I'll Be Your Everything (14 page)

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Authors: J.J. Murray

BOOK: I'll Be Your Everything
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“Yep, that was me.”
I blink. “So you weren’t at JFK.”
He shakes his head. “I flew out after I talked to Mr. Peterson at the Millennium. Who was that woman you were talking to after your meeting with Mr. Peterson?”
He has been stalking me! “Um, just a lost tourist.” My eyes are so wide that my eyelids hurt. “You saw me while I was talking to her?”
He nods. “And she took your picture. What was that about?”
“I don’t know.” I’ve been followed for two years by every woman’s fantasy, and I have no idea why. I am so confused!
“I just don’t see how you stay so trim,” he says. “You get a dozen glazed, mainly on paydays, and yet you stay so svelte.”
Oh my goodness. “What are you? A stalker?”
He looks down. “No. I’m just the guy who’s too shy to stop and talk to you, um, because ...” He sighs. “Because you intimidate me with your beauty.”
I cannot believe this. “You nearly hit me a dozen times with your bike! What, were you hoping you
would
hit me so you’d have a reason to stop to admire my beauty?”
He shakes his head. “I, um, I didn’t know what I was doing. I mean, if a random white guy on a bike just skidded to a stop in front of you and smiled, what would you do?”
“I’d run!” I say with a laugh. No, I wouldn’t. “No, I would have probably ... kept on walking, I don’t know. I might have... .” I know I would have talked to him, especially if I knew it
was
him. “I know I would have recognized your voice, but we’ll never know now, will we?”
He looks sideways at me. “Whenever I was in town, and it wasn’t as often as I would have liked, I used to follow you on your way to and from work. At a distance, okay? I wasn’t ... stalking you. I was, um, shadowing you.”
“Why?” I ask, though I think I already know the answer.
He sighs. “I just wanted to make sure you were safe. I didn’t want anything bad to happen to you. I know it’s crazy.”
I had a knight out there when I was walking at night? “I’m a big girl, Tom,” I say, which makes no sense because I’m so small. “I can handle myself.”
He catches my eyes for a moment. “I can see that, Shari.”
Geez, I’m blushing. “So you’ve just been out there watching over me, huh?”
He nods.
“Right.”
“Really.” He flattens his hand on the table. “I’ve always liked talking to you, and if I had any guts, I would have somehow found a way to talk to you face-to-face. In my mind, I saw you dropping something, like your purse or a package, and I would rescue whatever it was and bring it to you. But you don’t carry a purse.”
“I like to travel light,” I say. “What, were you waiting for me to drop my handkerchief or something?”
He looks away. “Something like that.”
It’s actually kind of sweet. “So you’re saying that I was Lady Shari and you were Sir Tom?”
He nods. “Yeah. I know it sounds corny.”
It’s actually wonderfully, sweetly romantic. “So you pretty much know my schedule.”
He nods.
Let’s find out. “What do I usually do on Tuesday nights?”
“Prayer meeting at Brooklyn Tabernacle,” he says. “I usually sit in the back.”
He was there? “You attend regularly?”
He nods. “Whenever I’m in town.”
I know I would have noticed him. Unless he was hiding. But how can Tom hide anywhere? He stands out like a sore ... god. “Where do I go on Sunday?”
“Nine a.m. service, and again, I sit in the back. You sure can dance. I’ve never been one to go to church, and, well, you have me going. I don’t understand everything, but I really like going just so I can see you.”
Wow. I have no snappy comeback. He has made me speechless.
I turn several more pages of his notebook and see—
wow.
That’s an astounding drawing of
me,
and I’m wearing a hard hat, goggles, and the orange vest. The goggles make my eyes seem fifty times their normal size. “Is this supposed to be me?” Hey, he even drew in my sexy glasses. He has good eyes.
He reaches over and uses a pencil eraser to remove the goggles and the hard hat. He redraws my eyes, my eyebrows, my glasses, and even recreates my natural hair. He is
really
good. He adds one of my dimples. Is that what he sees when he looks at me?
“You can draw,” I say, and I wish I could say more. I have to keep reminding myself that this man beside me is the boss’s man, friend, man-friend—or something like that.
“I can draw well when I have the right subject, yes.” He looks at my face then adds my lips and a sly smile. “And I finally have the right person to draw now.” He stares at me then draws my little potato-chip ears. “I’d, um, do more with your body, but ... I mean, um, well, I meant ...”
Is he blushing? I think he is.
“You know what I mean,” he says.
I know exactly what you mean, Tom, and it feels ... scary. I’ve never had anyone protect me, even if from a distance, and I’ve never had anyone draw me before. I’ve never had anyone even draw me a bath. And yet here he is, drawing me in ...
“If I had the right kind of pencils, I’m sure I could capture you better.”
You’re doing some capturing of my heart right now. I cannot believe that this sexy hunk of a man is shy!
He drops the pencil and slides a few inches away from me. “I can tell you’re not interested in hooking up with me, I mean ...”
He blushes again! I am tying his big ol’ tongue in knots.
“I mean, I can tell you’re not interested in working with me.”
Where’d his leg go? My leg was just getting acquainted with that tree trunk. “You said earlier that I’d be working
for you,
not with you.”
“I like how you hang on my every word.”
“No, I don’t.” Okay, I do.
He slides back. My leg says “howdy” to his. They’re becoming old friends.
“We’d be equal partners, Shari,” he says. “Fifty-fifty splits all the way. We’ll even have a written agreement if you like. A legal partnership, and if either of us should want to walk away, we’ll split everything down the middle.”
I feel the warmth of his leg seep into my
other
leg. “It, um, it sounds tempting.”
He puts his hand lightly on my back.
How can one hand warm an entire body?
