- Home
- Stephanie Franklin
Man Seeks Woman 2, Man Seeks Wife Page 2
Man Seeks Woman 2, Man Seeks Wife Read online
Page 2
I blinked and ran to the window, pulling aside the heavy red curtains and the thin netting to see that Ralph had indeed started the car but hadn’t yet moved. The driver window was wound down; his dark eyes even though it was night-time were covered in a pair of dark glasses.
Slowly, I raised my hand and placed it on the glass where I knew he was watching. He nodded in acknowledgement and wound the window up then pulled away from the curb slowly.
I stood at the window, my face pressed into the glass watching as the he drove off. The bright red brake lights were clear to see until the end of the road to where he disappeared as he turned the corner.
Letting the curtain fall from my hands, I turned and wrapped my arms around my middle and looked around at my quiet and lonely living room wondering what the hell I was to do now. I was back home where I was supposed to be. It’s where I would have come home to in a couple of day’s time anyway, yet it felt so wrong to be here.
Gathering myself, I shook my head and hands out and moved to the TV. I bent down to push in the little on/off button and stopped, my finger just hovering. It would be a waste of electricity to turn it on—I wouldn’t watch it anyway.
I bit my lip and decided against the TV and favoured the stereo. I quickly moved towards it, not liking the horrid silence around me. The longer I stayed in silence, the more I would think and the more my mind would go through everything like a toothpick. I flicked the little black button with the red light above it and listened to the click before the radio station came on.
James Blunt’s “Goodbye My Lover.” flavoured my speakers and echoed softly throughout the dull quietness of the space.
“Oh, God,” I mumbled as I stumbled backwards, my legs not wanting to take my weight anymore. My hands reached out for the wall as I slid downwards and landed on my arse with a plop. My breath hitched as I gathered my knees up to my chest and hugged them to my body or as far as my boobs would allow and laid my head against the top of my knees.
Isn’t it just the way whenever you felt like shit that the saddest song comes on and makes you feel even more like shit?
I should’ve changed the station before I flopped down but I didn’t, so I was stuck with the mournful song, his word’s scraping their way through me. I listened to the sad words and felt the hotness in my eyes becoming overwhelming. Hot tears gathered in my eyes and dripped down my face, dropping off my chin onto my legs and rolling down, uncontrollably.
“Oh God,” I mumbled again as a sob broke free of my chest, stuttering my heart with it. The pain and burn in my chest intensified and overtook me. Sobs of the strongest kind wracked my body, enough that all I wanted to do was crawl up into a tight ball and forget about everything in my life.
Next thing I knew I was a crumbling wreck on the floor with tears and snot streaming from me like a river...
A river that had Sebastian Blackwell’s name written all over it...bastard!
Chapter Two
Remind me again why I hired you?
“Vic, are you listening to me?”
I sighed into the phone as I rolled my eyes and slumped back in my chair, the thing creaking under my weight. “I am listening.”
I wasn’t really. I was chewing on a pen lid and becoming rather annoyed with Jenna who hadn’t stopped going on about a certain someone for the past ten minutes since she’d called me.
“Ria,” Jenna growled. “You are not listening to me, you’re chewing. I can hear your gnashers chomping. Chomp, chomp, chomp,”
Snorting out a laugh, I threw the decimated black pen lid down, watching it sail off the end of my desk and picked up a new blue one from a stack in the little pot I’d been collecting and put it straight in my mouth. “What do you want me to say, Jen?”
“Something,” She shouted down the line making my ears hurt. “I want you to go mad or cry or do something but you’ve done nothing for the past six months.”
That was true.
I mean I’d cried a river when Ralph dropped me home that faithful night but since then, I’d just felt numb and strange. Of everything that had ever happened in my life, this was the strangest in terms of emotions. Since that night, I would get up every morning and try to not think about Sebastian. In fact, I would make it a chore not to think about him but I would and then when I questioned myself as to why I was thinking about him, like whether I wanted to emasculate him or jump on him—preferably his bones, I didn’t have an answer.
