“Yeah… Eva….” Garrett trailed off and stared at him. “You… had a fling with Eva? You did that with your secretary?” he asked in amazement.
Derrick nodded and pursed his lips closed.
“You must be kidding me. You never do that kind of thing! Like… never ever! You didn’t even get wild in college. How on earth did that happen?” Garrett asked in utter amazement.
Derrick sighed. “Well, if I’m being honest, and I should be, it’s kind of been building up over the last few weeks, or even longer. I guess it’s been building up since I hired her. She’s beautiful. She’s smart… she’s funny and sweet, and damn is she hot. I just… kept thinking about her like that. I kept trying not to, but it was hard. When we got down there, we had all this champagne, and one thing led to another, and then there we were, and it… pretty much lasted the entire time we were there. It was incredible. It’s never been like that for me.”
Garrett stared at him. “I can’t believe you did that. I’d never have guessed it. Not in a million years. Wow.”
Derrick looked over at him. “Think I’m going to hell?”
Garrett scoffed and shook his head. “No. There’s no way you’re going to hell. You might have a difficult time here, though… you never do anything like that. Ever.”
“I know… I just… couldn’t stay away from her. I wanted her too much. She wanted me too, just as much I wanted her. It just… happened.” Derrick took a long drink of his beer.
“Soooo, I hate to bring this up, but what are you going to do about Felicia?” Garrett asked in a low voice.
Derrick felt his stomach twist in a knot. “I’m going to marry her. We’re officially engaged. I gave her my mother’s ring. You’re still my best man. I haven’t slept with her or anything. In fact, she and I haven’t done anything since college, and even then I was drunk and it wasn’t intentional; it just happened.”
“You and Felicia haven’t done anything since you got engaged to her?” Garrett asked in amazement, with a furrowed brow and narrowed eyes.
“No. I’m not going to do anything with her until we’re married. I don’t want to,” Derrick admitted in a quiet voice.
“But you couldn’t keep yourself away from Eva,” Garrett asked, looking skeptical.
“That’s about the size of it, yeah,” Derrick admitted.
“What are you going to do about Eva? Are you keeping her on the side or something?” Garrett’s face took on a dark look.
Derrick shook his head adamantly. “God, no, I’d never do that. It just kind of… happened with Eva, and we’ve both agreed that while it was incredible, it can’t continue to happen. I mean, she works for me. She’s my secretary. I don’t want to fire her; she’s the best secretary that I’ve ever had. We just have to… change the nature of our relationship and make sure that it’s strictly business down the line. She works for me. I get married to Felicia, that’s it. That’s the end of it. I have a responsibility toward her as her boss. We’re going to focus on work and nothing else, and that’s it. Straight down the line. I don’t want anyone getting hurt here, and I sure as hell don’t want to lose her.”
Garrett narrowed his eyes again and studied his friend closely. “You mean Eva.”
“Of course I mean Eva…” Derrick looked over at him. “I mean, I don’t want to lose her as a secretary. I don’t want to lose Felicia either, I guess. She’s who my dad wanted me to marry and spend the rest of my life with.”
“Uh huh,” Garrett said with a lowered brow. “Well, that was one hell of a last hurrah you had then.”
***
Eva and Derrick both worked hard to keep their eyes and their hands to themselves in the days that followed. They stayed in their own areas of the office most of the time, and when they were around each other, there was less eye contact and no body contact. They both reminded themselves several times a day that they should not flirt or say anything that sounded even remotely like a flirtatious comment. They had to give themselves space, at least as much as they could, and though both of them struggled with it every single day, they both tried their best to stay true to what they had told each other that they would do. They would keep their relationship strictly business.
A week had passed since the afternoon they had made love on the leather couch in his office. A week with no touching, no flirting, and no innuendos. Eva had begun to feel empty and sad, and she could see that something was bothering Derrick as well, but she knew she shouldn’t ask him about it at all.
She was sitting at her desk trying not to think about him when the phone on her desk rang. She picked it up and answered it. “Derrick Madison’s office, how may I help you?”
“Is Derrick in, please? I need to talk with him.” It was a woman’s voice. Light and airy, and sounding not at all like a business call.
Eva frowned slightly. “May I ask who’s calling, please?”
There was a slight scoff at the other end of the line. “Yes, if you must. This is Felicia Van Buren. I’m his fiancé,” she replied smugly.
Everything in Eva came to a halt. Her heart, her mind, and every cell inside of her. She blinked finally and tried to draw in a breath.
“Hello? Are you there? Did you hear me? This is his fiancé, Felicia. Please put me through right away. This is a very important phone call,” she insisted.
Eva could barely breathe or move. “Yes… of course,” she answered in a monotone voice as she placed the call on hold and sent it through without telling Derrick who it was on the line. She set the phone back down
in the cradle and rested her hands on her lap, sitting perfectly still as she stared straight ahead and tried to process the information.