Just A Woman (The Porter Trilogy Book 2) (10 page)

The Alex Porter that most people knew was a hardass in and out of the office. He was an eternal bachelor and a ladies man to boot. You never saw him with a steady woman on his arm, and you rarely saw him in anything but a full suit and tie. Even though it was highly cliché, all men wanted to be Alex Porter and all women wanted him.

Why was I talking about myself in the third person? Wasn’t that a psychopathic trait? Even with a fucked up childhood, I wasn’t crazy. I shook away those thoughts and concentrated on Charlotte. My beautiful, wonderful Charlotte. Phase one of my plan had gone better than I had anticipated and I needed to activate phase two as soon as possible. I didn’t want there to be any lapse, or to give her more time to second guess herself. Charlotte was fiercely smart, but sometimes, she could get in her own way.

Picking up my office phone, I punched in the speed dial to Rachel Mansfield’s personal number at Mansfield Management, and waited for the ring. I couldn’t call the regular line, since I knew Charlotte would answer.

“
Rachel Mansfield,”
she answered.

“Rach, it’s me. Listen, how would you feel about getting lunch?”
I asked.

“Hi Alex, nice to hear from you,”
she said, mocking my extreme lack of phone manners. Sighing when I didn’t respond to her sarcasm, she continued,
“Sure, I’d love to get lunch. When and where?”

“Anywhere away from the offices,”
I said. I didn’t want any possibilities of an accidental run in with Charlotte only half way through my grand plans of getting her back. That would ruin everything. I wasn’t a romantic person, but damn if I was going to let the plans I did make be spoiled.

“Is everything alright, A?”

“Never better. I’ll pick you up in an hour,”
I said happily into the phone.

I hung up with Rachel as I heard her giggling her goodbyes into the phone. I don’t know what I did or said to make her laugh, but I loved hearing it. She was, by all accounts, my mother. Not biologically, no, but she took me in when no one else would, and I owed her my life and more. Rachel Mansfield made me the man I was, and I could never repay her for her kindness.

The only issue I ever had with her was her stubborn and willful daughter. Ever since Rachel had brought me into the family fold, I had been constantly harassed and seduced by Sarah Mansfield. I tolerated her because of Rachel, but the sound of her voice put my teeth on edge. She was a spoiled child, and as much as she tried to convince me we were perfect for each other, I never gave her the time of day.

It was too bad Sarah never took no for an answer, and my need to not upset Rachel was high on my list. For the last few years, every few weeks I would take Sarah out to lunch. I didn’t want to, but keeping the peace was vital in my world. More times than I could count, Sarah would show up at functions and terrorize my date, effectively screwing my chances of getting anyone into my bed. Once I started the monthly lunches, she calmed down drastically, that was, until Charlotte.

I’d never seen Sarah extend her claws quite so fast than when she met Charlotte. It was almost as if Sarah knew my feelings about Charlotte prior to me even knowing or realizing. After the last encounter between the two of them, I knew things had to stop. After sending Charlotte home, I marched back up to my office and told Sarah, in no uncertain terms, that if she wanted to act like an animal, I would treat her as such, before I threw her, figuratively, out of my office.

Looking at the time on my computer monitor, I realized I had just spent the last half hour sitting and thinking without interruption, but if I wanted to pick up Rachel for lunch, I needed to get my butt into gear. Rachel hated when those around her were late, although she was rarely on time herself.

Punching the intercom on my phone, I waited until Brigitte answered.

“Mr. Porter?”
she asked shyly.

“I’m heading out of the office for lunch, I don’t know when and if I will be back.”

“That’s not a problem, Mr. Porter, I will make sure everything here is taken care of and you’re not to be disturbed unless it’s an emergency. Have a good afternoon.”

I turned off the intercom and stood up, straightening my suit jacket. Brigitte was an excellent assistant, but I still didn’t trust her. I glared at my monitor screen and studied her from the, above the desk, cameras. She looked like she was working hard. I decided that from here on out, as per Charlotte’s directive, I would attempt to be slightly less hostile to her. It would be difficult. My anger rose substantially every time I looked at her, and heard her voice. She had almost killed Charlotte. She hadn’t pulled the trigger. She hadn’t even been holding the gun, but she was the one who got Charlotte to that point, and I would always hate her. I didn’t have to like her, I just needed to be a bit nicer. I would try.

