It was a car horn blaring that broke them apart. Antonia’s face turned red with embarrassment. She’d never kissed a man like that, nor had she ever been kissed in that way. She’d definitely kissed other men, but none had affected her mind and soul the way the past few minutes had.
“I have to go,” Antonia said, pushing against his chest. She was grateful that he let her, as she slipped away, down the street and turned the corner just as she heard him call her name. She started running, panicking that he’d come after her. She needed to get away. She didn’t know how to deal with the feelings that were coursing through her body, but she needed time, lots of time, to figure things out.
Chapter 4
Brett was too dazed to do anything but let her push him away. But as soon as he realized that she wasn’t just stepping away from him to go around his car and get in, that she was actually running down the street and turning a corner, he called out to her.
“What the hell is she doing?” he asked, going after her.
He ran over to the same street she’d turned down only moments before, but there was no sign of her. She’d already disappeared.
“Dammit!” he said and headed back to his car.
Why in the world would she have run away after a kiss like that? What sort of hang-up did she have that she needed to escape from the most intense moment of desire he’d ever experienced? And he knew she’d felt the same way. He’d seen it in her eyes when she’d pushed against his chest.
Pulling out of the parking space, Brett tried to control his temper. He sped through the streets of Washington back to his office, trying to figure her out. She wouldn’t go out to dinner with him, she wouldn’t discuss her family situation with him, and she ran away whenever he spurred the smallest amount of passion within her. What kind of woman was she? Certainly not like any of the women he’d been with before.
Brett resolved to get her out of his mind. She wasn’t worth the trouble. He had a schedule to keep and she’d already interrupted it too many times. None of them were really her fault, but each time he saw her, he canceled meetings or appointments. He couldn’t afford to do that for long. Sooner or later, things would catch up to him. He had a multi-national corporation to run. He didn’t have time to chase after a silly woman who was too afraid of her own desires.
Storming into his office, he took the messages Beatrice handed to him and the files for his next meeting. He tried to concentrate on the pages in front of him, but they were all a blur. He was too furious to concentrate.
Taking a deep breath, he walked over to the bar in the corner of his office and poured a large measure of bourbon, tossing an ice cube into it as well. But the ice didn’t have time to cool the liquor. He threw the glass back and swallowed the brown liquid, grateful for the burn it caused.
Grabbing the file folders again, he forced himself to head down the hallway to the conference room. He refused to let that woman disrupt the rest of his afternoon.
But as he walked by Beatrice’s office, he stopped for a moment. He made a decision. “Get Jimmy on the phone. Set up a meeting for tomorrow if possible,” he said. Jimmy was the head of a private detective agency his company had used in the past.
Feeling better, he walked down the hallway, some of his calm control coming back to him. By the time the other members of the meeting were seated, he was back in control again.
Antonia refused to think about him. She wouldn’t let her mind wander long enough for Brett Hancock to enter her mind. She kept herself so busy over the next two weeks she didn’t have time to daydream about him.
Unfortunately, she couldn’t get him out of her mind completely. He came back to her, every night, no matter how exhausted she was. Each night, she relived that last kiss, as well as the following desire that had consumed her for hours. Each morning she woke up with the sheets wrapped around her as she tried to shake off the desire that overwhelmed her, hot all over from yet another dream where she made love with Brett.
Every night, she worked harder and harder in the hope of becoming too exhausted to dream. But each morning, she woke up before dawn, knowing that he’d been with her for the past few hours, if only in her mind.
She spent hours in the library researching companies, finding out about their debt ratio, capital expansion plans, locating their previous year’s annual report. Anything she could to keep her mind busy and on her goal of independence.
She went to church the following Sunday with the family, but skipped the afternoon lunch, knowing that her brothers were looking for another chance to corner her and convince her that she should move back into the house with Sal.
And anywhere she went, she made sure that she wasn’t followed. Whenever she left the house, she rode her motorcycle to the nearest mall, then got on a bus to meet one of her aunts or cousins, all of whom were worried about her and took her out to lunch as often as possible. They always had a present for her, and it was usually some form of clothing or jewelry, whatever her brothers thought would appease her and draw her back into the fold.
She never took the same route home, and was careful to check behind her to make sure she wasn’t being followed. If she knew her brothers, and she did, they had probably hired a private detective to find out where she lived and worked.
There were a few occasions that she suspected someone was watching her, but the feeling only lasted for a moment. She was almost always with one of her aunts and it was difficult for her to believe that her brothers would spy on her when she was with a family member.
It was Monday night when she heard from Sal again. He phoned her apartment and left a message on her answering machine. Antonia sat on the sofa and listened to him talking to her machine, afraid to answer it and talk to him. So she continued polishing a new, silver candlestick she’d found at a flea market Saturday morning before work.
She placed the now shiny candlestick on the dresser that held the television set then walked over to her answering machine. message, shaking her head in frustration.
“Antonia, it’s Sal. I was hoping She pressed the button to replay the
you could accompany me to the company’s annual spring gala this Saturday night. I’ll expect you at the house by five so we can all have dinner at Chez Francois. I bought you a ticket and there’s a dress waiting for you at Saks. I hope you like it,” he said and hung up the phone.
Sal just assumed she’d be at the house on the appointed night. And the awful thing about it was, she would be there. The party was five days away, and he’d already picked out a dress for her to wear, something appropriate she suspected. It never occurred to him that she might be able to afford to buy her own dress. Well, she couldn’t but that wasn’t the point, she told herself. He didn’t even ask; he just assumed.