Bradley's POV

CONCENTRATE. FOCUS. The words fell on deaf ears. I could not focus on the work in front of me because a dark-skinned goddess was haunting my thoughts. Every time I closed my eyes the curvature of her body flashed in my mind. 

I missed her terribly. More than I ever could have imagined. More than I wanted to admit. 

I knew it was a mistake to kiss Tiffany. I had compounded the problem by having sex with her foolishly hoping that doing so would satisfy my curiosity, quench my thirst and get her out of my system.  Never have I been so completely wrong on every count before. The more we touched, the more I wanted and now I was left with evocative memories. 

Ever since I'd left her in front of her apartment, I could think of nothing else but the enchanting woman I'd left behind.  

Right in the middle of a business transaction today I  experienced an erotic flashback: caught a glimpse of chocolate flesh, heard a provocative little moan, imagined her hands all over my body. The next thing I knew Ashton was clearing his throat and looking at him strangely. It was at that moment I realized that I was supposed to respond to a question I hadn't even heard.

I shook my head with regret. The way I left things with her was awful. The way she slammed the car door had shown how angry she was, not that I blamed her. I should have said more. But I hadn't known what to say. My dad's disappointment was too much for me to handle. There had been a million thoughts going through my head. But I should have at least tried to leave things in a good manner. Maybe if I  had then she wouldn't be in my thoughts now. However it wasn't my conscience that was driving me crazy, it was the other parts of my body. It's been a week and my body has been craving hers. I thought it was just sex at first and I could have had anyone to scratch the hitch. However, that didn't work. As soon as I tried to talk to another woman my mind went to Tiffany.

 I was too world-wise to be experiencing such overwhelming adolescent feelings. Not even in high school did I have such intrusive thoughts about a girl. 

What's so special about this girl? A girl that I knew for less than a week?

"Enough of this nonsense!" I told myself, tossing the stapler across the room and whacking it against the wall. 

Soft knocking broke my frustration and without waiting for a response, my brothers walked into the office. Each of them wore perfectly tailored suits. All of them held a striking resemblance but everyone was unique in their own way. 

Caleb smiled in greeting and looked down at the stapler.

Luke's brows were raised, "Who's pulling your panties?"

I frowned at him and took a deep breath. This was not the time for my brothers to make silly jokes. 

 "I think I have an idea," Ashton said taking a seat on the couch. 

"Oh?" Luke whispered before taking a seat beside Asthon. 

Irritated I asked, "Do you guys have a reason for coming into my office uninvited?"

"We always come into your office uninvited." Caleb started in a matter-of-fact tone. He moved to the chair ahead of me and took a seat. 

I rolled my eyes. 

"We noticed that you've been a little distracted lately." Luke inserted. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," I answered with conviction. I ran my hands through my head and looked at my brothers. "Look, I've had a lot of things on my mind lately." 

'"We can tell." Luke replied. 

"Your point?"

"My point," Ashton stated patiently, determined to get to the bottom of all this, "Is that you don't seem like the carefree bachelor you always were. We went to the club yesterday and ignored every woman who tried to talk to you.  And your mind has been all over the place. Today we were in an important meeting and your mind was a world away. Did something happen between you and that girl while you were in Pennslyvania?

I answered immediately with a firm. "No."

However, Ashton read between the lines. "You slept with her, didn't you?"

I began to deny it, then reconsidered. There were times I thought that Ashton probably knew me better than I knew myself. So I merely shrugged my shoulders. "There wasn't a whole lot of sleeping going on."

"What the hell Bradley!" Caleb shouted but a slight chuckle.

"Exactly. What the hell? We lost fifteen clients because of that girl and you're telling you couldn't keep it in your pants." Ashton was angry and he made no effort to hide it. He took a deep breath. "It was my idea to kidnap her to keep her away for the press but I thought you would have more sense to know not to sleep with the woman!"

After a few seconds of silence Luke spoke up, "And she got to you, didn't she?"

I nodded not denying it. 

She got way under my skin.

I missed Tiffany. 

I missed her smile, the intonation of her voice, the glimmer of her pretty dark eyes. My desire to see her again was hard to explain unless I admitted the obvious: I was missing Tiffany a hell of a lot more than I'd ever thought I would.

How could you miss someone you'd known for less than seven days? I silently demanded as I stared at my brothers.

What was wrong with me?

I was acting like some lovesick teenager. Even when I was that age, I hadn't behaved like one.

"So.. what exactly happened? You slept together a few times and now you have feelings for her?" Caleb asked with interest. 

"Feelings?" Luke frowned. "He's only known her for a week."

"That's all it takes!" Caleb responded.

"This is all ridiculous," Ashton added. 

"Look, I don't have feelings for her." I denied. " I just miss her. We become friends. She's a good person."

"Good people don't slander companies on social media," Luke replied.

I shook my head at my brothers. "It wasn't like that. You have to understand things from her point of view. She went to an interview and she was racial profiled, of course, she wanted to talk about it. She must have felt hurt. It's not easy being a black person in this country. Especially when you have white trash thinking they're superior. Black people just want to be treated as equals. She had every right to share what happened to her. Although she went about it the wrong way. She really had no idea it would blow up." I was a bit surprised by my outburst. I wouldn't usually mix myself in racial wars but after spending a week with Tiffany my perspective changed.

My brothers stared at me in silence for a few seconds.

"You like her," Caleb said breaking the silence.

I sighed and ran my hand through my hair. "It has nothing to do with me liking her. We've been white all our lives so we don't know the struggles black people have to face in America. Look at what Uncle Conrad and Aamira went through. Our grandparents told him to leave town if he wanted to be with her. Imagine how she must have felt. Her husband's family didn't want her around. Racism is disgusting. Tiffany shouldn't have to go on Twitter to seek comfort.  What happened in that interview shouldn't have happened at all."

"You're right and while you were gone we dealt with the situation. We've made sure that it will never happen again." Lukes said. I could tell by his expression that he was still thinking about what I said. 

"We can't change the world, Brad. We just have to make sure it doesn't happen in our company." Caleb added. 

Ashton shrugged, "What happened to her was terrible and you're right. I can't imagine what she must have felt. At least she got a million dollars."

"It wasn't cashed," Caleb replied. Caleb managed in the accounts department so he knew about every transaction that the firm made.

"It wasn't?" Ashton asked looking at me with a frown. "Why wouldn't she cash the cheque? A million-dollar is a lot of money."

I smiled. "Because she's not that type of person. She's independent and fierce. She doesn't want our money."

"Everyone wants money. Maybe she wants more than a million." Ashton was a cynic and he had a problem seeing the good in people or better yet, women. 

"She won't cash it," I said with conviction. 

"She doesn't have a job so she eventually will. Just wait and see." Ashton replied. 

 I sighed and turned my chair away from my desk to stare out the window at a sky pregnant with dark, ominous clouds.

Rain was coming, a storm by the looks of it. Just like... This had to stop.

I was building her up in my mind. Making her into something larger than life, into something she wasn't.

What I needed was to see her again—and see that I'd gotten carried away. That I had turned her into some sort of goddess in my mind. What I needed, I decided, was to have her here, on my home turf. That would be my wake-up call.