An Unintentional Affair (The Affair Series Book 1) (2 page)

TJ’s was almost empty, and
they were beginning to close up. We took the last satisfying sips of wine and walked
out into the cool night air. In the course of our conversation, I’d learned
that Adam was temporarily living in a hotel a few blocks from me while his loft
was being renovated. He insisted on walking me back to my apartment, even
though it was a bit out of his way.

“I would never forgive
myself if something happened to you walking alone this late at night,” he said
gallantly.

The flutter in my
stomach returned in a big way, and the wine made me feel a little lightheaded
and giddy. I smiled at him. “Have it your way.”

“I’d like that,” he
said suggestively.

The thought of him
“having his way” with me suddenly sent images racing through my mind like a
high-speed slide show. It had been a while since I was with a man, and the
thought of his hard, toned body and velvety hands all over me was a tantalizing
fantasy. He put his arm around me and pulled me close, his natural fragrance
wafting in my direction. It was intoxicating.

When we reached the
street-level door of my apartment building, he slid his arm under my jacket and
around my waist, drawing me close. I could feel his hardness pressing through
the layers of clothes between us.

I peered up at him as he
held my cheek in his hand. “Thank you for a lovely evening, Ms. Ryan.” He
kissed me gently. The power of his kiss shot through me like a lightning bolt. Oh,
my God, I was putty in his arms. “Can I have the pleasure of your company for
dinner Friday night?” he asked.

“Dinner? Friday? I,
uh…”

He put his forefinger
over my lips to stop me from talking. “Just say yes. I would love to hear more
about your food fetishes.” He grinned and kissed me again, licking my lips and
holding me a little tighter.

His kiss dug deep into
my soul, pulling my heart into my throat. “Yes, I‘d be happy to have dinner
with you Friday, Mr. Comstock,” I said, returning to my flirtatious tone.

He handed me a business
card and pulled his phone from his breast pocket. “May I have your number?” I
rattled off my cell number as he entered it in his. “I’ll pick you up here at
seven.” He kissed my hand and said good night.

Bolting up the stairs to
my little apartment two steps at a time, I was beaming from ear to ear. When I got
inside, I flopped down on the couch, trembling with desire for him.
What the
hell just happened?  Where did this man come from? And what about that kiss!
 I stared at his business card. I knew nothing about this mysterious man who
had just parachuted into my life. I grabbed my iPad and typed his name into the
search box. There were hundreds of results, but none of them instantly jumped
out at me as my Adam Comstock.
My Adam Comstock
. I liked the sound of
that.

It was getting late so
I abandoned the search and headed for bed. Before I turned out the light, I had
to text my best friend Bec. She was never going to believe this:
Met the hot
& gorgeous man of my dreams 2nite. Can’t wait 2 tell u.

In the darkness, the
anticipation of being with him Friday was almost more than I could bear. It was
only Wednesday. It would be forty-three hours before I saw him again. The wait
would be torture, but I had a feeling it would be worth every minute.

**

That electrifying kiss
on my doorstep filled my dreams. I was so distracted by it before going to bed that
I had forgotten to set my alarm, making me late for work. When I arrived at the
studio, there was no one in the front area of the office. I called to Clint and
Sam, the other full-time assistant, to see if either of them was around. Neither
answered. As I walked over to my desk, I saw a bouquet of brightly colored wild-flowers
and a bottle of wildflower honey with a ribbon around it. I couldn’t help but
grin. The card read, “Looking forward to seeing your wild flowers bloom. I’m
sure the honey from them will taste very sweet.”

Clint came out from the
direction of the warehouse. I was blushing. “Is
he
the reason you’re
late?” Clint asked.

“Who?”

“The guy who delivered
the flowers. He certainly was
not
a messenger,” Clint said.

“He was
here
?!”

“Almost an hour ago. I
didn’t hear him come in. I guess he was looking for you or someone to leave the
flowers with, and he was almost in the back when I saw him. I had my hands full,
so I told him to leave them on your desk. He was dressed in a very expensive
suit, so I knew he wasn’t a messenger.”

Wow! Adam Comstock had
taken the time to buy me flowers and honey and bring them to the office. It was
barely 10:30 in the morning.

“You didn’t answer my
question,” Clint said, breaking my train of thought. “Is he the reason you’re
late?” He wasn’t mad exactly - he was almost teasing me.

“Well, no, not really. I
mean, I guess, sort of…indirectly.” We had been out late, but not
that
late. I was just absentminded after he left me quivering like jelly at my front
door.

Clint chimed in again, “Well,
whatever, we’ve got to get some work done. All of the shots from yesterday have
to be formatted and categorized ASAP. Oh, and Clay Orwell is sending a
messenger to pick up this painting and drop off another one.” He leaned a small
crate against the wall by my desk. Clay Orwell was an up-and-coming artist
Clint was helping out by taking some shots of his work for his portfolio. I
thought it was a little rude of Clay not to come by with the paintings himself
and offer to help Clint shoot them. He had a day job and couldn’t break free to
help, but it still seemed like an awfully big favor to ask, considering this was
what Clint did for a living. I figured they must have had some “arrangement.”

I took a moment to text
Adam and thank him for the flowers:
Mr. C. U r funny. So u think I’m wild?
;) We’ll c. C u 2morrow.

Clint passed by my desk
again and was getting irritated. “Do you just want to take the whole day off
and go play with Mr. Wonderful?”

SEND!
  The “thank you” was safely in cyberspace.

“No, sir,” I said, and
quickly got to work.

