Ignite Me (The Annihilate Me Series) (15 page)

“Really?” she
said.
 
“I can’t imagine.”

“Could you give
us five minutes?
 
Please?”

“To look at the
menu?
 
Sure.
 
But please actually look at the menu
before I return, OK?
 
Because some
of us need to eat when we leave here tonight, and for someone like me, who
earns her living through the tips I receive, let’s just say that the more
tables I turn, the easier life is for me.
 
So, I’ll give you five minutes to decide what you’d like to eat, and
then I’ll be back.”

Her face
softened when she said that, and then she just shook her head at us.
 
“Look, kids, I might be old, but I get
it, OK?
 
I’ve been there before,
with a guy named Stan, who was unlucky enough to marry me twenty-eight years
ago, the poor son of a bitch.
 
There
was a time when Stan and I were the handsome couple who couldn’t keep our hands
off each other.
 
We made our share
of scenes—but we also learned when it was time to rein it in.”

*
 
*
 
*

When we left
Gordon’s Pub, Brock reached for my hand when we stepped onto the sidewalk, and
then we started to walk down Fifth.

Who are we now?
I wondered as
I felt the heat of his palm against mine.
 
A couple, or just a passing moment of lust that had ignited one
mother of a fireball at Gordon’s Pub?
 

I wasn’t
sure.
 
Clearly, it was more than it
had been before, but because this was so new, I wasn’t sure what the dynamic
was between us now.
 
Brock had
mentioned the attraction each of us had felt on the day we’d first
met—and so had I.
 
He’d said
that he’d never felt anything like it before, and I’d said the same.
 
This was foreign territory for me, but I
was here, I was present, and damned if I wasn’t enjoying holding his hand right
now.

For several
blocks, we just walked in silence, each of us still processing what had
happened at Gordon’s.
 
Never in my
life had I been so intimate with a man in public.
 
What had come over me?
 
Pure lust?
 
To say the least.
 
But with Blackwell’s words ringing
through me again about his womanizing past, I had to wonder if I’d just been
reckless with my heart, which was still pounding.
 

Was I being
played?
 
I hoped that I wasn’t,
because with his hand in mine and the taste of his lips still on mine, I’d
already taken a big risk when I allowed him to kiss me the first time—and
then the second, third, and fourth times.
 
For better or worse, I’d gotten caught up in the moment, and now he knew
for certain how deeply I was into him.
 
But what would come from any of this?
 
At that moment, I felt like a
target—he could either shoot an arrow through my heart or fill it with
joy.
 

Not knowing
what was to come unleashed a wealth of feelings in me.
 
Excitement.
 
Terror.
 
Happiness.
 
Fear.
 
But I couldn’t deny what had just taken
place, and so I had to put my faith in what I felt were two people responding
to their emotions.
 
Did Brock come
off as a womanizer to me?
 
It was
still too early for me to tell, but the way he’d kissed me told me the truth of
how he felt about me.
 
There was no
lying there.
 
When we kissed, I knew
that he felt it every bit as much as I did.

So where do we
go from here?

“You’re quiet,”
he said.

“I’m not the
only one.”

“Kind of
intense, huh?”

“You could say
that.”

“Are you
regretting it?”

“No.
 
Not now.”

“But you
might?”

I stopped on
the sidewalk and looked up at him as people walked past us on Fifth.
 
“You know what Blackwell said about you.
. . .”

“That I’m a
womanizer.”

“That’s right.”

“And you’re
concerned about that.
 
You might
even be thinking that what just happened back there wasn’t real.
 
That it was only meant to get you into
my bed.
 
Am I right?”

“When you put
it that way, it sounds awful.”

“I agree.
 
It does sound awful but it’s not the
truth.
 
It’s not what I’m feeling
right now.
 
It diminishes everything
that you and I just shared together, which was wonderful.
 
Meaningful.
 
Something I’ve waited years for.
 
I’ve known Barbara since I was a kid and
while I like her, I hate the barriers she’s set up between us.
 
I’m not sure if I’ll ever forgive her
for that, because it’s unwarranted.
 
I will never lie to you, Madison.
 
There was a period in my life when I slept with my share of women.
 
But when I decided that I needed to drop
my father and his resources from my life, I also knew that I had to change who
I was in the process.
 
I needed to
make it at Wharton on my own.
 
And
when that struck me, it hit me hard because I knew that I needed to focus on
school and work my ass off to prove my father wrong.
 
Barbara thinks she knows who I am now,
but she only knows who I was before I dropped off Alex’s radar.
 
When I went out on my own, I had no safety
net.
 
I’d severed ties with my
family.
 
I knew that if I didn’t
make it, I’d just prove to my father that I was a failure without his
assistance.
 
And because of that, I
reassessed my life, I haven’t seen or slept with a single woman in two years,
and now, after all of that, here I am with you.

“I don’t know
what came over me when I first met you, but I’ve since given it a lot of
thought,” he said.
 
“When I met you,
I was first struck by how beautiful you are, but that’s just a passing thing,
isn’t it?
 
What really caught my
attention was the fire you have in your eyes.
 
I felt that you also were in the ring
with me, trying to make a go of it for yourself in an unforgiving city.
 
That emanated from you in waves, which I
responded to.
 
And which I still
respond to.
 
I know that you’re also
fighting to prove yourself, but you need to know that I’m doing the same.
 
Just because I happen to be Alex’s
cousin doesn’t mean shit.
 
Believe
me, if I don’t come through with this report for him, he will dismiss me.
 
And I don’t blame him for that.
 
He has a large corporation to run, and
that’s resting squarely on his shoulders.
 
His shareholders rightfully expect a lot from him.
 
