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Surprisingly Ashton came alone.
Angela was shocked that some socialite hadn’t snagged a catch like him. She, however, wasn’t interested. Despite the appeal of his millions, he was a little too stiff for Angela’s taste. He wore a classic suit and silver tie, and didn’t have Daniel’s same pizzazz or style.
To her delight, Daniel introduced her to the governor and his wife, along with a few other affluent members of the community, before he eventually went off to talk to several of his friends, leaving Angela to fend for herself. She opted for a glass of wine and was standing in line at the open bar when a wife she’d encountered earlier commented from behind her.
“And how did you manage to land a playboy like Daniel?” the woman inquired.
Angela spun around. “Excuse me?”
“Oh, do tell,” the woman gushed. “It can’t have been easy gaining Daniel Cobb’s attention. Several of us—” she motioned to a group of at least half a dozen women who were gathered in a semicircle a short distance away “—have been trying to set him up for years with our girlfriends and have never been successful. What’s your secret?”
Of course they would assume she was his girlfriend, because that’s who wealthy men brought as their dinner dates to events such as these. But Angela had to clear the air. She didn’t want to be disingenuous. “Daniel and I aren’t dating.”
The woman touched her chest. “You aren’t?”
“No, we’re colleagues at his real estate firm.”
“So you’re single?”
The way she said it made Angela feel like it was a dirty word among these women.
“I had no idea,” the woman muttered and quickly rushed off to speak with the other women in the group.
“Ma’am, what would you like?” the bartender inquired. It was Angela’s turn to order.
“Chardonnay, please.”
Angela glanced toward the group of women and several of them were either outright glaring at her or giving her the stink eye. Was it really so horrible that she was single? What did they think she was going to do? Go after one of their husbands?
She was not interested in being anyone’s side piece. For her, it was all or nothing.
* * *
“Who’s the vixen you brought with you?” Joshua DeLong asked Daniel when he finally escaped a torturous conversation with an older member of the organization.
Daniel raised a brow. “Vixen?” He didn’t like Joshua’s word choice, but at least his friend had deigned to dress appropriately for the evening in trousers and a suit jacket sans tie. But then again, had Daniel ever seen Joshua in a tie?
“Yeah,” Joshua said from his side. “She’s pretty hot and all the women here are green with envy. Look around.” He inclined his head to two distinctive groups of women that were staring at Angela as if she were a leopard about to steal their young.
But Daniel wasn’t worried. “She can handle herself. I wouldn’t have brought her to Cobb Luxury Real Estate if I thought some insecure socialites could get the better of her.”
“It’s like that, huh?”
“Yeah, she has some skills. Skills that just need some refinement.”
“And you’re just the man to do that?” Joshua queried.
“Get your head out of the gutter, my friend,” Daniel said. “Angela’s my employee, nothing more.” And with that, he moved in her direction.
But before he could make it there, Angela had already headed to one group of women who were giving her the evil eye. She didn’t seem in the least bit put off by their less-than-receptive greeting. He thought about going over to save her, but instead stood back and watched.
Five minutes later, Angela had the women laughing and talking and pretty much eating out of her hand. She’d handled their animosity and their concern that she might be a threat to any one of their marriages with gracefulness.
Daniel was proud not only to have her on his staff, but to have her on his arm tonight.
He walked toward them. “Ladies,” he said as he inclined his head toward the women. “Mind if I steal her away?”
“Certainly.” One of the other wives beamed at him.
Once they were away from the group, Daniel whispered in her ear. “You handled that marvelously.”
She gave him an incredulous look. “Did you doubt that I would?”
Daniel shook his head. “Not at all. You know how to handle people.”
“I do,” she replied. “You included.”
* * *
Angela didn’t know what made her say it, but she’d definitely been flirting. She’d let Daniel know in no uncertain terms that she could take him on any time of day. But was she really ready to do that? Theirs was a working relationship that tonight had crossed the line. Would there be any going back?
Since the dinner was about to begin and everyone was finding a seat, they did the same. Daniel and Angela sat at a table with eight other people. She hadn’t met the man immediately to her right and Daniel wasted no time introducing them.
