Over the Hedge: Part 2- The Finale (Lucky in Love) Read online

  “I understand what I’m about to say might sound dumb. I’m telling you, it’s my truth and the only one I’ve got.” I paused allowing Crystal to understand the vulnerability I was about to expose to her. “The thought…no, the feeling, I get in my chest when I think about being pregnant by this man is unexplainable. Not like ‘oh if I’m pregnant then that means he won’t leave me’. It’s more like a sense of peace, contentment, a calm serenity, unlike anything I’ve ever experienced. It’s like peeking into my future and knowing every decision is with that end in mind. Us creating a life together is inevitable. There are billions of men in this world and I can’t imagine doing it with anyone but him.”

  Twisting my mouth, I gripped the side of the bathroom stall to steady myself. The line went quiet, and I prayed my sister understood how gone I was over this man. Yes, I still wanted to be cautious and take things slow. Maybe sex with him had screwed me up in more ways than one. Because having a child with him, felt like our destiny.

  “Well, damn what do I say to that?” Crystal responded, all trace of amusement gone from her voice.

  “I don’t know what to say to that myself,” I admitted.

  “You know I got you no matter what. I will not be the man-hating voice in your ear just because my marriage has fallen into shambles. Sean is great. We’ve gotten to know each other pretty well since that night at the club. Sounds like you’re in it for the long haul.”

  “I’m still getting to know him too, Crystal.” I pushed away from the stall and stepped farther into the open bathroom space. “I just know if a kid comes as a result of the activity from this past weekend, I’m keeping it.”

  “Fair enough. I’m sure we’ll talk more about this again. But, girl, let me go. I’ve got to go take a shower and go to the grocery store,” Crystal replied.

  I nodded my head. I might not sound like my usual overly analytical level-headed self, but I was thankful that my sister hadn’t judged me.

  “Oh, really quick. Did Momma tell you she wants us to get together again this weekend now that she’s feeling better?” I asked.

  “Mmhmm. It was what set Daddy off the other day. Momma said, ‘it wouldn’t be right to have you and Sean over and not invite Brian’. I told her he wouldn’t care. She’s insisting she doesn’t want to give him any reason to think my family hates him. She actually suggested it might be good for him to spend more time with us as a family,” Crystal answered. I could tell she was trying to keep the sarcasm from her voice.

  “Momma has always wanted to have a huge family,” I said remembering the gleam in my mother’s eyes. “Sean is planning on bringing his mom too. Momma has been in a frenzy trying to plan the perfect meal since this will be our first time meeting her. Well, let me let you go.”

  “Alright, Sis, love ya.”

  “Love ya, too.”

  I pushed away from the door and pulled it open. My breath caught in my throat seeing a familiar face standing a few feet in front of me.

  “Oh…hey, Jenny. I feel like I haven’t seen you in forever,” I said looking at the woman leaning against the bathroom stall door.

  It had been a few weeks since we went to the club together, and I felt like I had barely seen her around the office. Usually, I ran into her a few times a week, either when she stopped by my desk or if I saw her in the breakroom.

  I placed the phone next to the sink and pumped hand soap into my palms. I looked at my reflection in the mirror and smiled. My face had a glow I was sure was there because of Sean’s morning surprise. Waking up with the feel of his firm tongue on my clit made my brown eyes gleam with mischief as I thought of how I would repay the favor tomorrow morning.

  Jenny was still standing next to the entrance to the bathroom. Her eyes followed me as I moved from the sink to the paper towel dispenser.

  “So, how are things going with you? We missed you that night after the club. I thought you would tell us when you were headed out.” I turned toward her while I wiped my hands.

  “Oh, I’m doing very well,” Jenny responded with a stiff smile. “Sorry, I forgot to tell you I was leaving.”

  “Okay.” I waited for a few heartbeats to see if she had anything more to say. When the silence stretched just long enough for it to become uncomfortable, I turned away from her.

  “See you later, girl,” I said walking out of the bathroom.

