“Not panic?” she said, scrambling across the floor to gather her things and cram them back into her purse.
“Whoa. Whoa. What are you doing?”
“I’ve got to get out of here. I have to go.”
“Wait. Slow down. Let me help you.” He grabbed several lipsticks and handed them back to her. “I think that we need to talk about what just happened.”
“What’s there to talk about? I just screwed around on my fiancé!”
Riiiiiinnnng! Riiiinnnng!
Both of their heads jerked toward her cell phone, which sounded like it was miked up to a bullhorn in the acoustic staircase. On the screen popped up a picture of the very photogenic Rowan James, with his name typed above it.
“Ohmigod,” Corona moaned again, while shame and embarrassment colored her entire face. “What am I going to tell him?”
“Well, first, you might want to tell him that you’re having second thoughts about your wedding.”
Riiiiiinnnng! Riiiinnnng!
“What?” Corona twisted up her face as she grabbed the phone, shut it off, and then crammed it back into her purse. “Who said that I was having second thoughts?”
He blinked, caught off guard. “Well, clearly what just happened—”
“What just happened was a mistake,” she declared, jumping back to her feet. “It meant nothing. It changes nothing.”
She couldn’t have caused more damage if she’d pointed an assault weapon at him and unloaded an entire clip. Seeing the effect of her words, she quickly tried to repair some of the damage. “I’m sorry. I—I … this was just wrong.” She shoved her skirt back down her legs and made a halfhearted attempt to button her blouse. “I gotta go!”
Corona took off running, even though her legs were like Jell-O.
“Corona Mae,” Lyfe shouted, cramming himself back into his pants before taking off after her.
“Please, just leave me alone,” Corona shouted, hearing him closing in on her.
“We need to talk!”
“There’s nothing to talk about,” she insisted. Knowing that she wasn’t going to be able to outrun him on the staircase she shoved through the doors of the next landing and raced to find the elevator bay. As luck would have it, the door was just closing, and she managed to slip through it before Lyfe caught up.
“Corona Mae!” Lyfe thundered behind her.
The door closed. When the elevator started its descent, her entire body imploded with relief and the tears streamed down her face.
Chapter 18
“What’s the room number again?” Carrie asked, scanning the hallway of the tenth floor.
“Here it is,” Melody said, pointing. When she stopped in front of the door she took a second to draw in a deep breath and calm her nerves.
Sensing her nervousness, her two best friends wrapped their arms around her shoulders and gave her an encouraging squeeze.
“Don’t worry,” Amanda said. “We have your back.”
“Yeah,” Carrie said and then tossed in a wink. “We got you, girl.”
“All right. Here goes.” Melody lifted her hand to knock. But before she got a chance, the door swung open and an incredibly handsome giant towered above them.
“Oh, hello, ladies,” he said in a hypnotic baritone.
One by one, their mouths dropped open, and their legs seemed to take root where they stood.
“Oookay.” He chuckled under his breath and then struggled to squeeze by them. Once he’d gotten by, he continued to laugh to himself while he strolled down the hall.
The three teenagers’ gazes followed him until he disappeared into another room.
Amanda was the first to find her voice, “Did you see him?”
Tess’s voice floated toward the door. “What on earth is going on here?”
Melody turned and then watched her aunt gasp with surprise.
“Ohmigod. It’s my baby!” She threw open her arms and didn’t have long to wait before Melody stepped into her embrace. “I can’t believe it. Look how big you are!” She pulled her niece out of her arms so she could take another look at her. “I can’t believe it, you look so much like your … “ She caught herself.
“Like who?” Melody seized on the opening.
“Like your mother,” Tess covered.
Needless to say, they both knew that was a lie. No one had ever thought that Melody looked like her mother. Her skin was darker, her eyes lighter and she didn’t have a clue where she had inherited her dimples from.
“I hope you don’t mind me and my girlfriends just dropping by,” Melody said, turning and waving her friends into the room.
“Uh, of course not,” Tess said, smiling at her friends. “The more the merrier.” She walked over to the door and glanced out into the hallway before shutting it.
“Soooo,” Melody began. “Who was your friend?”
“Uhh … my friend?”
Melody didn’t know what to make of her aunt blushing as hard as she was. “Is he your boyfriend or something?”
Tess threw out a genuine laugh. “Hardly.”
And still, Melanie noted, she didn’t answer the question. She cut a look over at her girlfriends, who were still feverishly fanning themselves.
“All I know is that’s the kind of man I want when I grow up,” Carrie said, leaning over toward Amanda. “Did you see how wide his shoulders were?”
“Forget that. What about that smile?”
Tess laughed. “All right, ladies. Get a hold on your hormones. You have plenty of time before you have to start worrying about boys.”
“Boys?” Carrie volleyed. “We’re talking about men. And I won’t mind waiting a lifetime for someone like him.”
Tess shook her head and then turned her attention back to her niece. “Sooo, how did you know where I was staying?”
“Grandma,” Melody answered nonchalantly, as she shrugged off her backpack and pulled out one of her mother’s diaries.
