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The first time he’d actually said something stupid…
His brain had completely frozen as he took her in, Daphne had spoken of Kate repeatedly over the last 2 weeks, and he had been anticipating someone a lot less… this.
Yes, Daphne had joked about having met his future wife, but considering he had no intentions of ever marrying, this was just that… a joke.
Eloise had added her two pence in, having known Edwina, Kate’s sister for years. Everything he’d had reported to him from Thomas Kane, his then, head of Legal, had suggested that this woman was a miracle worker, she was ruthless yet kind…
Anthony had seen the resemblance with her sister, but he’d not expected his body to react in the way it did. He’d met Edwina. He’d barely stirred when he looked at her but… this… even his current girlfriend didn’t make him react like this.
She had long dark hair, that she’d tied up. Anthony found his brain wondering what it would be like sprawled out down her back, the curls framing her face more as she lay there… next to him?
Jesus wept, get it together…
He’d managed to make a complete arse of himself that day, and it was the first time he’d said something stupid…
He’d not even introduced himself when he blurted out “You’re our new Junior Solicitor?”
And then, to add further fuel to the fire… he’d asked if she was Edwina’s sister…
He tried to make amends by complimenting her, he’d really meant it as well when he said he could see the resemblance, there was something elegant and graceful about Kate Sharma that had Anthony a little tongue tied. Maybe not a little… completely.
He’d always been smooth with women but here… he couldn’t even make his brain work.
He’d gone to apologise but it didn’t matter, the damage had been done… and he took a stiletto through the toe for it.
He’d had to take his sock and shoe off and rub his foot as he listened to Sienna prattle on for well over an hour as he couldn’t help but feel his life had changed.
The next time he did something stupid…
She’d saved his arse… and his company when she clearly disliked, maybe even hated him. He’d watched her leave. He’d seen that glow of triumphant she had as she walked. It suited her. If he had thought she was beautiful before… this…
He just stood there, coffee in has hand, opened mouthed, staring like a complete good. The smell of lilies and soap had invaded his senses, the jostle and subsequent walk to his office had half cleared his mind…
Until he’d read the email.
She’d been so kind, professional… she’d not even covered him but his family and any future family. She was a hell of a woman.
He felt his heart clench at the thought of this woman, caring enough to cover his family, their future spouses and children. She’d gone above and beyond.
The swooping sensation in his stomach and heart seemed to intensify.
The decision to try and make it up to her just seemed to make sense. He’d made the arrangements with Edwina…
Sunday couldn’t come quick enough…
But then Saturday happened… and only intensified the weird sensation that was happening in his gut and heart.
He’d seen her…
Looking more breath taking than he’d ever thought possible in her running gear, but his mistake here…
Talking to her.
With his idiot brothers in tow.
By the time she’d ran away, she was looking uncomfortable, furious.
But by this point… he was in trouble. Something had sparked. Something like desire.
He’d missed most of what his brother’s had said as he’d been too busy watching Kate run off, watching her tight backside, as it wiggled as she moved, and he couldn’t help the twitch that happened as his brain wondered what it would be like to have her backside in his hands.
He’d ran off after this, for a cold shower, leaving his brother’s in his dust… and banging on his front door a good hour after he’d gotten home and showered.
Petty had never felt so good.
That night… however, he’d had that first dream… waking in a cold sweat, panting hard, his breathing laboured as he woke with a start, he felt around his sheets in an absolute fit of panic, please dear god… he breathed a sigh of relief when he realised, they were dry, but he was still hard as a bloody rock.
He’d had erotic dreams in the past… but this… this was something completely different.
Another cold shower.
By the time he met Edwina Sharma, he was exhausted. He’d bought Edwina flowers, though admittedly, the tulips he’d seen made him think of Kate when he picked them up.
He’d sat for a good hour with Edwina, she’d compared them with their tea drinking habits, he’d had zero reaction to the beautiful young woman…
All he could think of was Kate.
