“Are you serious?”
“Of course. You’ve got a big meeting on Monday with the team of executives from West Coast Burrito. “You can’t look like this then.”
She blinked. “Is the rest of me as messed up as my nails?”
Brenda exhaled a deep breath. “Maya, you’re a beautiful young lady, and you’ll get used to the hours, but at first they seem grueling and they put you through the ringer, physically. I’ve seen too many women buckle under the pressure because twice as much is expected of them as it is with the men in these jobs. I consider your success my success, and, clearly, I’ve not been doing my job these past weeks if I’m allowing your physical appearance and health to deteriorate. From now on, there will be a salad in that fridge every night at five o’clock. And I’ll schedule in your workouts as well. Do we need to bring a treadmill in here?” Brenda glanced around the office, and then finally landed on Maya. She frowned. “Sweetie, is something wrong? I mean something outside of work?”
The tightrope Maya had been balancing on for the last two weeks started to snap. She hadn’t been able to talk to Meade. It was important for Meade to see Maya staying strong, and for Maya to show her how easy it was to walk away from the beefcake if you just put your mind to it. Except Bo was so much more than a beefcake.
Meade was looking for jobs, real ones. She’d been in touch with professors and people from groups she’d been a part of before she decided to throw her career and her potential down the drain. Meade was doing too well for Maya to take the risk of showing her that missing Bo was ripping her to shreds from the inside out. But she needed to get it out before it imploded inside her chest.
She gave Brenda an abbreviated rundown of her vacation, and Brenda exhaled a deep breath, studying Maya. “I’ve known you a long time, Maya.” Maya nodded, swallowing hard. “Is this job what you really want?” Brenda asked.
“Yes, of course it is.”
Brenda narrowed her gaze. “You know it’s okay if you change your mind.”
Maya held up a finger, her heartbeat quickening. “I’m not changing my mind. I’ve worked for a decade for this job.”
“Yes, I know you have. And if they’d have hired anyone on the planet other than you, I’d have quit on the spot. Not really, but you get the point.” Maya half-smiled. “But things change. Life throws curveballs, and we have to reevaluate what’s important to us.”
Maya leaned in, elbows on her desk. “Brenda, do you have any idea how many lectures I’ve given my sister about giving up important things in her life for a guy?”
“I understand that. But possibly a little egg on your face would be worth it to marry a fantastic man.”
Maya held up both hands. “Oh, no. We’re nowhere near marriage talk. We’re over, to be exact. It’s been two weeks, and he’s not even so much as texted.”
Brenda shrugged. “Well, then maybe it’s not meant to be. But I think the week with this fellow has possibly helped you see that you’re not pigeonholed to a certain type of man. Life doesn’t have to be boring, Maya.”
Maya pursed her lips. “Boring is safe.”
Brenda looked over her shoulder and then scooted forward. “I was engaged to be married when I was twenty-one years old. My fiancé was set to inherit his father’s auto parts business. My job was going to be staying pregnant and learning how to roast a chicken. My girlfriends took me on a trip to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, and I left there married to a bartender I met on the boardwalk.”
Maya’s eyes flew wide. “Brenda!”
“It’s true.”
“I never knew you were married,” Maya said.
Brenda shrugged. “It was another life.”
“How long did you stay married to him?”
“A year and a half. He died in a motorcycle accident on the way to help a friend paint his house.”
Maya’s hand went to her chest. “I’m so sorry.”
“I was on the back of the bike at the time. It’s a miracle I survived.”
“Are you serious?”
“Point is, that year and a half was the best time in my life. Until that trip, all I thought I’d ever wanted was to be a wife and a mother.”
Maya couldn’t help stating the obvious. “But you never married again.”
Brenda smiled. “Hector was my husband. Once you experience love like that, there’s no settling.”
Maya fought the tears that stung at the back of her eyes.
Brenda picked up her legal pad. “Last appointment for the day. You have a five-thirty at Preen.”
“The restaurant?”
“Yes. He’ll meet you at the bar.”
“Who is it with?”