Tess groaned. “Sweetheart—”
“Aunt Tess, please. You just got to help me. I just know that this Lyfe Alton has to be my father. The timeline fits and everything.”
“Honey, it’s just—”
“And, please, please don’t tell me to talk to Mom. She keeps saying that she’ll tell me when I’m older, and I can’t wait anymore.”
Her aunt looked like she was weakening, but she only said, “It’s just not my place to talk to you about this.”
“Whatever you tell me, I swear I won’t tell Mom.”
“And if I don’t tell you anything?”
Melody drew a deep breath. “Then I’ll find him on my own.”
Lyfe was convinced that he needed his head examined. It was the only logical conclusion. How many times was he going to let Corona Mae make a fool of him? After sharing something so beautiful, he was now returning to his hotel room feeling dirty and used. Hell, all that was missing to complete the humiliating experience was her tossing money in his face.
And yet, he still had hope. Was he crazy? Was he a glutton for punishment?
“No. This is what I get for listening to my brother.” He punched the button for the other elevator and waited. There was no point in racing down to the lobby. He was sure that by the time he got there, Corona Mae would be long gone. No. He needed to fall back for a minute, give her a little space and then come at her another way.
Lyfe ran that plan through his head again and liked it even better the second time around. By the time his elevator arrived, a smile was carving back on to his face. As he stepped into the compartment and pushed for the tenth floor, his mind started to rerun images of the hot quickie in the stairwell.
There was so much passion in Corona’s kiss and so much heat in her touch that she’d had him, once again, feeling like the seventeen-year-old kid who had been so desperate to please her. Of course there were a few major changes. He liked to think that this time he knew what the hell he was doing. But the amazing thing was that he still knew all her G-spots
and had worked them accordingly.
Hell. If he could get her into a bed … or even a floor again, he would certainly show her a few new tricks. Of course, there was the voice in the back of his head screaming to remind him that she was now an engaged woman. But, while that was true, Stevie Wonder had famously crooned that all in love is fair. Lyfe was officially declaring war on Rowan James for the prize of his life.
The elevator dinged and the steel doors slid open. Lyfe took one step out before a young teenager plowed straight into him.
“Oops. I’m sorry,” she said, hardly glancing up at him.
“It’s no problem.” He smiled and then moved out of the way so that she could catch the elevator.
“Melody, wait up!” Two other teenaged girls called out, racing down the hallway. The moment they saw him they slowed up, and two huge smiles spread over their faces.
Lyfe tipped his head. “Afternoon, ladies.”
That launched them into a fit of giggles as they joined their friend in the elevator.
He even caught the exchange of, “Dag, he’s cuter than the other one.”
“I don’t know. I think it’s a draw.”
The one they had called Melody rolled her eyes. “Don’t you girls ever think about anything other than boys?”
Her friends looked at each other as the elevator’s doors started to close and said, “No.”
Lyfe chuckled. “Out of the mouths of babes.”
Chapter 19
The Christmas holidays were in full swing in New York. The entire city had transformed into a magical winter wonderland with sappy Christmas songs clogging up the radios and pouring out of every store. But with every tick of the clock, Corona felt herself turning more into an Ebenezer Scrooge than a St. Nick. It wasn’t just that she had to plan a great Christmas for Melody … and now her grandparents, too; but she was also running around trying to plan a wedding with her future mother-in-law, Cruella De Vil, aka Wahida James. As if that wasn’t enough, she had poor Margo giving Lyfe one excuse after another of why she couldn’t take his calls or return them.
After a week, she could tell that Margo was developing her own suspicions on the matter. And when Margo got suspicious, she got gossipy. It also didn’t help that winter flowers were being delivered daily, signed, “From your first and only love.” At first Margo had cooed about the flowers coming from Rowan, but now it was written on her face that she knew that the flowers were being sent from the man she lied to every day.
None of this was helping her absolve herself of the guilt that accumulated daily for cheating on her fiancé. She doubted that anything could help her with that. Every time Rowan called telling her about his long grueling hours or how the director didn’t know his head from a hole on the wall, the world crashed down on Corona’s shoulders.
I have to tell him. However, every time that thought whispered from the back of her head it was quickly crowded out by counter thoughts of how much the confession would destroy Rowan. After all, his last fiancé had had an affair on him.
But it’s not an affair. It was … an incident—a fifteen-minute incident.
She groaned. That sounded awful, even to her ears.
“Ms. Banks, are you there?”
“Uh, what?” She’d forgotten that she was even on the phone with Universal Media Studios. “Oh, I’m sorry about that, Ted. I just spilled some coffee on my desk. I got a little distracted,” she lied.
“Not a problem.” The producer chuckled. “I did that at least three times this morning myself.” He went back over the list of actors that he would be keeping for the next season of his television show.
This time she jotted it down, because the way her mind was working lately she wasn’t going to remember the list the moment they hung up.
“By the way, I hope my invitation to the wedding doesn’t get lost in the mail,” Ted joked. “I can’t believe that you’re actually going to marry some other guy—an actor, no less. All this time, I thought that I was making progress,” he said.
