Mr.arrogant(31)

Naomi looked up at her and took her hand, rising to her feet. "You are  the best friend I ever had. Thank you so much for being here for me when  I needed you the most."

Andrea hugged her tightly and grinned at her. "That's what good friends  do. Now, let's go find something for you to wear tomorrow so you aren't  hunting through your closet alone with no direction right before you're  supposed to be taking your next step."

Naomi gave her what might have been a small smile, and together they  walked back to Naomi's bedroom and spent a long while going through her  clothes until they found just the right outfit for her to wear the next  day. Andrea stayed for dinner, and Naomi ate with her, finishing most of  her meal, and then Andrea hugged her goodbye and made her promise to  call the next day after she left her new job.

It took a while that night, but Naomi finally let herself fall asleep  and pushed every little thought from her mind, making herself find some  peace in the chaos of pain and change.

The next morning she awoke to the fluffy orange cat that had camped out  with her for her entire duration of solitude and heartbreak, and he  purred as she opened her eyes and reached over to pet him. "You're a  good cat, Harold. Thank you." She said to him. He closed his eyes and  purred louder.

The sun shone brightly through the curtains and she pushed herself up  out of bed and showered, pulling on the clothes that she and Andrea had  chosen the day before. She gave herself a semi-cursory glance in the  mirror and walked out of the door, one step at a time, just as Andrea  had said.

With each step she found a new strength, and by the time she walked  through the doors at Jupiter Inc., she felt like she had begun to live  again, in more than small ways. There was possibility before her, and it  was not small.



Jonathon was sitting at his desk in miserable silence, going through the  stack of papers and mail to his side. He pulled a plain envelope off of  the top of the stack and ripped it open without even so much as a  glance at it. Sliding the paper from inside it, he opened the letter and  read it.

To Whom it May Concern,

Effective immediately I am tendering my resignation.

Naomi Bradshaw

Her signature was drawn across the bottom in carefully scripted  handwriting. The sight of her name caught him off guard and it ripped  open all of the fresh wounds in his heart. He had hated seeing the pain  he had caused her when she heard the announcement, and he tried to  follow her with his eyes as she disappeared into the crowd, but she had  been fast and there was so much commotion that he could not see her. He  hated that the last memory of her that he would ever know was the look  of total agony in her eyes as she heard him ask Susan to marry him.

By the time he had gotten back up to the office, he discovered that all  of her belongings were gone, and there was nothing that he would be able  to do about stopping her from going. She would not be in another  department. There was less than no chance of her ever happening across  his path again, because she was no longer employed at Cross Corp. Seeing  her deserted desk had hit him like a wrecking ball and he had sunk into  her chair and laid his head on her desk as his chest tightened and he  wept at having lost the most precious woman he had ever known.

His phone rang and disturbed him from his reverie. He blinked and drew  in a breath, looking over at it and hating it. It seemed like every call  that came in for him was no longer about business, and was instead  about the wedding, or it was Susan.

He had managed to successfully evade her company by making himself  inordinately busy, but he couldn't escape her calls, her constant texts,  her emails, and her endless stream of conversation about the wedding.  It was all she talked about, and it was the last thing he wanted to even  think about. He had told his new assistant, Robert, not to put her  calls through more than once a day.

Robert was a far cry from any woman who had worked for him in all of his  days at Cross Corp., but following his meltdown at Naomi's desk, he  made an immediate decision that he would not hire another woman to be  his assistant. No one could replace her. Robert had been working for the  company for years and was long overdue for a promotion. Jonathon hired  him immediately and Robert was thrilled, and had spent every moment  since his promotion giving his best effort.         

     



 

He reached for his phone and picked it up. It was Susan. He sighed  heavily and looked longingly at the open cabinet where the mini bar was  fully stocked. Placing her on speakerphone, he set the receiver down and  stood up, walking toward the bar while she blathered on about the  latest wedding details.

"Jonathon! Darling! I'm so glad to get to talk to you. I know you must  be thinking of all the things you want for our special day, but I just  wanted to run a few ideas past you before I make some final decisions  and purchases. Now, there is a china set that I want, and I know you  have your mother's, but really …  I've never cared for the design of her  china, and I don't want to use it when we host and have dinners, so I'm  going to have it put into a hutch in the back corner of the kitchen.

"I know you haven't seen this pattern that I like, but it's really  beautiful. There are little green flowers and roses, and it's covered in  gold leaf on the handle. It's so pretty. I know you won't mind if I  choose this one for our set." She went on and on, and he stood at the  bar and poured himself a double scotch.

He stood there, staring at himself in the mirror on the back wall of the  bar, thinking that he had never looked worse in his life, and wondering  when he was ever going to get a good night's sleep again. He hadn't  slept well since the last day he had seen Naomi. Her light blue eyes and  sweet sunny smile filled his mind. Her dark curls, her mahogany skin.  The curves and lines of her body. The way she smelled like spring  blossoms, the way she tasted so good to him. The sound of her laugh. The  feel of her in his arms.

He tipped the glass of scotch back and let the old liquor roll over his  tongue, warming him on the inside, wishing that he could pour it  straight into his heart to ease the pain and melt the ice that had  formed all through it. He hadn't felt anything in it at all since the  last moment he had seen her before she vanished.

"Also, the crystal must be Lalique, and I have a whole set of that which  I've chosen, so don't worry about that. We'll just tuck your mother's  crystal into the hutch with her china. It's going to be so beautiful! I  can't wait to show it all to you. It's going to be all over the house. I  just love the way it looks. I was thinking we could take down a lot of  what you and Phillip have up now and just put the Lalique crystal in  each room, so there's a continuance …  you know, some flow to décor. I  think it will be tasteful. I have selected all of my favorite pieces for  the house and especially the dining room. There won't be any place in  our home without it!" she went on and on, unaware that he was not  listening to her.

Jonathon was standing at the bar with his glass of scotch halfway to his  mouth, his thoughts drowning him in everything about Naomi. He was  reliving a memory of making love to her in a hotel downtown one night;  they had gone out to dinner and taken a sunset cruise, and then spent  the night in a penthouse suite overlooking the city. They had made love  for hours, touching and tasting each other, losing themselves in the  electric currents and fire that they felt for one another, and when she  had finally fallen asleep in his arms, he had kissed her forehead and  watched her as she drifted away peacefully.

It had only been a couple of weeks before the announcement his father  forced him into. It was that night, as she lay there in his arms,  dreaming happily, snuggled against him, that he realized that there was  no place in his heart where she did not reign. The newspapers had it  wrong. He knew that night that he had fallen in love with her. It had  nearly broken his heart in two when he realized it, lying there beside  her, holding her to him, gazing at her in her slumber.

He had kissed her softly on the lips, and whispered to her against their  fleshy curve, ‘I love you … ' but she had been dreaming and she hadn't  heard him. He didn't know how he would ever tell her and he didn't know  how she would feel about it, or react if he did tell her, and he just  wasn't willing to risk losing her because of the depth of his feeling.  He shook his head at the irony. He had found his queen, but it wasn't  the woman who was talking nonstop on his speakerphone.         

     



 

It was a woman who he had fallen for without realizing it. A woman of  strength and beauty, a woman who had grace and determination, a woman  who had turned on everything in him, from his mind and soul to his heart  and his body, and he had let her go, like the most miserable fool in  the world, he had let her go. He knew he had no choice, his father did  not make bluffs; his father made promises, and it was more important to  him to save her and everything she had always worked so hard for, than  to keep her and risk her never speaking to him again for what his father  was ready to do to her.