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Julio seemed excited to see her. She let him kiss her, but he caught her lack of enthusiasm. He said nothing about it.
“I’ve got it,” she told him.
“A solution?”
“One they’ll love. You know the changes we wanted to make for some of the infrastructure?”
“The access roads?”
“Right.”
Julio sat up and folded his hands. “Okay, I’m listening.”
“They wanted the building to face north to avoid solar gain in summer. That makes sense, but if we face it northwest, that will simplify the access roads from the A4—the main artery. We’d talked about that, and we can create a split-level system that will route the commercial traffic directly to loading docks, and the cars to parking lots.”
“The traffic isn’t really the serious problem here.”
“Actually, there is no problem. They want to see innovation, right?”
“They say that.”
“Then consider this. First, it we relocate things the way I’ve marked them, the building should stand forever. The problem, the structural problem, was that the center of mass was directly over the fault.”
“And moving it a little bit changes that?”
“Entirely. We will ensure that by using some new support structures that are fundamentally iron-reinforced concrete, but with some additives that give them tensile strength bordering on the heroic. Some new anchors let us put them in the collapsed area, and then we fill the voids with a special foam, and before you can say ‘ain’t technology grand,’ the site is more stable than they thought it was before.”
“I think they just might go for this.”
“Especially when they find out that the company that makes the products will provide them at cost, along with technical expertise and safety shock-load testing just for the chance to show what their stuff will do.”
“Now there is a good hook.”
“Abby was putting together a snazzy presentation on the flight over that I think will sell them on the idea. There is some clever animation. Another part that works for you is that this doesn’t require changes to anything you might have come up with for the building itself, unless you were planning an underground swimming pool.”
“I’d entirely forgotten to put one in. How careless of me.” He looked at her. “Your solution is perfect. Well done.”
“When they bless it officially, we can start work on the project—do the work we wanted to do in the first place.”
“Yes, of course. Now, unless there is anything else… What’s wrong?”
“Nothing is wrong.”
“No?”
“I’m unsure,” Lissa said.
“What’s changed since I left? It’s only been a few days.”
“I’ve learned a few new things. Like about you and Willa.”
Julio became very still. “I see,” he said, finally. “I assume she told you?”
“She sent pictures, actually.”
A muscle worked in Julio’s cheek. “Sneaky woman. I didn’t know about them.”
“I didn’t think that was your style. She picked photos that showed your…enthusiasm.”
“I’ve never said I didn’t find her attractive.”
“No.”
“And I thought I’d lost you.”
“See. That uncertainty thing.”
He sighed.
“How do we get over that?” Lissa asked.
“How did you get over being uncertain about your analysis techniques?”
She gave him a grin. “I was never uncertain about them.”
“Okay, that’s a bad example.”
“When I’m with you, I don’t feel the uncertainty. But when you are away from me…” Lissa tried to explain.
“Then maybe we have to resort to extreme measures and have me never leave your sight.”
“Or something close that’s slightly more practical?”
He raised his eyebrow. “If I might suggest a starter course?”
“Please.”
They’d been sitting in the grouping of chairs by the window in his room, looking out at the beautiful lights of the city. Julio rose and pulled the curtains closed. He reached for Lissa’s hand and pulled her out of her chair. He put his large hands on her shoulders, then slowly moved his fingers to the buttons of her blouse. “I think it would be a good and positive step forward for us both if I were to tear your clothes off you and make wild love to you.”
Lissa’s body shook as he traced his knuckle across her breast, then circled it over one nipple. She felt it stiffen immediately and felt her body responding, getting wet, craving him. Her words were breathless, a rasp. “You do?”
“I do. I propose I rip off your clothes, then make you put them back on later, after I have my way with you, so you can take me to my children so that I can play with them.”
He placed his hands on either side of her blouse, as if asking for permission to tear her blouse off her.
“No, don’t,” she said, pulling away. “I didn’t have time to pack, you can’t rip this.”
“Then hurry up,” he said, moving towards her like a leopard stalking its prey.
She giggled and moved away from him, then ran away. But his eagerness, his desire for her, was too much for her to resist, so she let all her reservations fade and allowed herself to succumb to her need for him. When they came together again, this time, he insisted on feasting on her pussy first. She lay back on the bed as his mouth sucked and toyed her swollen, aching clit. When her orgasm came, she couldn’t hold back her cries of pleasure. She was still writhing in the afterglow when she entered her, filling her completely on the first thrust.
“Ah, ah,” she cried out as he forced her body against his. She wrapped her arms around his neck and fisted her hands in his hair.
“Lissa,” he groaned into her ear as his hips thrust into her even as he yanked her against him.
When she came this time, her cries of pleasure mingled with his, and she felt his fertile seed once again, spilling without
barrier into her womb, and a part of her sex-lubricated mind hoped that she’d get pregnant again, as if three children wouldn’t be enough to keep him in her life.
# # #
Julio was gone before she’d woken up, and when they spoke, there was no mention of the previous night, or anything else regarding their relationship. They talked about the boys, and how Joan was getting on with them, then went straight into planning and prepping for the critical presentation later that day with the backers for the project.
Lissa had a million things to still prepare, but she couldn’t concentrate. Her nerves were shot. All her thoughts kept circling back to the same inescapable conclusion, one she didn’t want to accept, that she was falling hard for Julio Torres. She was afraid to let that happen. It was obvious he was attracted to her, and he’d be around for the kids, but she was kidding herself if she expected him to stay around for her for much longer. She needed to protect her heart from being shattered in two. She couldn’t risk falling in love with him.
# # #
“Well?” Julio asked conspiratorially a short while later, as Lissa pulled beside him in front of the food and drinks table.
Lissa picked up a small plate and placed a strawberry dipped in white chocolate on it, even though her stomach was twisted in tight knots and she knew she couldn’t eat a bite. She and Julio had both been circulating around the foyer outside the small conference room where they’d be making their pitch. They’d split the duty, and had been chatting up key players, hoping to gauge their positions prior to making the final case. Her mind hadn’t been one hundred percent on her task. She’d been thinking about Julio, her future, her babies' future, and those darn pictures from Willa, and her admonition. Keep your guard up. It was starting to sound, more and more like a good idea.
“Are you all right?” Julio asked. “You seem off.”
Now wasn’t the time, she had to get her head straight. In a few minutes she’d be making the presentation of her life. “Nothing’s wrong, it’s just that no one I spoke to was in a particularly good mood.”
