In the Eye of the Storm (10 page)

There was no hesitation this time.  Holly clung to him, running her hands up and down his back, keeping him close.  Impatiently, Stephen reached between them and untied the robe that was wrapped around her.  Pushing it off of her shoulders, he pulled back to look at her.  She was staggeringly beautiful.

There was no time to wait, no time to walk up the stairs, it had to be now.  He lifted her and placed her on the granite counter top behind her; careful to keep the robe under her to protect her from the coolness of it.  She gasped at the sudden move but quickly recovered and pulled his mouth back to hers while he pushed away his jeans.  In seconds he was there, inside of her.  It was heady to know that he could bring out this passion in her; his normally cool and composed assistant was no where to be seen.

He kissed her mouth, her neck, her breasts; each eliciting different sounds and cries of pleasure from her.  She was a feast that he could not get enough of and if the way she was clawing at his back was any indication, Holly felt the same way.  It was all consuming, blinding and frantic and soon Stephen felt her tightening around him, her tell-tale quickening of breath that made him feel more masculine that anything else in the world.  He held back long enough to watch her come hard before allowing himself to do the same.

Breathing ragged, Holly draped over Stephen, her head on his shoulder, like a rag doll.  “If we had breakfast together like this every day we’d never get any work done,” she mused.  Stephen chuckled lightly and agreed.  He helped her down from the counter top and righted the robe that was hanging off of her. 

“You okay?” he asked.  Holly merely hummed a reply and went to lean against him again, her arms wrapping around his middle.  He liked it.  That one simple move made him feel ten feet tall.  He was treading into dangerous territory here.  With every little movement, every word, every gesture, Holly was beginning to take hold of a part of his life that was off limits to everyone.  He had to take some action to stop it from happening if for no other reason than to wait until he knew for sure what she was thinking.

Carefully, he turned her slightly so that he could put an arm around her shoulders and walk her towards the living room so that they could sit on the couch and recover from their explosive encounter.  He kept her close as they sat down.  He grabbed the remote and turned on the TV to once again check on the forecast.  It seemed as if the storm was finally preparing to move out of the area and the rain was expected to end within the next couple of hours.  He felt Holly tense a little beside him and said, “It won’t matter if the rain ends today or not.  It’s Sunday and the trees are probably still down.  The roads probably won’t be cleared until tomorrow.”  In his own mind he was saying the words to Holly but he knew subconsciously that they were just as much for his own benefit.

Watching the remainder of the newscast in silence was oddly soothing.  When the house phone rang near the end of the broadcast, both nearly jumped out of their skin.  Stephen walked to the kitchen to answer it.  “Hello?”

“Mr. Ballinger?  It’s Margret from personnel,” she began. 

“Hi, Margret; what can I do for you?”  Stephen was a little perplexed as to why his employee was calling him at home and hoped that nothing was seriously wrong.

“Yes, sir, I’ve been trying to call Holly Abbot at home with no luck and figured it would be best to try and get to you myself.”

“Is there a problem, Margret?”

“Well, I just got a call from the building manager, sir, and it seems like there has been extensive storm damage in the downtown area as well as some to the building.”

“Are our offices okay?”  He was immediately in ‘boss’ mode and his brain was scrambling to the possibilities of what could possibly be ruined.

“Oh, no sir, our offices are fine.  The entire first floor and the basement were flooded and so our offices are fine being that they’re up on the eighth floor.  No, the problem is that they won’t let anyone in to the building until at least Tuesday afternoon and so I needed to get the phone tree going to notify all employees of this fact.  Holly normally assists me with that when we have snow days and such.  I guess her phone must be out because I can’t reach her.”

“Um…yes, probably.”  A part of Stephen wanted to hand the phone to Holly so that she could do what she normally does to help Margret but to do that would be to let someone know that Holly was staying in his home, and he was not ready to even attempt something like that just yet.  “Are you able to make the calls or do you want me to help you?”