When Edwina had explained the reasons for Kate’s reaction to his comparison, his heart well and truly broke.
When they left, he had a plan, an idea and nothing was going to ruin it.
He gave Edwina a decidedly friendly kiss on the cheek… which in hindsight, was a stupid thing to do…
Anthony had not expected it to go so wrong…
He’d gone to his Monday morning meetings feeling upbeat and positive. He was waiting for 11am to come around and Kate’s usual break…
When everything went, well… it went to shit.
He’d checked his phone…
He’d spoken to Ben… Hell he was still speaking to Ben when Kate had burst into the room, given him a verbal tongue lashing… and not the good kind, he’d ever received in his life.
And he went and did the stupidest thing he’d ever done in his life… opened his big fat mouth and for the second time… called her out on her lack of sex life… lack of personal life…
The look she had given him could have frozen the fires of hell.
He riled her up…
He’d been completely rude…
He’d hurt her.
He went to apologise… and got shut down.
He’d well and truly fucked up
He had to make it right… so this time he did something not stupid… and sent her a message. Asking to talk. When she was ready.
Then he had to go do something even more stupid…
Or maybe it wasn’t stupid…
Less than a week after the mail incident… and Benedict had questioned his feelings for Kate…
He’d been arguing with himself about it all week, the dream had gotten worse…
As she strode into his office, her arms full of files, her face determined, He’d never seen Kate with her hair down and he found himself unable to stop looking, she was breath-taking with her hair down and his heart seemed to kick into gear and speed up in a way that scared him to the very core of his bones.
He realised he’d missed her…
She spoke, told him of the merger, how it was a bad idea…
Her voice wasn’t its usual tone, it was cold… he didn’t like it.
Then they argued. Again.
Then…
His lips were on hers, and hers on his.
It was so good.
So right…
It was madness.
He knew there and then he would have had her against his desk, fucked her until she was out of his system…
When she’d ran… ran thinking he didn’t want her.. that he wanted her sister…
This was when he did, until this point anyway, the stupidest thing of his life… he didn’t chase her.
Then their siblings got fed up of their joint Stupidity…
In hindsight he couldn’t be too annoyed with his infuriating brother and Kate’s irritating sister, when had locked them in a room together and they’d been forced to stop being so ignorant of their own feelings…
When he had held her in his arms, helped her through her panic attack, he’d held her, and something had warmed his entire bones. It had taken all his strengthen not to blurt out something stupid like “I like you” and “I want to date you” it hadn’t been the time.
He had wanted to tell her everything, to tell her everything… there was something so special about Kate. She made him feel safe, she made him want to be a better man.
It had started as a gentle conversation…
About how he’d paid attention to her… it was so awkward… what on earth did you say to a woman who a few weeks ago you thought you hated, who you lusted after 24 hours a day…
She had to break the silence, she was the one who asked the question…
But he made the first move, he moved in and softly kissed her…
He thought maybe he’d read the signs wrong… she paced around his office making those comments, making those declarations… breaking his heart as she seemed to think she wasn’t beautiful, that no one wanted her…
And he finally, pulled his head from his arse and told her… told her how he felt…
Then in a blur… they’d kissed, Kate had told him about her past… she’d been open with him… she’d took that step…
So, he did something decidedly not stupid and told her part of fears…
He’d admitted he’d never felt like this before…
But then he was very fucking stupid and told her he never wanted to marry…
He told her of some of his fears… and she’d been so accepting of him… wanted to see where this was going… that he didn’t even think about what she said… how it would hurt anyway…
He then spent the next 3 months trying not to say something stupid, like I love you…
Especially after she’d helped Ben, spent time with his siblings, watching Star Wars with him… it was impossible not to love her…
And he wanted to tell her…
But then…
He was really stupid…and it nearly cost him… everything.
Pushing Kate away, when Thomas died, what without a doubt… one of the stupidest things that Anthony had ever done…
He knew that now.
