A Piece of Me (3 page)

“
Then I’ll have to set-up a
winery visit one day.” He lifted his glass and sipped.

“
There’s no need. You’ve
already done enough, Mr. Stephens.” Lowering her head, she stared
at her menu, but not before Neal noted the darkening of her golden
brown cheeks. “The day off, the massage, the stylists and even this
dress…”

“
No, Amana, I have not done
enough. Look at me,” he requested.

When she lifted her head and held him
in her dark brown eyes, his heart slammed against his chest. “You
gave me a kidney. That’s not something I take lightly.”

She shrugged, as she always did, an
attempt to brush away the importance of her actions. “I’m a donor.
It was bound to happen eventually.”

He gave a dry chuckle. “Well, we won’t
rehash this argument. I just wanted to tell you that these little
things that I manipulate my way into doing for you are nothing
compared to your sacrifice. Most people say thank you,” he
jested.

Her face lit up as she laughed. “Then
thank you, Mr. Stephens.”

“
No Mr. Stephens. Hell,
Amana, I’m carrying a piece of you, I think Neal will do just
fine.”

“
Neal it is
then.”

They stared at each other across the
table for a moment, neither of them willing to break the silence.
Even when he’d spent all that time in the hospital and rehab, she
would come and visit him, stay long hours into the night and
encourage him, yet she never used his first name. Now, a current
flowed between them heavy and pulsing at the sound of his name
coming from her lips. His first name had always seemed simple to
him, but hearing it come out of her mouth made it seem sensual and
inviting.

Thankfully, the server returned and
took their orders.

Once he departed, Amana began, “I
didn’t get a chance to set up the meeting with you and the legal
team to discuss--”

“
We are
not
going to talk about business
tonight,” he declared, adding more wine to her glass then his own.
She hadn’t finished her first, but he still brought it back up to
level. He wasn’t trying to get her drunk, just making sure she was
relaxed.

Raising her glass, she asked, “Okay,
then what would you like to discuss?”

He thought for a moment. Over the
years she had worked for him, he knew a lot of things about her,
and in the last year, they’d grown closer and discussed both of
their upbringings and swapped funny childhood anecdotes. However,
even in the last year there had been one subject neither of them
broached and that was relationships. As if somehow they both had
silently agreed not to talk about it.

In the past, her marriage and his
relationship with Paulette had been a barrier, a wall between his
feelings for her that was never supposed to be crossed. But, now,
it was all he wanted to know, what he was itching to discover about
her.

“
Tell me, something,
Amana.” He swirled his wine in his glass. “You’re a beautiful black
woman, so why haven’t you dated?”

Setting her wine down, she kept her
gaze on her fingers playing with the stem. Finally, she looked up
at him. “You remember me the first year after Kevin’s death, I was
barely functioning, just a shell.” She lowered her hand to her lap.
“If it wasn’t for you being so considerate and not firing me, when
I was screwing up left and right…”

“
You’ve never screwed up.”
He recalled that year, her eyes always filled with shadow and dark
circles beneath them. She had lost weight; spent too many long
hours at work, fixed errors that most people would have thought
were minor. For the first time in his life he’d felt fear,
recalling everything he’d ever heard about actions a grieving
spouse could take. It had been his mission to see Amana pull
through it. He remained at the office late with her, came in early
so that she wouldn’t be there alone. It was part of the reason he
and Paulette began to have so many arguments, but to him it had
been worth it to finally begin to see Amana smile. He continued,
“You may have forgotten a few things here and there, but nothing
irreversible.”

“
My family was there for
me. My mom took off a month from work and helped me. But, it was
the months that followed that got hard. I appreciate still being
employed.” She gave him a small smile.

“
You’re welcome. However,
you still have not answered my question. Why are you still single?
I’m sure there has been someone in this last year.” He sipped his
wine, gazing at her over the rim.

“
Too busy maybe…” she gazed
passed his shoulder, not meeting his eyes. “One day just came after
the next.” She glanced at him. “Besides, my boss is a task
master.”

“
This year has been hectic,
but it paid off.” He tilted his glass towards her.

Touching her glass against his, she
added, “Yes. I’m sure tomorrow the employees and their families
will appreciate how well it paid off.”

The first course of their meal arrived
and the conversation migrated to summer concerts coming to town and
memories of concerts they had attended when they were
teenagers.

As one course turned into the next,
Neal couldn’t help but compare the ease in which he conversed with
Amana about any subject. None of the women that he dated ever
seemed as fascinating and real. He equated it to the fact that they
were not attempting to build a romantic relationship, just CEO and
assistant. No, after all they had been through they were more than
that, they were friends.

Halfway through the main course, he
angled his fork on the edge of his plate and leaned back in his
seat. It was time to discuss the real reason he’d brought her to
dinner. He desired to give her something substantial that would
truly mark and signify his gratitude. “Amana, I want you to be
honest with me…” He paused, waiting for her to give him her full
attention. Once her soulful brown eyes were focused on him, he
continued. “If you could have anything in the world--. Correction,
if I could give you anything…a car, trip, house, a diamond waist
chain, anything, what would it be?”

Resting her fork on the side of her
plate, she took a moment to lift her linen napkin and pat the
corners of her mouth. “Neal, you should know by now that things
aren’t important to me.”

He did know that, but he
refused to do nothing. “I do, but I’m not taking
nothing
as an
answer.”

