The Billionaire's Impulsive Lover (The Sisterhood) (16 page)

The stairs were more trouble than she realized but she made it up the five flights to her floor, wheezing by the time she entered her office. She dumped her purse into her desk, got a cup of coffee in the kitchen, grateful she was early so no one else was there, so she could avoid conversing with everyone about the happy hour from the night before. She really didn’t want to hear all the jokes and the funny stories, who got what for dinner and who left with whom. She was done with office romances.

Sitting down at her computer, she pulled up the code she’d been working on the day before, diving back into the issues and working through the details. In the back of her mind, she heard the rest of the team drift slowly into work but she pushed everything out of her mind, focusing only on one problem at a time.

“Are you okay?”

Claire looked up from her computer, blinking to focus her attention on something other than the computer screen. Charlie Bonnasera, the team project manager, was standing in her doorway looking at her with a fatherly look of concern on his face.

“I’m sorry?”

He stepped a bit more into her office, leaning against the door frame. “Are you doing okay today? I know you left the happy hour early last night. This morning, you’re in before the rest of the team.”

She smothered a sarcastic reply. “I’m fine. I just got in a bit earlier than normal,” she explained. “I’ve been able to accomplish a great deal,” she explained and turned one of her monitors so Charlie could see what she’d done, explaining the code she’d written and how it would work, how it would interact with the other team members’ objectives to meet the overall requirements of the project.

When she was finished, Charlie stood up, nodding. “That’s impressive work. I like the way you’ve gone in a new direction and it will be interesting to see how the testers come back with their replies. But that still doesn’t answer my question.”

She turned her attention back to her computer. “Charlie, I’m perfectly fine. Just in a zone,” she said, pretending to smile as if she really were okay.

Charlie seemed to accept her answer, because when she looked up again, he wasn’t in her doorway any longer.

She got up and refilled her coffee cup, then went back to her computer. The next time she looked up, the hallway was empty and the lights were out in most of the offices. Glancing at her watch, she realized that it was already seven o’clock. She’d worked for twelve hours without stopping.

With a sigh, she went back to her office and shut down. With determination, she picked up her purse and left the building. She drove straight to a fitness store and picked out several workout clothes, purchased a good pair of cross trainer shoes and a new MP3 player.

The next morning, she followed the same routine, although she didn’t wear all black this time. By the end of the day, she wasn’t sure what she wore, but she drove from the office to the fitness center down the street from her apartment. It took only fifteen minutes to sign up for the classes and then she was in the back of the class, learning something called Zoomba. She had no idea what she was doing, but focusing on the person in front of her, mimicking their moves, helped her to not think about anything else.

The next three days followed the same pattern although she forced herself to eat more food, even though everything tasted like sandpaper or saw dust. She got it all down with either a cup of milk or a cup of coffee, whichever was closer.

By Saturday, she went into the office even though she was way ahead of her scheduled milestone dates. She couldn’t stay at home, she had no projects to work on and she didn’t want to face her neighbors.

Calling Darcy, she only reached voice mail once again. This was not good, she thought, grateful for something new to worry about besides the last two men in her life. Calling Matt, she reached the veterinarian’s voice mail but asked Matt to give her a call as soon as he could. Claire knew that their vet office was crazy busy on weekends, the time when they did most of their business.

She worked on her code, forced herself to eat more fruit, went to another aerobics class in the afternoon and got home Saturday night just in time to be extremely depressed. There was nothing to do, she had no projects. She didn’t even feel like baking, which was always her fall back when she was upset about something.

Pulling on her coat, she walked out of the apartment and strolled down the street. It was a cold, gloomy autumn day and the grey clouds only increased her depression. Sitting on a park bench, she watched the ducks paddle by, their bodies somehow able to stay reasonably warm despite the almost freezing temperatures and the biting wind that tossed them about slightly when a strong gust whipped across the water. The fountain in the middle of the pond was turned off now that the summer was passed. Which meant that she could see the bridge that spanned a portion of the pond. The grasses that normally grew along the edge of the pond were now dried up, the trees had lost their leaves and the people who normally strolled along the pathways were inside their homes, being warmed by a fire or reading a good book.

Claire thought about getting a book. Maybe a good mystery would occupy her mind until Monday morning. She couldn’t do anymore work on her code until the others caught up. She’d reached a stage where more of the others’ code needed to be interconnected, so she didn’t even have work as an outlet.

Instead, she sat on the bench, looking out across the grey afternoon. Not even watching the ducks. It wasn’t until she felt her toes start to tingle that she considered going back inside. As she walked, her eyes avoided looking at the couple walking along the path on the opposite side of the pond, or at the people in their cars, both couples and families as they hurried about their Saturday errands, some laughing, some not, but all of them looking a lot less lonely than she felt.

Her apartment was cold and empty feeling as she entered it a few minutes later. She didn’t even take off her coat as she curled up on her sofa. Claire turned on the television, but didn’t really find anything to watch. Still feeling cold, she pulled the blanket from the back of the sofa, covering herself from head to toe as the shivers started.

She woke to the television static and looked around. It was already three o’clock in the morning. Apparently she’d fallen asleep on the sofa but she didn’t feel any better now than she had when she’d come in from her walk earlier in the day. Pulling herself off the couch, she made her way into the bedroom, turning off lights as she went. She was so tired and miserable, she only took the time to pull off her shoes before climbing into bed, clothes, coat and all, covering her still shaking body in the soft, down comforter but as she closed her eyes, she wondered if she’d ever feel warm again.

Claire didn’t wake up until Sunday afternoon and that was only to go to the bathroom, get a glass of water and take some cold medicine. The day before, she’d thought she’d been cold from her walk but now she knew that she’d come down with a cold somehow. Uncaring of the how’s, she kept up with the water and cold medicine, and stayed in bed until Monday morning.

