Page 45 of At Your Service
Major had been thinking along those lines all night long. By the time he’d gone to bed, Nina had been asleep, and he’d eased into the bed so he wouldn’t disturb her. But she’d awakened anyway and had rolled over to where he’d been waiting with open arms. They slept cuddled together all night. Or rather, she’d slept and he’d rested his chin on top of her head, going over the plan he’d made and praying it would work.
“Good. And, yeah, you should have done it a long time ago. Anyway, I also wanted to give you a heads-up that Mom wants to talk to you.”
“About what?” Major asked, not looking at his brother but reading the latest email Ruben, his lawyer, had sent him. They’d been going back and forth all day.
“Don’t know. She wasn’t specific when she questioned me about why you weren’t answering your phone and sent me to find you.”
Major had asked Landra to hold his calls today and he hadn’t paid much attention to his cell if he glanced at the screen and it wasn’t Nina or Ruben. “I’ve been working on something important and time sensitive,” he replied.
“Okay, well you can tell Mom that when she finally catches up with you. But I’ll get out of your hair right now and let you handle whatever it is that’s got you so focused.”
He looked up to see that Maurice was standing but wasn’t walking out of the office. Instead his brother was looking at him closely, as if he could see through the words Major wasn’t offering. It was moments like these that he hated being a twin.
Major sat back in his chair and rubbed a hand over his chin.
“I did something I swore I’d never do.”
Maurice crossed his arms over his chest. “And that is?”
“I want her to stay so I needed to figure out a way to make that happen,” he told him.
There was no clear reaction from Maurice, which was usually the case. Only those who knew him very well could tell what he was thinking or feeling; that’s how good he was at keeping his poker face. To let Maurice tell it, that’s the way it had to be in the world they lived in. After his college years, Major agreed with the characterization to an extent.
“So is she staying?” Maurice asked after a few seconds of silence.
“Not sure yet,” Major admitted with a shake of his head. He swiped his hands down his pant legs because he was worried about the answer to that question. “Gonna tell her when she gets here.”
“What if she doesn’t want to stay? Or if she doesn’t want to stay to be with you? How’re you gonna handle that?”
“Like we handle everything else—we move on to the next thing,” he said, praying that wouldn’t be the outcome.
“I got a feeling she isn’t like anything else you’ve ever dealt with before.”
“How do you know?”
Maurice shook his head then turned to start for the door. “I know you better than you know yourself, bro. And that probably goes the same for you with me. I knew you’d fallen for her that first day in Desta’s office.”
And that’s exactly when it had happened—that day she’d bumped into him. That had been the start of it all.
“If you were her, would you stay here and continue to build your business?” he asked when Maurice was at the door. “If it was a great business opportunity and helped you achieve all your goals, but you’d be leaving your hometown and your family...would you stay?”
“If it were just about business, yeah, I’d stay.”
That was cryptic even for Maurice and Major was left staring at the empty doorway because his twin was gone before Major could ask him to explain.
She still wasn’t here yet and he’d texted her fifteen minutes ago. Major stood and paced his office second-guessing himself and hating that feeling. He never second-guessed, always knew the right thing to do for himself. But now there was someone else. And what if she didn’t want to stay?
There wasn’t time to explore the issue for the billionth time because his cell phone rang. He leaned over to grab the phone and saw that it was Ruben.
“Yeah?”
“Okay, I’m working on these new contracts and there are a few places that have to remain blank until you get me more information,” Ruben said.
“Fine. Can you just email them over to me now? I need them like ten minutes ago.” His tone was testy, and he didn’t want to admit it was because he was so nervous.
“Are you sure this is what you want to do? I mean, it seems sort of sudden and Brand Integrated has been your project for a while.”
Major pinched the bridge of his nose and let his head fall back. He’d thought about this all last night and had decided it was the best solution.
