In the Beginning

Chapter 1
She would often stop and think about the things that had happened between them. How could she have let this get so out of hand? She was only supposed to have wanted him as a friend and here she was realizing that he fascinated her. His deep, rumbling voice, the way in which his eyes glanced around them as they talked often led her to thoughts completely unbecoming for a good friend. She liked him well enough as a friend and now that they had grown so close definitely did not want that closeness to end and she knew that she couldn’t want or ask anything more of him, could she? No, she definitely couldn’t.
She would often watch him from the corner of her eye and look at his profile. Admiring his unusually long lashes and his earnest brown eyes, and eventhough she shouldn’t, his full, sensual lips.
She had known Damon in high school and had had one of the biggest crushes on him but could never bring herself to face him with it. So many people had told her to go for it. That they would make the most adorable couple and she had heard rumors that he would definitely be interested in her given a little encouragement. She had denied herself that possibility. She had not felt herself ready for any kind of relationship at the time. She had been seventeen and almost all of her friends had been dating or had dated someone. She had never been out with anyone and had to admit that she had felt left out of some circle, but she had grown used to that. She still had yet to date anyone. Most of her friends thought she was nuts.
“Valeria,” they’d often say, “You are twenty-one years old you need to at least go out on one date. The man of your dreams is not just going to happen upon you and ask you to marry him or anything medieval like that.”
She still couldn’t believe it, she was twenty-one years old and not even one date yet. She sighed.
“You alright, Vale?” Damon asked slowly, “I know that I can be really tiresome and everything but I had hoped I was not boring you too much with my stories.”
He smiled in that way that made her forgive him just about anything and looked into her eyes as if he could find out what was going through her mind, he knew he couldn’t. When her eyes lost their sparkle he knew that she was in a place where he could not be and it annoyed him.
“You know that it’s not you,” she stated plainly, smiling at him and patting his hand in a manner that she thought would comfort him, “I’ve just been having an odd time of it lately.”
He watched those sweet brown eyes that he had spent some time learning to read in the past year. He had never understood how or why they had become friends but he was thankful for it. She was so sensitive to his moods, and he to hers, and it killed him to admit to the fact that she knew him better than any of his past girlfriends ever had. She knew how to talk to him when he was upset and just to how to maneuver a smile when he was at his worst. Even his present fiancée was completely unaware of the way his mind worked. Rebecca was okay. Actually she was better than okay. She was gorgeous, talented, and possessed a number of other attributes that he was particularly keen on.
He had been dating the beautiful, blonde law student for almost two years. He did not regret their relationship in any way. She was stunning, intelligent and, well, perfect in every way. The one thing that Rebecca would not and could not put up with was his friendship with Valeria. They often argued over the time he spent with Vale or the fact that Rebecca was sure that there was something going on between Vale and him.
“I see the way you look at one another,” Rebecca would say to him pretending to be utterly calm when he knew all she wanted to do was hurl something at him or rant and rave at him for cheating on her. Her temper was probably the one thing about her that wasn’t perfect.
He always reassured her that nothing was going on between them and that they were just friends, but in the back of his mind he always felt that he was lying to her in some way. He knew that the time he spent with Vale felt like stolen time. For instance, right now he was supposed to be in an afternoon finance course, but that had been canceled and he had convinced Vale to skip her classroom management class for the afternoon so they could have a talk. He should have called Rebecca. Any other man he knew would have preferred his girlfriend to a girl who was just a friend.
“Well, I think that I should be going now,” Vale said aloud rising from the table they occupied in a crowded courtyard.
“Where are you off to in such a hurry?” he asked, “Do you have some place to be? I’ll give you a ride anywhere you want to go.”
He smiled at her again and she was so tempted to take him up on his offer, but she knew that she took up too much of his time. He almost seemed to have adopted her in some sort of little sister program. If he found out she needed something fixed or that she was in any kind of trouble he was always there and he shouldn’t have been. He didn’t need to be. She was a big girl and she could handle anything that came her way, but she had to admit, she loved it when he took the reins in a bad situation.
“I think that it would be best if you gave Rebecca a call,” she said quietly, “I hate it when she looks at me as if I were her competition.”
“She doesn’t do that,” Damon stated fully knowing that he was lying, “Now come on, tell me, where are you off to?” He took her hand and stood up with her letting go when he got her attention. He had to let go, her hands were soft and warm and he hated himself for noticing.
“You know that she thinks that we’re having some sort of grande affaire,” she said smiling in a way that attracted him more than it should, “And you do know that there are plenty of things that I do that you don’t have to know about.” Her eyes took on a certain sparkle that made them look as if they were more chocolate than her belief that they were just “plain brown.” And he had to admit that he loved that particular shade of chocolate brown.
