Part 6 (1/2)
”Yes, but there's no telling how much longer we'll be stuck here so you might as well endure it on a full stomach.”
His smile deepened and she could see that he had dimples in the same place on his face as Erica. And she couldn't help noticing how totally masculine his facial features were. He was definitely a handsome man and his pleasant att.i.tude and disposition made him even more so. If she were to guess she would say he was just a few years older than she, which would put him in his late fifties.
”I'm hoping it's not much longer, but even so, it's not going to be too bad now that I have such nice company.”
She accepted his words as a compliment. Had it been any other man she would even go so far as to think that he was flirting with her. But she knew better. Wilson Sanders was a married man. The father of her son's fiancee. But still, as off-limits as he was, she still found him desirable and, for a woman who hadn't shown any real interest in a man since her husband's death fifteen years ago, that was a startling surprise.
But then, she was still a woman.
”Thanks for saying that. You know, in a few months our families will become connected through our children.”
”Yes, that's true. I propose a toast,” he said, holding up his coffee cup.
”And what are we toasting?” she asked, laughing, following suit and holding up hers.
”To your son and my daughter. May they have a wonderful marriage. One that's filled with love.”
Rita couldn't help but smile in seeing that Wilson's att.i.tude toward the upcoming nuptials was nothing like his wife's. ”Yes, to Brian and Erica.”
Their cups touched and then they smiled as they took sips of their coffee.
As much as he didn't want to be, Wilson knew at that moment he was attracted to Rita. And that wasn't a good thing.
He drew in a deep breath as he looked beyond her to study the landscape outside the window. At least he was pretending to study the landscape, when in all actuality his main focus was still on her.
She looked elegant in her own sort of way, and now he knew what it was about her that he admired. Style. He found it totally hilarious that he was drawn to her for the very thing Karen thought she lacked. As far as he was concerned, she didn't need to wear all those famous name brands and designer labels that Karen boasted about. Rita made a statement in a way that he found admirable.
Even now for traveling she was wearing jeans and a printed peasant blouse. Her hair was pinned up and a pair of hoop earrings dangled from her ears. Another thing he liked about her was her positive att.i.tude. If he was a man interested in pursuing an affair with a woman he would definitely put her at the top of his list.
But he didn't have a list. He'd never had a list. He'd never had a choice of a mate, either, since one had been chosen for him before he could walk. Probably before he'd been born. It was only lately that he'd found himself reflecting over his life and realizing just how unhappy he was married to Karen. How unhappy he'd been for a long time. It wouldn't be so regrettable if there'd been any phase of their marriage he would say he'd found memorable. But sadly, he couldn't. The only good thing that had come from it was Erica. And he was determined to make sure she married for love even if he hadn't.
But with all those emotions he was now bringing forth and all the rights Karen had been denying him as a husband for years, he had not once been unfaithful to her. He had thought about it once or twice but could never go through with it. Things were as they were. He'd made his bed years ago when he'd allowed his parents to run his life and he'd been paying h.e.l.l for it since. He rubbed a hand over his brow. The entire thought was depressing. He would be sixty at the end of the year and he'd spent all of his life trying to please someone. First his parents and now his wife. Erica was probably the only person that truly loved him unconditionally.
His gaze returned to Rita. She was sipping her coffee and appeared to be lost in her own thoughts. He couldn't help wondering what they were. And, since she seemed preoccupied as he had been earlier, he allowed his gaze to travel over her. He liked what he saw too much and forced an image of Karen in his mind but it refused to come to the forefront where it belonged.
The best thing to do would be to finish off his coffee, stand up, bid her a safe trip back home and then go somewhere where he couldn't see her, where he couldn't think about her, where he couldn't wonder...
”Was this a productive trip for you, Wilson?”
Her soft voice intruded into his thoughts and broke the silence surrounding them. Their gazes held, maybe for a second too long, because she then looked away, down into her coffee cup. And then it hit him. She had picked up on the same vibes that he had picked up on earlier. And like him she was trying to ignore them. Doing so made perfect sense, since they shouldn't be having these feelings anyway. He wasn't free to act on them. But she was a widow and free to do whatever she wanted with any other man, although not with him. He was taken. Why did that realization dampen his spirits?
