Next Stop: Love

by Miranda J. Fox

  Wow. No man had ever spoken to me that openly and honestly in my entire life, and it surprised me that we’d been thinking along the same lines—because I was also sick of guys of the type that I’d assumed he was. Even my ex-boyfriend had never said such nice things to me. Then again, his approach was a bit off. “So what you’re saying is, you’re interested in me because I don’t know how to dress and I’m not a successful career woman?” My voice was equal parts amused and offended.

  He bit his lip, which was indescribably seductive, and then grinned broadly. “Yeah, that’s exactly why.”

  A SOMEWHAT DIFFERENT DATE

  As expected, the rumor mill was in full swing the following day, and I had to endure both curious and disapproving looks.

  “Well, look what you’ve done now,” Aileen whispered when I sat down at my desk.

  “We just had a drink together,” I insisted, looking annoyed.

  “I believe you, honey, but Mary’s been embellishing the story quite a bit. According to her, she caught you guys just as you were about to kiss,” she said.

  I gaped at her. “You’re joking.”

  “And when dear old Dad gets word of that, things could get uncomfortable pretty quickly. He’ll fire you if he gets wind that there might be something going on between you.”

  “But we didn’t do anything,” I emphasized.

  “He doesn’t know that.”

  I looked around, and Mary was nowhere to be seen. “Where is she?” I growled. “I’ll rip her extensions out one by one!” It was obvious what she was trying to do. She wanted me out so that she would have a clear path to Luca again. She was in for a world of disappointment, though. I wasn’t going down that easily.

  “Three guesses where she is now . . . Mr. Marcs’s office.”

  My heart began to race. That goddamned bitch. “Can you hold the fort for a minute?” I asked, jumping up. “I’ll be right back.” She was not going to spread any rumors about me.

  I’d never been up to the sixth floor, simply because I never had any reason to see the elder Marcs, who rarely received employees, anyway. If he was listening to Mary, though, he was sure to want a word with me as well.

  I took the nearest elevator up to the sixth floor . . . And when the doors opened, Luca was standing right there. “If you’re here because of Mary, I’ve taken care of it,” he said, and then gently pushed me back when I tried to take a step forward.

  “How did you know she’d come up here?” I asked in a trembling voice as he pressed me against the wall. The elevator doors closed, but the car didn’t move. I saw a key in the display panel.

  “I didn’t, but immediately after she left his office, he called me up here, and I dispelled the rumors.”

  “How?” I asked. He’d braced his hands against the wall on either side of me and moved in close enough that I could see the tiny yellow flecks in his eyes. Having him so near me completely took my breath away.

  “I just told him that there was nothing going on between us.” He shrugged as though the answer was as simple as it was obvious. “Do you know that kissing you is all I’ve thought about today?” he went on in a low voice, brushing my cheek with his. I was about to pass out from sheer desire.

  Somehow, though, I mustered up enough willpower to push him away. Or at least try to, because he didn’t actually move very far. “No fooling around before the first date,” I said, trying to sound stern, but my voice was shaking too much. The look in his eyes told me that he wanted to devour me then and there, but as long as I still had even a glimmer of self-control, I wasn’t going to let him. Just because I’d decided to finally open myself up again didn’t mean that I was going to jump into bed with the first guy who came along. Even if that guy was as easy on the eyes as Luca. And this was obviously neither the time nor the place. “Besides, your father monitors the elevators.”

  “Who cares,” he murmured as he smoothed my hair back. When he lowered his mouth to my collarbone, my eyes actually rolled back in my head. The feeling of his soft lips on my clavicle was simply indescribable, and if he hadn’t suddenly wrapped his arms around me, I would have collapsed in a heap. Pushing him away was almost physically painful, but I had to be sensible.

  “Luca! What if your father is watching?” I was appalled, but he only laughed at the fear in my voice.

  “That’s just a cock-and-bull story we tell the newcomers to keep them from getting any dumb ideas,” he said, looking amused.

