chapter 2

The following day Ana woke up very early. She has been an early riser from childhood. She didn’t remember whom she learned that from, since she had never met her parents. She took a quick shower and put on tight fitting black skirt and a white blouse designed with pink roses. She then chose black stilettoes and tied her hair back in a ponytail. After she was satisfied with her look, she wondered if Nick will notice her this time round. Mark had also made an impression on their first encounter together and if Nick continues to ignore her, she will give Mark a chance if at all he is interested.

Now that she knew that Mark was not a criminal. The thought of giving herself a chance at love couldn’t leave her mind.

She entered her car and drove to work. It was about 30 minutes’ drive from her house.

She reached just on time to find Nick entering his office. A thought crossed her mind “what if she hide in the opposite office to look at him secretly. She couldn’t dare do that on his face, since she feared what his reaction could be.

Ana let herself in the office, making sure she didn’t make noise to alert Nick. She closed the door and left a small space just enough to spy on him. He was amazing as always. Perfectly built with broad shoulders that she imagined has a six pack underneath it. ”I wonder if he has a gym in his house” Ana thought. Her gaze moved to his lips and she found herself fantasizing on how it felt like to be kissed by him. Nick could feel that someone was looking at him. He looked at the door right where Ana was standing and she moved to hide her body so she couldn’t be noticed.

Suddenly he stood up and walked straight in to the office where Ana was hiding. He opened the door and saw Ana sitting on the Visitor chair.

“Hi! Ana “He greeted

“Hello! Nick” She greeted back.

“You are late, I have been waiting for you. I thought I told you yesterday not to come late.” He said while looking at her with a scolding look. Ana felt so embarrassed and bowed her head down so he could not notice how her cheeks turned red.

“I thought I could give you some time to finish urgent matters fast. I was just resting in this office. “With a trembling voice Ana managed to explain herself.

“I will be with you in just a few seconds, let me pick some files”

A while later, they were comfortably seated in Nick’s office deep in conversation. Nick was saying” Ana I called you here so I can give you more information on Mike. He has just been spotted by the FBI in California where he is currently staying. Please make sure you follow all the leads “He handed her several files with numerous information.

“Thanks Boss this will help me a lot. I thought of asking you for more leads but I realize now that you beat me to it.

“Do you have any questions?” Ana just looked at him blankly. All her thoughts were on his perfect body and handsome face.

“Ana” he snapped his fingers “Please concentrate, I have other matters to attend to. You do know that I am a busy person” He said while smiling .He must have realized that Ana was lusting at him.

When she came back to her senses, she looked side-ways with embarrassment written all over her face.

He moved closer to face her directly while smirking. But after a few seconds he turned back to his serious face and started sorting out other documents on his desk.

Avery deep silent fell on the room until he raised his head and repeated to her “Do you have any questions?”

“Not for now, Boss”

“Good, See you around” With that he stood and left Ana in the office.

”Please close the door when you leave the office” he said while climbing down the stairs.

By his actions, she knew that he will never notice her. He didn’t even give her a peck on the cheek to say goodbye. As there was no hope of them ever being together, she vowed that very instance that she will forget about him and give another person a chance to love her.

Nick climbed on to his car on the parking lot. He was waiting for Ana to come out so he could secretly admire her. Back at the office he was surprised at how Ana stared at him shamelessly, but he liked it.

Were it not that he was her boss, he would have asked her out by now.

God knows how he loves the woman. It has taken all his self-control to not show how much love he has for her. Just then Ana walked out of the building looking sweet and sexy as always. Her eyes sparkling in the mid-morning sunlight. How he wished he could jump out of the car and grab her close to his body.

He wanted to embrace and kiss her soft and already inviting lips.

Nick has always known that Ana is attracted to him just pretty much the same way he is in to her. But he had to play hard so as not to compromise the working relationship they have together. He might seem to be tough and cruel but inside he was dying with love for her. No any other woman has been close to making him feel what he feels to Ana.

He watched closely as she entered her car and drove off in to the traffic that was already piling near the office building. He sighed with relief and promised himself that one day she will be his woman no matter what.

****

Ana woke up on Saturday morning and decided to go for a morning run. During the week she had searched everywhere for Mark with no success. She needed something to distract her for a while. To her surprise someone knocked her from behind and when she looked back, it was Mark.