At that point, she knew she had to get to work. Still feeling awful, not having spoken with anyone since Darcy and Emma Friday night, she pulled herself out of bed and forced herself to get ready for work. Stuffing the package of cold medicine into her purse, she grabbed a glass of orange juice, but couldn’t drink it because her throat was too sore.

At the office, she tried to focus on her work, but as the day progressed, she felt even worse than she had on the weekend.

“Where the hell have you been?” a deep voice demanded from her office doorway.

Claire looked up, not really caring who it was, as long as they could let a little breeze into her office. She was suddenly feeling uncomfortably hot. “Excuse me?” she said, as politely as possible. Her tired, sore eyes took in the incredibly handsome form of Mitch as he stood in her doorway, looking like the wrath of God with all his fury shouting at her through is eyes.

“Claire? What’s happened to you?”

“To me?” she asked, propping her head up with her hand. “Nothing’s happened to me. Why do you want to know?”

The anger left his body and he moved inside her office. “Why do you look so horrible?” he asked, a bit more gently, concern in his eyes replacing the fury of moments before.

“Possibly because I feel awful.”

“Why didn’t you call in sick? You’re feverish and you look like hell.”

That got her attention. “Okay, first you desert me, probably for some bimbo who didn’t drive you so crazy and didn’t give you a hard time, and now you come into my office, demanding to know where I’ve been , when I’ve been home by myself, not that it’s any of your business. And now you dare to tell me I look bad? Well you can just go to hell,” she said, but the last words didn’t come across as much of an epithet since she sneezed, several times, so the “hell” came out as more of a “Helsh” instead.

“You’re coming home, Claire. You’re sick.”

“No I’m not. I don’t have any sick days since you forced me into this job. So if I’m sick, then everyone else around here is going to be contaminated.”

“No. You’re coming with me and you’re not going to infect the rest of my staff. Get your purse Claire. Let’s go.”

“I’m not going,” she countered, and turned away from him, trying to focus her blurry eyes on her computer screens. She wished he would just go away so she could blow her nose in peace and isolation.

“Come along,” he said and, on the first try, pulled open the drawer that contained her purse. “Are we going to do this the easy way where you walk out of here on your own two feet? Or am I going to carry you?” he asked.

Claire waved him away, pretending to ignore him. But the next moment, her chair was jerked back and his strong arms were about to pick her up.

“Fine!” she screamed, pushing at his arms and moving out of his reach. “Fine,” she said more calmly when he stood back from her, crossing his arms over his chest. “I’ll go. But you clear it with my boss, Charlie and tell him that I’ll make up the time.”

Charlie stepped into the doorway right at that moment. “She worked about eighteen hour days all last week. She’s more than already made up the time. Besides, if you’ll get her out of here, the rest of the team will have a chance to catch up with her. She’s so far ahead of everyone else that she’s at a standstill until we can connect the code she’s already written.”

Mitch nodded his head. “Thanks Charlie. I’ll make sure she gets home.”

“No you won’t,” she said and grabbed her purse, walking out of the door. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Charlie,” she said it more softly, all the anger burned out of her after her last tirade.

“I don’t want to see you back here until you’re one hundred percent,” Charlie contradicted. “Don’t worry about us. Just feel better, okay?”

“Thanks,” she said, truly grateful for his consideration. She didn’t bother to glare at Mitch, not having the energy.

Instead, she walked out, using the elevators this time. She knew that Mitch was right behind her, but she didn’t care. She just wanted to get back home and crawl into bed.

When the elevators opened up, she stepped into the cab, leaning her cheek against the mirror, hoping to cool herself down. The heat was right back and she wanted to peel her coat off just to cool down.

She didn’t realize that Mitch had followed her into the elevator until he sighed and pressed the lobby button when Claire simply continued to lean against the cool mirrored wall. “I would have gotten to that eventually.”

“I know,” he said softly.

In the lobby, Claire walked out of the steel and glass doors, trying desperately hard to ignore Mitch who was right behind her, as well as focus on the ground in front of her so she wouldn’t make a fool of herself and trip. For some reason, she was having a great deal of trouble lifting her legs and placing her legs one in front of the other at the moment.

She headed towards her own car, but Mitch stopped her with a simple shake of his head and led her to his own. By this point, her head was pounding so badly that she didn’t even have the strength to argue with him about which vehicle she was going to use to get home, as long as she got there as fast as possible.

When she slipped into the soft, comfortable leather seat, she simply leaned her head against the glass, getting whatever relief from the heat she could find. By the time Mitch was in the driver’s seat, she was already sound asleep so she didn’t notice when he gently strapped her into her seatbelt and drove her to his house.

He parked in the garage, then walked around to the still sleeping woman, greeting a very excited Duke as he walked around to the passenger side. With fast reflexes, he opened the car door and caught Claire who had still been sleeping against the window. Duke noticed the difference in his new friend and sniffed her clothes curiously, then stepped back to make room for his master who was trying to get Claire out of the car.

He effortlessly carried her upstairs to his room, pulled off her shoes and stockings, then her slacks, purposely turned his eyes away when he saw her black lace underwear, then tucked his sick little woman under the covers. When he was finished, he looked down at her blond hair fluffed up on his pillow and realized that he wanted her there. Not just for the weekend, or the next month. But for always. This woman had driven him crazy with lust and sheer amazement at her gall and loyalty, had somehow gotten under his skin and weaseled her way into his heart. He loved hearing her laugh, wondering what crazy plan she was going to come up with next, her intelligence and creativity. He knew that there wasn’t much about her he didn’t like.