The one question though that I did ask myself was, Could I be in the same room with him or hear his voice? No. My body and my mind revolted to that idea and thought straight away but yet had no problem thinking about him from afar.
Strange!
I missed Ralph and Rosa like crazy because they were really nice people and when there weren’t too many of those sorts around anymore, you kind of swayed to those types and I had.
Of course Sebastian had tried to contact me through phone calls and text messages, not emails because obviously I had given him his iPhone back but he had tried to contact me no less. He’d sent presents consisting of chocolates, satin baby dolls, underwear, jewellery, electronic items and finally, art supplies which he knew for a fact, I would have a hard time sending back but I did... eventually. After I’d taken the paints out of the wrap and box just to run my fingers over the expensive colours, I’d re-wrapped them and sent them on their way.
The only thing he hadn’t done was come to me in person or attempt to.
It was obvious that he wasn’t sorry, it was him just trying to worm his way back into whatever we had. Of course, I listened to the messages and read them all, hearing and reading his excuses and waited to feel anger towards him but yet felt nothing but numbness.
“Are you even listening to me?” Jen snapped, bringing me out of my thoughts.
“Hey.” I said calmly. “You need to calm down before you pop that baby out with how much you’re stressing.”
The woman would send herself into labour if she wasn’t careful. She wasn’t due just yet. I think she was something like three weeks away or whatever. I’d stopped listening when she’d started talking about blood loss and placentas. Yuck!
“Don’t talk to me about babies.” Jenna roared down the phone. “I am a woman on the edge.”
Yeah, I think I grasped that already.
“Listen, Jen.” I sighed and looked up at the ceiling in the office, absently counting the joins in the large squares. “I don’t care who Sebastian is doing right now. Why are you telling me?”
Liar!
“See.” She growled again. I could just imagine her pacing the length of her pumpkin orange kitchen with a bright red face and her hands already out in front of her, wanting to strangle me. “You’re not listening. I didn’t say he was doing anyone. I said you should have a look online to see what he’s been doing.”
My brows pulled together. “And why would I want to do that, exactly?”
“Because,” She said as if that was a perfectly good reason which in my book was not.
“Victoria!” my boss, Conrad shouted my name from his office.
“Listen.” I sat forward quickly and gave myself a head rush. I pressed my hand to my forehead and spat the pen lid out of my mouth before I swallowed it. That was typical of me. “Jen, I’ve got to go, that’s Conrad.”
Jenna clucked her tongue. “Tell him to wait.”
Normally I would have but I saw his intervention as divine and would not pass it up to get off the phone from a very persistent and stressed Jenna. “Can’t, speak later.”
I put the phone down on her threatening me with actual bodily harm. I chuckled as I picked up another pen lid and pushed up from my chair. I reached down to my skirt and pulled at the material that stuck to me like glue.
“Victoria!” my name came again.
“I’m coming, damn it.” I mumbled and pushed open Conrad’s door. I stood in the doorway and crossed my arms over my chest watching him fluster around his office obviously looking f
or something.
“Vic—“he went to shout again but realised I was already standing there.
“Yes, Conrad,” I said sweetly, which I knew for a fact pissed him off more.
Conrad Brewster and his twin brother Ben were my bosses. They were nearly thirty years old and in my opinion, players who loved not only men and women but work as well. I’d worked for them for five and a half months so far and loved coming into work everyday except when Conrad was like this. Normally he was the relaxed one of the two brothers that ran their own Security business in the middle of London but recently, he’d been like a bear with a sore head and snapping at everyone—including me.
Conrad narrowed his dark brown eyes at me and hitched his hands on his hips, the muscles under his shirt bunching together as if he was getting ready to pounce. “Where is that file that I left on my desk?”
