Kelly did as he asked and looked around for a bit and told him that the rooms were fine and they didn’t need anything else in them. Benton knew there was more coming, but he didn’t say anything to her about that. She went back to the couch and started to play the game again. He went to the lab for a few hours, and when he came back, he found her nearly in tears on the couch. He walked quickly to her. “What? What happened?” he asked softly as he sat down next to her. “I don’t understand this.” She said as she looked at him with tears in her eyes. They were clouding the normal brightness that was there. It hurt to see her in this much pain. “Understand what?” he asked, and she moved her phone to show him the score. “I can’t ever be a master at this.” She said as she looked at the phone and then him. The tears were close to falling out of the corners of her eyes and he never wanted to see that. It ripped at his heart in a wa

    It hit Benton at dinner. It was like hitting an immovable object. A brick wall came to his mind, but it was even more than that. He was reeling from the idea that had hit him. He was in love with Kelly. Kelly was everything that he had wanted in a partner, and he didn’t even know it. She had put herself through hell trying to be able to talk to him, but he knew that wasn’t an issue. He found that everything about him changed when he was with her. He was calmer. He was lighter. He could think better. She was the reason he had been able to get things done quicker and better than before. He was even more caring about the fact he was not the best of bosses before she arrived. He was trying. Benton looked at her and realized that all at the same time. His head hurt now. He knew he was attracted to the small woman before him. It had never been a driving need to have a woman in his life, he had thought. Then she arrived, and he wanted h

    Benton had no idea what was going on, but he waited there as she just looked at him. There was so much in her eyes that was going on. He could see the tears starting to build up in the orbs that normally had so much life in them. Her breathing also changed. It was short and forced. She didn’t want to look at him.  She was trying to force her eyes everywhere. “Kelly?” he asked softly. “It hurts.” She said even softer. “What does?” he asked, thinking that he somehow hurt her. He hadn’t thought about it, but he didn’t know if she had any pain throughout her body that could be set off through touch. He was sinking in his own doubt. This was not what he wanted. Just a taste. A simple taste of her to help ease the dull ache throughout his own body. Never to hurt her. “He cheated on me,” Kelly said. “What?” Benton asked, surprised. “Derrick. Derrick cheated on me, and then he tried to play it off. He was fri

    She was exhausted. Her head hurt in a way it had never hurt before. She closed her eyes, and she could see everything in front of her. Every memory was fighting with another to get there to the front of her mind. It was like fighting with herself in a way that she had never done before. Everything was just flashing, and then it would fade, and then it would flash again. The memories just flooded her mind, and it was extremely painful at the exact same time that she was trying to figure everything out and where everything was fitted together. Nothing was easy right now for her the pounding her head was even more than the physical pain that she had sustained from falling down the mountainside. All she could do was closed her eyes to block out everything that was around her. All she could really hear was the sound of his heartbeat against her ear. It was slow and steady, and he just kept his hands on her back. It was the only thing that was letting

  “Does the why matter?” he asked as he looked at her. “Yes it does.” She said as she lifted her head to look at him. “Alright. Then let me tell you a few things that you don’t know about us.” Benton said as he looked into her eyes. “My great grandfather is the one who began the family company. He is the one who made the most money before I took over. He grew it from nothing to what you see here. When his son took over they were still new money and were looked down on. So my grandfather was forced to marry my grandmother because she was raised in the right circles, as my mother would say. My grandfather was distant and then when they had kids, they had to marry from my grandmothers circles not my grandfathers. Everything was a transaction between them. My Father had to do the same. He was forced to marry my mother and then have children. He was never happy if she was around, and I am not sure my mother has ever been a happy a day in her life unless she w