  “Like lunging at their assistants?” I scolded him as I tried to push him farther away—without success. Fortunately, though, he pulled back of his own accord, removed the key, and sent the elevator down another story. Then he pressed his forehead against mine.

  “You’re going to drive me out of my mind, you know that?” He sounded almost tortured when he said it. “Just don’t keep me waiting too long.” With that, he got out, and the doors closed to take me to the fourth floor. Waiting too long? What was that supposed to mean?

  Utterly bewildered, I arrived on the fourth floor and wobbled over to my desk. What had just happened? I felt almost drunk; I could hardly feel my legs. Couldn’t he have waited until our date? How was I supposed to concentrate on work now?

  I was just as keyed up as Mary was miserable. Not that I felt sorry for her—I mean, she’d stabbed me in the back—but it looked like Luca had had a serious word with her. He’d summoned her into his office with a stony expression, and I have to admit that I’d never seen him so enraged, let alone so serious. Normally he was the very definition of friendliness . . . and, apparently, an exceptionally good kisser. Well, we hadn’t actually kissed yet, but what he’d done to my neck gave me a pretty good idea of what he could do with his lips. I was completely useless for the rest of the day because all I could think about was how he’d pressed me against the elevator wall and awakened all the feelings, long presumed dead, in me. Goddammit, where was all of this heading?

  After work, I went to the supermarket and bought fresh fruit and vegetables. I knew I had to eat something, but my stomach was full of butterflies, so there was no room for anything else. As a result, I was ravenous later in the evening. Oh man, I was like a teenager before her first date. I was completely overreacting and knew it, but it had been so long since I’d gone out with anyone that I’d pretty much forgotten how to do it. Before I knew it, there were just twenty minutes before Luca was due to arrive. I started flying around the apartment like a tornado. Lisa was at some kind of gaming convention, so she was spared the circus I was creating.

  When, in my haste, I ran into a chair and knocked it over, I finally realized how I was acting. “Okay, chill out,” I chided myself. The way I was behaving was ridiculous. I was twenty-five years old, not sixteen, and this was a totally harmless date. With the most attractive bachelor in the city! added an excited voice in my head.

  I heard a car horn honk three times and sprinted to the window, only to brake just before I reached it and ease the curtains open instead—I didn’t want to seem too nervous. God, I felt like I was in some Hollywood romantic comedy. I waved to Luca to let him know I’d be right down, then turned around again in a panic. Goddammit, I wasn’t even ready. I still hadn’t decided what shoes to wear, and I had to brush my pants and put on my teeth. Or was it the other way around? I hastened through the apartment—ignoring the admonishing looks from Khasi, who felt I was disturbing his beauty rest—and ran into the bathroom. Toothbrush still dangling from my mouth, I finally slipped into a pair of black skinny jeans and a dark top, then grabbed my favorite sneakers. I hoped Luca knew that high heels and short skirts had no place in my everyday closet—I only dressed like that for work. If not, he was about to be disappointed. But why pretend to be someone I wasn’t? He wanted a date with me, so he was going to get to know me, and I was more about function than fashion. I went without makeup, too, not because I didn’t wear it in my free time; I was simply too fidge
ty to put it on. I would have just smeared the mascara into my eyes, and they would have been all bloodshot when I met up with him. No, that wouldn’t have done anyone any favors.

  Just a quick spray of perfume, then I walked out of the apartment and into the night. And there he stood. Perfectly dressed, with that wonderfully mussed hair. He’d swapped his corporate attire for dark, loose-fitting pants and a black sweater, alleviating my fear that he would show up in an elegant tuxedo. That would have made me feel pretty pathetic standing next to him. As it was, though, not much about him was businesslike, so he matched my casual outfit perfectly.

  I was a little confused when he neither kissed my cheek nor gave me a compliment, the way he usually did. Maybe I should have dressed up a little more after all? Instead, he only smiled, laid a hand on my back, and led me to his car. It was chillier that night than I’d expected, and I started to wish I’d brought a jacket. On the other hand, one glance into his smoky-green eyes was enough to warm me up.