My eyes darted to his desk that was currently looking like a warzone. I sighed in annoyance. I tidied and sorted that desk on a daily basis then he came in like a whirlwind and messed everything up, as per usual. “What file?”
His big fists clenched on his hips, his eyes pointing lasers at me from where he stood. “The Albatross file. Where is it?” he spat.
Of course I knew where the Albatross file was and so should he. I’d given it to him last night but he was on the phone at the time arguing with someone. I remembered that he actually snatched the file from my hands, stuffed it in the drawer and turned his back to me.
Now, I licked my dry lips and pushed off the doorframe, walking over to the desk and picked up a random file from the top of the hazardous pile. “Don’t do that.” He snapped and marched around the desk, snatching it from my hands. “I asked where the file was, not for you to touch anything.”
What the hell was his problem this morning?
My brows rose as I backed away from him and the warzone of a desk towards his sofa and plopped down into it, the leather huffing under my weight. “Are you finished?”
Really, it was pretty funny to see Conrad Brewster flustered. The guy was at least six foot four and in old terms, built like a brick shit house. This guy was muscle piled on top of muscle. He went to the gym at least six times a week, visited the salon twice a week for a tan and a mani and drunk those horrible chalky drinks that made me gag every time I saw the carton filled with them in the staff room. In my opinion, just looking at them was enough to put weight on me rather than entice muscle.
Conrad’s face reddened even further. “Remind me again why I hired you?”
I snorted and began to tap my foot on the floor to a beat in my head. “Because you love me,”
He grunted a rude sound. “Uh-huh. Try again.”
This was the same thing I went through with both brothers on a daily basis whether they were in a good mood or not. They were really like two playful bears wanting to spar and roll around in the dirt but verbally even though they were nearly thirty for God’s sake.
“Because I do my job so well,” I batted my eyelashes at him. “You and Ben just simply couldn’t live without me.” I gushed and patted my chest with my hand. I bit the inside of my mouth to stop from laughing out loud when his eyes narrowed on me and his lips moved as if he wanted to dismiss the comment.
“Whatever.” he grumbled eventually and began rooting through the files on his desk. I opened my mouth to tell him about the red one that was just about to—oh shit, it already went. I watched with a sigh as all the files that I had placed on his desk this morning fell to the floor in a great big heap.
“You’ve made a mess now.” I said quietly, idly picking at my nails, my foot tapping faster against his carpeted floor.
My head snapped up when an elastic band flicked against my cheek. I clucked my tongue and removed the pen lid from my mouth where I’d been chewing it and placed it in the middle of my palm. I squinted my eye closed and aimed it at him like a missile. Flicking my index finger against my thumb, I aimed right for his forehead and...Damn it, I missed.
Conrad watched the chewed on pen lid sail past his eyes then looked back at me with raised brows. “More of the stock you’re destroying. I’m taking that out of your wages.”
I stuck my tongue out at him and pushed up from the sofa, making my way out of his office, seeing as I wasn’t getting anywhere with him in this mood. I stopped at the door and looked over my shoulder at where he still stood looking way too big for the office. Actually even with his white shirt, red striped tie and black suit trousers, he made the place look untidy. “You mean along with the elastic bands that you flick at me from your desk when I’m on the phone. Do you know how many boxes of those we go through because you have this overwhelming need to flick those fingers of yours—“
“Alright,” He snapped and flicked another elastic band at me which I was too slow to avoid. I growled at him when it landed on my right cheek this time.
Fucking elastic bands!
My mouth opened to tell him to bite me because he was a prick when the office phone rang. I sauntered over to the desk and plucked the phone up. “Brewster Brothers Security, Victoria speaking, how may I help you?”
“Hey, Angel, I need you to do me a favour.” Now it was Ben, my other boss.
I rolled my eyes and slumped down in my seat, reaching over for the pile of yellow post-it notes and a pen. It was always a favour with him. “Hit me.”