Corona tried to laugh, but it sounded stiff and flat to her own ears.
“Are you excited?”
It was a simple and legitimate question; however, Corona’s answer was anything but. “It’s … it’s a lot of planning … and work. You know, marriage isn’t something that one should take on lightly. I mean, I have a daughter. Her … concerns should be taken into account. You know what I mean? Plus, it’s not like I still have feelings for … someone else. That was in the past. A long time ago. One can never just go back to how something was after all this time. Can they? One has to move on. Put one foot in front of the other and just let go. Right?”
There was a long silence over the phone while Corona mentally reviewed that lovely word vomit that she had just spit out.
“Okay, then, uhm,” Ted said, “I guess that I’ll just see you at the wedding.”
“Yes!” She injected enthusiastically. “I can’t wait to see you there.” She quickly hung up the phone and then plopped her head into her hands. “All right, girl. Pull it together.”
Riiiiiinnnng!
She lifted her head and snatched up the phone before reading the Caller ID screen. “Yeah.”
“Yeah?” Lyfe chuckled over the line. “Is that how the big movers and shakers answer the phone in this city?”
“Lyfe?” She jumped out of her seat and twisted her neck to see out the side-glass paneling next to her door. Margo was nowhere to be seen.
“Well, I guess at this point I should be happy that you even remember my name.”
Corona drew a deep breath, but it didn’t do anything to stop the heat simmering in her core. “Of course, I remember your name.” She glanced around the room. “You’re the man who has turned my office into a flower shop.”
“Aww. So you did get them,” he said. “I was beginning to think the little man at the florist was lying to me. I didn’t get a thank-you call from you.”
Corona drew a deep breath while searching for the courage to say what she needed to say. “You didn’t get a call because I didn’t have any intentions of calling you.”
“Ouch. You really do know how to hurt a guy,” he said, but he didn’t sound the least bit hurt at all.
Now that she’d gotten what she considered to be the hard part out, Corona continued, “Look, Lyfe, I told you at the hotel that … what happened—”
“You mean my making love to you up against a wall?”
An instant image flashed inside her head. “I—uhm, yes. That incident was … regrettable.”
“Incident? Regrettable?” Lyfe paused, and then his laughter rumbled through the phone line.
The warmth that Corona was experiencing was quickly morphing into a heat wave. Not only did Lyfe have a face and body that any of her male runway models would die for, but he had a voice that could make a woman’s panties melt over the phone.
“Are those the words you used to explain to your fiancé what happened between us?”
Corona dropped back down into her chair, and, this time, she really did knock over her coffee. “Oh, dammit.”
“Careful. That’s hot stuff,” Lyfe said.
“Shh. I know it. Don’t you think … “ She stopped just as she was about to reach for a box of Kleenex on the corner of her desk. “Wait. How do you know what just happened?”
Her office door pushed open and Lyfe filled up the doorway. “Because I can see you.”
“What are you doing here?” she still asked into the phone, even though she was looking dead at him.
He continued talking into the phone as well. “Well, I figured that since you wouldn’t call me back, I would come by and see you.”
Corona shook her head even as he stepped farther into her office. “You shouldn’t have come here.”
He cocked his head and took his time drinking her in. “No. I should’ve followed you to New York a long time ago.” He finally made it over to her desk, leaned one hip on the edge and then reached over and gently re
moved the phone from her hands. When he hung it up, he punched the Do Not Disturb button and then pocketed his own phone.
“Once I got up here, I should have made you tell me to my face why you left.” He locked gazes with her. “I should have made you look me in the eye and tell me that you didn’t love me anymore and that you didn’t want to have a future with me—or have my children.”
Corona bounced out of her chair like a hot Pop-Tart. “You have to go.”
“Wait.” Lyfe’s hand snaked out and caught her around the wrist.
“No,” she snapped, jerking her hand free. “You’re not funny.”
At the word “no,” Lyfe eased back and held up both hands in surrender. “Hey, calm down. I’m not the type of man that’s going to force you to do something that you don’t want to do. I love children, but if you don’t want to have any … “
“What?” Corona stepped back again and studied his face. He doesn’t know. How is it possible that he doesn’t know?
“Just like I wasn’t the one who initiated our last … regrettable incident.” He cocked his head again and hit her with a smile that she remembered from his high school football days. For a moment, she felt the urge to pump her fists like pom-poms, like she had in the good ol’ days.
Lyfe lowered his hands. “You do remember asking me to kiss you in that stairwell, don’t you?”
“That was—”
“And you do remember how fast you melted in my arms, don’t you?” He stood up from the desk and moved toward her.
At the sudden lack of oxygen, Corona stepped back and then heard herself beg, “Please.”
“Don’t worry,” he said, his voice dropping to a lower register. “I’m only going to do what you ask me to do.”
Her head jerked up. “Then leave. Go back home to Atlanta.”
“Well … anything but that,” he amended, holding on to that same cocky smile. “See … your beautiful lips say leave, but, when I kissed you, those same lips begged me to stay. I wonder what else they’ll say when I get you the way that I want you.”
She bravely took another step back. “That’s never going to happen.”
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