“You’re right,” he said tersely, “There are things that I really shouldn’t ask you about.” He had to look for a way out now. They were too friendly by far right now. He had to put that distance between them. He knew that lately he had wanted to spend more time with Vale than with anyone else, even Rebecca, which he knew was wrong. His fiancée should come before anyone else. He began to walk away from her.
“Damon,” she said following him, “Are you okay? I didn’t mean to make you upset.” She linked her arm through his. She hated to see him upset with her, or upset period, though what she hated even more was touching him and then having to let go.
“I’m fine,” he said trying to lighten up his mood. This wasn’t her fault. “I just realized that I have to call Jonathan and my secretary to discuss some paperwork that needs to be done.”
“Oh,” she said slowly letting go of his arm. She had to break the contact with him. It was just too hard to touch him knowing that it wasn’t her touch he wanted.
He had the sudden desire to grab her arm and put it back into his own, a desire he fought at all costs to keep his sanity and his relationships with both her and Rebecca the way they were right now.
He couldn’t think about how nice it had felt when her hand had been touching his. Oh what the hell, nice couldn’t even describe it. It had felt right. The touch had sent heated sparks throughout his body. Her soft hand, her perfectly French manicured nails rubbing against the hairs on the back of hand had his imagination going to places where he knew it shouldn’t be. He had to snap out of it.
“I think that you’re right, I should spend more time with Rebecca,” he stated after a few moments of silence, “She has been complaining that I have been neglecting her.”
She felt a hitch in her breath and a tug on her heart that made her feel particularly queasy. Why did she feel so sick lately every time he mentioned his relationship with Rebecca? They were just supposed to be friends. She had known that he was dating Rebecca and had been dating Rebecca before they had even met up again. Besides all this, he wasn’t interested in her in that way. He was more like a big brother/best friend to her. He wasn’t in love with her. She knew the difference. She might not have dated anyone yet but guys who she knew liked her had asked her out any number of times. She had not felt like this about any of them. She often wished she had felt an attraction to any guy except the one standing next to her.
“Good,” she said slowly forcing herself to smile, “Maybe now she’ll realize that I am not out to stake a claim on her territory.”
Damon blushed and tried to hide it, “Please Vale, I don’t really think that I’m anyone’s territory. Just because she’s my girlfriend does not mean that she owns me.”
Vale rolled her eyes. “Damon, you forget, she is not just your girlfriend. She is your fiancée. She has a right to be territorial. I know I would be if I had a fiancé with friends of the opposite sex.”
When the word sex left her mouth, he felt his own dry up. They had been friends for a while and it wasn’t that he had never heard her say the word but whenever she did say it brought his thoughts to the one place where he didn’t want them to be. They certainly weren’t anywhere near Rebecca and involved mainly Vale and her silky touch in a dimly lit bedroom. Damn it all! He was doing it again.
“Really,” he said trying to get the words out of his mouth without sounding like the idiot he felt he was at that moment and simultaneously trying to absolve the images he had just had in his mind, “What kind of fiancée would you be?”
“Honestly,” she replied, trying not to sugar coat any part of her character, “You remember me in high school. I tend to be high strung about just anything so knowing that my fiancé had female friends who he’d rather hang out with, on occasion, would make me particularly upset. No, actually, upset is not the word I would use to describe it, jealous and bloodthirsty are a lot closer than upset. I would probably never let him out of my sight, or her for that matter and make sure that I was the one he wanted and no one else. I guess that if I could get that feeling from him, and of course the sensation that his friend was not dying to take him away from me then I guess I would try to live with the jealousy.”
He shouldn’t have asked. He didn’t want to know how she would behave with a man she was interested in. In the past year he had seen almost a dozen men expressing their interest in her and each and every time getting struck down so sweetly and gently that they couldn’t help but stay her friends in case they ever stood a chance.
She had not been attracted to them and often times he wondered why. But he understood attraction, or at least he thought he did. No, he told himself, he was not attracted to Valeria. She was not his type. She was not blonde and beautiful like Rebecca. Vale was a classic brunette with her long brown-blonde hair almost always up in a ponytail or a braid. Her figure was definitely not like that of any of the girls he had been with in the past. He liked women with the mythical Coke bottle figure and Vale’s was more of an evenly spread body. She did not have too much on top or behind, but it suited her. And as of late he had to admit that it was growing hard to deny the fact that his tastes seemed to be changing.
