“You called for me?” she asked politely, standing in the doorway to his office, not daring to come inside.
Brett looked up from the file folder he was reading and nodded his head towards an empty chair in front of his desk, indicating that she should take a seat.
Instead of taking the chair, Antonia stepped into the office but only a few feet.
Brett noticed her defiance and his mouth thinned in frustration. “Close the door,” he snapped.
“I’d rather…”
“I don’t care what you’d rather, shut it,” he interrupted and turned to face the window, assuming she would follow his orders immediately.
Antonia did but only because she wanted to have it out with Brett and didn’t want his other employees to hear the conversation.
As soon as the door closed, Brett swung around and glared at her. “Ok, tell me what the hell is going on.”
Antonia bristled at his tone. “Well, let’s see, I’m working on a project…” “Not about your work. Why are you avoiding me?”
Antonia’s raised an eyebrow sardonically. “Why would you think I’m avoiding you? And how could I possibly do that?” she snapped, her anger rising as she thought about her circumstance. “Our rehearsal dinner is in exactly one week, our wedding is the next day. Apparently I have the whole day off next Friday and the following two weeks which I didn’t know about until this morning when Kim mentioned it to me.”
“It’s for our honeymoon!”
“Well, thanks for asking me!” she snapped right back.
Brett leaned both hands against his desk and glared at her. “What’s going on? I know you love me so what’s your issue with this wedding?”
His comment took all the wind out of her. And in a small voice, she replied, “No one asked me.”
“Excuse me?”
Antonia took a deep breath to control the sudden need to cry. “You never asked me to marry you. You just told me.”
“Because you would have said no,” Brett replied, his voice softer as he took in the hurt expression on her face.
Antonia nodded. “Yes, I probably would have.”
“Why?” he demanded.
“I explained all this before. I’ve spent my whole life being controlled by my father or my brothers. Everyone has always told me what was in my best interest. But no one ever asked or trusted me to know what was in my best interest.”
“That’s not true,” Brett started only to be interrupted by her.
“Yes, it is true,” she said, nodding her head forcefully. “Look at how you got me here. You took control of my bank account, my stock portfolio and got my brothers to make sure I couldn’t depend on my trust fund for money. I’m completely at your mercy.”
Brett shook his head and came around the desk to stand right in front of her. “Believe it or not, I didn’t do any of those things. But I’m grateful for your brothers for doing them since it pushed you right towards me,” he said. Antonia blinked back the tears. “You didn’t?”
Brett shook his head and crossed his arms over his chest. “Nope.”
“Then, why…who…?”
“I’m guessing your brothers finally found out all of your secrets and manipulated everything themselves. But I promise I had no prior knowledge of anything they were doing,” he said.
As she thought back to the conversations with the bank managers, all of them had mentioned one of her brothers. Antonia had just assumed that Brett had set them up to it. And then her face brightened again when she realized that he trusted her to work in his company.
“So, you weren’t trying to control me?”
Brett shook his head. “No. But if you’d left, I would have dragged you back here,” he corrected.
That took some of the wind out of her sails. “Why?”
Brett took one of her hands and pulled her closer to him. “We’ve already had this discussion. You would have been running away from me, and from what I can make you feel.”
Antonia couldn’t deny that anymore.
“Are you going to stop avoiding me?” he said, lowering his head to kiss her.
“I don’t know,” she replied, lifting her head to meet his kiss.
Brett growled in response. “You’re going to drive me crazy,” he said and kissed her passionately.
A few minutes later, he raised his head. “Will you marry me?”
Antonia examined the face she loved so much it hurt. “I need to ask you a question first.”
Brett sighed deeply. “Ok, what’s the question?” he said and leaned back against his desk, bringing her with him so she was standing between his long legs. “How do you feel about kids?”
Brett shrugged his shoulders. “I love them. I want lots of them,” he replied immediately.
Antonia nodded her head, accepting his answer. “I do too.” She was looking at the buttons on his shirt, afraid of what she had to tell him now, worried that he meant having babies later rather than sooner.
“So are there any other issues or can I kidnap you for the rest of the afternoon and make love to you?”
Antonia laughed, liking the idea but wanting to get her news out first. “Well, there’s something you should know.”
“If I agree to it, will you finally agree to marry me?”
“I’m pregnant,” she said bluntly, then held her breath while she waited for his reaction.
Brett’s stunned expression lasted for only a few moments. Then a huge grin started on his face, growing to a wide smile that ended with him throwing his head back and laughing. “So all this week, you really were sleeping?”
Antonia nodded, feeling more free than she ever had in her life. “Yes,” she said.
Brett stilled. A moment later, he pulled her shoulders back so he could look into her eyes. “Yes?”
“Yes, I’ve been falling asleep early each night. Yes, I’ve also been avoiding you for fear of your reaction. Yes, I’ll marry you. And yes, I love you.”
“Thank God! I’ve been waiting for you to admit that for weeks!” he laughed. “I’m glad that we have a wedding already planned. Otherwise, you’d be flying out to Reno tonight.”
“Brett…”Antonia started, feeling shy once again.