She nods, and just then my phone starts to ring. It’s Landon.
“You set?”
“Yeah. Almost.”
“Joe is on his way over to pick you,” he tells me. “I have a conference call, but I’ll be done in about twenty minutes, so he’ll swing by the office to get me.”
“Okay.”
“Fine.” He seems reluctant to get off the phone. “So I’ll see you soon.”
“Yeah.”
“Okay.”
“You should get to your conference call,” I tell him, smiling.
“I know.” There’s a deep chuckle from his end, but he makes no move to end the connection.
I laugh. “Seriously, I’ll see you soon.”
“Hmmm, yeah. Soon.”
Laurie rolls her eyes, and leaves my room, laughing softly as she closes the door behind her.”
“Okay, I’m going to go now,” I say determinedly. “I have packing to finish.”
“Okay.” There’s a long pause. “What are you packing?”
“Sheer lingerie,” I tease.
“Now I most definitely have no desire to get off the phone.” He pauses. “Are you going to describe it to me? Give me something to think about for the next few minutes.”
“No. no.” I laugh. “I’m getting off the phone now.”
“Okay. Okay.” He’s laughing too. “I’ll see you.”
After our conversation, I can’t wipe the silly grin off my face. I love him. It isn’t possible that there would ever come a day when I wouldn’t be in love with him. You’re setting yourself up for an excruciating heartbreak, a warning voice whispers in my head. The thought is saddening, depressing, but not enough to take away the excitement, the reckless elation of knowing that soon I’ll be with him.
A few minutes later, there’s a knock on the door. It’s Landon’s driver, Joe. He also doubles as some sort of bodyguard. He’s probably very skilled, I think now. Or else Landon wouldn’t trust him with his safety.
Suddenly fretting about imaginary scenarios where Landon would need protection, I wave goodbye to Laurie, who’s already nose-deep in one of her unattractive law books. I follow Joe downstairs to where the gleaming black car is waiting on the curb.
Joe doesn’t say much, and the drive is quiet all the way to the entrance of the Swanson Court Tower, Landon’s downtown high-rise building, which houses the offices of the Swanson Court International. The memory of my first time here rises unbidden into my mind, and I bite back a smile. I’d been so mad at him, and yet, after our encounter in his office, I’d stopped struggling against the fact that I was helplessly attracted to him.
I’m still smiling when Landon emerges from the building, looking as immaculate as he did in the morning. He says something to the doorman, then strides purposefully towards the car, joining me in the back, and bringing with him that slight hint of his cologne coupled with his aura of inescapable sexual magnetism.
“Hello sexy,” I say with an appreciative smile.
“You’re the sexy one,” he says with a grin, leaning over to place a kiss on my lips. “What were you smiling about?”
I shrug. “Nothing. Just memories.”
“We have some of those,” he muses.
“Yes,” I agree. We’d only known each other for such a short time, and yet he had taken over almost every part of my being.
It’s a long drive, and somewhere between talking about plays we’d seen, arguing about which movies were better than their book adaptations and which ones were not, and me confessing that I’d never been able to see constellations, I fall asleep with my head on his lap.