It also didn’t help that he was starting to become very agitated with Rebecca. It was becoming evident that she was being the territorial person Valeria thought her to be. He had been trying to block Vale’s opinions out of his mind thinking that he was only feeling this way because he was beginning to feel attracted to her and making up excuses to get him out of his present relationship, or maybe because his relationship with Rebecca was moving so fast. He was only twenty-two, maybe he should be holding off getting married for another few years. He had been reluctant to end his relationship with Rebecca for obvious reasons. She was cultured, driven, and completely and utterly desirable. Her body was perfect and she knew it and if he hadn’t made this step she would have found someone who would.
His parents had been so pleased with his decision. Besides the fact that Rebecca was two-years older than he was, they had believed that they were meant for each other since he had first started to date her. They raved over her manners and correctness and were unaware of her intentions to seduce him early on in the relationship. He had not minded that at all in the beginning. He had appreciated her candor and her strength of character, but lately it was all wearing thin on him.
He had been seeking Vale’s attentions more and more lately to get away from Rebecca’s tantrums and her demands. She wanted to get married soon, but he wasn’t sure any more. He spent more and more time comparing Vale and Rebecca when he knew the comparisons were unfair. They were so different in temperament and personality.
Rebecca was as beautiful as she was manipulative. In the past few months in particular she had become fond of saying that if he kept leaving her alone for long periods of time she would find someone who would fill his gaps. He had not felt as angry as he thought he would at hearing this. He really should have been furious or at least hostile to this idea, instead he had told her to go ahead and try, knowing that a part of him meant this literally and not metaphorically.
Valeria was different. She was sweet and was a lot easier to influence, which often scared him. Some day, some idiot would come and she would be putty in his hands; he definitely wanted to protect her. Her heart was so open to the people around her and he loved seeing her with small children, the way they looked up at her with shining, adoring eyes and the way she played with them often running around like a maniac in the process. Stop it, he told himself. It’s Rebecca you love, you idiot. He felt no romantic feelings for Vale at all.
“Well, gorgeous,” Vale said sweetly, “I’ve got to go now. But I’ll see you soon, okay. Have fun and try not to let her get to you.” She quickly kissed him on the cheek and ended up a lot closer to his mouth than she meant to and then pulled away. “I left a little lipstick…” She rubbed off the lipstick that she had left behind on his cheek and the corner where his lips met with trembling fingers.
“Well, bye,” she blurted out while practically running the rest of the way to her car.
She shouldn’t have done that. Why had she kissed him at all? She didn’t have to. But she had wanted to and that was the truth. For a moment she had wanted to forget he had a girlfriend and take whatever liberties she could. She had been so close to those lips of his that often drew her gaze. Now she wouldn’t be able to look him in the eye for at least a week. As she got into her car she gave a groan of desperation. What kind of a fool was she any way?
Damon felt like he had just been struck by lightning. For about two seconds he had been completely immersed in Vale. He had smelled the soft floral perfume she wore and been transfixed. And when her lips had brushed against his cheek and the corner of his mouth so close to his lips he felt he could almost taste her. All he would have had to do was move his face a about a half-inch and her lips would have brushed against his.
What the hell was going through his head? He should not be thinking these things about Valeria. But God, he couldn’t help himself any more. He felt too comforted by the sound of her voice; too drawn to the image of her soft mouth touching his own, and too damn afraid to admit that he would much rather spend time with her in any and every way than with his gorgeous, ex-model girlfriend.


Chapter 2
She couldn’t believe what she had seen. She had wanted to surprise Damon outside his class and instead she found him with her again. She knew that she was right not to believe anything he said with regards to Vale. She had known it from the beginning Damon’s supposed “friend” was out to ensnare him. And he definitely did not seem immune to her charms. She had seen the way he looked at her from across a room or when she talked to other guys. She knew that it was getting harder and harder for her to contain her animosity at his growing attraction to his supposed friend.
Well Vale wasn’t going to get him, he belonged to her and if there was one thing she knew how to do was keep a man happy and at her side begging for more. Though she also had to admit to herself that Damon was not the type of man that could be kept happy for long periods of time through just sexual persuasion and she often felt that was the only weapon she seemed to have with him and even that power seemed to be dwindling.
Rebecca looked at herself in her rear view mirror. She knew that there were any number of men who wanted her and she had to admit that there were men she would rather be with besides Damon. She had wanted to cut the relationship for the past few months but when he had started to be drawn to Vale, an insignificant nothing compared to her (at least in her opinion), she began to feel that it was only right that she not allow this girl to take away her fiancé. If it hadn’t been for this situation maybe she would have broken it off with him and tried to find someone else. Instead, she had begun to push him into marriage, though she knew she shouldn’t, Damon did not interest her as much as he had before. Love didn’t even seem to be a word that could be related to her feelings for Damon, or for anyone else for that matter. But she couldn’t think about it from that standpoint, her relationship with Damon had its advantages.
