by Katie Dowe
She had been brought up in a single parent home where her mother had worked as an office attendant to send her to school. Her dad had disappeared when she was little and never looked back. She had heard he died some years ago but had not gone to the funeral. She had no time to spend on a man who had run away from his responsibilities. She had been thankful that she had been able to show her mother a very good life before she died of cancer a few years ago.
Her intercom sounded. “I am afraid rest time is up, honey. You have a meeting in ten minutes.”
******
Alicia stepped out of the sunken tub and reached for the white fluffy towel hanging on the towel rack near to the bath. She stopped in front of the mirror and stared at her damp naked body critically. She was tall and slim, wearing a size two. Her breasts were a little too generous for her taste but made her waist appears much smaller. Her complexion was a healthy cocoa brown and her eyes were large and a warm brown which could smile in an instant or freeze with a glance. She had a full bottom lip and winged eyebrows. Her hair was thick and had curls to it and when loose drifted past her shoulders. She did not wear much makeup because she had no need for it. She put her fingers over her flat stomach and wondered what it would be like to be carrying a child inside her womb. With a shake of her head, she used the towel to pat dry her skin and went to find a nightgown to put on. She had taken a glass of wine to the bath and the glass was now empty. She slid the blue silk over her head and went into the kitchen to get some more wine. Allen had insisted on her having something to eat before she left the office so she was quite full. She had a woman come in three times a week to tend to the house and prepare her something to eat, leaving it in the warmer. She never cooked, hating the humdrum of it but would order takeout when she felt like it. She had something to peruse but decided that she was going straight to bed. She had a flight to Chicago and would like to be fresh for her meeting there. She looked around her spotless ultramodern kitchen before wandering into the living room where a life size picture of her mother hung above the mantel. Angela Barnett had been a very strong woman and her hero. She had seen her mother battle loneliness and poverty and provided for her. She had sworn from an early age that she was going to make her proud and thankfully she had done just that!
Chapter 2
“What’s this?” Alicia asked as her friends marched right into the apartment bearing a bag each which they dumped on top of her granite counter. They had called her while she had been at the office and told her that they were coming over and she had better leave work at a decent hour. Allen had shooed her out of her office at six and told her to go home. “Honey, you need a life,” he had complained.
“An intervention,” Donna announced as she pulled out a bottle of wine. “I know it is not your usual fancy label, but we are providing the snacks and beverages today.”
“Sit,” Elaine ordered as she went to get glasses and plates. “Where is the corkscrew?”
“In the top right drawer.” Alicia watched as Donna took out cartons of Chinese food.
“I have everything from sweet and sour pork to sesame chicken, orange chicken.” She peered into another bag. “Egg roll, fried rice, and Wonton soup.”
“Are you planning on feeding an army?” Alicia asked as she took out the chopsticks, the saliva drooling inside her mouth. It smelled delicious! And she had just had a salad for lunch and nothing else. Normally, she existed on coffee and spring water throughout the day because she had little time to have a sit down meal unless she was having lunch with a potential business associate.
“We are going to be strategizing.” Donna poured the wine and passed it along.
“For what?” Alicia was already digging into the chicken.
“We have a solution to your problem,” Elaine told her as she passed her a glass of wine.
“I was not aware that I had one.”
“A dating site,” Elaine declared with a wave of one hand. “It’s very tasteful and caters to women like you who are busy with their careers and have no time to meet someone.”
Alicia stared at her friends for a moment and then burst out laughing! “I am not looking for a man through a dating service.”
“This one is very respectable. Absolutely discreet. It is a kind of blind date, you get to meet each other and you sit at a restaurant and talk and if things go okay then you go on from there. If not then you move on from each other with no strings attached,” Elaine told her.
Alicia stared at her in fascination. “I am not going to sit across from some man I don’t know and probably have not the faintest idea what to say to him! I am perfectly able of finding my own man when I am ready.”
“When will that be?” Donna asked her as she sipped her wine.
Alicia shrugged and continued eating her meal.
“Exactly.” Elaine reached for the egg rolls. “You are doing this. Matchmakers is a very reliable and reputable business and they have a solid reputation. You have your first meet on Friday at eight. The restaurant is Leonardo’s and you have the corner booth. The guy will be wearing a white rose in his lapel so you will be able to identify him. He will get there first so you will know it’s him.”
“So in other words you have gone behind my back and arranged everything?” Alicia looked at her darkly.
“Along with Allen’s help,” Donna told her.
“Remind me to fire him tomorrow when I get to work,” Alicia muttered. “Listen, guys, I know you mean well, but I am not interested. I am going to Chicago in the morning and I am not coming back until Friday morning. I have back to back meetings when I get back. I just want to come home and sleep until very late Saturday morning.”