“Nathan Edgefield. He’s on the partner track at Madero, Lopez, and Washington.”
Maya tossed her hands up. “Who is this?”
“Your blind date from last Friday night. We rescheduled it for tonight.”
Maya let her head drop into her hands. “I can’t go on a date.”
“He may be your Hector,” Brenda said.
Maya looked at the time on her tablet. It was already five-fifteen. “Okay.”
“Grab your purse, head to the bathroom, and give yourself a quick makeover. Even if he doesn’t compare to this guy from Florida, if some form of chemistry is there, who knows, this could be a good guy to have a date with once in a while.” She gave Maya a significant look.
Maya wondered if this was standard for single executives—find a counterpart whose life was as swallowed up in work as one’s own just so one could have sex on occasion. Was this the life she was choosing for herself? What about a family and children? Where did they factor in? What about soccer games and school plays? Runny noses and homework? Was this sort of life conducive to any of that? And since when was she interested in runny-nosed kids?
She made herself as presentable as possible, trying to ignore the bloodshot eyes because there wasn’t much she could do about those, and she called Meade as she walked the few blocks to Preen.
“I’ve got a meeting at five-thirty that I wasn’t expecting, so I won’t be home till later.”
“Like that’s new. Who schedules a meeting at five-thirty on a Friday night?”
“It’s a blind date, actually.”
“Oh. Okay. What do you know about him?” Meade asked.
Maya hit the button at a crosswalk. “I don’t know. He’s a lawyer.”
“Mmm. Sounds responsible.”
“What are you going to do tonight?” Maya asked.
“There’s a documentary I’ve been wanting to watch about Eleanor Roosevelt. Looks like it’s popcorn and that for me tonight.” Maya couldn’t help the bit of relief that flooded her chest. They’d been home two weeks, and Meade hadn’t even mentioned any men. It was like her brain was powering back up. “I was going to tell you tonight,” Meade said, “but since I may be asleep by the time you get here…I got that job interview in Chicago.”
Maya pumped her free fist just as a car horn honked. “Yes!”
“I didn’t get the job, just the interview.”
“I know, but you’re so good at interviews. If you want this, Meade, it’s yours.”
“I do want it. I can’t keep living the way I’ve been living. I’m looking at forty in two and a half years. Something’s got to give.”
She had no idea how much this was music to Maya’s ears. But Maya also knew all it’d take was one trip to some stupid dance club and this house of cards could topple like an avalanche. “That’s great, Meade.”
“Don’t get too excited yet. The guy told me the process would last about six weeks.”
“All right, but I’ll still keep my fingers crossed. I just got to the restaurant. I’ll see you later, okay?”
“Okay. Love you,” Meade said.
Maya smiled. “Love you, too.”
They hung up, and Maya glanced around the bar and spotted the guy who matched the picture Brenda had sent her. He wore a suit, the jacket slung across the c
hair beside him, love handles hanging out of his white, tucked shirt. Oh well, she was dating in her mid-thirties. What did she expect? And the way she’d been treating her body these past weeks, she was on her way to having a matching pair.
“Nathan?” she asked.
He stood up, and she looked down at him. With her three-inch heels, she was a good six inches taller than him. She held out a hand. “Nice to meet you.”
They sat down, and he pointed at a half-eaten plate of appetizers. “Sorry. I skipped lunch today. They’re going to squeeze us in at six-thirty. Does that work with your schedule?”
That meant she had to entertain him for a solid hour before they got a table. She forced a smile. “Sure.”
“So,” he said, swiping the crumbs off his hands. “Tell me about your work.”
The minutes dragged by like slugs as they exchanged mundane information about their lives like they were both on a job interview, until Maya’s text alert dinged. Her heart practically flew out of her chest when Bo’s name came across her phone’s screen.
Where are you?
She drew her shaky hand to her forehead and tried to put her attention back on Nathan, who was detailing a courtroom case he’d recently argued.
She nodded, smiling, and he looked at her curiously. “Are you okay?”
“Oh, yes. Please, go ahead. You were saying that the defendant had a second policy?”