  On my way back to my desk, I stopped by to see what Anna needed. The attitude I got from Jenny was still fresh in my mind. Was there something going on with her I wasn’t aware of? Did I unknowingly say or do something to offend her? My questions went unanswered as I thought back to my interactions with her over the last few months. I was far from perfect and well aware things could be done without ill intentions and be interpreted wrongly. A word, a phrase, an offhanded comment. Anything could be taken out of context and only made worse when it had time to manifest.

  There was apparently something bothering Jenny, but I was not about to figure it out at this moment. I had a meeting to get to and way too much to think about. Some other day she and I would have to go out to lunch and catch up on what’s been going on in her life.

  CHAPTER 4

  LASHAWNDA

  “Hey, Dr. Barnes it’s time for our meeting with Dr. Colcord.”

  I popped my head into Dr. Barnes’s office to let him know it was time to head to the conference room. He was knee deep in research reports and reference books; speaking lowly under his breath. Over the years I’ve been witness to some of his intense creative spells and they were always a pleasure to watch. The first one was like a scene out of a suspense novel. He stayed holed up in his office for three days straight; not leaving to shower and only eating because I forced him to.

  I could feel the shift in energy around us. Something groundbreaking was on the horizon.

  “Give me a minute,” Dr. Barnes answered without lifting his gaze from his reading material.

  “We are in the conference room next to the elevators. See you in a minute—not thirty minutes, one minute.” I told him using that voice my mother often used on Crystal and me when she had zero tolerance.

  He waved me off and dived back into his papers. I was tempted to wait for him, but the way he was so engrossed in the papers in his hand, I would be waiting for a while. I was better off going to get the meeting started with hopes he would eventually show up since this was all his idea.

  When I walked through the conference room doors, I found Sean sitting at the table awaiting the rest of us.

  “Always on time,” I said while closing the door behind me.

  Sean looked up and blessed me with one of those boyish grins of his. Piercing green eyes and a look of love made my heart stutter in my chest. Any woman would love to get a look like this from a man. In fact, he looked at me as if I was his favorite gift on Christmas morning.

  Gosh, he was undeniably sexy and so darn cute.

  Unconcerned of Human Resources’ rules about proper etiquette in the office, I bent down and took his lips in a slow kiss. Sean moaned as I sucked his bottom lip into my mouth. Slipping my tongue along the warmth of his, I worked his mouth with a sultry dominance. When I finally pulled away, his cheeks were flushed, and his eyes were low and hooded with arousal. It was tempting to slide my hand down that firm chest of his, but alas we were at work and less than five minutes away from the start of a meeting.

  “You’re playing with fire, little lady,” Sean said holding on to my waist as I stood before him.

  “Sorry. I couldn’t help myself.” I smiled coyly.

  His green eyes never ceased to arouse me on multiple levels. I watched him style his hair in the bathroom mirror this morning and based on the messy appearance, I could tell he had been running his hands through it in frustration. Something was bothering him since he got to work. I made a mental note to ask him about whatever had him so frustrated.

  Using the tips of my fingers, I smoothed the spiky patches back into place, enjoying the feel of his silky st
rands. Sean rewarded my efforts with a low moan. At night, he loved when I massaged his scalp while he rested his head on my naked breasts.

  “Go sit over there before I lose my job,” Sean ordered, pointing at the opposite side of the table.

  I huffed, my face despondent with the thought of not being close to him. Sean shook his head at my false pout of innocence. Placing his hand on the small of my back, he gave me a light shove to help me along the way. I hurried over to the other side with a girlish giggle. I exaggerated the sway of my hips with each step. The taste of coffee and something else sweet on his tongue had me salivating with anticipation. This banter between us was all foreplay for later tonight.

  I was primed and ready for Sean’s punishment since I broke the rules on fraternizing in the office.

  Sean’s dismissal of my attentions was perfectly timed. Dr. Barnes walked in as I was taking my seat. He greeted Sean with a grunt. Sean returned his acknowledgement with a head nod. I tucked my lips inward to contain my smile. Dr. Barnes was never chatty and barely cordial. You could count yourself lucky if he spoke to you at all.