“Angela, I’d like you to meet my good friend, Joshua DeLong. Joshua is a relatively new member to Prescott George.”
“Nice to meet you, Joshua.” Angela offered her hand, which Joshua pumped enthusiastically while looking her straight in the eye. She liked him and those blue eyes of his immediately.
Joshua DeLong was certainly the heartbreaker type with those baby blues, but at least he hadn’t sized her up like he wanted to take her to bed like some of the married men had tonight. A few wives had a right to be worried. If the wrong single woman had been here tonight and not Angela, there might have been some deals made that had nothing to do with business.
“Joshua is our charity outreach and public relations chair,” Daniel said.
“And what does that entail?” Angela inquired.
“Are you familiar with Prescott George?” Joshua asked.
“I am.”
“Every year we support a deserving foundation or charity, and they benefit from our fund-raising proceeds.”
“That’s wonderful,” Angela responded. “Do you already have this year’s recipient in mind?”
Her enthusiastic response to the project caused Joshua to smile. “Sure do. Ever heard of The Aunt Penny Foundation?”
“No, tell me about it.”
“The Aunt Penny Foundation provides mentoring and counseling to high school seniors who are in need of assistance. I’ll be meeting with their representative shortly to go over the details.”
“Sounds like an excellent organization to support,” Angela said.
Joshua jabbed his thumb in Daniel’s direction. “I like this girl. She’s a keeper.”
* * *
That’s exactly how Daniel felt. Even more so as the evening progressed. Since Angela had been at the firm, they’d rarely discussed anything personal. And with his laser focus on work, he hadn’t given her much thought other than recognizing she was a beautiful woman.
But tonight, it was like he was seeing her for the first time.
Throughout the four-course dinner, Daniel and Angela had their heads together in private conversation.
“So you’re from here?”
“No,” Angela replied, “my folks live here. My father, Eric Trainor, is a professor at University of Miami.”
“And your mother?”
“Ella, she’s a high school principal. And my sister, Denise, is in graduate school studying for her PhD in education. So as you can see, all the members of my family are academics. My parents wish I’d be more like my sister. They find it hard to believe that I can make a living being a real estate agent given my history.”
“Do tell,” Daniel said, leaning in closer.
Angela turned to face him. Sitting so close to Daniel, she could smell just a hint of his aftershave and it filled her senses. Daniel was impossible to ignore. He was the kind of man who drew attention, and that’s exactly what he was doing to her this very moment. She normally didn’t speak about her family to anyone, but tonight she was being more open than she had been in a long time.
“I’m sure I’m not the first teenager to want to take off for parts unknown, see the world.” She shrugged and reached for her wineglass, which somehow was refilled every time she sat it down.
She took a sip.
“Your parents didn’t approve?”
She shook her head. “No, they thought I should stay in college, but I wanted to live a little, see the world. And I did. I ended up bumming around Europe for a couple of years, working odd jobs, until finally coming back to the States.”
“But you didn’t ever go back to school?”
“No. I’d already seen what it was like to live on my own and didn’t want the regimented lifestyle that being in college required. And so I went from one job to the next, until I worked as a receptionist at a real estate agency.”
“Same as Myrna.”
“Indeed. I learned a lot and realized that I had what it took and I could make the same sort of commissions I helped the broker and agents make. So I signed up for real estate class immediately. Passed the state test on my first try because I think I was finally passionate about something other than men, clothes and shoes.”
A smile creased his face. “Are you a shopaholic?”
Angela held up her hand. “Guilty as charged, and I have the closet bursting at the seams to prove it. But I’ve since calmed down because there are some goals I want to achieve.”
Daniel leaned back. “Talk to me about them. What are your long-term plans?”
Angela beamed. “To not only become a successful agent, but to one day open my own agency, same as you.”
“Quite lofty goals.”
“But not impossible ones,” Angela responded quickly.
“You’re stuck in the twentieth century!” A loud voice boomed through the room, interrupting their conversation.
Daniel knew the owner of that voice.
Joshua.
He glanced behind him and saw that Joshua had indeed left the table. And Daniel didn’t need to guess who he was yelling at.