Margret was stunned silent for a moment.  “Oh, no, really Mr. Ballinger, I’ll be fine.  I have the entire company list here and we have a system.  I just need to get Holly’s branch of the phone tree going and then everyone passes a call on to the next person on the list.  I just thought that you should know what was going on for yourself since I couldn’t reach Holly.”

After thanking her and wishing her a good day, Stephen walked back in to the living room where Holly was channel surfing in search of something to watch.  “You have like a thousand channels.  How do you ever find and decide on something to watch?” she asked, looking at the TV and not at him.

“Honestly?  I don’t even watch TV.”  Holly stopped surfing and turned to look at him with disbelief.  “It’s true,” he assured her.  She shook her head and returned her focus to the TV until she found something that caught her attention.  She was laughing when Stephen interrupted her.  “That was Margret on the phone from personnel.”  He went on to explain to Holly all that was going on.

“So the earliest that we can go back to the office is on Tuesday?”

It was such a simple question and yet it held many implications.  Did that mean that Holly was coming back to work?  Was she going to stay on with him?  Stephen truly wished that but really all he could make himself focus on at the moment was that this new development with not being able to go to work meant extra days that they would have here together in his home.  In his bed.

God, this was insanity.  He had to force himself to focus here and to get his mind out of the bedroom.  “It seems that way,” he finally remembered to answer.  “I guess we have no idea how extensive the damage really is going to be until we’re out driving in it.  I’m glad we found out now rather than on Monday morning when we couldn’t have gotten near the place.”  Holly nodded in agreement.  “Do you need to call Margret or do anything?”

She took a minute to answer because she was partially still paying attention to the comedy on the TV.  “Um…I’m sure Margret has it all under control.  Besides, won’t it seem suspicious if I call her after she couldn’t get through to me?  And from your phone?”

“What about your cell?”

“Dead.  I forgot my charger.  I’m sure my mom is getting slightly frantic by now but I’ll talk to her when I get home and put her mind at ease.”  She was being pretty casual about the whole thing even though her insides were jumping around.  More time with Stephen.  More opportunities to lock away from the rest of the world and live the fantasy for a little bit longer.  It was more than she would have dared ask for but was so thankful to receive.

Sensing that all was all right at the moment, Stephen returned to his spot besides Holly on the couch and allowed himself the luxury of just relaxing on a Sunday afternoon with a beautiful woman by his side.  It was a new sensation – yet another one – and he found it to be very comfortable. 

Chapter Seven

As Holly drove away from Stephen’s home on Monday afternoon, they had carefully agreed upon the fact that she would be returning to work at Ballinger’s the next day.  As awkward as it might be, Holly was too dedicated to the company, and to Stephen, to leave him high and dry without an assistant. 

That had been an easy decision.  How to handle what had happened over the weekend had been a little more awkward to handle.  Holly had been the first to address it.

“You realize that I’m more than willing to stay on at Ballinger’s, Stephen, on a temporary basis, right?”  He had nodded and let her continue.  “I know I’m going to be a little more paranoid than normal because I’m just going to be looking for someone to say something off color or to look at me weird; I’m not quite sure how I’m going to handle it.”

“You may be worrying for nothing, Holly.  I mean, just because Derek made a comment doesn’t mean anything.  Derek thinks everyone is having sex.  Hell, he sleeps with most of his assistants.  In his mind, he can’t imagine why I haven’t.”

“But you have,” she said quietly. 

He studied her quietly.  They had been lying in his bed having this discussion and she was on her side facing him.  One breast was exposed as the sheets had draped over her and he had to fight the urge to trace its roundness with his fingers.  But now was not the time.  This was a serious discussion and it was one that had to be had before she left his house. 

“I know I have, Holly.  I’m just not sure where we’re supposed to go from here.”  His voice was raw with honesty and he was leaving the choice to Holly as to whether or not they continued.

