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She returned her eyes to her laptop to escape his merriment and curiosity. But she no longer saw the data she’d just inputted, what she believed was her first breakthrough, which had caused the first lift in her spirit in the last two weeks. The two weeks since she’d last seen Antonio.
“For the last time, Brian,” she mumbled. “I didn’t do anything. The man just reconsidered.”
“After you gave him all of your mind, not just a piece of it.” Brian perched his hip on her desk. “But I thought that only made him give you back your research. Judging from today’s developments, you must have done more.”
“Unless I’ve developed some sort of long-distance mind control, I can’t see how I could have. I haven’t seen the man since the day I came back to work.”
The day after her magical time with Antonio came to a disastrous end.
Brian regarded her as if he was deciding whether she was telling the truth. Then his grin widened even more. “Seems you didn’t have to do more. That initial dose you gave him worked like a vaccine. Its effect intensified as time went by, until he developed full immunity, or in this case, empathy with your own views.”
“Botched scientific metaphor aside, it’s so nice to be likened to attenuated or dead microorganisms.”
“I’m likening you to the tiny busters who save lives, like you’ve saved ours.”
Slumping back in her chair, she exhaled. “Don’t exaggerate. I didn’t do anything. And what lives? You were all gung ho about joining his projects.”
“I myself would have worked on anything that kept me employed and serving the cause of science. But this? This is what I became a scientist hoping to do one day. This is the beginning of a life I never thought I’d be able to live. And whatever you say, I know I have you to thank for it.”
“Fine. Believe whatever you want and leave me in my own version of reality, where everything is the absolute opposite of what you insinuate about my effect on Antonio Balducci.”
Brain sobered when he realized she was barely reining in her agitation. “Have I put my foot in it?”
“Down to the knee joint.”
Dismay flared in his eyes. “Don’t tell me you’ve...”
“Fallen for him” went unspoken. And “been rebuffed” was also concluded.
“Man, Lili! Granted, the guy is a god, and all the women and half the men around here are swooning over him, but you of all women... I thought you’d be immune.”
“Well, you thought wrong.”
His gaze switched from disconcerted to solicitous in a heartbeat. “You know the last thing I want to do is step on your toes, but I know how you bottle stuff up, and how you always feel better when you talk to me about it.”
“Not this time, Brian, so just drop it, okay?” His persistence had helped her once before, after her mother’s death, when he’d finally gotten her to unburden herself. But knowing it wouldn’t help this time, she changed the subject. “But since you’re so eager to listen to me, do you have an hour? I think I’m onto something big here and I want your opinion.”
Her diversion tactic worked, since scientific curiosity was the only thing that could take Brian’s mind off just about anything. And for the next two hours she showed him her latest findings and he corroborated her every hope. By the time he left her, they were both certain she’d just broken through to the next level in her research.
Though this was huge, and she was beyond thrilled, that excitement didn’t carry to the rest of her being. Most of her remained a prisoner to the memory of that night with Antonio.
That night, after his driver ha
d taken her home, she’d collapsed in bed, shaking like a leaf with both mortification and arousal.
Instead of dreaming of him, she’d stayed awake all night, her mind filled with memories of the mindless minutes when she’d offered herself to him, when he’d almost taken her. His every touch and look and breath had replayed over and over, burning her with their vividness and her humiliation. She’d been so on fire for him, it had only taken him a few thrusts through their clothes for her to climax.
While it had stunned her, since she’d never reached release so easily, so violently, it had shocked him more. Maybe even alarmed or disgusted him. For what kind of woman would go off like that from just a few kisses and grinds? He must have figured he’d terribly miscalculated, and the iceberg he’d thought he’d enjoy melting had turned out to be a powder keg that would end up blowing up in his face.
She couldn’t blame him that he hadn’t wanted to be anywhere near her after that. He’d torn his gaze away from her pleading eyes and himself from her clinging arms, rushing to put clothes on to show her there’d be no further intimacies. Not that she’d been about to wait for him to come back to tell her that. She’d tried to run out of his mansion without seeing him again. But he’d caught up with her before she could, and though he’d tried to be considerate, what he’d said, how he’d looked at her, had been an even worse blow. Besides his obvious dismay and regret, it had seemed as if he’d...pitied her.
She hadn’t closed her eyes till morning after that night, agonizing over whether to continue her earlier plan of leaving California, or going back to the lab he’d promised she could return to on her terms.
She’d ended up going back to work. A major part of her decision had been the hope that she’d see him again. She’d kept envisioning scenarios of how he’d come and what she’d say, in apology, or at least in an attempt to excuse or explain her actions. Anything to take them back to where they’d been before she’d touched him and spoiled everything.
That first day back in the lab, she’d kept expecting Antonio to walk in at any moment, kept jumping at any movement or sound, imagining she’d heard his voice or caught a glimpse of him.
But he hadn’t come. Not that day, not since.