Ashton.
Daniel wiped his mouth with the napkin from his lap. “Excuse me for just a moment,” he said, and quickly left the private dining area.
He found Joshua and Ashton both standing outside the open doors. “Do you have any idea that everyone can hear you?” Daniel snapped, closing the double doors behind him.
“I’m trying to explain to this dinosaur that he’s stuck in the Stone Age,” Joshua replied. “We need to be capitalizing on all the positive press that a social media blitz and good press could do for The Aunt Penny Foundation. Hell, for us, too, but he refuses to see it.” Joshua paced back and forth as he ranted.
“There is no such thing as good publicity,” Ashton replied, calmly. “Not in this day and age. Are you so blinded by your animosity toward me that you can’t see that? Prescott George is about lifting people up. All the press knows how to do is bring people down. Furthermore, now isn’t the time to be discussing this.”
“You have to know how to spin publicity,” Joshua replied, “which clearly you don’t but I do. I’m a master puppeteer at getting the press to report exactly what I want them to.”
“Like the fact that you steal other people’s money?” Ashton said. “Did you give them that tidbit, too?”
Joshua steamed beside him and Daniel thought he might deck Ashton, but instead he turned to Daniel. “Tell him.” He pointed to Ashton. “Tell him I’m right.”
Both pairs of eyes turned to Daniel. He hated that Joshua was putting him on the spot like this.
“I think both of you are upset right now and need to let cooler heads prevail,” Daniel returned. “Ashton is right. Now isn’t the right time to discuss this.” He watched a smirk cross Ashton’s face. “But I think Joshua’s suggestion merits further discussion.”
“You’re agreeing with him?” Ashton wasn’t happy that Daniel wasn’t taking his side. It was clear that Ashton was not a fan of Joshua’s. Daniel had long since suspected that he thought Joshua was an interloper who’d smooth-talked his way into the organization. It certainly had been one of the younger members who’d invited Joshua to join Prescott George. If Ashton had his way, Daniel was sure there would be only legacy members. But it was a new dawn and a new day, and Ashton was soon going to realize that Prescott George had to change with the times.
“I’m keeping the peace,” Daniel said. “As leaders of the organization, you both need to go back in that room and show them there is no friction.”
Ashton huffed, but opened the doors and walked back in while Joshua fumed outside.
“Why do you always try to play mediator?” he countered to Daniel. “Eventually you’ll have to choose sides. Mine or his.”
Daniel rolled his eyes. “How about neither?” he responded, and turned on his heel and walked back into the room.
When he returned to the table, Angela asked, “Is everything okay?”
He nodded. “Yes, everything is fine. Just a difference of opinion. Sometimes we men get rather loud.”
But Daniel feared this wasn’t the end of Joshua’s beef with Ashton; he suspected that the stakes were about to get significantly higher.
* * *
His mind was elsewhere, Angela thought when Daniel returned to the table. She tried reengaging him in conversation, but it was clear that the night was over. She supposed she should be thankful that the electricity she’d been feeling earlier in the evening had cooled. She’d felt stirred by Daniel, and that would never do. He was her boss who’d asked her to accompany him to a business dinner. She mustn’t forget that.
As the evening came to a close, Angela and Daniel said their goodbyes, and shortly after they were seated back in the town car.
“Would you like us to drop you home?” he asked her.
“I left my car at the office, remember?”
“Oh, of course. I’m sorry,” he apologized. “I’ve been a bit distracted this evening.”
“It’s fine.”
“It’s not. It was incredibly rude of me. Allow me to make it up to you by following you home.”
“Follow me home?” Angela’s heart began hammering in her chest. “That’s not necessary. I’ve got it.”
They drifted into a comfortable silence until the driver eased the town car next to hers in the garage. Daniel requested he keep the engine idling and turned to face her. “I had a really good time tonight.”
“So did I. Thanks again.” Angela didn’t wait for his response and quickly opened the passenger door. She wasn’t sure what was going on between them, but she wasn’t sticking around to find out.