He was a handsome and charismatic man and his family connections and wealth had attracted her more than anything else from the very beginning. His parents traveled in the highest circles of society and she would have loved to have these connections when she was starting out as a lawyer. She sighed. So much work for her career, so much time spent studying when she could have been doing other things. She always wondered what would have happened if she had taken Richard’s offer three years ago. She could have been a model, an actress, and probably married to someone rich and influential, or maybe even Richard himself, if she had wanted him enough in the long run. She would have had everything except what she had wanted most, her career. She wanted to be taken seriously as an attorney and that it would already be difficult enough to convince others of that with her extraordinary good looks.
But she also knew that it hadn’t just been because of her career that she had not considered Richard’s offer. She could still remember the attractive raven-haired man who one day came into her life and had swept away all thoughts of other men. Damon had been the only one who had come close in attracting her, the way Richard had. She had been nineteen when she met him, he had been twenty-four and the attraction had thankfully been mutual.
She was glad that she hadn’t suffered what she believed Valeria to be suffering; since there was no way that Damon could be attracted to Valeria the same way he was to her. No matter how much attention he seemed to be giving to Valeria.
She was a lot like what she used to be like when she first met Richard but she had been a lot stronger in the end. She had put her carefully constructed plans ahead of her feelings and they were so close to being completed. Two more years of law school and then she would have her degree, but she couldn’t help but think of what she had given up on.
Her reveries led back to meeting Richard. From the beginning, she felt that her feelings for him were so perfectly obvious. She couldn’t keep her eyes off him. He had been hired by her modeling agency to take a number of photographs for an ad campaign. His piercing emerald gaze followed her with every shot and she had often locked eyes with him during the shoot.
He was an amazing photographer and each shot seemed better than the one that had come before it. He had allowed her to chose which she believed were best and they had spent about three hours looking at a number of different poses for different ads in his dark room. He had admired her keen sense of what would sell and which poses made her look the best. He had seen past what most men could not see. Instead of her outward appearance he had appreciated her intelligence and her personality.
It was one thing that she had found so similar between Richard and Damon. Damon had seen past her looks and considered her intelligence and had acknowledged her good sense. He wouldn’t even had asked her out if it weren’t for a mutual friend who had convinced him to go for it.
She smiled. Well, she thought, I’ve got my work cut out for me. She had to find why she had been so drawn to Damon and revive that so that she could find the desire she had once had for the relationship. She had lost one man in order to follow her career she was not going to lose another to some other woman.


Chapter 3
Damon walked to his car wanting to recapture the moment Valeria kissed him. Damn! Damn! Damn! He had done the one thing he should never have done. He became attracted to Vale. He had a perfectly gorgeous girlfriend who was living with him at the moment and he was falling for a good friend.
After that one silly kiss on the cheek all of his attempts to dismiss his feelings as stupid and immaterial were gone. He had to admit what he was really feeling. What he longed to do was touch her and kiss those bronzed lips. He couldn’t deny it any longer. Regardless of what he thought his tastes were, they had definitely changed. That wasn’t the truth, and he knew it. It was those latent high school feelings for Vale that had resurfaced when he first saw her again.

He had liked her in high school and he had known that she reciprocated his feelings but he had not been able to do anything about it. When Jonathan had gotten in touch with him after he had moved back and had told him that Vale was actually still living in Miami. He knew that from that moment he had wanted to see her again. He had not thought about his girlfriend then and he had not been thinking about her now. Damn!
He could still remember the party where they had met up again. He had taken Rebecca to meet some of the people he had been good friends with in high school. Jonathan really knew how to throw a party. The DJ played all types of music and he had spent the first hour or so dancing and greeting people he hadn’t seen for almost four years.
There had been one person who had been drawing his attention during the first two hours of the party, a woman across the room wearing a long blue skirt and sparkling blue halter-top. Her golden brown hair in curls cascading past her shoulders drawing attention to the fact that the halter was backless and the sun-kissed skin exposed was glittering in the dim lights of Jonathan’s backyard.
Rebecca had noticed where his gaze was going and had not been very happy with it.
“Damon, are you still with me?” she had asked her voice full of the irritation more than apparent on her face.