“So you’ll at least think about it?” he asks.
My back is suddenly hot. “I might think about it.” Of course I will! I just don’t want him to know how badly I want this—and a back rub from that hot hand. I wiggle a little, and he removes his hand. No! I wanted you to rub my back, man!
“And you don’t have to buy me dinner or breakfast, Shari. I just got lucky. That nurse had to be the horniest woman Down Under.”
Now there’s the title of a good flick for Nicole Kidman to make.
Oh, now my back is cold. And if one of his hands could warm me up like that, what could two of his hot hands do?
“I’m, um, I’ll be going back to the hotel now,” he says. “I’m sure you’ll want some face time with Mr. Peterson.”
I’d rather have some more face time with you. Wait. How can I play this off as something other than what it’s starting to be? “I need to follow you back to the hotel. I don’t want to get lost. Let me say my good-byes to the Petersons.”
“Sure.” He stands and offers his hand.
“I can get up by myself, thanks.”
He leaves his hand there. “Could you hand me my notebook?”
“Oh.” I put the notebook in his hand, and he slides it into his back pocket. That poor notebook! It’s going to get crushed!
After dropping off my equipment in the holding area, I walk lazily to the office while Tom waits by his rental car, a Ford Mustang.
That
man and
that
car in
any
kind of ad—that car would be a best-seller for sure.
Mrs. Peterson is still at her solitaire game. I guess this business does run itself. “Leaving?” she says.
“Yes. I wanted to thank you for your hospitality.” I take out the two twenties and lay them on her desk. “Lunch was my treat.”
She nods and collects the bills.
“Is Mr. Peterson around? I’d like to say good-bye to him, too.”
“Trouble with one of the machines, don’t ask me which one,” she says. “He’ll be at it till dark. And Mondays used to be so slow around here.” She smiles. “We don’t normally get visits from outsiders, no offense. And then we get two on the same day.”
Hmm. “And Mr. Peterson told me Monday would be the perfect day for me to visit.”
Mrs. Peterson wrinkles her lips and looks at the ceiling. “Hmm. Now why would Mr. Peterson say that this particular Monday would be perfect for you?”
I have no idea, unless ...
She raises her eyebrows.
“He knew Tom would be here,” I say. “He knew we’d both be coming.”
“That’s my Woody,” she says. “He likes to make people uncomfortable, put them on the spot, see how they react. While he didn’t seem to be paying attention at H&H, he really was.”
And Mr. Peterson heard our crazy conversation. “I hope I didn’t let him down.”
“Just don’t let him down next week. You’re good people, Miss Ross. Truth be told, I didn’t think it was wise for my husband to even use a New York ad agency. That place is so far removed from here in every way. We’ve been doing just fine without y’all, you know? I said Atlanta has ad agencies. Why not use them? And then you show up. You’re not what I expected. You’re just a little slice of home, you know that?”
A little slice of home. Another possible tagline. “Thank you for your kindness, Mrs. Peterson.”
“Did you and Mr. Sexton settle your differences?” she asks. She is so perceptive. “Um, there was nothing really to settle.” Because we’re really not that different. Okay, he’s huge and I’m not. He’s a real hunk, and I’m just a slice of a home girl. He’s shy, and I’m ... sort of shy.
“Did y’all come to some sort of agreement at least?” she asks.
“Something like that.” I just wish I knew exactly what “that” was.
I know I’m forgetting something, something important. Geez. I need the freaking product! I am such a rookie. “Um, I should have run this by Mr. Peterson earlier today, but I’m going to need a representative bicycle to take back with me.”
She nods toward the door. “It’s already in your truck.”
“It is?”
“You left your door unlocked, Corrine,” she says. “See, you haven’t completely lost your country roots. He didn’t want to forget either. He said it was a present.”
“A present? I can’t accept a present from a client, Mrs. Peterson.” Though Corrine does it all the time.
“He likes you,” she says. “Say it was for your birthday. Use it however you wish.”
“I just wish I could thank him. Does he have his walkie-talkie?”
She whips hers out. “He should.” She hands it to me. “First button on the right there.”
I press the button. “Mr. Peterson?”
“That’s a strange voice,” Mr. Peterson says. “You okay, Freda?”
“It’s me, um, Corrine.” Almost blew it again. “Thank you so much for the bicycle.”
“I just figured you’d need it, Miss Ross. Might be a tad tall for you. Didn’t have time to measure you. You drive safe.”
“Yes sir. Thanks again.” I hand the walkie-talkie to Mrs. Peterson. “Well, thanks again to you, too.”
“You take care now.”
I go to the GMC and look in the back. Wow. It’s a red and black bike with all the accessories and attachments, including a really cool digital speedometer.
“Ah. You got the red one.”
I turn and look at Tom and only see his chest. “I suppose you have one, too.”
“Two, actually.” He smiles. “And you’ve already seen them both on the bridge.”
He didn’t tell me he already had a Peterson bike! And he has two! He already uses the product and has been using the product to follow me around! How unfair an advantage is that? “Oh.” I nod at his car. “You ready?”
“Oh. Yeah.”
I follow him to the hotel, and I can’t keep my legs still. Why do I feel so much anticipation? Nothing’s going to happen. Bryan’s coming Friday, and Bryan and I have a long history, even if it’s stagnant and dull. Tom’s still kind of evasive about Corrine. She may be psychotic, but there has to be
something
going on if she’s still pining for him. He hangs around her for two years
without
sleeping with her? That’s hard to believe.
And the only reason he’s doing her dirty is so he can win this account. But he’s been following
me
. He calls
me
all the time. He’s here with
me
instead of in Australia with her. Oh, he didn’t know I would be here, but still.

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