He’d pushed her away, his mother had told him not to… she’d see him doing it… she’d warned him and he did it anyway.
She tried to talk to him like an adult…
She’d thought he didn’t want her anymore and nothing could have been further from the truth.
But then…
Then she said the most wonderous thing…
She loved him
But he didn’t deserve her…
Not right now…
Not until he understood how he was meant to live out the rest of his life.
And if that meant he had to deny himself the one thing that might bring him salvation, so be it.
So, he’d sent her away.
But her parting words had cut him worse than he thought possible…
some of us are more invested in this relationship than the other
those words haunted him for the next hour.
He’d done the cowardly thing… sent her away. It wasn’t even stupid…
It was cowardly, it was… he deserved his pain.
But when Benedict stormed into his office… soaking wet, full of fury and fear…
Anthony knew what it was to die…
Hearing of Kate’s accident… knowing it was his fault…
He’d clung to the back of Benedict, clung onto his brother as he drove them through the streets of London, his mind racing that he might never get the chance to tell Kate he loved her…
That he wanted to marry her… that he didn’t want to be afraid anymore…
There could be no more being stupid.
He had to be there for her. He had to tell her…
When she woke… he told her…everything. He had admitted his fear, he’d took a giant step and asked her to move in with him…
And he had thought… that life was perfect and that he had been stupid… for the last time.
Or so he thought…
Only this time he wasn’t alone in being stupid
He did it again. Not even 6 months later
He’d pushed her away.
He just didn’t know how to tell her.
He’d spoken to Benedict, Benedict didn’t even know what to say to Sophie…
They were idiots.
Total fucking idiots.
So said nothing…
He grieved, he relived the second most traumatic period of his life… he was sure losing, or thinking he’d lost Kate was up there either as a joint first… a close…. Whatever…
He did it alone.
She’d pushed back… she’d tried…
Anthony could see the worn looks of both women’s faces and he knew it was stupid… he knew… but he still didn’t…
She confronted him.
His heart broke.
Sophie was worried about Ben, thinking he was cheating on her…
He’d promised Kate not to keep things from her… but he just couldn’t make his mouth work…
And then her words would haunt him again…
Anthony felt her words like he’d taken a bullet to the heart… petulant fucking idiot of boyfriends who don’t seem to be as invested in our relationships that stung… but he knew it how it would seem. He hated that both of them were being hurt by this… he hated that sweet Sophie was being hurt as well… it was just… hard
Kate stormed out not long later and he locked himself away… thinking he might not see her again… that he’d fucked up again.
When he woke the next morning, he’d resolved to tell her… but she wasn’t home.
Anthony couldn’t help but feel like the biggest idiot in the world.
And as he’d crawled into their bed, with her dog for company… smelling Kate on her pillow, tears overcame him, and he cried. Not only for his father… but for his girlfriend.
Having her dog with him, knowing no matter what she’d come back from Newton… stopped him completely breaking.
This… this had been the stupidest thing he had ever done…
The knowledge that his brother had apparently done this as well… did not make it any better… in fact, made it worse.
He had no concept of time… no concept of anything by the time he’d heard her come home. It could have been the next day. It could have been two hours later…
But all he knew was he was a coward and didn’t have the strength to do this…
He didn’t want an argument.
But when the door flew open, he was braced for her anger, for her ire…
He glanced at her… his eyes swollen red and puffy, his heart break so clearly etched on his face…
He’d whispered not now…
But she surprised him.
She jumped into the bed, still dressed and just held him.
She knew. She told him. She told him off for not telling him but gently…
He’d clung to her like she was a lifeline on a sinking ship. Shame welling in him at his stupidity, at his vulnerability and not wanting her to see it.
He’d managed to swallow his pride… he told her everything…
And by the time he was done… and she’d held him some more… He vowed no more.
He’d made the decision,
He’d bought the ring…
He had a plan…
And every day he had to fight the urge
To not say something stupid like…. Marry me.