She was in her car within seconds and was about to pull out when she saw Daniel had rolled down the rear window and was motioning to her. Sighing, Angela lowered the window. “Yes?”
“I’m following you home.”
“I told you that’s not necessary. I’m a big girl.”
“You are, but I’d feel more comfortable, so we’re just going to follow behind you.”
Angela rolled her eyes. She didn’t want Daniel to see where she lived. Her apartment building was ordinary and certainly nothing like the luxury ones they sold. Now he would know that she was merely acting and dressing like she was one of them. He’d see she was a fraud. But she had no choice because he’d already raised his window.
When she arrived at her apartment building thirty minutes later, Daniel was still behind her in the town car. She sighed when he exited the vehicle and turned off the engine.
Oh Lord!
He came around to the driver’s side of her car and opened her door. She exited, but all she could do was stand there, holding on to the door. For what—support? Or to escape back inside so she wouldn’t be faced with the potent magnetism that exuded from Daniel’s every pore?
“You really didn’t have to do this,” she began, but he placed an index finger over her lips. Angela sucked in a deep breath at the light contact.
“I understand why you didn’t want me to come, Angela, but it’s nothing to be embarrassed about.” Daniel glanced up at the building. “Before my parents divorced, I grew up in a middle-class community. It was a far cry from where I live now.”
“Yeah, well, some of us can’t live as upscale as all that,” Angela responded.
“I know that. So be proud of who you are and where you come from.” He reached out and tucked a wayward curl behind her ear. Doing so brought his sensual mouth entirely too close to her own. “It’s made you who you are.”
She glanced up at him. And in that moment, she wanted him to kiss her. Oh, how she wanted it. She would instantly surrender if he tried.
Instead his hands moved from her hair to slide across her cheek. “Get inside safe and I’ll see you at the office on Monday. Nine o’clock sharp.”
All Angela could do was nod and walk with leaden feet to the door of her apartment building, feeling as if she’d been kissed even though he’d barely even touched her. And that could only mean one thing. Trouble.
Chapter 4
On Monday Daniel was out of sorts. As much fun as he’d had with Angela on Friday, he wanted their return to the office to be business as usual, because he understood those parameters. However, that was hard to do because his mind kept wandering to how good Angela looked last night and how great she’d smelled when he’d been standing close to her after accompanying her home.
He’d wanted to kiss her. Badly.
His libido had even demanded it, straining in his trousers at just how fine the woman looked. And if he’d made just the slightest overture, turned on his signature charm, she could have been his.
But he hadn’t crossed the line.
If he went with his heart’s desire, which was to learn more about Angela, he risked problems at the office. But practicing restraint was a lot harder to do than preaching it, especially when Daniel had told Angela that he’d mentor her and that she could accompany him to high-level client meetings.
One of them was a new listing for an eight-bedroom, six-bath waterfront estate on Sunny Isles. The sellers were just the right mix of privileged wealth that Daniel knew Angela needed to be exposed to. In addition to co-brokering with him on the downtown Miami development, Angela would see in person what it would take to sell a large development from start to finish.
But he’d promised her he’d take her under his wing, and he was a man of his word.
* * *
After some off-site meetings, he returned to the office on Monday afternoon to pick up paperwork for his next appointment and made a beeline for Angela’s office. She waved him in, glancing up from her computer screen.
“Hey, there,” she said, “how are you? How’s your day been?”
Daniel was jolted by just how different Angela looked today. She was back to her usual work attire of a sleeveless fuchsia silk blouse tied at the neck and a black pencil skirt, but no less sexy than she’d been on Friday.
“Busy,” Daniel replied, “and about to get even busier. I have a listing appointment at four on Sunny Isles. Care to join me?”
“Sure, just give me a minute. I’ll meet you in the lobby.”
A few minutes later, Daniel was leaning against the edge of the reception counter chatting with Myrna when Angela came toward him. He stood upright as she approached, desire instantly surging through him when he noticed her long, shapely legs emphasized by a pair of strappy heels. He willed the hard throb of his desire to disappear, but it didn’t. His attention was focused so entirely on her sleek body that he ignored Myrna. Instead, he headed swiftly to the door to open it and Angela slid right past him, allowing him to catch sight of her tight bottom as she walked ahead of him.
