ben’s mother’s quiet demeanor hid a deep intellect that he admired and often sparred with.

  Had he loved them? He’d been sad when they passed, of course. His father of a heart attack. His mother not two years after that of a sudden brain aneurism. Ben had been orphaned by age twenty-six.

  From that moment on he had lived with the certainty that he was alone in the world. It hadn’t frightened him or worried him. He’d simply embraced his solitude and lived his life for his work.

  Never once had he met a woman for whom he wanted to change that life.

  Until
Anna had left him. Because she loved him and was tired of not being loved back. Anna wasn’t prone to dramatics or tears, yet she’d cried when he asked her to come home.

  Home.

  The word should have registered with him. He knew what it meant to her. Knew what she sacrificed each pay period to put money aside so that she could finally have her own house someday. A house she declared would be the best home she could imagine, because it would be hers.

  Those tears showed him how very serious she was about her feelings. She deserved to know how serious he was about making something work between them, as well.

  He knew he wanted her in his life. She was probably his closest friend. The first one he’d really allowed himself to have when he returned to the states. Because of her he’d found himself becoming closer to the other people he worked with like Greg Chalmers, a man still struggling to overcome his own demons, who Ben found himself want to help. And Madeleine Kane, who had needed a kick on the bottom to jump start her life again. Would he have made those more personal connections without Anna having been there first? Doubtful.

  “Loving your parents isn’t the same thing as loving a woman,” he said.

  “No, it’s not. But don’t say you don’t know how to love someone.” Anna reached across the small table and laid her hand on top of his. “You’re not as coldhearted as you want to believe. You would have to choose it, Ben. Decide what path you wanted to take in life.”

  He laughed without humor. “Choose my path? Sort of an ironic thing to say to a man who has had little choice for the past year. You want to talk about dropping bombshells, forget that I wasn’t sure if I was going to live or die, I broke a long-held, self-imposed rule and had sex with with an employee. Then my long-time employee and very close friend suddenly left me at a time when I desperately needed her. In the span of weeks I realized two things—I was going to live and I was sterile. I would never have my own children, which I didn’t even think I wanted, until…wait! You come back into my life to tell me you’re pregnant with my child and that you have, in fact, loved me for a very long time. However, immediately on the heels of that declaration you tell me there can be nothing between us. Those are some pretty big surprises, wouldn’t you say?”

  She had the decency to blush. He hoped guilt motivated it. “I’m sorry. I guess, I was only thinking about…well, me. Yuck.”

  He turned his hand under hers so that their fingers meshed and he squeezed it in shared commiseration. “You had a pretty rough few months, too.”

  She nodded and he could see her eyes watering. This new pregnant Anna, he was coming to realize, was a crier.

  “I was so afraid you were going to die,” she sobbed. “When the first round of chemo didn’t work, I didn’t know what to think. I couldn’t believe it could actually happen, that you might not live. I wouldn’t believe it. So all I could think about was the next step, the next round of treatment.

  “Then one night, out of the blue, you’re sitting there with this massive erection and all of a sudden we’re doing it when I’ve wanted to do it with you for years. Then you don’t talk to me for days. Nothing about your health, certainly nothing about that night. Suddenly, you get this call and, oh, by the way, you’re doing this risky procedure that might kill you even faster. And about that night…it just sort of happened and you’re really sorry it did.” She paused. “I had to leave. Don’t you see? You left me no choice.

  “Except four weeks later I’m peeing on a stick and, wow, I’m going to be a mother. I had to tell you about it. Then finally, finally after six years of holding it inside I spill my guts all over the place and tell you I love you. You say it’s not over and walk out and I’m, like, what the hell does that mean? And today, after twenty-two years of not caring I finally decided to find my parents. So, yeah, I’m right there with you.”

  He stood and moved around the table to pull her into his arms. Hugging her like he hadn’t hugged anyone in a very long time.

  She sobbed on his neck and he could feel the dampness seep through the short-sleeved polo.

  “You did say massive erection. I heard that correctly, didn’t I?”

  She laughed and hiccupped and then hit him on the shoulder. All the things he wanted to accomplish with that statement.

  “I’m sorry I didn’t consider things from your perspective,” she said as she used the back of her hand to wipe away her tears. “I can’t say I’m sorry I left you. Because I really felt I had to go, but I’m sorry for all the other stuff you went through alone.”

  “Okay. That’s fair.”

