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Joanna
Although I had been with Zander for a while, I still recognized the signs of another man’s interest, or at least I hoped I did. A part of me wanted to be cautious about thinking Anderson had actually asked me on a date, especially since our outing was supposed to be business related. On the other hand, I was pretty sure there had been something more to the way he had looked at me.
I’d known Anderson for a long time, and he had never once looked at me that way before. Just recalling it gave me butterflies.
Regardless, I kept reminding myself to not get my hopes up too high.
“Hey, Joanna!”
Tobias called me from downstairs while I was in my bedroom, stressing about what to wear, not knowing whether I should dress casually, in business attire, or as if this was a real date with a man I wanted to impress. I felt silly, but there was no denying that I wanted Anderson to just look at me as more than just Tobias’s kid sister…
Still dressed in the sweatpants and t-shirt that I’d thrown on after stepping out of the shower, I headed down the hall and peered over the balcony to where Tobias stood. “Yeah?” I said.
“What do you want for dinner? I was going to order takeout. Is that good with you?”
My throat suddenly felt too tight to speak. I hadn’t told Tobias that I was going out with Anderson. As I peered down at him, the awkwardness suddenly felt unbearable.
Sometimes, Tobias felt entirely too much like my father than my brother, and it was hard to talk about these kind of things with him. Something told me he wouldn’t approve of my attraction to Anderson. When I was a kid, I had never dared let a soul—especially not Tobias—know about the massive crush I’d harbored on Anderson. And as Tobias looked up at me in that moment, waiting for my answer, I felt like a sixteen-year-old with a secret all over again.
I scratched my nose and averted my gaze. “Um…don’t worry about me. I’m…I’m going out…”
“Oh yeah?” he asked, eyebrows raised. “Where?”
“Just some little restaurant. No big deal.”
“With who?”
“Anderson,” I said after a long pause. I looked down to my fingernails and started fidgeting with them.
“Anderson?” Tobias said, his voice full of confusion. I looked back at him, seeing that his head was tilted to the side. “Really? He didn’t say anything to me about that.”
I shrugged my shoulders. “I guess it just slipped his mind. It’s nothing, really. Um…after the meeting, he asked me to look over some numbers with him. You know, about that project you were talking about at the meeting. It’s going to take a while to go over, so we decided to finish up over dinner.”
Tobias nodded his head. “Oh, all right. That makes sense,” he said. “It’s about time. I kept telling him to get a move on with that. I’m glad he finally listened. You see, I told you we needed you, Jo.”
I forced a laugh. “I see.”
“What time are you guys leaving?” Tobias checked his watch.
A slight panic came over me as I wondered if he was about to invite himself to come along. But before I could answer, his cell phone began ringing from somewhere in the dining room. “Never mind,” he said as he rushed off to answer it.
“Hey, Tobias, can I use one of your cars to meet him there?”
“Yeah,” Tobias called back before disappearing from view.
I breathed a sigh of relief and headed back to my room to finish dressing—hoping that I could make my escape before Tobias could ask any additional questions, and before he could see what I had finally decided to wear.
After much consideration, I decided to wear a slinky black dress that I usually reserved for special occasions. With everything I’d been going through with Zander, I’d hardly had an opportunity to wear it.
I slid into the dress, loving the way it hugged my curves, but also hoping it wouldn’t look like I was trying to catch Anderson’s eye. Before my doubts could become too loud, I slid on a pair of heels, added a long-hanging silver necklace, threw on a fresh coat of lipstick, and let my natural curls hang freely down my back.
Rushing out before Tobias could see how I was dressed, I took the keys to his Mercedes and headed out the door.
*
“Good evening, Joanna.”
I had just stepped inside the restaurant when I heard a smooth voice sounding from behind me. I turned around and spotted Anderson, looking so handsome he almost took my breath away.
