Page 29 of The Perfect Deception

“Doesn’t mat­ter. And you’ll have to work with­out a para­le­gal for now.”

“How about I con­tact the pres­i­dent of Bradley and apol­o­gize?”

His fa­ther squared off the pa­pers on his desk. Adam stared. His fa­ther liked or­der­li­ness more than any­thing else. He didn’t want to think where that left him.

“I can’t have you any­where near them right now. The agree­ment I made with him is ten­u­ous at best. I have only our best peo­ple work­ing with the com­pany. And if you say or do any­thing that hits them the wrong way, they’re gone. I won’t risk it.”

“I swear it wasn’t me, Dad.”

“I wish I could be­lieve you, but you’ve screwed up twice be­fore this. If you were any­one else, I would have fired you.”

Adam ran a hand through his hair and tried to ig­nore the sud­den nau­sea that made the food they’d just eaten threaten to come right back up. There was noth­ing left to say. He rose from the chair, his body leaden. As he turned to leave, his fa­ther stopped him.

“That pro­mo­tion you want? I need to see a com­plete change in how you con­duct your pro­fes­sional life, Adam. Be­cause there’s no way I can jus­tify pro­mot­ing you with­out sig­nif­i­cant changes in your be­hav­ior. That means you need to put your work first and your per­sonal life sec­ond. Too many peo­ple have seen how you rush through things, and it causes doubt and dis­trust. You have my last name, and with that name comes re­spon­si­bil­ity. You, more than any­one, have to be above re­proach. That ap­plies to your per­sonal life as well. No more sto­ries around the of­fice of how you’re rush­ing out early to hit a club or stag­ger­ing in late in the same clothes you wore the day be­fore be­cause you were with some ran­dom woman. This Dina of yours seems like a good start. Let’s see if you can keep her.”

Keep her, like a cov­eted toy? Or maybe a grade point av­er­age? Or pos­si­bly a wild an­i­mal need­ing to be tamed? What the hell did his fa­ther think of him? The irony of his fa­ther push­ing him to com­mit to one woman, when he couldn’t even keep Adam’s mother from leav­ing, wasn’t lost on him. The is­sue begged for a much longer dis­cus­sion than he had the time for right now. Dina was wait­ing for him in the liv­ing room. In­stead of ris­ing to the bait, he nod­ded.

“Thanks for din­ner.”

His fa­ther fol­lowed him out of the of­fice and back to the liv­ing room, where Dina was wait­ing.

“It was a plea­sure to meet you, Dina.”

Dina smiled, looked be­tween Adam and his fa­ther. “It was an en­light­en­ing evening. Your house is beau­ti­ful and din­ner was lovely. Thank you.”

Be­tween mem­o­ries of his mother leav­ing and ad­mo­ni­tions from his fa­ther, Adam couldn’t get away from the house fast enough. He ush­ered Dina out the door. Swing­ing his car around, he drove down the long drive­way. When he could no longer see the house in the rearview mir­ror, but had not yet reached the street, he put the car into park.

“What are you do­ing?” Dina asked. “Is ev­ery­thing al­right?”

He gripped the wheel with both hands at ten and two, as in­structed years ago by his driv­ing teacher. His thumbs rapped out a beat on the wheel only he could hear. He bowed his head. He just needed a mo­ment to re­group…

“Adam?”

He breathed in through his nose and out through his mouth, in­hal­ing her co­conut scent that per­fumed his car. Un­like the other women he’d been with, her fra­grance didn’t make his eyes wa­ter. It re­minded him of the beach. Turn­ing to­ward her, he reached out and cupped her cheek. She stared at him, a quizzi­cal look on her face. He ran his thumb over her cheek­bones be­fore bury­ing his hand in her hair. His life was turn­ing to shit, and all he could think of was her.

“I…You….” He groaned and pulled her to­ward him, brush­ing his lips against hers. They were soft, giv­ing, like ev­ery­thing about her. Af­ter the in­tractabil­ity of his fa­ther, he wel­comed the change.

He needed the change. But he needed Dina more.

She gripped his shoul­ders as he kissed her. She tasted like wine and choco­late. His hands drifted down her back, mem­o­riz­ing the out­line of her body be­neath her sweater. In a cor­ner of his mind he won­dered if his hands were as dis­tract­ing as hers were for him. Be­cause hers were cur­rently play­ing with the hair on the back of his neck and send­ing chills down his spine.

The thought came to him in a rush of panic. She was go­ing to leave him, just like ev­ery­one he’d ever cared about deeply.

He leaned for­ward, de­ter­mined to make her stay. The gearshift dug into his rib, but he ig­nored the jab, need­ing to get closer to her. Pulling her against him, he traced kisses along her jaw. He nuz­zled the skin be­hind her ear, smil­ing as she gasped. His hands roved her body, slip­ping un­der her sweater, slid­ing up her sides and stroking her breasts. Heat shot through him straight to his groin. He groaned. When her mouth opened, he plunged his tongue in­side. She stilled be­fore her tongue meet his.

He was mov­ing too fast, he knew it. He shouldn’t rush her. She was the only woman who made him feel good about him­self. He needed her to like him, to care about him, to not leave. How was he sup­posed to achieve that?

She raised her hands to his face and pulled away so their noses touched. He wanted her mouth on his. He reached, but she stilled him with her hands.

“Shh,” she said. “What’s the rush?”

He tilted his head and rested his fore­head against hers as his breath­ing slowed. He was afraid if he didn’t rush, she’d find a rea­son to leave. But she was right, he was mov­ing too fast. He pulled away. She re­ally was go­ing to leave him.

Turn­ing back to the wheel, he swal­lowed. “Sorry. I’m sorry about that. It won’t hap­pen ag—.”

Now it was she who leaned over and pulled his face to­ward her. She kissed him long and deep be­fore pulling away. Again.

“I didn’t say stop. I said slow down.” She placed her hand over his on the steer­ing wheel.