Chapter7

Eva smiled genuinely when she looked up and saw Greg coming into the office. “Well, hello!” she greeted him pleasantly. He gave her a nod.

“I’m sorry to drop in unexpectedly like this again. Is he here? Would it be alright to see him?” Greg asked, looking from Eva toward Derrick’s office door. She gave him a nod.

“Yes, I’m sure it will be fine. Let me just tell him you’re here and then I’ll send you in.” She picked up her phone, and Derrick asked her to send Greg in to see him.

Derrick rose from his desk and reached his hand out to his father’s almost retired assistant. “Greg, it’s good to see you again. How are you doing?” he asked with a grin.

“I’m good, Derrick, thank you. I wanted to check with you to see how you’re doing. I haven’t heard anything from you about the wedding, and I wanted to be sure that we had everything we needed to move forward.” He sat down in one of the chairs before Derrick’s desk, setting his briefcase at his feet.

Derrick sat down opposite him and sighed with a half-smile. “Well, I’m sorry I don’t have any further news for you. I left it all up to Felicia. I haven’t heard anything specific from her, other than she does want to get married really soon. I left it all up to her. I’ll be totally honest with you, I don’t really care when we do it, and I’m letting her make all of the decisions about it.”

Greg frowned. “Is that so? Why is it that you don’t care?”

Derrick pursed his lips and eyed Greg carefully. He wasn’t sure just how much to tell him. “Well, I’ll be honest with you. I know my father trusted you implicitly, and I know that I can do the same. I just don’t love her. I know I ought to. I know I shouldn’t marry someone that I don’t love, but I just don’t feel that way about her. The matter of marriage to her is more of a business arrangement, at least as far as I’m concerned, and her father is anxious for it, and she is anxious for it, so that’s where it is. We’ll get married when she says she wants to get married, and that will be that.”

Derrick paused then, watching Greg and trying to discern the man’s thoughts by the expression on his face. He leaned forward then and looked seriously into Greg’s eyes. “Do you think that’s the right thing to do? Do you think that I should marry her?”

Greg’s mouth twitched, and he looked as if he wanted to say something but couldn’t, or shouldn’t. “Derrick, it’s not for me to say what is right for you, or for Felicia or Franklin. Your father made it very clear that I was to have no involvement in the way that things turn out, only that I was to handle whatever you decide to do, no matter what that decision is.”

With a frown, Derrick realized something that hadn’t occurred to him before. “You know something you’re not telling me, don’t you?” he asked, amazement flooding through him.

Greg pressed his lips together into a thin line. “It doesn’t matter what I do or don’t know, what I can tell you is that I cannot be an influence in any of your decisions. I cannot interfere with your choices or help you make up your mind about anything. That’s something that you have to do on your own. I’m here to facilitate whatever your decisions may be, in as far as the final wishes of your father and the last details of his will. Davenport and I are on standby here, ready to help you with your future, no matter what that future is, but that future is entirely up to you. We are merely tools to make things work for you after you’ve made your own choices and decisions. We are not guides to help you make those decisions. Do you understand that?” he asked, looking as if he was somewhat pained.

Derrick furrowed his brow. “If you know something, if you’re hiding something from me, especially about my father or my future, or any of the choices I have to make regarding Franklin and Felicia, then I implore you to tell me! Please… you can’t leave me sitting here with these kind of choices before me, life-changing choices, and not give me all of the information. What if the things you know might have an impact on the choice that I make? How could you live with yourself, knowing that you held anything back from me that might alter my future and what I decide to do with it?”

Greg shook his head. “I cannot. Your father was extremely explicit about his instructions. I’m here to handle it all for you, not to influence you in any way. I know you understand that. Please don’t ask me to go against your father’s wishes. I just can’t do that.”

With a frustrated sigh of resignation, Derrick sat back in his chair. “Alright. You win. I won’t ask anymore. So, I guess it just comes down to me telling you when the wedding will be, is that right?”

Greg nodded. “Yes. If you marry her, I need to know when the wedding will be, and you can send me details about that. When it’s over and you are legally married to Felicia Van Buren, I can complete the work that your father set for me to do. Well, Davenport and I, but it will be done then.”

“Very well. I’ll send you the information when I know it.” Derrick stood up again and reached his hand out toward Greg, who took it. “I do wish you’d tell me what you know. If you have a change of heart, I would like to know about it. I hope you do. I hope you give this some real thought. You might have served my father to the best of your ability, but he is gone now, and you are serving me. I need you to do that to the best of your ability, and that includes telling me everything that you know so that I can have all the information I need to make the best decisions that I can.”

Taking his hand, Greg nodded. “Thank you for your time, Mr. Madison. I will be in contact with you.” He turned then and walked out of the office, pausing at the door to look back over his shoulder at Derrick. His mouth twitched again, and he frowned before he turned once more and walked out.