**

The hard drive
containing all the shots of the oils was spinning. My job was to make sure the
color representation was as accurate as possible, crop the photos, add the
metadata, and format them for the catalogues. It was a luxury for me to be able
to see these paintings up close while we photographed them and have this time
to study them in detail while I cleaned them up for the catalogues. One by one,
I reveled in the works of the masters as I prepped each photo to beckon
potential buyers.

After about half an
hour, the messenger arrived with Clay’s new work. Peter, the messenger, was a
stocky fireplug of a guy, strong as an ox, and always decked out in his bicycle
messenger regalia with tattoos visible on every inch of bare skin. He was so
serious all the time. One day when he was making a delivery, I tried to lighten
him up a little by striking up a conversation, but all I gleaned from that was
his name. He quickly swapped the two crates by my desk and loaded up the
enormous satchel he carried on his back. The paintings weren’t very large, but they
were bulky to be carrying on his back on a bicycle. As he looked up to leave,
he spotted the Gauguin on my monitor. He gazed at it for a moment, smiled ever
so slightly, and said, “Sweet.” That was the most emotion I had ever seen in
him. I tried to ask him about his interest in the painting, but he was out the
door and on the elevator in a flash. Really odd guy, that Peter.

I buzzed Sam on the
intercom and let him know the painting was there. He was another odd one. I actually
had a crush on him when I first started working for Clint. Sam was very fit, with
olive skin, soft brown eyes, and thick, wavy black hair. He seemed a little
aloof when I first got there. I realized after a few weeks he was just
painfully shy, but he was attracted to me. He gradually got up the nerve to ask
me out, and I was very excited about the date. It didn’t go well, though. He
was extremely awkward and difficult to talk with. After that evening, I
suggested that perhaps it would be best if we remained friends based on our
work relationship. At the time he seemed almost relieved, but since then he’d
been chilly toward me. Apparently I had bruised his ego when I bowed out of any
kind of potential romantic interlude.

Sam emerged from the
warehouse, grabbed the painting, and started to head back. The warehouse was
his domain. He tinkered in there for hours, repairing and maintaining all the
photo equipment so it would be ready to go at a moment’s notice. He was visibly
uncomfortable when anyone went in there, which was why I called him to come and
get the painting rather than taking it to him. I didn’t want to go in there as
much as he didn’t want me there. “So, Emily, I see you have a new boyfriend,”
Sam said with some annoyance in his voice.

“He’s not my boyfriend.
I just met him last night,” I responded, trying to get back to my work.

“Uh-huh. He seemed
awfully disappointed that you weren’t here when he brought the flowers this
morning. And what’s with the honey?” he asked.

I was sure I was
blushing from head to toe. “Oh, the honey was something we talked about last
night. I had never tried this kind before, and he thought I might enjoy it,” I
said, trying to sound nonchalant about it.

“Uh-huh.” He wasn’t buying
the story. “So are you going to see him again?”

“Maybe…probably. What
difference does it make?” Now I was getting annoyed.

“None, absolutely
none
!”
Sam shouted, then marched back to the warehouse and slammed the door.

His outburst surprised
me. I had no idea Sam had any feelings for me other than as a co-worker. We
were barely even friends, since he kept so much to himself. There was too much
work to do to worry about it. I’d deal with him later.

Around four-thirty I
finished up the photos from the Wednesday shoot. I felt bad that I had gotten
annoyed with Sam prodding me about Adam. I didn’t dislike him after our first date.
There just wasn’t any spark between us. It was never going to be a fit, so I
put things back on neutral ground before anything got uncomfortable. It had never
occurred to me that he might still be interested in seeing me socially.

I poked my head in the
warehouse and called to him. “Sam?”

“Yeah, what’s up?” he
asked as he moved toward the door, protecting his lair.

“I just wanted to
apologize for being short with you earlier when you asked me about Adam. I’ve
only seen him once, and it was a chance meeting. I don’t even know what to
think about it myself.”

“Uh-huh,” he said,
seeming annoyed that I was trying to apologize for my life.

“Well, I didn’t want
you to think it was some big romance or anything…I mean….” I was reaching for
words, trying to get back on some sort of even turf with Sam.

“You don’t have to
explain anything to me,” he said tersely. “You’ve made it pretty clear you
don’t want to have anything to do with me unless it has to do with this damn
job.”

“That’s not it at all.
I just didn’t think we were necessarily romantically suited for each other. I
like you a lot and consider you a friend.” It was a stretch, but I had to say
something to try to patch things up. I had to work with him, and if he was
going to hold a grudge, it wasn’t going to be fun or easy.

“You do?” He was
genuinely surprised.

“Of course I do. I know
we don’t spend much time together outside work, but I’ve always enjoyed your
company and think you’re very smart.” I was reaching again, but it seemed to be
helping his mood.

“Really? You never told
me that before,” he said, again with surprise in his voice.

“There’s never really been
an opportunity to tell you. Whenever we’re in the thick of shooting, it isn’t
the right time. There haven’t been too many opportunities to have anything but
a work-related conversation.”

He was obviously
calming down. “Okay, that’s cool,” he said with more confidence in his voice
than I had heard before. He paused for a moment, then added, “If you do see
that guy again and he
ever
gives you a hard time, you call me, okay?” His
tone had shifted and was now almost cocky.

“You bet I will. Thank
you, Sam. I appreciate you looking out for me,” I said, patting him on the
shoulder.

“Yeah, sure.” A little
smile was creeping on his face. In that moment I realized I hadn’t ever really
seen Sam smile.

**

My mood Friday was
unmistakably elevated. I was on a high thinking about seeing Adam again. Of
course, after my conversation with Clint Thursday morning, he knew why I was so
giddy. Around lunchtime, he said, “You really are taken with that guy, aren’t
you?”

I just gave him a
Cheshire Cat grin and said, “He’s okay.”