  Since their first meeting, Dr. Barnes was continually discussing new research ideas with Sean. During one of our morning sit downs in his office he even confessed to enjoying their conversations. He loved Sean’s analytical mind. Few people in the world could handle an intellectual exchange with Dr. Barnes when he became impassioned about his work. Knowing he and Sean were so close wasn’t a surprise. What was shocking was their similar dry sense of humor.

  Call me silly, but it meant something I fell in love with a man similar to someone I considered a father figure. I guess it’s true that girls marry men like their fathers.

  Marriage? Just the thought of being Mrs. Colcord sent my heart into a fit of frenzied excitement. I straightened my posture and tuned back into the two men in the room.

  “Read through those quickly,” Dr. Barnes instructed as he dumped a stack of papers in front of Sean. “I will need you for this new project. You as well,” he said glancing in my direction. “Right now, take some notes for this meeting.”

  “What’s this new project about?” Sean asked.

  “I have a theory about cancer prevention within the body; specifically at the blood-brain barrier,” Dr. Barnes replied vivaciously.

  I peeked over the conference table to see Sean organizing the articles based on publication date. A slight chuckle settled in my chest. Sean loved to organize things. I mean just about everything—my hair products, the condiments in the fridge, even Fat Bastard’s cat food. I wouldn’t go as far as calling it OCD, but undeniably a personality quirk I found endearing.

  “Just a second.” I pulled my thick notepad in front of me and pulled up the software program on my computer to record the meeting. No matter how good my note-taking skills, it was always good to have a recording as a backup just in case I missed something.

  We spent the next hour discussing Dr. Barnes’s theory. It was hypothetical in nature, an original idea, unlike anything currently being tested in the field.

  Dr. Barnes explained how cancers often metastasized to various areas of the body. Most of the time the brain is the last place a cancer will infect. He hypothesized that the blood-brain barrier works as a supercharged filter to prevent the introduction of cancer cells into the brain. Over time, as the cancer progresses, it slowly erodes this mechanism, leaving the brain defenseless and open to oncogenic cell exposure. He wanted to discover if there was a way to replicate this natural defense process in other areas of the body.

  Sean loved the idea and wanted to see how best to perform a biospecimen sample collection. We agreed to work with the local cancer center and other hospitals in the area to get tissue samples from all patients who died of cancer not originating in the brain. For those who died of metastasized cancer, he would compare their brain tissue with those who didn’t. A pilot project with enough evidence to show a significant difference between the two groups would be groundbreaking.

  This new theory intrigued me so much that I offered to do the literature reviews. We discussed the steps needed to get the project up and running with enough time that they would have some preliminary data available to create a poster before the next conference in DC. If we could get enough pilot data, this could be a tremendous step to gaining a multi-million-dollar grant to expand the project. In the business of research, grant funding played a huge part in how we could continue our work. As much as the local, state, and federal governments claimed to be fighting the spread of diseases like cancer or heart disease, they provided very little in funding. Year after year the budget for health services got smaller and smaller.

  We had been so engrossed in the topic that we lost track of time. Thankfully, I had set my phone’s alarm to notify me of our next meeting. It was a few minutes until the webinar with Dr. Vanderpool, and I started setting up the computer in the conference room for the video chat. Dr. Barnes invited Sean to stay for the meeting.

  “Simon, you old bastard,” Dr. Barnes spoke with a mocking tone when Dr. Vanderpool’s face appeared on the projection screen.

  “Hey, if it isn’t Nathan Barnes, looking ancient as usual. What is it now, ninety years since you’ve been in the business?” Dr. Vanderpool jested.

  It was an ongoing rivalry between the two men. Dr. Vanderpool still had a head full of dark hair that he kept at shoulder length. A laid-back lifestyle left Dr. Barnes’s body looking every bit of a man in his late sixties. However, Dr. Vanderpool spent a lot of time doing outdoor activities, like hiking and biking. The man was healthier than most people half his age.