”Are you spying on me”? Ana said to him sarcastically admiring how Mark was looking sexy while in his running gears. He was sweaty but that made him even look more attractive. However, Ana noted that Nick was way more attractive than Mark. That made her smile bitterly.

“I should be asking you the same question because you are the spy. So tell me darling, why are you following me around? Don’t you have other people to spy on? May be you find me attractive and you want to be closer to me.”

“Come on don’t be a jerk, what are you doing here? I thought you will be staying away from the public” .Ana said sarcastically but still flattered at the comment Mark made. If he knew that she was considering getting closer to him even though it was against the career rules.

She just didn’t want to sit around waiting for Nick who may never even look at her.

” Yeah I thought about that but I want to live my life despite the dangers I will face. You only got one chance to live, and I want to make the rest of my life as enjoyable as possible with a woman I truly love by my side. Our paths keep on crossing which makes me believes that may be fate wants us to be together.”

Ana blushed that he realized and touched her cheeks and asked,” Can we give each other a chance beautiful lady?”

“No I don’t think so I have a mission to catch your brother. So there can never be anything between us. Besides we just met and I don’t trust people that easily. I feel you just want to play around with me and toss me aside like other women” She still wanted to play hard to get so as to test him.

“Honestly I feel something strong for you, and I am not my brother who keeps on destroying other people’s lives. I want to start something special with you. Even though we met under very bad circumstances, I love your bravery.

At that moment they moved closer to each other and hugged very tightly.

“You know I am starting to like you and I am willing to risk everything for you. The only condition I have is you don’t get in the way of my investigation on your brother.”

”Yeah we sometimes fight like cats and dogs, but that doesn’t mean we don’t love each other I just don’t support his way of life. It would be sad for him to go to prison.”

Ana moved away and told him that she had a business to take care of and that they will talk later. He touched her cheeks softly and smiled showing his perfect jaw line.

”Ok blondie lets meet for dinner, it’s on me. I will take you to the best restaurant in town. I wish to show people around how lucky I am to have you by my side.

”Sure, just send me the location and I will be there” Ana replied.

Later that night, when Ana arrived at the restaurant, She saw Mark in a different way. He was dressed in a black suit as if he was just coming from work. His eyes looked very tired and he had a strange voice.

”What is wrong Mark?” She asked genuinely concerned and wished to know more about his day. She was surprised at how much she had grown to care for this man she just met a few days ago. Her biggest worry was if she was really making the right decision because as far as she was concerned her heart always belonged to someone else.

“Don’t worry, it’s just business problems. I had several meetings all day long. I feel tired and hungry and I appreciate you coming to eat with me at this time.” He reached out for her hands and squeezed them lovingly with a smirk oh his face.

“You don’t say, that’s a side of you I didn’t know, tell me more.”

“Well I am a Business man, I am in furniture manufacturing. I did the design course in college and I know

a bit of interior designs .So that’s how I make a living and also it’s a profession that I can’t be traced easily.” Ana was so impressed, He could see her very attentive at each sound of word that comes from his mouth. Suddenly Ana changed her expression and asked about his life with his brother.

“It’s a long story I don’t like to talk about .Anyway the time has come for me to tell the truth.

“You probably know who my family is, I don’t need to talk about them. We are both children of the maid who used to work at our house. When my father got married, they never had children because of some health issues his wife had. So he had an affair with the maid and we were born. The three of them agreed to keep it a secret and the woman who raised my brother took one of us and I remained with our biological mother. “

“My father made sure we did not lack anything in one condition that we keep our existence a secret. We tracked each other through Facebook, when we were 19 years old and we kept on seeing each other secretly until one day our parents discovered. The love we had for each other was so huge that they accepted us getting to know each other. The only problem was that my brother was already a criminal and there was nothing I could have done about that.”

“But you could have still helped him”

“I tried as much as I can but he refused to listen to me, he only said that he was force d to be a criminal after the family lost everything”

“You have to know that I was only carrying out my duty obligation.” She kind of felt guilty for bringing the family down.

“I don’t blame you at all darling, I know you were doing your job. However now let’s enjoy the food or else it will turn cold”

“Okay”