After that comment the woman turned in Damon’s direction and he was afforded a view of the sweet face attached to the glittering back. He had stopped dead in his tracks when he realized who it was. Valeria Brailey, the one person who had filled him with any regret after he had left Miami. He had liked her despite her silly moods and her jittery personality. He had seen the way in which people turned to her and understood that most of her moods were for show.

The smile on her face now definitely brought back memories. She had an amazing smile. None of her friends or even anyone around her could stay sad for long around that smile or her effusive personality. She exuded a calming effect on others whether she realized it or not.
In high school, he had to work and go to class and in most of his classes he easily fell asleep or just drifted off, but in the few classes they shared he was always awake and alert and often just hearing her warm greeting would drag a smile from him.
It had often been like pulling teeth to get her to open up to him and at times he had wanted to give it up, at least until a very enlightening conversation with Jonathan half way through senior year. He learned a little about Vale’s past experiences with guy friends and that she harbored feelings for him that were reminiscent of those she had felt for other guys in her past; guys that had not exactly proved to be the best of friends to her and had not given more than a thought towards her feelings. Jonathan had not given him to many specifics but enough so that he had gotten a hazy picture of what these guys were like. All of them had been stupid, insecure, little boys who would not have been able to deal with her then and even less now.
By the time graduation came around it didn’t make sense to try to get anything started with her. They were both off to college with very different futures and careers in mind.
Since nothing had ever come of the kind of friendship they shared he had put those silly high school crush feelings in the back of his mind and gone on with his life. But seeing her again brought them all back.
She had seen him and seemed to be as struck by his appearance as he was by hers and quickly excused herself from the group of people she had been conversing with. Her smile as she walked towards him and Rebecca was almost angelic and filled with sunshine. She greeted him with shake of his hand and peppered him with questions about his life and career choices and eventually who he was with. From then on they were on the fast track to becoming the friends they were now.
How could he have let their friendship get to this level? When had he stopped seeing Vale as his friend, his little sister, and started thinking of slipping his arms around her and kissing her mouth, her neck, her shoulders…
He shook his head and tried to clear those lascivious thoughts from his mind. He couldn’t shake them. He knew that he had been having some of most sensual dreams he had ever had in his entire life in the past few months and they all involved a beautiful brunette whose face he never saw. When Vale had kissed him today he realized that she was probably the striking woman in his dreams. But she couldn’t be. It didn’t make sense. Vale was his friend and had been only his friend at the time regardless of how his feelings might have changed at the moment. Not only that but he already had a girlfriend, not even a girlfriend, a fiancée.
He was in a serious relationship that he knew he could not and would not get out of.
He definitely had to shake all of these thoughts out of his head. He had to go to work and deal with Jonathan and his knowing gaze. He would be able to tell right away that something had happened and he would be only too glad to listen to this story.
Jonathan, along with another friend of his named Monet, had known that there should have been something between Vale and him during high school. They had pushed all they could to get them to get together, particularly because they wanted him to take Vale to the prom. He knew he wasn’t going to go to prom, but if he had gone the one person he would have wanted to go with would have been Vale. She was the only person he would have been completely sure of having a good time with, though now that he thought back on it maybe it had been very good that they had not gone to the prom together. He had been attracted to her even in high school. Her dramatic personality and bubbly smile had made him wonder what it would be like to kiss her and he would definitely have tried to find out on prom night. He still did not know and was completely intrigued.
Her lips had felt soft and pliable near his mouth. He passed the tip of his tongue over the spot she had kissed tasting her watermelon flavored lip-gloss. It tasted good, not like Rebecca’s lipstick, which normally made him gag (if he ever tasted it). He knew that he really shouldn’t care what Vale’s lipstick tasted like or how Rebecca’s tasted in comparison, especially the former. Rebecca was his girlfriend and Vale was his friend.
Though he had to admit that Vale was more than that and he knew why. She was always there when he needed her and he was there when she needed him. It was a little dumb but he always wanted it to be that way, even if it seemed that he was her brother instead of a friend. He definitely didn’t want to be her brother, but did he want to be just a friend to her?


Chapter 4
She kicked herself all the way home. What the hell was the matter with her!!! She had almost kissed him. She had been so close to him and she had been dying to touch those amazing lips of his and find out if he felt anything for her besides friendship.
She thought herself one of the stupidest women on the planet. She wanted the one person who she shouldn’t have fallen for. His mouth looked so inviting and she knew that in her mind her own lips had wanted to be on his. She kept repeating her little mantra all the way home from university, “He’s my friend. He’s my friend. He’s engaged. He’s engaged!” She knew it wasn’t helping. Other thoughts began to crowd her mind. How great he was with his hands. His sexy voice that always made her think of the inviting lips the sound came from.