The urge to throw caution to the wind was almost more than she could bear.  But Holly was a sensible woman and knew herself well enough to know that she had more of a future as Stephen’s assistant than she did as his lover.  The revolving door of women she’d seen over the years had proven that.  With a lump the size of a grapefruit in her throat, she voiced her decision hesitantly.  “I think…it would be best if we left this weekend as just that; the weekend.  This has been wonderful, Stephen, but I think it would be best if we went back to our previous relationship and let this just…go.”

While he knew he should be relieved, hell, thankful, that she was making this easy for him, Stephen wasn’t so sure that they could go back to the way that things were before.  How was he supposed to work with her everyday knowing what she looked like in the throws of passion?  How could he sit at his desk and watch her take dictation and not imagine what she was wearing under her clothes?

Could he possibly go back to asking her to handle making dinner arrangements for him and another woman without feeling guilty?  On the flip side, how would he feel watching Holly date another man now that he was promising her that they’d cut back on their work schedule so that she could have a social life?  Maybe a clean break would be the best decision for them both all the way around.

Glancing over at her as she stretched beside him made the decision for him; he’d rather see her every damn day and torture himself than not see her at all.

As Holly made her way home, she was shocked at the amount of damage left behind by this storm.  Trees were down, parking lots were flooded.  Luckily the route that she took home did not require too many detours and when she pulled up to her condo and pulled in to her driveway, she was relieved to be there.  The weekend was over and it was time to get back to the real life.

The weekend had been a fantasy; a lovely escape from her ho-hum life.  She could never regret it, but she had to put it behind her and regain her focus so that she could continue to work at Ballinger’s.  Maybe Stephen was right and that opinion was merely Derek’s.  After all, in three years, if people in the office had truly suspected anything, wouldn’t someone have said something by now?  Holly was friendly and knew almost everyone that worked at Ballinger’s, surely if people were thinking that she was sleeping with Stephen, it would have come up in conversation by now.

Feeling confident at what lie ahead of her tomorrow, Holly climbed out of her car and with a grateful look around and seeing that she had no structural damage, she went inside to make her calls, do her laundry and return to the role of Holly Abbot, single-woman, personal assistant.

Her home seemed tiny after her time in Stephen’s massive home and the walls started to push in on her but she just reminded herself that this had been her home for years and that one weekend away should not have her feeling any differently towards her place.  When her laundry was going, she placed her much-needed phone call to her parents to let them know that she was alright.

“Where have you been?” her mother cried at the sound of Holly’s voice.  “Dad and I have been worried sick!  We couldn’t get through to you and the news reports were showing the devastation around you and all we could think was that something had happened to you!”

Her mother always had had a flair for the dramatic.  “Relax, mom.  The phone lines were down all over the place and I was without power and my cell phone couldn’t be charged.  I’m sorry that you worried so much but as you can hear, I’m fine.”  She decided it would be best to leave out any details of being stranded at Stephen’s place for the weekend.  That was so
not
a discussion she was ready to have.  Besides that, her parents already had issues with Stephen because he worked her so hard that she hardly had time to come home for visits. 

With a promise to call over the weekend and to think about coming home for a brief Thanksgiving visit, Holly hung up the phone an hour later.  Once her mother got her on the phone sometimes, it was hard to get her off.  Holly felt thoroughly up to date on every friend, neighbor and family member, now, and was sure that if she never went home again, she wouldn’t be missing anything!

Next on her to-do list was to go food shopping.  She looked at her tiny kitchen and had to once again stop herself from comparing it to Stephen’s.  The good news was that she could look forward to doing some cooking again now that she would be getting home earlier; the bad news was that she was still going to be doing that cooking for only one person.

Later that night as she lay in her bed, the enormity of it all hit her.  What was that stupid phrase – ‘It’s better to have lost at love, then never to have loved at all’?  Well, screw that!  The first tear fell and she was helpless to stop the rest.  Dammit.   Her bed was too small, her kitchen was too small, her home was too small and it was all Stephen Ballinger’s fault!  If she hadn’t answered that damn call Friday night, none of this would have been an issue.