Making sure I had all of my essentials, I walked to my office door, opened it and headed for the elevator, giving Brigitte a small smile. Today was shaping out to be a pretty good day and I hoped that, for once, it would stay like that.

**********

Forty five minutes later, I sat in front of Mansfield Management waiting for Rachel to come out. Rachel always had a habit for being late, but I was used to it, and expected it. I looked down at my phone, thinking about texting her and letting her know I was there and waiting for her, but something pulled me away from my screen. Looking up from the front door, I saw the most amazing vision.

Charlotte was coming out of the front door, wearing a white fit and flare dress, her hair down around her shoulders and blowing in the minimal wind. I watched as she absent-mindedly reached her hand up and smoothed down her locks, trying desperately to stop them from flying around everywhere. She was talking to a man I didn’t know and it took every ounce of self-control I had to not jump out of the car and tackle him to the ground.

Looking back at Charlotte, I felt my breath catch in my throat. I knew that the windows in the car were black out tinted and there was absolutely no way she could see me, but she was staring as if she could. Her eyes blazed into mine and my heart went into overdrive. I felt like a teenage girl when her crush got to close to her. I couldn’t look away. Finally, she seemed to break from her trance and looked back at her companion, who had obviously asked her a question.

I couldn’t pull my eyes away from her, she was like a walking angel. Her eyes were glowing and she was laughing at something the guy had said. She was breathtaking. Without warning, she was blocked from my view, and the door opened, letting in the hot southern California sun. I scooted over and let Rachel in, feeling a slight annoyance that my gawking at Charlotte had been interrupted, but I managed to focus my attention back at Rachel and plastered a smile on my face. 

“Good Afternoon, Rachel, you’re looking lovely as always,” I said, leaning over to graze her cheek with my lips.

“And you, my dear Alex, are a liar,” she said, swatting my arm and laughing.

“Bracks, can you head over to the Italian place in Pasadena that I like?” she asked.

Bracks nodded his head and we pulled out into the traffic. I knew she’d make fun of me, but I couldn’t stop myself from swiveling around in my seat to look out the back window for a hopeful last glance at my daydreaming angel in white.

“Tsk, Tsk, Tsk,” she clucked. “You’ve got it bad, don’t you?” she asked, placing a gentle hand on my knee.

I turned around to look at her and process her words. I really did have it bad. Charlotte was all I could think about most days. She had invaded my mind and my heart and wouldn’t budge. More times than not, during a particularly long meeting, I found myself doodling her face on a scrap of paper instead of listening to the numbers surrounding my company's profit. It was juvenile, but I couldn’t stop it from happening.

“I do,” I whispered, “but I’m scared that things won’t work out.” I shoved my hands through my hair, giving it a much needed tug to center me. The pain radiated through my skull, pulling me from my thoughts and bringing me back into the here and now.

“I don’t think you have anything to be scared about, Alex.” Rachel said, confidence oozing from her voice as she pulled my hands from my hair like she’d done so many times in the past.

I looked up into her eyes and knew immediately she was keeping something from me. In any normal circumstance, and if she was anyone else, I would yell and threaten to get the information she was withholding from me, but this was Rachel, and it didn’t matter how much I threatened, begged, or pleaded, she would never tell me if she didn’t want to or couldn’t. The best I could do was ask, and see if she would divulge.

“What do you know that I don’t, Rachel?” I asked as nicely as possible, a small bit of sarcasm dripping from my words.

She smiled at me, and looked down at her phone, “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Taking a deep breath and huffing it out, I crossed my arms and looked out the windshield. I wasn’t going to argue with her, in fact, I needed to get on her good side for the conversation I was hoping to have with her at the restaurant. Yelling wouldn’t help my overall cause.

Once we arrived at the restaurant and had ordered, I was feeling slightly better about things. I’d almost completely forgotten the fact that Rachel was keeping something from me. We both ordered our food and sipped on our drinks while exchanging light conversation.

