Free A Designed Affair by Cheryl Barton Page A

help herself as she watched him move about. He was quite a delectable specimen to behold.
    No one spoke as he handed her the juice and all was quiet. Silence hung in the air and since he’d asked her to stick around, she hoped he would explain why. Now it seemed neither of them had anything to say. It wasn’t the silence that disturbed her as much as the sexual tension in the room. She knew that Mike had to sense it as well. She nervously drank her juice while wondering what to do next.
    Mike watched Loren as she drank her juice, afraid to say anything, not sure of what would come out of his mouth. He’d gotten up the nerve to ask her to stay and now what? he thought. He wanted her so bad that if he opened his mouth to say a word, he would spill every thought that was floating around about him and her being naked and sweaty.
    Loren couldn’t take the silence and the not knowing anymore. She sat her glass down and looked up at him, into those eyes of his that held so much promise and into his handsome face that she wanted to caress with her hands. To keep from doing so, she placed her hands in the back pocket of her jeans and inquired.
    “Mike, what’s this? What are we doing here?”
    She watched as her questions perplexed him, catching him off guard. He had to know that one of them had to say something. She waited for him to get his thoughts together. His stance looked tranquil, but the expression on his face was one of confusion. He was struggling, that much was obvious.
    Mike knew this was it, he either does or the opportunity dies.
    “I don’t know Loren. I’m trying not to do anything here. I’m trying really hard, but I think I’m losing the battle. I have a problem and I’m not quite sure how to handle it. The problem is you, which is not a bad thing, depending on how you look at it.”
    Mike looked at her and it was obvious he wasn’t choosing the right words. She looked worried. Now he really needed to fix things.
    “Can I be honest here?” he asked.
    “Yes, I wish you would.”
    Mike took a deep breath and not holding anything back, he put it all out for her to hear.
    “Okay, here it goes. I’m very attracted to you and I have been for a very long time. I can’t stop thinking about you and I don’t know if that’s weird or not for you considering our connection is through my closeness with your brother and your family and we all seem to be one big happy family, but my thoughts about you have nothing to do with family. All I can tell you is that my thoughts when I think of you are not of a sisterly way. I’ve tried for a long time to ignore these feelings I have for you, but they aren’t going away. I play several scenarios over and over in my head about how this could work and every single one of them ends with your brother kicking my ass.”
    Unbeknownst to him, she knew exactly what he was feeling because she was feeling the same way and had been feeling that way for much longer than he had been, she was sure. After he spoke, she considered what would happen if she was as honest with him as he was with her. Since they were laying everything out, she couldn’t let him be the only one out on the limb.
    “Mike, what if I told you I have feelings for you as well, that are not brotherly in nature?”
    He didn’t immediately respond, though he was happy to hear her admission. He thought of a response, but none would solve the problem of the predicament they were in. He still wanted her to know that he understood.
    “I would say that we’re in serious trouble here. Don’t think that I’m shooting down anything that either one of us are feeling here, but this goes way beyond just you and me. Duron is my best friend and my business partner. I love your family as if they were my very own, you know that and I’m not sure they would be receptive to knowing about anything going on as far as the feelings I have for you or the feelings you have for me. I think they expect me to be that older brother