  “Ever gone out for tacos in Berlin?” he asked, opening the passenger-side door of his Jeep. Because I hadn’t worn heels, I had no problem getting into his elevated car, and no short skirt meant no worries about unintentional exposure. Man, I loved comfy jeans and sneakers.

  “Just the packaged ones from the grocery store,” I replied and buckled myself in.

  The corners of his mouth twitched. “Then you’ll love Gonzales Tacos!” he exclaimed as he stepped on the gas.

  The drive with Luca was pleasant, not nearly as awkward as I’d feared. I was nervous at first but relaxed quickly, thanks to him. He was funny and attentive and knew how to lighten things up . . . Basically, he was just easy to talk to. It was becoming clear to me that the nervous tension I’d felt between us over the past few weeks had all been in my head, because I’d been fighting so hard to keep myself from having feelings for him. But I couldn’t help it—I’d had feelings for him since our first meeting, although back then, the feelings had been closer to homicidal. Over time, though, I’d seen that he actually wasn’t such a bastard, and his compliments hadn’t left me completely cold. After all, here I was.

  The Mexican place was in an out-of-the-way neighborhood, but the drive down there was worth it. When we walked in, I was shocked. I’d been expecting an elegant restaurant, or maybe a trendy gastropub, but this place was plain, almost run-down. The color of the paint on the walls had faded until it was hardly recognizable, and the jumbled assortment of bistro tables had their best years behind them. But the warm Mexican decor and the delicious smells hanging in the air made it incredibly cozy.

  I wouldn’t have thought Luca would ever be caught dead in a place like this, but as far as I was concerned, he couldn’t have picked a better location for our first date. Out of a hundred possible points, this restaurant alone had already scored him ninety-nine. I was super enthusiastic, and even more so when I bit into the first taco. The freshly made guacamole, spicy ground beef, and crunchy shell were like a taste explosion in my mouth, so Luca was flabbergasted when I finished my fifth taco and still didn’t quit.

  “I don’t care if you write me off as a glutton, I’m going to keep eating these things until I burst,” I told him as I started in on the next one. In response, he ordered another portion for himself, and we spent time enjoying our food in silence. I hadn’t thought I’d be able to eat in front of Luca with no inhibitions, but he radiated such calm as he ate that I just stopped worrying about it. Besides, with all the tacos he’d shoveled in, he had me beat, anyway. Eventually, I gave up and contented myself with watching him. It was unbelievable how much food the guy could pack in . . . and with a body like his, too.

  I must have had that dreamy look on my face again, because when he finished eating, he asked, “What are you thinking about?”

  I shrugged and took a gulp of soda. “I dunno. I just expected you to pull out all the stops, like show up in a tux and take me to the opera or something. But here we are, in this hole in the wall.”

  He laughed, then grew serious. “Would you rather have gone to an upscale restaurant?”

  “No, this is perfect. It just . . . doesn’t fit your image somehow.”

  “Image? What kind of image do I have?” He sounded cautiously intrigued. I hesitated, knowing that this could very easily go in the wrong direction, and I didn’t want to spoil the mood. “Okay, now you’re really scaring me,” he said, half-joking, when I didn’t respond. “Sophia?”

  “Well, the staff at work is just crazy about you. Everyone’s happy to see you come in, which is almost disturbing, since you’re the boss. But the women . . .”

  “What?” he urged me, straightening up a little. Was it possible that he genuinely had no idea what I was getting at?

  I shrugged helplessly. Why had I even brought this up? “There are just a lot of rumors about your having affairs with your assistants,” I finally managed to say. I’d been staring at my hands, and now, when I looked up at him, his gaze seared into me.

  “And?” he asked.

  “And nothing. There’s a lot of speculation, but nobody knows anything for sure. I just heard that the woman before me quit because of you.”

  He bit the inside of his cheek, folded his arms across his chest, and glanced out the window—all pretty bad signs. Then he looked at me again. “That’s not really something I would necessarily talk about on the first date, but apparently I need to clear up a few misunderstandings.” He didn’t sound offended. “Laura, your predecessor, got her hopes up. I know I can’t prove it, and it’s easy to make claims after the fact, but if there’s one rule for the managers in our company, it’s ‘Don’t have affairs with your employees.’ ”

  I knitted my brow. “Hard to believe, seeing as I’m sitting here with you now.” I smirked.