  “Ben.” She looked at him intently. “I don’t think I can do it. I mean, have sex with you. The first time it was too much. Too big. Leaving you was the hardest thing I ever did. I felt broken for weeks after and it took all my strength to get back to this place where I am. I’m not ready to go down that road…yet.”

  And there it was: that small window of opportunity. Ben was suddenly in love with the word yet.

  “I get it,” he said, stopping her from saying anything else, before she could think too much about it. He didn’t want to screw this up. He cupped her face in his hands. Her precious face that he’d missed so much. He ran his thumb over her cheekbone, then her lower lip.

  Yes, he wanted her. But not now. Not after all this stuff that had been spewed about the room. Ben could feel how the emotions cluttered up the air. On both sides. But there was one thing he had to set straight. He wasn’t leaving her without her knowing what their future would look like.

  “I said that I don’t know if I love you. But I do want you. Desperately. Like you said…maybe love is a choice. Well, then let me try.”

  She shook her head, her cheek brushing against his palm. She was so damn soft. “Ben, you can’t force yourself to love someone. That’s not what I meant when I said you had a choice.”

  “I know what you meant. You meant I have to believe it can exist before I’ll believe I can experience it. Fine. Then show me.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “We can date. Like any other couple. I want to take you out and get to know you not as a friend or an employee but as something else. I want to take you to dinners and movies and buy you flowers. Hope maybe I can impress you enough so you’ll let me and my massive erection back into your bed.”

  She rolled her eyes. “I can’t believe I used the word massive. You’re never going to let me live that down are you?”

  “Unlikely.”

  “So we date.” She paused as if considering the idea. “With maybe the potential for sex. What if it doesn’t work out?”

  He shrugged. “What if it doesn’t? You were ready to have a relationship based only on our shared parenting of the kid. If we date and it doesn’t work out, we’ll still have that.”

  Her eyes narrowed a little. “You made me think you weren’t happy with that arrangement.”

  “I’m not. I want the baby in my life. Full time. Not part time. But I guess that’s punishment for every man who doesn’t have the good sense to marry the woman first before making a baby with her. I don’t get my way in this.”

  He watched her taking in his words, and knew that she was satisfied with them. He wasn’t lying. He knew he had very little control in what the final arrangement between them was going to be.

  “Okay. We can date.”

  “Excellent. Before I leave give me a taste. Just a taste, so I can remember…”

  He didn’t finish his thought. Simply lowered his head and felt for her lips. They were exactly like he remembered. At first touch they were plump and delicious, giving him a little resistance as they pushed against his own lips. That should have been enough, but when he heard the slight gasp in her throat he wanted more. His mouth opened and he pushed his tongue inside feeling the moist heat of her mouth, remembering all too well how her wonderful mouth had surrounded the head of his cock.

  Holding her face in his hands, he thrust his tongue steadily against hers, hopefully reminding her of
that night, too. How they had moved together so easily, so naturally.

  Then he felt pressure against his chest and he knew that he was taking her too far too fast. She wasn’t ready for sex. He could respect that, he would honor that. But he damn well wanted her to know that, in terms of desire for her, he had no equal.

  Slowly he lifted his head and watched with satisfaction as she struggled to blink her eyes open.

  “Delicious. Just like I remembered.”

  “You should go,” she whispered. “I can’t…think when you do that.”

  Which was the point but he didn’t want to press things. He had made good progress. She’d let him back inside her apartment. She let him back inside her mouth. It was only a matter of time before he was ultimately back where he really wanted to be.

  Between her legs and in her heart.

  “Good night. I’ll call you.”

  Ben left with a reminder to lock the door behind him and had this crazy urge to jog down the hallway to the elevators. For the first time in these past few crazy days with Anna he had a sense that things weren’t truly over. That he could fix them.

  Like any other mission he took on he simply had to focus on his goal, set a plan in motion, then make it work.

  In this case he needed to make this relationship work. Okay, so she wanted to be loved back. It seemed like a reasonable request and he hadn’t lied to her when he said he would try. Unfortunately, he knew himself too well. Love was something poetic and pretty. He wasn’t a man inclined to either. But regardless of whatever he came to feel for Anna, she would never think for one second it wasn’t love. He could convince her every day that she was the center of his world, and she would never have to know how he labeled his emotions.

  She would be his and with her came his child.

  Yes, this courtship was just another mission for him.

  And when he was on a mission he did not fail.

  *