Derrick watched the door close, and he rubbed his finger over his chin thoughtfully, wondering what it was that Greg was keeping from him, and wondering even more than that what it might be that his father would hold back from him that might change his mind about anything that he was doing. He didn’t like not knowing, but he knew that he did not wish to defy anything that his father wanted to do, or wanted to have him do. Franklin had made it quite clear that his father had wanted him to join their two businesses, their two families, and to create a lasting and powerful legacy. He could not let his father down, no matter what he wanted, no matter how much it bothered him that he would be marrying a woman he did not love and probably never would. He had an obligation to his father, his grandfather, and the whole of the Madison line before him, to their company, to everything that every Madison before him had built up and created, and he could not let them down, any of them, especially his beloved father.

There would be a wedding, and Felicia would become his bride, his wife, his partner for the rest of his life. He would be intimate with her at least enough to have children with her, but beyond that, he had no physical or emotional interest in her at all. It was going to be a long and lonely life, but he was willing to do it for the betterment of his estate and the generations of Madison’s to come after him. He was willing to do it for his father, though it came at a steep price.

He would make himself forget what it was like to be with a woman he wanted, with a woman who dominated his every thought, who made him ne

ed her like the very air that he breathed. He would turn away from that when the time came, and he had to face the responsibilities of his future. He would let her go and never touch her again. Never allow himself to succumb to his burning desires for her, his need for her presence, even for the comfort of her smile and her voice in his ears. He would be true to what his father had asked of him. He would marry Felicia, and that would be the end of his young and passionate days. There was no more to it than that.

In the days that followed, it seemed to both Eva and Derrick as if the moments that they found themselves alone together were growing increasingly often, and intimacy burned hotter and brighter between them the more they shared it. They both knew that it was going to come to an end in a short while, and both of them were desperate to hold on to every chance that they could have with each other until that happened, swearing that they would stop when the marriage happened, and they both knew without a doubt that the other meant it when that was said. His vow of marriage would be sacred to them both, and they would not continue their passionate alliance.

Eva and Derrick found themselves loving one another in almost countless times and places—in his limousine, in the office, in the stairwell at the office, in elevators, in hotel rooms on short business trips, in his condo, in her condo, and even once in a dressing room at a clothing store. They could not hold back the desire that they each felt for one another, and neither of them wanted to. There was such a powerful and magnetic draw between them both that they were compelled to be close, to answer that need and desire every chance that they could, even though they both knew that it was going to come to an end and that there would be no chance for them in the future. It only seemed to make the present more precious to them; it made the fires between them burn hotter, the desire more desperate, the emotions more acute, and the releases together much more profound.

They had begun doing small things for each other, little tokens of their affection, little ways that they loved to show each other how much they cared and how often they were on one another’s minds, from sensual texts when they weren’t together to him making sure that she had fresh roses on her desk, to her leaving little sexy little notes in his desk, and him treating her to massages to put her to sleep or cooking for her when they were at either one of their homes. There were no end of little ways that they shared their care and emotions with each other. There seemed to be no end to the pillow talks that lasted for hours throughout the nights that they shared together. There was no end to the array of topics that they discussed, or insights and opinions that they shared, other than the fact that neither one of them was willing to talk about his impending marriage.

One night, moments after Eva and Derrick had shared overwhelming orgasms, holding each other tightly in their arms, he rested beside her and gazed at her, looking as though he was lost in her eyes. He leaned forward and kissed her softly.

“God, I love you,” he whispered. He hadn’t meant to say it, though he had certainly been feeling it and thinking it, but at that moment, he discovered that he didn’t want to hold it in any longer. He wanted to share it with her. He wanted her to know it, and to know it without any doubt, without any shadow of doubt in her heart or her mind.

She stared at him, barely willing to believe that she had just heard him speak the words that he had spoken. After a silent beat, she blinked. “Do you really mean that?” she asked incredulously.

He kissed her softly again and nodded. “I do mean it, with every part of me. I love you, Eva. I love the way you smile, I love the way you feel in my arms, and I love your laugh; you have a wonderful laugh. I love the light in your eyes; I love the way you smell and the way you look at everything with such a positive outlook. I love the way you think and the way you make coffee for me. I love the way you know exactly what I’m thinking most of the time and I don’t have to say anything, I can just look at you, and you know. I love the way that you love me, the way that you are so giving and passionate in my arms. I love the way that you let me love you, like there’s nothing you could want that I don’t already give to you. You’re an uninhibited woman, and you follow your heart and your mind, and I love that about you. I love seeing your toothbrush next to mine. I love sharing secret smiles with you. I love just about everything about you, Eva. I love you.”