  “You don’t really count, though. I wanted to date you back when you didn’t work for me yet.”

  I laughed. “You have a funny way of showing it. I still have a clear memory of you making fun of me, you know.”

  “Only at first. I was pretty quickly fascinated by you.”

  I bit down hard on my lip to keep myself from grinning in delight. “But I do work for you now.”

  “I could fire you,” he mused. “Then it wouldn’t be breaking any rules.”

  “You really want to do that to me?” I laughed. “Throw me out on the street? That would be awfully egotistical of you.” I pouted innocently.

  But if I’d expected him to laugh in response, I had another thing coming. “Sophia,” he began, and the sudden serious note in his voice told me that he had something important to get off his chest. “I can tell you’re afraid to trust me, and I’m sure you have your reasons for that, but I can’t keep treating you like just another employee. I can’t have you around me all the time but keep you at a distance. I brought you here tonight because I want you to see who I really am. My job, all the business dinners, my nice suits—those are part of me the way jackets are part of your work attire, but they’re not me. Despite my position, despite all the money, I’m still just a regular person, and if you let me, I’d like to share more of myself with you.”

  The abrupt change in mood had thrown me somewhat off guard, and I nodded as if on autopilot. “Okay” was all I could say in response to his captivating smile.

  “That’s great, but first I want to know more about you, too. What brought you to Berlin? What did you do before you moved?”

  Despite what he’d shared, I still felt a little self-conscious about telling him my sad life story. But somehow the date wasn’t going according to plan, anyway, so why not come out with it? If we laid our cards on the table at the beginning, at least we’d both know what we were getting ourselves into, and there were certainly more screwed-up relationships out there than the one I had with my mother. So there was no reason for me to make such a fuss about it.

  “Okay, well, I moved to Berlin because I wa
s fleeing from my control-freak mother. She kept me on too tight a leash—which is still putting it nicely—and then I snuck off like a coward. All my life I did everything exactly the way she wanted. Take these classes, go to that college, study law. And eventually enough was enough. It took quite awhile, I’m ashamed to admit, until I couldn’t take it anymore and decided to do something, anything, as long as it wasn’t part of her plan. And why not? With a law degree in my pocket, I’ve got nothing to lose. Time to live by my own rules.”

  “Well, then, you’re much further along than I am.” To my surprise, he didn’t sound the least bit taken aback by my failed relationship with my mother. “My father wants me to take over the company, but I don’t want to at all. So in that respect, you’re a lot stronger than I am. You stood up for yourself and freed yourself from your mother’s chains. I’m still a long way away from that.”

  “Why? Just do it,” I said. He didn’t strike me as someone who was afraid to make decisions. Not if he ran half a company.

  He gazed at me for a long moment, probably trying to decide whether to tell me what he said next. “The fact that my mother can’t walk anymore is my fault. When I was younger, I was kind of a hellion, and I drank a lot. One night, my mom was picking me up from yet another party; I was drunk and threw a fit on the way home, which made her lose control of the car. We skidded over an embankment, and she broke her back. Now she’ll never be able to walk again.”

  “Oh my God,” I said, barely managing to stop myself from clamping my hand over my mouth. That probably would have caused him even more pain.

  “I was just a teenager and didn’t realize the seriousness of what I’d done at all . . . but I felt the consequences quickly enough. First we moved to Berlin, where they sent me to rehab. I stopped drinking, and later I met Mike, who got me through those hard times . . . but things were never the same again. My mother forgave me, but my father couldn’t, and deservedly so. I’d taken away her joie de vivre and her dancing, and I’d robbed him of all his pride. A year later, they separated, and my mother moved away. She never accused him of it, but I think he just couldn’t stand to see her like that. Even though my father has never spoken about the accident since she left, I can’t shake the feeling that he would have rather lost me that night.”