An Act of Persuasion(11)

Ben didn’t think so. He thought Madeleine was trying to help him.

“Party or not, I would have come to see you anyway. I mean, we worked together for six years. Hell, you were my first job out of college. Yes, I quit. And yes, I was mad, but I’m not going to hold a grudge. I really can’t anymore.”

“You changed your cell phone number,” he accused her. The first time he’d gotten the message stating the number was no longer in use he’d been so angry he wanted to break something. Lucky for him, he’d been too weak to do anything of the sort at the time.

“I guess I didn’t want talk then.”

“But you do now?”

“Now I have no choice.”

She was confusing him. She was here because she needed to talk to him. Because she didn’t have a choice. “Are you in some kind of trouble?”

“You could say.”

“What is it? I’ll fix it,” he said before she could answer his question.

She shook her head. “Oh, you’re going to fix it? Just like that? Snap and it’s done? Sorry, forgot who I was dealing with.”

Ben sighed. He could feel his strength waning. He’d purposefully slept for a time before the party. But talking with so many people, being on his feet for the past hour, was starting to take its toll. Not to mention the heat was draining him, as well.

“Can we go some place? Some place cool where I can sit down.”

Instantly, he watched her face change. Concern, sympathy and...caring. It poured out of her like she was a pitcher of water. Then he watched her deliberately shut it down, as if she was reminding herself that he wasn’t hers to care for any longer. It made him strangely sad.

“We don’t have to do this today. We can pick another time.”

She wouldn’t meet his eyes when she said it and he had an awful feeling that if he let her walk out on him tonight, he might never get another chance to talk with her.

“No. I’m okay. I don’t want us to be disturbed,” he said.

“My car’s outside. I can drive you home.”

“That will work. I took a car service here.”

Again, accounting for his condition. He knew driving himself to the party wouldn’t be an issue. But it was how exhausted he would be driving home that concerned him. Not comfortable with cabs and the multitude of germs that could compile in a backseat over the course of any one day, he’d hired a private car service to be on call whenever he needed to go some place.

With the briefest of waves, he acknowledged Madeleine and a few of his other colleagues as he followed Anna through the room and outside where the valet attendant took her ticket. If he thought he saw a satisfied smile on Madeleine’s face as he left, he ignored it. The woman was blissfully in love with her fiancé and it obviously distorted her thinking.

Once Ben and Anna were alone in the car the tension between them increased. He watched her fiddle with the temperature controls and turn off the radio, but she didn’t immediately open up with whatever her problem was.

Ben found himself glad for her trouble, because she obviously had no plans to apologize for quitting. And given that she’d already found a new job, she apparently had no intention of returning. That would change though once he talked to Sharpe. Ben would explain that there were rules against poaching another man’s woman...assistant.

“So what did you want to talk to me about?”

“Huh?” Ben asked, lost in his own thoughts.

“You said you planned the party so I would come and you could talk to me. What did you want to say to me?”

He’d been hoping she would have forgotten that part. Once they started talking about her and why she needed him, he hoped that would overshadow everything, including why she was mad at him.

But that smacked a little bit of cowardice to him. He was a grown man who fully accepted his actions. Hiding from them wasn’t the best way to proceed if he and Anna were to move forward...in business.

“I wanted to apologize.”

She turned to him and then quickly turned back as if she forgot she was the one driving. “Seriously? You are apologizing to me?”

“Yes. I didn’t really account for your opinion when making my decision. In hindsight I can see why that might have...hurt you. Also, I was probably more defensive than I should have been. We both said some things in the heat of the moment. I’m sorry.”

He could see her eyes narrow but she kept them focused on the road. “Exactly what are you sorry for, though?”