He leaned back and forced his brain to formulate a response to her question. ”Yes, I think it was productive, and my staff will agree since I clinched a million-dollar deal.”
”Congratulations.”
”Thanks. What about you? Was this trip productive for you?”
She laughed. ”I didn't clinch a million-dollar deal or anything close to that, but I did get a few members of the royal family to agree to consider my company when they landscape the palace grounds.”
For the next twenty minutes or so they continued talking, engaging in pleasant conversation about their work. He enjoyed being educated about something he didn't know a lot about. Plants. His only excuse was that the Sanders Estates always had a gardener who knew what he was doing, which meant that Wilson didn't necessarily have to learn.
The more Rita talked the more he kept thinking that it didn't seem possible that a woman like her-smart, stylish and cla.s.sy-who had a lot going for her, had remained single after her husband died.
When there was a pause in the conversation, he heard himself asking, ”Why didn't you ever remarry?”
She glanced up and looked stunned by his question. She could have said it wasn't any of his business, and it would have been within her rights to do so. Instead she said, ”Patrick and I were college sweethearts and I took his death extremely hard, mainly because I hadn't seen it coming. He'd never been sick a day in his life.”
She paused a moment when a waitress came by and refilled their coffee cups. ”I figured he would be here forever,” she then said. ”I had a.s.sumed that he would always be my rock, my s.h.i.+ning star, the man who was everything a husband and father should be. The pain of losing him was excruciating, but I had to endure it for Brian. Although I was hurting, I knew he was hurting just as much. He was very close to his father.”
She took a sip of her coffee. ”It was important to me not to bring another man into Brian's life that would take Patrick's place because I thought no one could. So I filled the role of both mom and dad and was satisfied with doing that.”
Wilson nodded. ”What about when Brian left for college?”
She shrugged what he thought were beautiful shoulders. ”I dated but not often, and never let anyone think it was serious. Patrick's parents tried encouraging me to go on with my life, saying that's what he would have wanted, and I know that to be true, but I couldn't date anyone else. To fill the void of Brian leaving home I decided to go back to college for my master's degree.”
She lowered her head and took another sip of her coffee as if reliving those times.
”Do you date now?”
She lifted her gaze, tilted her head and studied him for a second. ”Why do you want to know that?”
That was a good question. Why did he want to know the answer to that? ”Curious.”
He waited a heartbeat for her to ask why. Instead she said, ”I go out on occasion with friends-both males and females-but that's all I want right now. Friends.h.i.+p. Less cluttered and complicated that way.”
He was saved from having to say anything when a voice came over the speaker system. ”Attention, pa.s.sengers. We regret to inform everyone that all flights have been cancelled for the next twenty-four hours. Please go to your respective airline's customer service counter for further details regarding obtaining a hotel voucher. We repeat, all flights...”
He watched as Rita stood. ”I guess that means I need to go back upstairs. It was good seeing you and I hope that-”
”The announcer said we're stuck here for twenty-four hours. Would you like to join me for dinner somewhere?” he asked as he stood.
She began shaking her head even before he could get all the words out of his mouth. ”Thanks, but no. I'm just going to stay in my room and relax. It was good seeing you again, and I hope you have a safe trip back home.”
”You, too.”
He watched her hurry across the floor toward the escalator as if fire was nipping at her heels. Evidently his line of questions had made her uncomfortable. Understandably so. He'd really had no right asking them. But it was something he wanted to know. Something he needed to know.
He walked to get information from his own airline, in the opposite direction from where she had gone. At least they had offered them a hotel room. He wished he could say he intended to relax, as Rita had indicated she was going to do, but he couldn't. After checking in to the hotel he planned on going out and finding the nearest bar to wash away these emotions, which he shouldn't be having in the first place.
As he stepped onto the escalator that would carry him down to his gate, he thought that a gla.s.s of scotch later sounded pretty d.a.m.n nice.