Valentine's Dream: Love Changes EverythingSweet SensationMade in Heaven Page 14

“Unbelievable!” he exploded and she could hear him breathe deeply and imagined that he was asking the one tired plant in his office rhetorical questions.

  “How am I supposed to get this done if he keeps screwing everybody we work with? Is he trying to kill me? Send me to the unemployment line in the company limousine?” Craig’s breath expelled and she lowered her cup.

  The phone buzzed in her ear as he released the hold.

  “I suppose it’s too late to reserve the room again at that same hotel?”

  Neesie gave him a ten for control. He didn’t sound as if he’d just thrown a tantrum.

  “Yes.”

  “And you’ve looked into other hotels?”

  “I have. We only have about four weeks left.”

  His chair creaked as he dropped into it. “Don’t remind me.”

  “Waymon Stadler can’t ruin this event any more than he already has, Craig. We’re going to make this fund-raiser a success, not him. All we have to do is find another location, hire caterers, a band and make sure everyone has costumes.”

  “What happened to the caterer?”

  “I haven’t gotten a call back. But Craig, I’ve worked with Hannah before and she’s reliable.”

  “You’re dreaming if you think we can pull this off within the budget in four weeks.”

  The budget? She wouldn’t go there. Not today. “Oh, ye of little faith. Have some confidence. Besides, doesn’t the challenge of being the underdog excite you?”

  Craig laughed for the first time since they started talking. “Only when I’m betting on a sure thing.”

  Neesie grinned. “We’ll win, Craig. Aren’t you just breathless?”

  This time his laughter was full throttle.

  “Swearing leaves me breathless. Among other things.” The implication lay before her and she wondered if he’d elaborate.

  “Like what?” This was the side of Craig she liked.

  “Sports.”

  “Sports.” Neesie couldn’t bite back a chuckle. She couldn’t help but wonder if they’d ever get into a little body to body, hand to hand... She sighed. Nothing serious. He was leaving soon.

  “You leave me breathless, Neesie.”

  She relished the shift in conversation. She almost didn’t even recognize her own voice. “I wondered if I’d imagined last week.”

  “No, you didn’t. But it wouldn’t be fair for me to pursue something that can’t go anywhere. I’m planning on taking the promotion if they offer it to me.”

  If she didn’t care, then why did she already miss him? Why was her heart pounding and her throat tight? She tried to sound optimistic without revealing how good an actress she really was.

  “That’s what you’re supposed to do. You got to work to eat, my daddy used to say.” She smoothly changed the subject. “Since we missed our date Wednesday, let’s get together after you get off tonight. I heard about a building that might be perfect for this fund-raiser.”

  “A building? What kind of building?”

  “The type with four walls and doors. It’s amazing how people classify those types of things these days.”

  “You’re a laugh a minute. What time?”

  “What time can you get here?”

  “Five-thirty.”

  “I’ll be waiting.”

  * * *

  Neesie gave up working an hour later and dug into the freezer and pulled out her favorite ice cream. Scooping up a spoonful, she sucked and waited as the flavor slid over her taste buds and down her throat. Pulling out a cheesecake, she dropped it into the refrigerator and scooped up another spoonful of ice cream.

  Craig was interested in her and she shared his feelings.

  What was the problem? He was leaving.

  If she had to choose, she couldn’t have chosen a better male distraction.

  Men didn’t stay with her anyway. She was too unpredictable. Too eager to pursue life when they were interested only in breathing. She didn’t have time for brothas who preferred their armchair to her.

  She and Craig shared other interests. Craig likes sports and he worked out. Not only at in-office basketball, but when he’d taken her to the hairdresser she’d spotted a health club parking sticker on the windshield of his Acura.

  So he worked out a little, took his job too seriously, was somewhat complicated and had wanted to get to know her better.

  Enjoy the moment, she convinced herself. Soon he would leave and it would all be over anyway.

  Neesie dragged on her winter coat, hat and scarf and was pulling on her gloves when the headlights of Craig’s car reflected off the windows. She opened the front door a little and rushed back to her office for her briefcase and the directions.

  Craig was in the hallway when she sprinted back.

  “Hey.” Breathless, she stopped in front of him.

  His appreciative gaze stroked her. His right eyebrow raised. “You ready?”

  “I’m ready. I’ve got the directions. Why don’t you put your car on the street and I’ll drive. It’ll be easier than me reading the directions to you.”

  “That’s cool.”

  He stooped, looking around her face and behind her back.

  She turned, looking over her shoulder. “What? What are you looking at?”

  “I’m checking to make sure you don’t have any surprises under that hat.”

  Neesie held the door, glad to see him. “I promise you, there’s nothing under here you haven’t already seen.”

  He flipped the brim on the velour hat and caught sight of several bronze strands of hair. In the fading twilight she glanced at his silver-and-gold banded watch, and allowed his cologne to wreak havoc with her senses. He fixed her hat and winked. “Quality control.”

  The drive took forty-five minutes. Neesie checked the address again and wondered if her life could get any worse. The building they sat outside of was a crack house. Unsavory types drifted in and out of broken crevices and streams of late-model cars stopped at the corners to the east and west of them.

