No Kissing Allowed (No Kissing Allowed #1)(21)
I briefly heard Aidan rattle off that the elevator was stuck, in what he guessed to be between floors two and three. He thanked whoever was on the phone, and then I felt him by my side.
“Cameron, look at me.”
Swallowing hard, then again because the first time didn’t seem to work, I forced myself to glance up. Aidan’s face softened, and he reached up, his thumb trailing just under each of my eyes. I hadn’t realized the tears had fallen, but I was too afraid to be embarrassed. Too afraid to be anything at all.
“Claustrophobic?”
I gave a sharp nod.
“Do you want me to give you some space? Would that help?”
I thought of the question and drew another breath, but I couldn’t seem to get my lungs to work properly. Dear God. I closed my eyes. “Can you just talk to me? Tell me a story. Tell me anything. Just…please. Talk.” My legs felt weak, so I slumped down onto the floor and rested my forehead against my knees. Aidan waited a moment, perhaps unsure of where he should sit, what he should do, but then I felt him beside me again. He took my hand in his and traced lines on my palm, each stroke soothing the tension.
“When I was little,” he began, “my father used to say that nothing in the world mattered more than how people said your name. Whether they said it with fear or respect or hate or love, the way they said it spoke to who you were as a person. He said if you ever wanted to amount to anything, your goal should be to hear fear or respect, nothing else.”
I bit my lip to keep from spouting out exactly what I thought of such an asinine comment, and instead thought of how different his dad was from mine, how my father would have said nothing mattered but how God saw you. That if you were good in God’s eyes, then that ought to be enough for anyone else. “Do you agree?” I asked, praying Aidan didn’t share his father’s extreme views.
“No. But then I disagree with most of what my father says. I think it matters less how people see you and more how you see them. You can learn a lot about a person if you pay attention. You can learn what makes them tick, what makes them more efficient at work, happier in life. You can learn things you would never know otherwise. Things the person would never tell you.”
My eyes lifted, and I knew he was reading me the way he explained. I could only imagine what he saw—crazy lady on aisle three! Can’t even get on an elevator! Send a cleanup crew!
At least he wasn’t laughing. Not out loud, anyway.
I cringed at the thought and focused on the wall across from us, listening as the second hand on my watch tick, tick, ticked loudly, reminding me how long we’d been trapped. I knew it was only a few minutes, ten maybe, but it felt like hours. I swallowed again. “Are you close to your dad?”
He stiffened and looked away. “No, not at all. He left my mother and me when I was eight and never looked back. He’s in advertising, too.” At my pointed stare, he added, “He’s the president and founder of Graham Group.”
Wow, I had no idea. Graham Group was Sanderson-Lowe’s biggest competitor. Easily the second-largest advertising agency in the world.
“So, your father is…?”
“Stuart Graham. He’s the reason I went into advertising. Not because the field interested me at first, but because I wanted to be better than him in every way. A better businessman. A better man. Especially after my mom died.”
“I’m sorry about your mom.”
He looked away. “It was years ago now.”
We fell into silence, and it was then it hit me—this was the no-dating thing. He didn’t want to be the kind of man who left his wife, like his father had left his mother. Surely he knew not all men left. There were great men who stayed. Day in and day out, through the tough stuff, they stayed. A thousand questions rushed to my mind, on the tip of my tongue. Questions I wasn’t allowed to ask, questions I shouldn’t even think. The silence lingered between us.
“How are you feeling?” he asked after a while.
“Better than expected,” I admitted. “I like it when you talk. It helps.” My cheeks burned at the truth in my words. What would I do if he weren’t there with me, helping me through this? I couldn’t imagine. I liked to think of myself as a strong, independent person, but this phobia went beyond all reason and explanation. I’d tried everything to coax myself out of it, which was why I still rode elevators—though that little gem of triumph flew out the window the moment this horror began. The likelihood of me ever getting on another one was slim to never.
“I like it when you talk, too,” Aidan said, almost in a whisper. “I could listen to your voice all day and never grow tired of it. It’s gentle, but sure. I’ve never known a woman who could come across as delicate and strong all in the same breath.”
My heart warmed at his words, at how easily he admitted these things. “What did you mean by what you said in your office?” I asked. Our closeness (and our looming death) made it easy to ask. Who knew if another opportunity would arise?
This time he looked at me. “I want you. Every time you speak, I want you more.”
My body went numb, lost on how to respond. Of all the scenarios I’d played out, all the things I thought he might say, none of them came close to this. But then the elevator jerked again, and my pulse sped up. Visions of crashing to my death ripped through my mind, but then it began to move down, finally stopping on the first floor, where it opened, a few firefighters and some of the building technicians there to greet us.