“So tell me about the estate and the seller,” Angela said when Daniel met her at the elevator bank just as the doors were opening. They both stepped inside, but when he opened his mouth to speak he realized just how close she was standing to him. His gaze traveled from the elegant line of her neck to the curve of her shoulders to the smooth, silky strands of hair that hung generously down her back. Angela had returned to the boundaries of their previous encounters, and that was just fine with him. He needed to get his head back on business.
He blinked rapidly and then finally answered her. “Well, it’s a seven-thousand-square-foot two-story home that sits on the water and has a private dock. Not to mention there’s a spa, a gym and a gorgeous infinity pool with a large outdoor entertaining area.”
She smiled. “Impressive. Have you determined a listing price?” Angela asked once he’d finished describing the house and they’d made it to the garage. This time she didn’t ask whether she should get in his sports car; she just slid in and buckled up.
“No, but I’m hoping to convince them that seven point five is the right price.” He roared the Ferrari to life and exited the garage.
“Are they thinking of more?”
Daniel nodded. “They would love eight million, but the comps in the market aren’t supporting it. So I’ll talk them off the ledge. They are motivated to sell and don’t want it to sit on the market.”
“Wise move.”
* * *
Angela did her best to keep the conversation focused on selling the Sunny Isles home, but it wasn’t easy. She hazarded a glance Daniel’s way when his eyes were on the road. He was dressed in a linen suit that was exquisitely cut and showed off the hard muscles she suspected were underneath it. She marveled at the size of his large masculine hands wrapped around the wheel. Sitting beside him right now, Angela was very aware of him.
She’d felt it Friday night, too. Felt the pull of desire between them, but had blown it off as the excitement of the evening. But now? Today? There was no excuse for the way she was feeling. Daniel was off-limits to her and she knew that. But that hadn’t stopped her mind from wondering what it would be like to feel his incredibly full lips on her.
Feel the heat of his skin.
Touch him all over.
Their short drive to Sunny Isles went faster than Angela expected, and she was happy to escape the confines of the sporty car. As she exited, Daniel was right there to grasp her hand.
“Thank you.” Angela managed to step out onto somewhat shaky legs. Because that’s exactly what Daniel’s touch did to her. It made her slightly weak in the knees.
They walked together to the impressive front door of the home and Daniel pressed the doorbell. An older woman with flaming red hair and a bright smile greeted them dressed in a colorful print tunic and flowing white pants.
“Daniel, darling,” she drawled with a hint of a Southern accent, “please come in.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Wilson,” Daniel replied as he stepped inside the foyer and Angela followed him. Once inside, he turned to her. “I’d like you to meet my associate Angela Trainor. She’ll be partnering with me on this listing.”
The woman’s brow rose. “Partner? I thought you would be representing us.”
“And I will be,” Daniel responded softly. “I’m mentoring Angela on larger listings such as yours. Let me assure you, you will have my expertise at the helm.”
A smile returned to her face and Angela tried not to be offended. She knew she wasn’t as experienced as Daniel, but the disappointment on Mrs. Wilson’s face made it clear that she expected Daniel, and nothing less than the best would do.
“Come, let me show you around,” Mrs. Wilson said as she began walking down the corridor.
“And where is Mr. Wilson?” Daniel asked.
“Oh, he’ll be joining us as soon as he finishes his business call.”
“Of course, lead the way.”
Mrs. Wilson showed them the main level of the home, and it was nothing short of spectacular. The Mediterranean home with its whitewashed walls and red tile roof felt open and spacious. Then again, Angela should have known that Daniel represented only exclusive listings.
Eventually, Mrs. Wilson left them to their own devices and Daniel and Angela were able to walk the grounds at their leisure. Their first stop was the private dock.
“What are your thoughts on marketing strategy?” Angela inquired. She could already see the wheels in his mind turning.
Daniel rubbed his square chin. “I’ll bring in Elyse to handle staging. Then we’ll have to get some new photos of the property showcasing this.” He opened his arms, motioning to the stunning water view.