“Stop it!” she told herself aloud, very thankful that she was in her car by herself, “He loves his fiancée and you are more like a little sister than anything else.” But I’m not his sister said that sneaky voice in the back of her head.
Why am I thinking about any of this? She asked herself. It was something she should not have done. Another in a long string of stupid things she did without thinking.
She had always been very attached to the idea of Damon being someone important in her life, even as far back as high school. She knew that the little crush she had felt for him went a lot deeper than she cared to delve into, but life had taught her early on that her instincts with the male of the species were not all that great. Her father and most of her uncles sucked as male role models. They were all loud, opinionated, and thought that they knew everything there was to know about life. Yet, despite this, she loved them dearly.
It also didn’t help that early on in life she had made a lot of bad friends. The type of friends that stole from your family one day and still expected you to be nice to them the next. That had hurt. She had been very young about ten or eleven and had a huge crush on one of her guy friends and it had seemed to her that she liked her as well. One day another of her friends, a guy who always hug around them when they played after school brought her a note from a secret admirer. Being the airhead that she was, she had thought that the note was from the guy she had a crush on finally making a move about it.
She received a second note and charmed the other friend into telling her who it was from. He finally caved and told her that it had been from him and that he liked her. She began to laugh at him, not believing this story for a minute. He reiterated that the note was from him and she told him that he did not have to cover for her crush, that he could tell her the truth. He repeated that the note was from him and this time she finally realized that she had been laughing at him and in front of a few of her girlfriends making his humiliation worse than it needed to be. He left before she could apologize properly and tell him that the notes were sweet but she was not interested in him that way. Before she could say any or all of these things he began to say that he would get even with her for turning him down and she had to admit that in the end he had.
A number of weeks later, she was asleep in her room. A noise woke her up and she glanced outside her window. She saw some familiar faces but thought nothing of it and believed she was probably having a dream and was not awake at all. She had closed her eyes and gone back to sleep, remembering the face she had seen shortly outside her window as that of her crush object.
The next day, her father discovered that their basement had been broken into and a lot of the merchandise he sold to the bodegas around town had been stolen. He asked her if she knew anything about this. Her father had never approved of her making friends with any of the boys in their neighborhood. He had believed them to be rough and bad mannered, with all kinds of hidden agendas that she, as a well-bred girl, would never get. That’s when her hallucination of the faces outside her window came back to her full force and she realized it had not been a dream of her crush that night but an actual fact that he had been near her backyard the night before. She felt humiliated and could not bring herself to tell her father what she had seen. She would not have stood it when he went into his I told you so’s with regards to her tastes in friends.
Her father had found out eventually who had done it from other neighborhood children who her supposed “friends” had passed the candy and other goods to. They had not wanted to get in trouble for something they hadn’t done and definitely they hadn’t believed these guys when they had said that the candy they were receiving was a “gift” from her dad.
All the kids in her neighborhood had told on these boys. She had known it and said nothing to keep her pride intact with her father. For years after this occurred, these boys were thought of as the worst blight. Few of the children in the neighborhood who told on them would speak to them. Vale thought that would be enough but in a small corner of her mind she always felt that her father sensed that she had known something about that night and throughout her teen years had often felt that no friend she could ever have of the opposite sex would ever be trusted by her father.
This was true of Damon as well as any other guy friends she’d had over the years. She had to admit that Damon was great. After her parents’ divorce, her father had moved away and she had taken up a lot of the slack that he had left behind. She did not become a provider, but she became her mother’s rock and her companion. When Damon had come back to Miami and they became friends, Damon had become her rock. The person who she called when she was in a jam or when she wanted to bounce ideas off someone about an important decision.
Then recently her father had moved back into the picture. Her father, realizing that he had made a mistake in leaving her mother, was trying to come back and realized that Vale had a close guy friend. After he had met Damon for the first time, Arthur Brailey decided that something was wrong with him. There has to be something wrong with him, he had stated, Vale picked him out, right. Her father did not trust Damon and a big part of her wondered why. Damon had been perfectly polite. He was very comfortable in her home since he had been spending some time there helping them paint the living room a few days past. His father thought that if he had a girlfriend he should not be making himself at home at his house. Vale had laughed at that. He had been gone for over six years; this was no longer his house. She had told him so and almost gotten herself smacked in the process. Her mother had interceded agreeing with her that he had no right to tell her or her daughters what to do in their own house which was no longer his.