“We paid our money to sign you up and arrange everything,” Elaine told her.
“I will pay you back.” She got to her feet. “How much? I will just write you a check.”
“Sit!” Donna barked. “It’s nonrefundable and even if it was not we will not be taking back our money. You are doing this, honey, even if we have to hog tie you and take you there. Allen has instructions to make sure you get off early on Friday to come home and get ready. We are going to be here when you get home to help you choose what to wear. We know you have excellent taste in clothes so that will not be a problem.”
“I am definitely going to fire Allen’s gay ass as soon as I get to the office,” Alicia said with a pout as she sat back down.
“You are going to thank us,” Donna predicted.
“I sincerely doubt that.”
********
“Drop whatever you are doing and come into my office. Now!” Alicia told the tall attractively dressed man as she moved from his office to hers. She had spent the night fuming and going over ways to get around this asinine plan that her friends including her usually faithful assistant had put in place for her without her permission and had gone to bed feeling angry and helpless.
Allen came in to find her pacing the length of her large and elegant office. He noticed in admiration how well the grey pin striped suit fitted her and how her thick dark hair was fashionably styled.
“Close the door. I certainly do not want the rest of the staff to hear me chewing your ass out!” she told him darkly.
“You are upset.” He closed the door and went to sit on one of the chairs facing her desk. “Certainly not the time to tell you that we have a distribution crisis that needs your attention or the fact that leakages have been found in one of the cartons being delivered from our warehouse in Seattle.”
“I will deal with those minor incidents as soon as I fire you,” she told him heatedly. “You conspired with Elaine and Donna to put me on a dating site?”
“Darling, you need it,” he told her mildly, not in the least bit intimidated by her threats. “This place is your entire life. You are one of the most beautiful woman I have ever see, you are certainly one of the smartest and let’s face it, honey, you are over forty and still without a man, not to mention I am sure your biological clock is in frenzy! You
need to get out there and find someone. With your running things here, we as your friends realized that if we don’t do something then nothing will get done.” He got to his feet gracefully. “Now it’s almost eight and you have meetings and the crises to deal with so let’s get on with it.”
“This conversation is not over.” Her voice stopped him at the doorway.
“I know, honey. You still will threaten to fire me, but we have work to do.” He closed the door behind him.
“Damned cocky gay bastard,” she muttered with a reluctant smile on her lips.
********
“You are what?” His secretary stared at him in shock.
“I have joined a dating service and I am going on my first blind date.” Steven grinned at the look on the woman’s face. Phyllis Lattimore was more than just a secretary, she was his advisor and very good friend. The middle aged woman has been with Hughes Software since his father had been in charge and practically run his life.
“Steven Hughes, you are one of the most eligible bachelors in the world. You are sweet and if I was not already married I would be on you like white on rice! What on earth were you thinking?” she exclaimed. She had forgotten what she had come in to tell him on hearing the news.
“I am shy and prefer my own company. I am forty-three years old and I have not seen anyone I really like so far and I have a feeling time is running out on me. Besides Mother is pressuring me for a grandchild,” he added with a charming grin.
“You did not need to go that route,” she told him, her light green eyes eyed him thoughtfully. “I am reasonably attractive and I did not go that direction.”
“You are very attractive,” he corrected as he leaned back in his chair. “I made the choice to go that way so I can weed out the undesirables and have no strings attached if it does not work out. It might be fun.”
“Or it might be some crazy chick looking for an insane white guy.”
“Matchmakers are very selective and very discreet. They weed out the crazies,” he said with a grin.
“When is this date?”
“Friday night. I am supposed to wear white roses in my lapel so she can identify me.”
“She knows who you are?”
“No,” he said with a shake of his head. “I have no idea who she is either. That’s the mystery and beauty of it.”
“So you are going to be sitting there waiting on a woman you have no idea how she looks or what she does.” She threw her hands up in the air. “I give up! It must be the proclivities of the very wealthy.”
“Or the very desperate,” he said wryly.
“You are certainly not desperate. You are way too hot to be desperate.” She laughed at the look on his face. “My fifteen-year-old daughter’s words. She thinks she is in love with you.”
“Have you told her that she is my ideal girl? If only she was my age.”
She eyed him wryly. “Your ten o’clock is on his way.”