“So,” she started, “You’re coming to the fundraiser next Friday, right?” She smiled at me, knowing how much I hated fundraisers.

“Probably not,” I responded, “You know how much I deplore those things.”

Taking a lazy sip of her wine, she looked up at me, mischief gleaming in her pretty brown eyes. “Oh, well, alright. It’s probably not a good idea for you to be around Charlotte anyway.”

The look on my face was probably priceless and, had it been anyone else but me, I would have laughed at the poor bastard. I hadn’t even considered that Charlotte would be there for Mansfield Management. How stupid was I?

“Why is she going?” I spluttered, once the words started forming in my brain again. “She just started with you. You can’t seriously be making her work it?”

“Not that my business decisions are any of your business, Alex, but Charlie is incredibly smart and she’s an excellent personal assistant, but I didn’t invite her to go because she’ll be working, I invited her because she needs something fun in her life. If you didn’t know, she has had a rough few weeks.” The harshness of her words threw me off guard for a minute. She’d never spoken like that to me as an adult and I wasn’t sure what to make of it.

Seeing the look of confusion on my face and my lack of response, she took pity on me. “I know you didn’t do it on purpose, Alex, and I also know that you love her and that she loves you. Just give her a little more time and keep doing whatever you did last week. It was the first time I’ve truly seen her happy.”

My head popped up immediately at her words and I felt the grin slowly form on my face. “Really?” I asked, needing the verbal confirmation.

“Yes, Alex. She was really happy last week. It was a joy to see.”

“Tell me,” I stated, a little roughly than I intended.

She chuckled at me, and reached over and grabbed my hand. “I’ve never before seen the light in her eyes, and this week it was there. You really made her happy.” She tapped my hand twice and then leaned back in her chair.

I thought about her words for a while. I knew that Charlotte was into the lovey dovey romance stuff, but I wasn’t sure I would be able to pull it off. Romance was not my strong suit, to say the least, but I wanted to make her smile and it seemed I had completed that mission.

The waiter interrupted my thoughts at that moment, placing our food plates in front of us and grating some fresh cheese over our dishes. As I lifted the first bite to my lips, I looked up and saw Rachel staring at me, food untouched.

“I have to ask,” she said, “For someone who is a tech whiz and has been for many years, I’m surprised you haven’t considered tapping into a certain set of cameras to view her for yourself.” And with that, she smiled at me, picked up her fork and dug into her pasta primavera leaving me with my mouth agape and wondering why I hadn’t thought of that sooner. I really was an idiot.

Alex

The next part of my plan was going to be a bitch to execute. I needed help from other people, who weren’t exactly friends of mine. In fact, the two people I needed the most help from, I was pretty sure hated my guts and would be fine with seeing me struggle and suffer. However, I had to make them believe that Charlotte was what I wanted and what I needed. Besides, one of those individuals worked for me, and as much as I would loathe using his employment as blackmail, I was just desperate enough to do so.

Picking up the phone, I took a deep breath and called Jerry’s temporary extension. He picked up after one click, and was professional, but his voice was anything but friendly. Yeah, it was obvious I wasn’t his favorite person.

“Mr. Porter, How can I help you this afternoon?” he asked.

I looked at the clock, noticing that it was almost 5pm, and I knew Jerry would want to go home soon. Angering him when I needed his help didn’t seem like the smartest idea. I would need to make this quick, or at least make it memorable. I needed him to see me as a man in love, not his boss.

“Can you please come up to my office? I’ll try to be as quick as I can so you can leave at closing,” I said sincerely.

I noticed it took him a few moments to respond, and I took that time to plan what I would need to say if he refused to come see me. Luckily, it didn’t come to it. He said he’d be right there and hung up.

In all of my years as owner of Porter Industries, nerves were never a factor in any meeting I had ever gone into, including my very first. But today, waiting for Jerry to come up, I was attacked by a bout of butterflies fluttering around my stomach so hard I thought for sure one of them would fly through, tearing me open, similar to that weird alien movie.