As time ticked by, he thought she
wouldn’t give in and would make finding a way to repay her an
arduous task on his part. But then her lips parted and an
incredible sentence tumbled from her mouth.

“
A baby. That’s what I want
out of everything in the world.”

His heart stopped, started, then
stopped again and finally slammed against his chest and beat in a
rapid pace while heat began to pool in his lap causing his cock to
twitch. He hadn’t expected that. “Excuse me?”

She waved her hands in front of her
face and her eyes stretched to the size of half dollars. “Oh, no,
Mr. Step-- I mean, Neal. Not from you.”

The words didn’t make him sigh with
relief. Strangely, he felt offended that she looked so horrified at
the thought of him fathering her baby. Taking a liberal swig from
his wine, he hid his emotions beneath a cool veneer. “Then with
who? Is it someone we work with or from another company you’d like
for me to set you up with?” God, the last thing he wanted to do was
play match maker for Amana with another man. He’d cut his own
tongue out first. The power of his jealous emotions rocked his
core.

“
That’s not it. I don’t
need a man.”

He frowned.

She giggled. “If I was going to do it
the old fashion way I would. However, I’ve decided to go another
route.”

“
Why? You’re an attractive
woman. I know you loved Kevin, but you’re not even thirty yet and
could still marry again.”

“
I know, but I don’t want
to have to wait to meet someone, then date, get engaged and finally
marry them before I can start on a family.” She glanced away, then
back. “I tried that route the first time and still I have nothing.”
Clouds of sadness formed in the dark depths of her eyes. “Kevin and
I had planned to start trying, then the cancer was found
and…”

Neal knew Amana to be a rational and
meticulous woman, leaving him with no doubt that if she were
voicing this to him, she’d already thought it out to the fullest.
He had no plans to trivialize it and announce all the cons to her
decision only to be countered by her pros. “What is it you need
from me?”

“
I have decided on being
inseminated.”

“
Artificially?” He couldn’t
refrain from commenting.

“
Yes,” she declared.
“However, the agreement of our health insurance policy has become a
barrier.”

“
In what way? I know the
insurance covers the procedure because a few people have used it.”
Quarterly, the insurance company sent him stats on the medical
services used by his employees. In protection of the people’s
privacy, it didn’t release names only numbers.

“
I’m sure in those cases
the couples had been trying for more than a year with documentation
from a physician of their infertility.”

“
Ah.” Now he was beginning
to understand.

“
Since, that’s not the case
for me… it will not cover. So I’ve been paying out of pocket for
the consultation and preliminary screening and exams.”

“
And you want me
to--”

“
Get the policy amended so
that single women can have the same advantage of parenthood as
those married or in long term relationships.” Amana’s upper body
was leaning forward and her voice was slightly elevated and
impassioned.

She would have made a great political
advocate, he thought. He finished off his second glass of wine and
assessed her. There was no doubt in his mind that Amana would make
a wonderful mother. She was thoughtful, caring and the most
generous person he knew. Add to that there was a daycare on
premises, there would be no reason for her to quit work. Besides if
she was thinking of leaving, she was honest enough that she would
have given him that bit of news with everything else she’d laid on
him tonight.

He pondered his reason for bringing
her to the restaurant and wanting to give her something that was
remotely close to her saving his life and at the moment the lavish
gifts he’d been considering seemed trite and worthless. Now, before
him was something substantial he could do, something he wanted to
do, second only to starting his company fifteen years
ago.

“
I’ll give you the
baby.”

Her features became distorted with
confusion. “You mean you’ll get the policy modified?”

“
I will look into doing
that, but it’s not something I can do overnight. It will take time
and I’d have to bring it to the board for votes. The whole process
could take months before its available to you.”

“
So, how do you propose I
get pregnant?”

“
By me.”

Chapter 3

What in the
hell
, were the words that went through
Amana’s mind. However, the message must not have got to her core,
because the butterflies from earlier had begun dancing again.
Pushing away the desires of her body, she had to think logically
about all of this. The last thing she wanted to do was offend her
boss.

She observed the man across from her,
impressively dressed in his designer suit. He was an attractive
man, with his short, straight blond hair, light green eyes
surrounded by thick lashes, a narrow nose and a squared jaw line.
His skin always held a light golden appearance as if he was fresh
from a vacation, never appearing pale and washed out, even in the
winter time. After dropping that bombshell of his, he was casually
leaning back in his chair as if he’d just proposed they upgrade the
front lobby of the company.

Lowering her voice, she whispered,
“Neal, you can’t be serious.”

“
I’m very serious,” he
said, not missing a beat. “You want a baby and I don’t mind giving
it to you.” He paused for a moment, looking down at his strong wide
hands. When he returned his gaze to her, he continued, “Honestly, I
never thought about when I wanted to have children. Usually, if
asked I would say someday, but hearing you talk about how
determined you are to have a baby, that in some way this child will
fill a gap in your life…” He shrugged. “Maybe it will do the same
for me. Hell, I’ll be forty next year. It’s about time I got a move
on.”

“
Look, Neal, unlike me, you
have women clamoring to get into your bed. Do you know how many
calls I field for you a day? Any of them would have a baby for you
in a heartbeat.” At least three to four times a day some woman
would call asking if he was available, wanting to know if they
could have his private number or requesting his appearance at some
function with them. However, her boss had been very specific since
returning back to work, that if it wasn’t undoubtedly business
related, he didn’t want any messages. She had admired his drive to
see his company succeed once again.