She really had to stop pining all her hang-ups on her dad. She was insecure about her taste in guys. She was afraid that she would pick another “winner” and she definitely did not need Damon mucking up the very easy life she had carved out for herself. She went from home to school to work and going out with family or friends on the weekends. She didn’t need to fall for a guy especially one that was already in love with someone else.


Chapter 5
Rebecca honked her horn at Damon as she approached him in the parking lot. She tried to be as calm as she could and not go off on him for what she had seen. On any given day she would have yelled and threatened to leave him for someone else, but today she had decided that she would let it slide. He belonged to her and she intended to keep it that way for as long as she felt interested.
Damon looked up. He half-smiled, a smile that was nothing like the one he had given that Vale before that little kiss. That smile had been cheery and full of charm. That smile had been the one that had first caught her attention in the first place. The kind of smile that made you think of those fifties male actors. It encompassed their charm, finesse, and that little spark of the hidden bad boy. Vale should not be getting those smiles, she should.
“Hi, sweetie,” she called out the window trying to keep the green monster under control.
“Hey, Becca,” he called out, “What are you doing here?”
“I just came to see my favorite guy. Is that so wrong?” Her eyes skimmed his face and ended up looking him dead in the eyes. She saw something she had not expected to see, guilt and …something that she could not quite place. Some type of revelation… he couldn’t have, could he? He could not have fallen for Vale. Rebecca knew that if that were the case it would be too late. Regardless of how long they had been dating and their engagement she knew that they had not reached that level yet. She knew that neither of them had ever really fallen in love with the other. That had been okay for both of them, but what would happen if he fell for someone else?
She knew that she could not begrudge him that. Rebecca understood that deep power love could hold over you when it struck. She also knew that he had never been in love before. Was she really ready to throw it in? Give up all her plans, her expectations, just because she did like Damon and wanted him to feel those feelings as she had felt when she had been with Richard.
Had she seen what had happened? Damon wondered to himself. No she couldn’t have or she would have thrown a major fit and maybe even popped out of the car to get back at Vale. Damon felt uncomfortable under Rebecca’s gaze. She was very intelligent and she would eventually realize that he was feeling…what the hell was he feeling? He didn’t even know. He wanted to touch Vale. To kiss her and find out exactly how she liked to be held and caressed. That wasn’t much different than what he had felt for Rebecca when he had first met her.
“You’re thinking some heavy thoughts, sweetie,” she stated in a somewhat strangled tone. Rebecca knew that whatever he was thinking it involved a comparison or a sense of his wrongdoing. It had to involve a comparison between herself and Vale, which she had to admit it seemed that she was winning. Vale did not stand much of a chance against her looks.
Damon knew he had to shake the thoughts away. It was just jitters and Rebecca’s insistence lately that they should decide on a date for their wedding that was making him to turn to Vale. “Nothing much, Becca. I just have a lot of work so I thought I’d head back to the office since my class was cancelled.”
“Poor, baby,” Rebecca, said smiling up at him, “All work and no play make Damon a dull boy. Why not spend tonight with me and I’ll make it worth your while.”
Damon knew exactly was she was offering and knew he should take it. Being with Rebecca would help him forget all the thoughts he’d been having about Vale. Then why am I thinking of calling Vale while my sexy fiancée is planning what seems to be an exciting evening? That’s why he needed to be with Rebecca.
He forced a smile for Rebecca. “I promise I’ll be home as soon as I can get these things straightened out.” God, he hoped he could get rid of all of these ridiculous feelings as soon as tonight, because if he could not, making love to Rebecca would be difficult indeed.

Chapter 6
Vale’s cell began to ring. She almost ignored the cutesy little theme she had chosen as her ring tone. She really was not up for polite conversation. It was times like these that made her want to renege on her promise not to use curse words. Over the years it had helped to improve her vocabulary but when she was mad she was left with few if any options besides the normal screaming in fits of pique.
“Hello,” she said into the phone using a tone she reserved only for telemarketers and people who called to ask her opinions on silly radio surveys.
“Hello, to you too stranger,” answered the agitated yet amused voice of her friend Jonathan, “I have a huge emergency and I need you to come to my office as soon as possible.”
“What?” Vale stated in disbelief. ‘What the heck could you need me for now?” There had been a few times in the past when her knowledge of computer programs had come in handy for Damon and Jonathan’s company but she thought that they had hired someone to come in full time to deal with their company problems.
“Vale, the mainframe seems to be down and there are many important files that are lost somewhere in the computer,” Jonathan explained as quickly as he could get the words out.
“And where’s the tech you hired last month?” Vale asked trying not to show how impatient she was getting with him.