And because of that, he has zero time
for fools.”

“Are you
thinking that you’re going to fail?” I asked.

“I don’t know,”
he said.
 
“I think I have a handle
on Biogen Shire, the company I’m researching, but who knows how Alex and
Jennifer will react when they learn that a year ago, during phase III trials of
their new blood-pressure drug Inoxtin, that someone sued them for wrongful
death and walked away with millions because of it.
 
That happened about sixteen months ago,
and since then, no other deaths have been attributed to the drug, which has
been tweaked and refined.
 
So considering
all that, how much weight should I put on that death?
 
Biogen Shire is now in phase IV trials,
they’re almost ready to go to market, the success rate for their drug is high,
and it looks as if FDA approval is on the horizon.
 
So I’ve decided to recommend that Wenn
Pharmaceutical acquire them.
 
Am I
right?
 
Am I wrong?
 
I have no idea how Alex and Jennifer
will react to my report, because they’ve given me no guidance.
 
They want me to flesh this out on my
own—and then they’ll decide whether acquiring Biogen Shire is a good fit
for Wenn, and also, based on my report, whether
I’m
a good fit for Wenn.
 
It’s stressful.”

“It would have
to be,” I said.
 
“I didn’t realize
that you were so stressed out.”

“Believe me,
there have been times while writing this report when I’ve wanted to consult
that business mind of yours, because I know that it’s being wasted in your
current position.
 
I could use
another set of eyes on the report I’ve written.”

“Are you
finished with it?”

“I finished it
today.
 
It’s a draft, but the core
of it is there.”

“Then send it
to me tonight.
 
I’ll have a look,
and I’ll give you feedback.
 
When do
you need to deliver it to them?”

“In three
days.”

“That’s plenty
of time.
 
Send it to me, I’ll look
it over.
 
I also think I overheard
Blackwell saying to you that she’d read it herself.”

“She did,” he
said.

“Then you’re
covered.”

And with that,
he swept me into his arms, kissed me full on the mouth, and then he said
something that would remain with me for the rest of my life.

“Despite
everything, we’re going to fall in love, you know?” he said.
 
“I’m certain of it, Madison.
 
I know it sounds crazy—but I can
feel it.
 
And I hope that you can
too.”

CHAPTER
FOURTEEN

When I arrived
home that night, it was just past nine-thirty, and I saw that Rhoda was sitting
in the living room.
 
She had a glass
of white wine in her hand, her red hair was pulled away from her cherubic face
in a kerchief, and Bessie was working overtime to cool off the apartment.

“Well, that was
a long workout,” she said in a teasing voice as I walked into the living room.

“You already
know that it was much more than that.”

“Kick off your
shoes, toots.
 
Change if you
want.
 
And if you’d like, we can
catch up on our day and talk.”

“You’re on.”

When I emerged
from the bedroom in shorts and a T-shirt, I sat down opposite her in one of the
overstuffed chairs.

“I poured you a
glass of wine,” she said, nodding at the glass on the coffee table between
us.
 
“You know—to settle your
nerves.”

“They need to
be quashed.”

“I thought so.”

I lifted my
glass to her, she lifted hers to me, and we sipped.

“You, my dear,
are glowing,” she said.

“Let’s just
hope that I’m not when I arrive for work tomorrow.
 
Because Blackwell will notice, and
she’ll immediately wonder why.”

“Blackwell,
Blackwell, Blackwell.
 
How about if
we just dismiss her for the time being and you tell me about your workout.”

I told her
about my workout.

“Well,” she
said.
 
“It certainly sounds as if
you got in your cardio.
 
What
happened after that?”

I told her what
happened after that.

“And then
apparently you got in a bit more.”

“You don’t even
know.”

“And now you’re
doubting everything, am I correct?”

“You already
know that I am.”

She furrowed
her brow at me.
 
“Sort of.
 
Like I said, for the life of me, I can’t
get a read on Brock, which is frustrating as hell.
 
The man just comes up as a blank to
me.
 
Does he have a force field around
him?
 
I’m beginning to wonder if he
does.
 
Anyway, as you know, I’ve
been able to tap into you since I was six, so tonight, I had a feeling that you
were under some sort of romantic duress.
 
Lot’s of highs, lot’s of indecisions, lot’s of questions.
 
I figured it had to do with Brock.”

“And how.”

“So, tell me,”
she said.
 
“How do you feel?”

“Overwhelmed.
 
He was wonderful, Rhoda.”

“Well, toots,
then that
is
wonderful,” she said.
 
“Tell me more.”

“I’ve never
been kissed by anyone like that.”

“What was it
like?”

“Like nothing
I’d ever experienced.
 
I don’t know
why, but there’s some sort of connection between us that I can’t explain or
deny.
 
It’s just there.
 
I haven’t felt anything like what I’m
feeling now with any other man that I’ve been with.”

“Some
connections we can never explain,” she said.
 
“But they’re there for a reason.
 
I can promise you that.
 
The universe aligns, and it deploys.”

“Naturally,
there’s a downside to all of this.
 
After what happened between us today, how in the hell am I supposed to
work with him when I’m just going to want to be with him.
 
Kiss him.
 
Have his body against mine.
 
Am I just setting myself up for
disaster?”

“I can’t answer
that for you,” she said.
 
“We have
an agreement.”

“Then you
know?”

She said
nothing.

“You’re right,”
I said.
 
“Best not to answer
it.
 
Because I do need to figure
this out on my own.”

“True enough,”
she said.
 
“And you will, Madison.”

“I’m concerned
about tomorrow,” I said.

When Rhoda didn’t
respond and instead looked down at her glass of wine, I knew at once that I had
every reason to be.