  “I don’t understand. This is the address the Realtor gave me. I told her specifically I wanted a building that was old, but in good condition. One with character.”

  “This has character all right.” Craig motioned as someone covered in black approached the driver window. “Let’s go.”

  The second building wasn’t better and the third had been marked off with condemned tape. Silence engulfed the Volvo station wagon as they drove through the hotel district in Avery and then headed toward Atlanta.

  Neesie was afraid to look at Craig, afraid of what she might see. He’d said this wouldn’t go off and it looked like he was right. No matter how much she wanted the fund-raiser to be spectacular, she knew it wouldn’t be without the proper facility.

  “Anymore buildings on your list?” he asked, quietly.

  “No, but I can get some more tomorrow. We’ll have to expand our search area. I’ll do this every night until we find the perfect place.” Optimism was something she’d always clung to, but Neesie felt a false cheer invade her. “Craig, I have to be straight with you. We can keep looking, but we might run out of choices and we have to know something before tomorrow afternoon. I have to have a head count when I talk to the caterer and for the printer, as well.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “I’m saying let’s not close off any options. Including Mr. Stadler’s mansion.”

  “Neesie—”

  “I know how you feel about it. But it’s the best thing we’ve got going.”

  “Let’s exhaust all our other options then go to him if we have no other choice. I don’t want him to think we don’t have our act together. How about dinner?”

  She got the hint and headed toward her favorite restaurant in Atlanta.

  * * *

  The drive back to her house was smooth as snow flurries danced around the windshield. Only once did she hit a pothole.

  Throughout dinner Neesie discovered she and Craig shared interests in investi
ng, sports and the best local gym to work out in. The couple next to them argued politics, but they agreed to stay far away from that subject.

  Then Craig had delighted her with tales of his family. His mother and father lived out west, his brother, two sisters and their spouses were north.

  He was the successful one if success was measured by a person’s job.

  The ties with his family weren’t close, but they did bind and she was glad to hear him speak with reverence and respect about them.

  She tried not to give too much of her family’s quirks away but soon found him laughing as she shared their antics and their fun. She loved them and would never leave them.

  “I’ll never leave them.” The words slipped out just as she parked in her garage and shut the door. The light overhead cast a halo around the car and they sat cocooned in the private chamber.

  “Never is a long time.”

  “It sure is. I like living here. Don’t you ever imagine settling down in one town?” Careful, a little voice inside her warned. Like politics, this is forbidden territory.

  “Sure. But my career has to get past the first hurdle. I can’t provide the way I want to until I’m where I want to be, dollar and position wise.” He released his seat belt and Neesie did the same.

  They got out. His voice was silky smooth. “You turnin’ in?”

  “I think I might have some coffee. Want some?”

  He quirked his lip and nodded. “Yeah, I’d like that.”

  The cheesecake she’d defrosted earlier was perfect and Neesie quickly thawed some strawberries. She’d seated Craig in the den off her kitchen and took an opportunity to sneak quick glances at him while she prepared the tray.

  “Need any help?” he asked, examining her record collection.

  “I got it. Just one sec.”

  Tonight he had on black pants and a dark tab-collared shirt. He wore a gray jacket over the ensemble yet she was sure he hadn’t worn this outfit to work. The style was too casual and informal.

  This was another side of him. One she didn’t know well. They were moving into territory that wasn’t fitting in an office environment.

  Neesie wondered if he realized the shift in mood. His dark eyes caught hold of hers and she realized he did know. She brought the tray to the table and set it down. He leaned the Teddy Pendegrass album he’d been holding against the table.

  His arms circled her waist and hers drifted around his neck.

  She gave him a chance to back away, and he, her. When it was understood each wanted to be where they were, they moved together and touched.

  His lips were gentle and warm and smooth. So smooth as they moved across hers in provocative form, her knees grew weak wanting more. Neesie opened her lips slightly, tasting him with her tongue, letting another sense take over and give her details on the man who held her close.

  His large hands glided up her back bringing her up against him and onto her toes as his tongue laved her in strong sensual strokes. His hands palmed her shoulders, drifting around her neck until they cupped her cheeks.

  She lifted her lids with much effort and noticed his eyes were half shut. She smiled.

  His eyes drifted open. “Something funny?”

  “You kiss with your eyes closed.”

  “No, I don’t.”

  “It’s very sexy.”

  His arms circled her back and he drew back looking down at her. “It is? According to whom?”

  “Me, of course.”

  He moved close and before his lips met hers said, “Open your eyes, Neesie.”

  Neesie did as instructed. Before he was finished making a form of love to her mouth, she knew what was sexier.

  Eventually they broke away and regained a degree of composure.

  “Let’s drink our coffee so you can go home.”

  They sat on the floor in front of the couch drinking coffee, eating cheesecake and talking, and not once did Craig suggest they check the score of the latest game or fall asleep while she explained her brief trek into anthropology the summer she turned sixteen.

  He had possibility, she knew as she curled her back against the sofa.

  “Where did you grow up?”

  “Chicago. West side down by Cortez.”

  “Mmm, Chicago. I’ve been there. Nice place.”