“He quit last week,” Jonathan said slowly, “He said it was due to professional differences, but I think it was mainly because my secretary, Jamie, wouldn’t give him the time of day.”
“That’s great gossip, Jonathan,” Vale said tersely, “But how will that solve the problems you are having now? It’s been a week and you have yet to hire someone else for the job?”
“Vale, this is very important,” Jonathan said in pleading tones, “We really need your help. You know this mainframe better than the guy we hired yesterday. He is still getting used to it and has no idea what is wrong with it.”
“Then he should be fired for being incompetent at his job,” Vale said without remorse, “I’ll be there in half an hour.”
This was ridiculous! The last thing she wanted to do was spend time in Damon’s office. She knew that as soon as he found out about this he would be there trying to figure out some way to help or to get things done without the computer. It was his family’s business after all and had been carried out for many years without the use of a computer.
She would have to be near him after what had happened a few hours ago. It was the last thing she wanted or needed at that moment, but she also knew that she owed Damon for all of his help and that Jonathan would make sure that she was amply paid for her consultation. Her family could use every bit of money she could bring in at the moment. Not only that but soon she would be starting her teaching internship and would not be able to continue her tutoring job. She might need their recommendation so she could make some money as a consultant during her internship.
She was determined to stay as far from Damon as she could possibly get. She did not want to think of what she’d do if he got too near. Today had been a near miss. That episode, that closeness they had shared, should never happen again. He was off limits and not interested in her that way.
Damon would soon marry Rebecca and though Rebecca had never been particularly nice to her, she was Damon’s match. She was beautiful, incredibly so, and also intelligent. She was every man’s ideal. Vale knew she could not compete with Rebecca’s charms and experience. She knew that Rebecca was the one warming Damon’s bed. The one who touched him in every way Vale wanted to. Just thinking about it made her boil in jealousy and other feelings she did not want to name.
She tried to calm herself down. She had no right to be angry or jealous. Damon would never respond to her in that way. He was in love with Rebecca. That is why he was marrying her and the sooner the better for Vale’s overall mental health. Maybe with him finally married it would sink in that she needed to look elsewhere. Maybe that was the key to completely getting over him. It would kill her slowly at first to see them married but it should also kill any hopes she might have had of Damon returning her affections.
She turned her car towards the entrance of Rosado Import and Export and parked in a visitor’s spot, she’d hardly even remembered the drive over from her house to the large and airy business offices. Before getting out of the car she made the promise to herself that she would stay as far from Damon as she could. Hands off, she whispered to herself as she walked in the door.


Chapter 7
Damon, trying to put away troublesome thoughts, checked his cell phone and saw that Jonathan had left seven messages in his voicemail. The news was not good. The computers were all down and the tech had no idea of what to do. Jonathan had called Vale and she was on her way to RI&E to help them fix the problem. Vale would be spending hours this afternoon in his offices. The one person he really should not be spending time with would be there.
His mind began spinning. Parts of him were ecstatic that she would be near him. They would joke together and she’d smile and he’d want to touch her lips and… damn it all! It always went back to that. He needed to get away from the idea of being anywhere near her mouth. He had Rebecca and she was waiting for him with the types of surprises most guys would do just about anything for.
He began to drive faster trying to get to RI&E before Vale. Maybe if he were able to work on the few things he had pending he could leave without even seeing her. Even as he thought of it he saw the stupidity of that idea. Jonathan had a wife and kids to go home to and he would be staying as long as it took to get all this settled. This company was more his than Jonathan’s and he knew that if it weren’t for Vale’s presence and the strange thoughts flowing through his mind about her he wouldn’t think twice about staying as late as it would take to fix this damnable problem.
He parked in his designated spot and saw Vale’s car parked near his spot. She had beaten him there and was already inside. Should he even go in? That thought wasn’t even an option. This was his business he needed to take care of it regardless of his own personal troubles.
He slowly got out of his car and walked up to the glass doors still hesitating and then he saw her. She must have gone home to change because she was wearing green warm up suit, the kind she only wore to go to the gym or running with her cousin. Her long brown hair was up in a ponytail flowing down her back. He knew Vale’s main vanity was her long brown hair. She went to get highlights once every two months and for frequent hair cuts. She also made sure she blow dried it or curled it just the right way. Right now all he wanted to do was touch the soft curls and pull her near him. Good God if this is what happened when he looked at her through a glass door what would happen when they were actually in the same room?
He opened the glass door and tried to put thoughts of touching her and kissing her aside and began to think of ways to solve the company’s problems.