*****
Alicia padded barefoot to her closet and stood in the center of the large room and stared around with a small frown. It was Thursday night, she had come back a day early from Chicago because she had wrapped up her meetings earlier than expected. She rifled through the rows of clothes and took out a sparkling green dress that she had never worn since she had purchased it a month ago. It was a Romano original and had the popular brand’s signature style and cut. It had cost a fortune but it was worth every penny. She usually go out to functions that was company related and aside from representing the popular beverage she liked to look good. She remembered having to wear the same outfits over and over again when she was a teenager and in her early twenties. She held up the dress in front of her and looked at her reflection in the mirror. The green looked great against her skin. She reached up and pulled the pins from her thick dark hair and watched as it tumbled past her shoulders. Maybe she would leave it loose or not! She put the dress back into the slot and put her hair back up. She was going on a blind date with a complete stranger and she was not feeling nervous just yet! She walked into the room and climbed into bed. It was not a big deal, if for whatever reason she did not like him or what he had to say she had the choice to walk out of that restaurant and never see him again. She had nothing to lose! It was not like she was the one who paid for in any case!
“Okay, Alicia, you can do this. You are smart and independent and you are certainly not desperate. It’s the normal for busy people to find a mate this way, it does not mean that you are desperate. You are going to consider this as an adventure and you love adventure.”
Taking a deep breath, she turned out the light and went to bed.
*****
“I already picked something out,” Alicia protested as her friends rifled through her closet. She took out the dress and held it up.
Both women looked it over critically. “It’s lovely, no strike that. It’s spectacular and that is the problem. It might be too much for a first meeting. I think you should go simple.” Donna took out a striking apple green dress with a scalloped neck and straight skirt. “This is perfect.”
“I think so too.” Elaine walked over to the shoes rack and selected a black shoes with ridiculously high heels. “How is this?”
“What if he is short?” Alicia asked her with a twinkle in her brown eyes.
“Then we both know that you will be heading out the door,” her friend told her dryly.
“Okay, you are right. Are you going to stay here and make sure I get dressed and walk through the door?”
“We are.” Donna glanced at her watch. “It’s not after seven so you have half an hour to get dressed.”
“Really?” she said dryly as she made her way to the bathroom. “I am going to take a shower. Would both of you like to see me bathing?”
“No,” Elaine said with a straight face. “Use the apple blossom wash,” she called out.
“I am using the vanilla,” Alicia called back defiantly.
*********
He saw her the minute she entered the darkened restaurant. He knew it was her instinctively. He had been sitting there for the past five minutes wondering if he was making a mistake. He had seen a tall brunette walked in but had dismissed her instantly as not being the woman he was picturing and he had seen her being greeted by her companion. He got to his feet automatically as she made her way over and saw when her attention turned to him. He intercepted the Maître D and came forward. “I guess you are looking for me.” His ready smile came as he extended a hand to her.
“You are Steven Hughes,” she murmured with a slight frown as she looked at him.
“Guilty.” He guided her to the booth and made sure she was seated before he took his seat. The waiter came forward immediately. “Just some water for now.” He looked at her. “Unless you want something else?”
“No, water is fine. With a twist of lemon, thanks,” Alicia told him.
“And you are Alicia Barnett, the COO of ColaCo.” His dark blue eyes were twinkling with mirth. “I have to say I am very pleasantly surprised.”
“So am I,” she stared at him puzzled. “Why are you doing this?”
“Maybe for the same reasons you are doing it.” He paused as the waiter came back with their water. “I am busy and I hate to meet people. So I decided that I would go this route.”
“I came here expecting-” She sipped her water and looked at him. “I certainly did not expect to be sitting across from Steven Hughes, the billionaire software giant.”
“Who did you expect?”
“Some brother who was going to tell me all about their accomplishments as a brother,” she said with a grin. “I fully expected to come here maybe have a polite drink and then tell him that I had to leave.”
“And now?” he asked with a thick blonde brow raised.
“And now I think I might make it through the entire meal. Unless of course you are ordering something I don’t eat,” she told him with a smile.
“I am willing to allow you to do your ow
n ordering. I am forward thinking that way,” he teased her. He could not believe it! He had seen her pictures many times in the business magazines and had admired what she had accomplished and her coolly flawless beauty. If he had chosen for himself it could not be more perfect!
“Then we do not have a problem.” She lifted her glass and he did the same.
“So why are you here?”
“My friends ganged up on me along with my assistant.” She leaned back against the padded seat. “They claimed that time is running out on me,” she said airily. “You are not thinking how old I am?”
“I am a gentleman. I would never ask that question but say that you do not look a day over twenty,” he told her with a slight smile.
“I am definitely staying for dinner.” She stopped talking for a minute as the waiter came forward to take their order.
He watched as she spoke to the besotted waiter, telling him exactly how she wanted her chicken. His eyes drifted to her lips. She had on cranberry lipstick that suited her well and brought attention to the fullness of it. He had watched her as she walked over and admired the way she moved. The dress shimmered and flowed around her like a lover’s caress. The thought had come unbidden to his head as he looked at her. She was truly a beautiful and sexy woman.
“Sir?” The waiter stood there politely waiting.
“I will have the same, thanks,” he said with a nod. “So how does a woman like you end up being in charge of a company?”
