26
Chapter 1
“Hey, beautiful.”
Latonya Stevens glanced up from the papers on her desk. Smiling, she tilted her head and batted her eyes playfully at her coworker.
Jeff Weatherby leaned against the entryway to her office wearing a designer suit and a smile that could best be described as sexy with a little mischief thrown in for good measure. His tall, lean, muscular build, along with his Hollywood heartthrob looks and boyish charm, made him almost irresistible. And he knew it. Observing the player-on-the-prowl gleam in his eyes, Latonya thanked God she had developed immunity to smooth-talking playboys ever since the first one, her father, broke her heart.
Jeff loosened his tie as he stepped into the office and took a seat. “So, beautiful, how about you come to Soka’s with us for happy hour. It’s Friday and it’s time to get ready for the weekend.” His piercing cobalt-blue eyes glimmered as he spoke. He casually leaned back in the chair.
Watching as he made himself comfortable, Latonya admired his easy, laid-back nature. She figured that it must have been nice to let go and not have to worry about anything but working and partying hard, sometimes in that order.
Unfortunately, she had too many responsibilities to test the lifestyle Jeff seemed to promote so wholeheartedly.
“Thanks for the invite, but I have to get a head start on next week’s projects.” She stood up and stretched, moving her neck and head in a circular motion.
“You know what they say about all work…” Jeff ran his fingers through black hair that would put male-shampoo-commercial models out of business and let his words linger.
“I know. I’m dull,” Latonya admitted as she sat back down in her seat. She didn’t need anyone to tell her that she didn’t have a social life. She couldn’t remember ever having one. And given the amount of responsibilities she now had, she doubted she’d be getting one anytime soon.
She’d started working for Harrington Enterprise’s Miami offices fresh out of her MBA program full of energy and hope. The company exported cement and refined petroleum products from the Bahamas and imported crude oil from the States into the Bahamas. At twenty-four years old, the job with the Fortune 500-company allowed her to remain at home and help out her family in a stressful time: her grandmother—who had single-handedly raised Latonya and her sister—had just had a stroke.
She’d needed a job that would allow her to take over the mortgage payments on the small two-bedroom home where she’d spent most of her life and pay the part of her sister’s tuition that wasn’t covered by scholarships. The entry-level position at Harrington had barely allowed her to make ends meet when she combined those responsibilities with her own student-loan debt, but she was getting by.
Jeff smiled as he stood up, slinging his suit jacket over his shoulder. “You’re not dull, beautiful. Just a little uptight, that’s all. But I intend to make it my business to loosen you up. You work too hard. You need to learn how to relax, and I’m just the man to show you how.” He winked at her.
Tilting her head, Latonya squinted and pursed her lips. “I’ll tell you what, when I have time for a social life you will be the first person I call. How about that?” She knew she would never take him up on his offer. Flirting was fun, but it didn’t pay the bills.
“That sounds like a plan to me, beautiful. I’ll see you on Monday. That is, unless you want to give me a call later and hang out this weekend. Let’s say Saturday night. You, me, a little dinner—”
“I’ll see you on Monday, Weatherby. Now, go and party or whatever it is you guys do on a Friday night. I have work to do.”
“Right. Catch you later, beautiful.” Jeff gave her one last wink as he strolled from the office.
I’ll tell you what, when I have time for a social life you will be the first person I call. How about that?
Carlton Harrington III let the words linger in his mind as he continued down the hallway. He hadn’t meant to listen in on the conversation between Jeff and Latonya. He’d simply been walking by her office when he heard a sound that he seldom had the pleasure of hearing from her. Laughter.
Had he known that he would become automatically irritated by what he heard, maybe he would have kept walking.
As he made his way through the fairly empty corridors of Harrington Enterprise, two of his employees stopped him.
“Hey, Mr. Harrington, do you want to come to Soka’s with us? A few of us hang out there on Fridays to unwind after a long week.”
Carlton glanced up and noticed Stan Carter and Juan Esperanzo standing in front of the elevator. Before he could answer Stan’s inquiry, Juan spoke.
“Hey, Jeff, is she coming?”
Carlton turned and saw Jeff Weatherby trotting down the hall.
“No, she says she has work to do,” Jeff responded.
Carlton expelled a breath of air he didn’t even know he was holding as he moved to face Stan and Juan.
“I told you she wasn’t going to come. Face it, man, your skills are lost on this one. That’s a serious sistah and she is not checking for you, Jeff. Give it up.” Stan let out a chuckle as he pressed the button for the elevator. He glanced over at Carlton. “So, would you like to come hang out?”
Carlton considered it briefly and decided to decline the outing with his employees. He already had plans to meet up with friends at Soka’s later. “No, I’ll take a rain check this time.”
The elevator came and the trio of men stepped on.
“Just so you know, Ms. Latonya Stevens will be mine by the end of the year. I’m wearing her down. She won’t be able to resist much longer. I can already see that she is falling for me—” Jeff’s words and Stan and Juan’s laughter were cut off by the elevator.
Like hell! Carlton thought as he listened to Jeff’s boasting. Shocked that he even cared what went on between Jeff and Latonya Stevens, he continued on to the copy room. He had to make a copy of some paperwork from the Biltmore account and mail it to the Bahamas office.
It was hard to imagine that the small storefront business his great-great-grandfather had started back when he’d first moved to Miami from the Bahamas had become a huge import-export business. The company dealt mostly in cement and oil refining. Harrington Enterprise had two large main offices: one in Miami and the other in the city of Nassau in the Bahamas. They had several more satellite offices throughout the Caribbean.
As the sheets filtered though the copy machine, Carlton noticed that several
