The Job Offer - By Eleanor Webb Page 0,66

even though they waved him over. Anne had to be around somewhere. He decided the best place to start looking was at her parents' house. He knocked several times on their door but no one answered, and he eventually left. Then he went down to the dock, but did not see her. He even checked the log bench further down the shore. Knowing he was running out of time, he went back to the inn’s main building.

He ran into Jim coming out of the office door when he walked into the main building through the back way. Stopping him, Ben asked Jim if he knew where Anne was.

"I wish I could help you, Ben, but I thought she was with you."

"No. Is she at your house?"

"No, she's not there. At least she wasn’t when we got up." Ben looked at the time and swore under his breath.

"Look, Jim, I have to leave. My flight back to Seattle will be leaving soon, but I need to talk to Anne. Can you tell her to call me?" He pulled a business card from his wallet and wrote his personal cell phone number on the back with a pen he saw sitting by the fax machine.

"I'll give her the card, Ben."

"Thanks, Jim." Ben walked back to the lobby, disappointed that he would not see Anne before he left. He would feel much better if he could talk to her. His family came out of the dining room and walked outside onto the veranda. The car that would take them back to the airport had arrived, and the driver was packing their luggage in the trunk. After looking around one last time inside of the inn, Ben finally went to the veranda and climbed into the vehicle. She would call him, and when she did he would tell her that he loved her and beg for forgiveness, if necessary.

* * * * *

Anne returned to the inn late that afternoon after a long day on the water kayaking. The sky was overcast and she could feel rain in the air. Fitting, she thought. She would not have been able to stay at the inn and watch Ben leave, and she also did not want to face her parents, so she left early that morning. She and Ben said their goodbyes the night before and a whole lot more. She was not up to seeing his derision today when he looked at her. Over the course of the day she went through every minute of their time together, and her heart ached with pain. She honestly had had no idea that he was Benjamin Stanford, and it hurt her tremendously that he accused her of using him to get a job with his company. Then she went and fell in love with the man she thought he was, the grown boy from her youth. That should teach her to follow her heart. Whenever she overrode her logic, she always got into trouble.

She walked into her parents' empty house and went to the kitchen for a bottle of water. She had not eaten anything since last night and only had a bottle of water during the whole day. She was dehydrated, hungry, and had a terrible headache from caffeine withdrawal. Deciding to make herself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, she went to the counter by the silverware drawer and saw a business card with the Stanford Enterprise logo on it sitting on the counter. Looking at the front, she saw Ben's, make that Benjamin Stanford's, contact information at the office printed in neat lettering.

He probably stopped by wanting to rake her over the coals again or threaten her with legal action if she declined the job now that the contract was signed. That’s probably what his phone message was about earlier. She did not want to answer it and turned her phone off when she saw that it was him. She was just not in the mood to deal with what he would throw at her next, and knowing that when she finally saw him again, it would be at a distance as boss and employee, she picked up the card and threw it in the garbage. If he wanted to talk to her, he had her cell phone number.

Chapter 17

"Put that box over there, please." Anne was in her new rental home, the blue Cape Cod down the block from Carla and Gary, directing the movers when she saw Carla and Gary show up.