  “You’ve been to Chicago,” he challenged.

  “I’ve been to Chicago. Why?” Neesie couldn’t keep her smart mouth in check. She gave him a bold stare.

  “You’ve probably been as far as the Gucci store in the Water Tower. You probably haven’t seen the real Chicago.”

  “What’s the ‘real’ Chicago? The el train snaking around downtown? A Bulls game? I was there when Michael Jordan and Larry Bird played against each other for the last time. I even survived a winter. Got a T-shirt to prove it.”

  “You’re jokin’? You lived there?”

  She nodded. “For exactly one year. I did an internship with The Chicago Academy of Sciences. I wanted to study anthropology and they had an internship available. I liked the culture of the city.”

  Craig smirked, shaking his head. “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.”

  She shook her head in agreement. “I wish I could visit there more often. ’Course, I love Avery, too.”

  He leaned back, sitting his coffee cup on the low table and picked up a rare album jacket. Louis Armstrong and W. C. Handy had taken Teddy’s place and pulsed in the background. Craig’s big hands smoothed over the album cover as if it were a baby. He studied it a while longer, his eyelashes low against his cheek, his shoulders bumping slightly to the beat. Then he leaned it carefully against the paint-chipped table and turned to look at her.

  “What’s so great about Avery?” he asked.

  “My family is here. I grew up playing under the train viaduct off Powers Street. My sister and I used to run through fields of grass and laugh and play imaginary games all day long. Did you know Avery still has a half-acre ordinance for property owners?

  “They don’t chop up the lots here and parcel them out by the quarter acre the way they do in other cities.” She shrugged, regarding him.

  “So you stay in Avery because you get more property for your money?”

  Neesie felt herself grinning and gave him a dubious smile. “No. I stay because I don’t see a reason to leave. I’ve had friends leave here and they struggle without their extended families to lend a helping hand or to just kick back and hang out with. Kind of like we’re doing now.”

  “But we’re not family.”

  “Ain’t that the truth. My family is cuter than you. Just joking.”

  His eyes widened and he blinked. “You could give a brotha a complex.”

  “Not you. You know you’re handsome. So we don’t have to call in a therapist yet.” Neesie let her eyes drift half closed and regarded him as he regarded her. “Do you want a wife, children?”

  He rested his elbow up on the couch and played with the fringe of her sweater. “Yeah. A couple of rugrats would be nice.”

  “I imagine you with, oh, five kids.”

  “You must be trippin’.” Craig laughed deeply. “Two, three at the most.”

  “All boys?”

  “Is that another ‘I’m getting ready to slam Craig’ question?”

  Neesie pushed hair from her eyes. “Nooo. I asked because most men want males to carry on their name.”

  He shrugged. “I don’t care. Nowadays girls keep their names, too. I just want them healthy and good. How about you?” He looked over at her. “I bet you want a bunch of little girls to dress up—”

  Neesie was already shaking her head. “I want three boys. Rough, tough, dirty and loud. And I’ll name one Ricky after my father, and Chester after my grandfather and Emerson after my great-grandfather.”

  “What about your husband? Wouldn’t he have a say in the matter?”

  “Sure.” She sipped her cool coffee. “He’d agree with me.”

  He laughed again, the smooth soun
d washing her with warmth.

  “What else?”

  “What? What else?” Neesie giggled. “That’s what I want.” She defended herself all the while laughing, barely able to contain the tale she was concocting.

  “So you want three monsters. What other plans do you have for your delinquents?”

  “I’d let them wear shorts to church, and I’d let them eat candy whenever they wanted.”

  “You have issues, Ms. Neesie. Don’t tell me you always had to wear dresses and never had candy as a child?”

  “All the time and I hated it.”

  The current song ended and Neesie pushed the remote for the CD player and soft jazz filled the room. “So what’s your mission in life, Craig?”

  Craig drew one knee up and rested his forearm on it. He gave her the rundown on his current job. And she couldn’t help but think he talked about his career as if it were a marriage.

  “I plan to make vice president soon, do that for four years, then open my own employment agency featuring online interviewing. I’ve done some research and California is a great place to start a business like that. I’ll keep expanding until the company is where I want it to be.”

  “Wow,” she said, awed and sad, too. California was never far from his mind or hers. “You’ve got it all worked out, don’t you?”

  “I’ve been thinking about this for a long time. It’s my dream.” He sat back and lifted her hand. “What about you? What’s your mission in life?”

  Neesie talked about her goals for her business but, like Craig, avoided mention of personal desires. We’re both young, she kept telling herself. But so alike.

  When she expressed an interest in working with teenage girls who needed job experience, Craig confessed to working with adults who couldn’t read.

  She teased him when he alluded to the fact that he lacked patience for knucklehead employees and had to grab her side when he told tales of his worst interviews.

  It was easy to amuse Craig with stories of her worst party disasters, drunken guests and difficult hosts. Present company excluded, she added as an afterthought. He took her humor in stride and Neesie was glad.

  Finally in the wee morning hours, he got up to leave and kissed her softly on her temple.

  Later, Neesie lay in bed and asked God, why did He send her a man she could love when He knew Craig was going to leave her?