He went on, and she glanced back down at her phone, which had gone black. She hit the button and Bo’s name populated her screen again, the message just sitting there unanswered, sending a fresh wave of tingles through her stomach.
Where was she? Two weeks of radio silence, and now he wanted to know where she was? She forced another smile at Nathan, running her hand over her forehead and smoothing back her hair. She was in freaking Indianapolis. What did he care where she was?
Nathan’s phone dinged, and he checked it. “Sorry, this will just take a minute. We’re in the thick of a big case. I’m headed back there after this, actually.”
Maya picked up her phone and swiped the message open. Where was she? She’d tell him exactly where she was.
On a date.
There. Not her finest moment, but she felt better, sort of, not really at all, actually. Her breath caught as the ellipses popped up indicating he was typing.
Where?
What did he mean, where?
Downtown Indy. A bar called Preen. Why?
“Sorry about that. I’m all yours.” Nathan smiled at her. “Do you need another one?”
Maya’s wine glass was down to its last few sips. “Sure.”
Nathan waved at the bartender, and then went back to his story. Maya’s phone had gone black again, so she pressed the button. No new messages.
“Do you need to get that?” Nathan asked.
She scratched her head. “Um, let me just check really quickly.” She swiped open her screen, and there sat her message, the last in the thread, no rolling ellipses. That was great. He dropped this bomb on her, completely throwing her off guard for what could otherwise be a…sufficient date, and then disappeared. “Sorry,” she said, putting the phone down. “Please finish your story.”
Nathan went on as Maya struggled to focus on him, her mind back in Bo’s bedroom in Panama City Beach, her legs wrapped around his back as he pumped into her, his head between her legs as he made her feel like some sort of sex goddess, sensations pouring through her, her on her knees while he—
“Hey.”
Maya knocked over her wine glass as she turned to find Bo standing in front of her breathing heavily, his face flushed red.
Nathan picked up the wine glass, which was thankfully almost empty, and dabbed the bar with a stack of beverage napkins. Her mouth was forming the word what, but sound wasn’t coming out behind it. Bo held out his hand to Nathan. “Bo Harrison.”
Nathan shook his hand. “Nathan Edgefield.”
“Nice to meet you,” Bo said. “Y’all care if I sit? I just ran three blocks.”
“Sure,” Nathan said, glancing at Maya for further explanation, but Maya was as mute as a mouse.
Bo pulled a barstool over and sat, each of his knees pointed at Maya and Nathan. The bartender, being a breathing female, was at Bo’s service right away. “What can I get you?”
“I’ll take your finest pilsner on draft, please ma’am.”
The bartender, looking utterly charmed, got right to work. Nathan pointed between the two of them. “So how do you two know each other?”
Bo rubbed his hand over his head. “Oh, well, that’s a funny story.” He turned to Maya. “Do you want to tell it, or should I?”
She glared at him, not sure what he was up to, but not wanting to miss a second of it. “Why don’t you tell it?”
The bartender set Bo’s beer down, and he took it with a wink. “Thank you.”
“Mmm hmm,” she muttered with a look that conveyed he could have anything he wanted from her, and Maya was reminded of exactly why she was here with Nathan and not the beefcake. Except Nathan had cream cheese dripping down the side of his mouth as he shoveled in another appetizer.
Bo took a long drink and then set the glass down. “Goddamn that’s good.”
Nathan, his patience clearly wearing thin, said, “You were saying how you know Maya.”
“Oh, yeah. So she came down to Florida on vacation to visit her friend Sebastian a few weeks ago. Has she told you about him yet?”
“I’ve just met her a half hour ago.” That gave Bo a smile that Maya wanted to smack off his mouth, or flood with kisses, she couldn’t be sure which.
“Well, anyway, she was there to see him, but we met and had this fantastic week of passion-filled romance.” He leaned in. “Best goddamned sex of my life, and I’ve had a lot to compare it to, if you know what I mean.”
Nathan pursed his lips, his face coloring a bit.