He chuckled. “I had a meeting booked at one thirty tomorrow that I was supposed to attend but I’ve just got a call from the client and they’ve informed me that they’re not going to be in the office then, so we’re going to have the meeting in our offices at the same time, tomorrow, hopefully. Can you make sure the meeting room is suitable and deal with any problems?”
“You mean like making sure the table is clean of any bodily fluids that you may have left the last time you used it?”
Ben sniffed indignantly. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Uh-huh.” I shook my head and tapped the end of my pen on the top of my desk, disturbing the screen saver to my computer. “I heard you and Damon in there on Friday, banging away. Don’t deny it.”
In actual fact, I’d stood outside the door for a couple of minutes being the perv that I actually was, listening. I know that if it were to have been me in there with someone, he’d have done the same. We were all pervs together.
He was silent for a beat then his teasing tone came across the line. “You’re just jealous.”
“Damn straight.” I laughed out loud. I hadn’t had my hole filled for going on six months and my vibrator just wasn’t cutting it. A woman had needs and listening to him and his weekly squeeze in the room down the hall had been too much to bear for little old me. “Okay but you owe me if I have to clean up anything. Remember I am a receptionist not a glorified helping hand.”
Who was I trying to kid?
“Whatever.” he grumbled, much like his brother had. “You’ve got the rest of the day to do it. I’ll bring you a cake in the morning for your troubles, how’s that?”
Oh well, food was the way to get to me nowadays seeing as I had nothing else. “Two Danishes and a hazelnut latte then you’re on.”
Ben made a sound at the back of his throat before he sighed dramatically. “Such a hard bargain,” He chuckled. “You got it, sweetheart.”
Chapter Three
Go get her tiger.
“Can I buy you a drink?”
I blinked into my nearly finished drink before looking up at the smoky voice that had spoken from somewhere over my left shoulder.
He was talking to me, right?
My eyes flicked to either side of me before darting back to him. There was no-one close enough to me that he could have been talking to.
“Huh?”
The man who was dressed in what looked like a black satin shirt and dress trousers with a rather orangey coloured tan smiled at me revealing straight white teeth that to my slightly woozy eye were false as fuck. He looked like TOWIE’s Mark Wright bu
t better looking with dark eyes.
“I said.” He leaned in closer to me making my nose twitch and itch with how much aftershave he wore. “Can I buy you a drink?”
Huh, he was talking to me. “That’s what I thought you said.” I murmured as I twisted the straw in my glass then sucked up the rest of the fruity liquid. I was all for a free drink. I smiled a little and pushed the glass towards him. “Malibu and pineapple,”
Normally I would have had my poison consisting of a beer and a shot then chased it up with a whisky if I felt like it but tonight was different. I needed a different type of buzz.
He smiled back, a ‘get in there’ man smile that had me biting the inside of my cheek to stop from laughing out loud and telling him he had no chance in hell in getting frisky with me but I kept my mouth shut. Let him think what he wanted, most men did anyway.
“Here.” He handed me back a full glass and took hold of my elbow. “Let’s move to a table.”
“What’s wrong with the bar?” I grumbled, sliding off the stool, grabbing my clutch from the bar. I was pretty comfortable on the stool all by myself which was totally the way I liked it lately.
He leaned in close to me again and this time I did sneeze. “Bless you.” He whipped out a handkerchief from his trousers and held it up to my nose like was a child.
“Yeah, thanks.” I clucked my tongue and took the handkerchief from him then did actually laugh out loud when I saw initials sewn into the cloth. “Seriously,”
Whatever his name was because I was sure he hadn’t introduced himself yet looked a bit sheepish as he shrugged and continued to lead me to a booth in the corner of the bar we were in. I slid in the seat first and curled myself into the corner.
“I didn’t catch your name.” He said sliding in after me and sitting a little too close for my comfort.
“Ugh. Dude, honestly, personal space,” I waved my hands around and pushed his side a little to get him to budge over. I nodded when he moved a little. “Victoria. How about you,”