  “Yes, yes. I might have more gray hair than you, but as far as intelligence is concerned, I will always have you outnumbered,” countered Dr. Barnes with a dismissive wave of his hand.

  I looked at Sean who had been watching the older men banter back and forth. He had his arms crossed over his wide chest as he gave them his rapt attention. In that instance, I realized there was something else that had attracted me to Sean. Something I had never thought about until all three men were together for the first time.

  His intelligence.

  He fit right in with the two men picking on each other like primary school children. Was he aware how much his immense aptitude appealed to me? There was absolutely nothing sexier than a man with a high IQ.

  I recently discovered I could easily describe myself as a sapiosexual or sapiophile. It was an odd term that described something we all knew existed. Attraction based on intelligence was important. I respected men from all walks of life. But I could never see myself with someone I couldn’t hold an intellectual conversation with. I appreciated intelligence, actually I needed it in my partner.

  Even before Sean and I had ever spoken a single word to each other, I was intrigued just by reading through the emails he sent to the staff in his lab. The man was a thinker, prolific in his vocabulary, and had an insatiable curiosity for knowledge that aroused me mentally and physically. Some of my favorite nights spent wrapped in his arms were the ones that didn’t involve sex. On those nights we simply talked, often jumping from topics random from our favorite books, social injustice, or planning outings.

  We even had a heated discussion about which Power Ranger series was the best. Obviously the original Mighty Morphin Power Rangers was the clear winner, but Sean swore that Power Rangers Time Force was better. The debate was still ongoing, but I was sticking to my OG characters.

  Sean must have felt my eyes on him because he turned his head and caught my eye. He quirked his eyebrows and mouthed ‘what’. I was already pushing it today by making out with him at work. The sexual tension made me press my thighs together underneath the table. The thump of my clit had me biting back a moan. I needed to keep my lust-filled thoughts under control. So, I shook my head and looked back at the screen, still feeling the heat of Sean’s gaze on me.

  Dr. Vanderpool picked up his horn-rimmed glasses and placed them on his nose. With an exaggerated expression of shoc
k, he finally acknowledged my presence.

  “Well, if it isn’t one of my favorite women in the entire universe.” His smooth southern drawl brought a smile to my face.

  “Hello, Dr. V,” I replied.

  “Hello? Is that all you have to say after all these weeks of silence? I remember when there wasn’t a week that went by without us conversing. I guess that’s when you only wanted to pick my brain about the psychosocial data collection measures.” Dr. V placed his hand over the middle of his chest, feigning a broken heart. “I thought you were different, Lashawnda. I guess I was wrong. Just like every other woman—use us men until we no longer serve a purpose.”

  His playful banter made me giggle. Dr. V was always smooth with his flowery words. The opposite of Dr. Barnes. He took time to get to know me when we first met. Not the obligatory stuff about my role as a member of Dr. Barnes’s team, but the details about who I was outside of work and what my career goals were. Even as busy as he was, Dr. V always sent me postcards on major holidays and flowers for my birthday.

  “Dr. V, you know I would never throw you to the wayside. I’ve just been a little busy lately. And don’t give me that look, you loved our conversations.” I lightly scolded him for calling me out.

  “Yes, well as much as I miss our talks, what I want to know is why I didn’t see your name on my class roster this semester?” Dr. Vanderpool chided.

  I bowed my head, feeling put on the spot. I looked at Sean and then at Dr. Barnes, who was busy scribbling notes on his writing pad. Sean’s brows were pinched in an expression I couldn’t read.

  “We’ll talk about that later,” I urged, pushing for him to change the subject. “Now, let’s get this discussion going so we can all get back to work. I don’t know about you, but I’ve got a stack of papers on my ‘to file’ pile that’s growing by the second. I’d like to introduce you to Dr. Sean Colcord. He has taken over as the Lab Manager for Dr. Barnes’s team.”