“But then I, of course, had to go fuck the whole thing up by ending it before I should have, but my intentions were good.” He turned to Maya. “I assure you of that.”
She just stared at him, not ready for a minute to let him off the hook yet, even though he had traveled seven hundred miles to see her.
“So, as you can imagine, I didn’t want her to leave, but how can I ask her to stay there in Panama City Beach with me? She’s only known me a week. She’s pretty sure I’m not a psycho because her friend Sebastian vouched for me. He’s my friend, too. Did I mention that?”
“No,” Nathan said, crossing his arms over his chest, but still not leaving, surprisingly.
“And on top of all that, she’s got this high-powered job here up north, and I’ve got a small business down in PCB. But I can’t ask her to give up everything in her life to take a chance on me when she’s not even sure if what she feels for me is driven by a week’s worth of mind-blowing sex, or if it’s something that’ll fizzle in a month.” He turned to her. “But see, I’m sure of my feelings for her.”
Her whole body sizzled with heat, tingles running down her arms and through to her fingertips.
“So I moved here,” he said.
Her heartbeat thudded in her chest. “What?”
“Just down the street, actually. I sublet an apartment. I figured if I was gonna live somewhere else for the first time in my life, I wanted the full metropolitan experience.” He lifted his beer mug and took a drink.
Nathan stood. “Well, this would all seem sweet and charming if I didn’t have a brief to write.” He dug in his back pocket.
Bo held up his hand. “I’ll take it from here.”
Nathan pursed his lips and snatched up his suit jacket. “You’re getting off cheap. I usually bill my time at four hundred an hour.”
“Were you gonna leave her with an invoice?” Bo asked. Nathan held up his middle finger as he left, and Bo pointed in his direction, looking at Maya. “You sure you don’t want to chase him down?”
“Bo,” Maya said, a million thoughts running through her head. “You
can’t move here. What about your family? Your nephews? Your business?”
He shrugged. “It’s all taken care of, the business at least. Shayla’s moved home. She told me Saturday after you left. Already had all her stuff packed on a moving truck and shipped to a storage unit in PCB. She didn’t want to tell me before. Said she was a grown-ass woman and didn’t need her baby brother trying to step in and help her.”
“You’re so close with her, and she’s finally home, and now you’re moving here?”
“It’s working out perfect. She’s gonna take over the business for me. She worked for me for years before she moved up to Nashville, so I can’t think of anyone better to do it. She’s even gonna live at my house and take care of Jake.”
Jake, his beloved dog. Just one more reason this couldn’t possibly work. “What about money? Your mortgage there and an apartment here. I’m not trying to be nosey, but—”
“I paid off my house a couple of years ago.”
Her jaw dropped. It was a decent house in what had to be a somewhat expensive area being so close to the beach and all the tourism. “Really?”
He smiled. “Don’t look so surprised. My business may be small but it performs well.”
“I don’t mean to seem surprised. I just…that’s great. Will you work from here?” she asked, as if this was actually happening, when clearly it couldn’t.
“As much as I can. We’ve got everything on a system so I can keep up with inventory and financials that way, manage all the schedules. I do a lot from my laptop at home as it is when I’m too lazy to go in. I’ll see how it goes. If it’s too hard, I’ll just step back and let Shayla take on a bigger role and hire someone else to help her, and I’ll find a job up here.”
“Doing what?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. I’ve got an MBA, and I’ve run a successful business for over a decade now. Surely that’ll land me an interview somewhere.”
“Bo, I can’t let you do this.”
“It’s already done. I knew if I tried to talk to you about this, you’d think too much about it. I’m here. I’ve signed a month-to-month lease on a furnished apartment. If at any time you get sick of me, you can kick me out of town.”
She couldn’t believe this was happening. She couldn’t let him do it, but he already was doing it. Brenda’s talk had meant something to her, but she hadn’t had time to process it yet. She had planned to do that later this evening. But here he was, throwing her a curveball. And everything he’d said had made sense, at least to her.
Seacrest Sunsets (Love Along Hwy 30A Book 2) Page 22