His only focus was this impending marriage and what it would mean for his pockets.
Yes, I wanted Sheffield Technologies. I just didn’t want the stipulations that came with it.
Hearing the voice again, I shut down the computer and scooted back in my chair.
“Hello?” a voice called out.
“Uh, we’re closed,” I said, hurrying from my mother’s office to the front of the building.
I’d assumed that the last person had locked up before leaving. Maybe it was the cleaning staff.
There wasn’t a lot of staff working on Saturdays, but there had been a few to come in.
My mother had left an hour earlier, not feeling well. And all of her other staff left at the decent hours of one, two, and three. It was now almost eight.
Frustration swelled inside of me at the realization that I’d been in the office all alone with the door unlocked all this time.
I wasn’t worried about being the victim of a robbery. There wasn’t anything to steal other than maybe petty cash.
Our little ocean side town seldom saw any crime besides drunk driving or some teen swiping a handful of tomatoes, potatoes, or apples from the open-air market for the fun of it.
Every now and then, old Clyde Wayburn would get arrested for indecent exposure when he would drink too much at O’Malley’s bar and pee by the fountain near the square. But that was the extent of our crime spree.
Or at least it had been before I’d left. I’m sure not much had changed in all these years.
“I wasn’t coming for business,” Lake’s deep drawl curled around me like smoke as I stepped from the shadows.
My heart pumping erratically in jerks and thumps wildly in my chest, while my palms grew warm and clammy denoted a panic attack coming on, but I knew it wasn’t that. The way my thighs were clenching again and the warm flush creeping up my face was quickly becoming an alarmingly normal reaction to Lake Chambers.
“Lake, what are you doing here?” I asked, trying to maintain my composure as I stopped behind a desk for safety purposes.
Because if he touched me just one time, I might rack up a sexual assault charge.
Walking to meet me, he reached inside of his pocket and pulled out a card, flipping it to the back and passing it to me.
“I’m a man of my word. Here’s the information,” he said, wearing a smirk.
“Information?” I asked, looking at the card and back at him.
“Yes, the meeting request for Russell.”
Holding my head up and squaring my shoulders, I accepted the card. “Thanks, Lake. You didn’t need to do this.”
“Do what?”
“Drive down here just to drop this off. You could’ve called him up, you know.”
Snapping his fingers, he said, “You know, I thought about that. But I failed to get his contact information that night. Too bad.” He shook his head as though disappointed in himself.
Twisting my lips, I said, “You could’ve called me and gotten it.”
“How? I don’t have your number anymore either.”
“The same way that you found out I was down here.”
“You’ve got a point there,” he said, leaning across the desk and forcing me to back up.
“Running again,” he noted.
The way he leaned over the desk was so imperceptible, almost unseen, but somehow it closed the distance between us, making me wonder if we’d been this close all along. The distance wasn’t the only thing that felt infinitesimal, so was the breathing space. It took several seconds before I noticed that my chest was heaving as if someone had vacuumed all the oxygen from the room.
“I’m not running,” I said while walking around the desk.
“You act as if you’re scared of me.”
“What would make you think that, Lake?” I asked frowning.
“You seem uncomfortable in my presence. But I don’t think that it’s just my presence that frightens you. I think it’s what I make you feel.”
“You don’t make me feel anything, Lake. It was just a kiss,” I scoffed.
“Oh? Then why is your breathing erratic? Your chest is rising and falling...struggling for air as though there isn’t enough in the room. And the way you’ve clenched your fists and jaws, it looks to me as if you’re wrestling with yourself for control,” he said, jutting that arrogant chin in my direction.
Unclenching my fists, I rubbed my hands up and down my arms, surprised to feel chills on my arms.
“It’s the shock. I didn’t expect anyone to be here this late at night, so it caught me off guard, at first.”
“You sure? It seems like there might be something else,” he declared.
“There’s nothing wrong, Lake. I’ve just got a lot on my mind preparing to take on this business and doing some projects for Mom. Please...don’t read anything into this situation that there’s not,” I said. “So, if that’s all, I need to lock up around here and get going.”
“There’s something more that you can do to help me.”
It scared me to ask what I could help with, so instead, I stared at him indignantly, trying my best to relax my posture. But I couldn’t. I was scared to breathe in Lake’s presence, scared of what he made me feel, and even more afraid to acknowledge it.
“You’re not going to ask me what.”
“No, I’m not, because I don’t think that I can assist you.”
“You can. You can start by allowing me to take you out to dinner.”
Shaking my head rapidly, I said, “That won’t be possible.”
“Why not?” he asked, tilting his head sideways as if he were trying to figure me out. An evasive enigma.
“Lake, you’re unfair. I have a fiancé now, and I don’t think it would be fair to him if I
