An Act of Persuasion - By Stephanie Doyle Page 0,42

each year.”

“But all that time you still hated your age. You were only what, ten, eleven?”

“Twelve by then. Yeah, but I knew any minute it could go away, right? I mean, what if Larry or Jan got sick? Or what if their son couldn’t get a job and wanted to come home but didn’t want me around? They were great people and did as much for me as any two people could, but there was still that fear. The knowledge that they weren’t mine and that it was all temporary. I needed to be eighteen. Because then I would be independent. Once I was eighteen everything that was mine, was mine to keep.”

“When did you come here on your class trip?”

“Freshman year of high school. It was part of our art class grade. You know, back when school still had art. I remember thinking how normal I was. I had been with Jan and Larry for almost two years. Not everyone knew my situation, just some close friends who asked because I called Jan and Larry by their first names, instead of mom and dad. I had a boyfriend for the first time. I felt normal for about ten seconds. Then I remembered. I always remembered. And I thought, only four more years to go.”

“Eighteen is young to be on your own,” he said gruffly.

“Larry and Jan were great that way, too. I worked all through high school at two different jobs and earned enough for a semester at community college. They let me pay board for a ridiculously low rate while I got my associate’s degree. Then with a solid waitressing job and some financial aid I was able to go to Rutgers to get my bachelor’s degree.”

“Was that hard? Staying with them when you wanted out?”

Anna smiled softly. “You don’t get it.”

She could see he didn’t like that response.

“It wasn’t about getting out or away from them because they were bad people. It was just about knowing that if something happened, I could be the one to walk away. Nobody was ever going to place me again. That’s all I cared about.”

He looked at his feet as if he couldn’t meet her eyes. She realized he did that a lot when they talked about the hard stuff. The kind of stuff they’d never talked about before with one another. “You never told me any of this.”

“You never asked.”

He sighed. “I wouldn’t have. You were my employee and it wouldn’t have been my right.”

She nodded. It was hard to forget that’s how he had thought of her when she had thought so differently about him.

“Ben, can I ask you a question?”

“You can.”

“Why did that night happen? If you only ever thought of me as your employee, if you had all these rules about not messing around, then what made you break them? Honestly.”

Again, his gaze dropped to the floor and as she waited for his response she worried that he was formulating the perfect answer. What she wanted to hear, instead of the truth. She braced herself when he finally did look her in the eye and, at least, she thought, she would be able to see if whatever he told her was partially true.

“Yoga pants.”

“Huh?”

“Yoga pants. You were wearing these tight clingy pants and you bent over to get a book and...”

“And?”

“I got hard.”

Anna blinked. Then she tried to see through his words to whatever game he might be playing, but she didn’t think he was playing. He was answering her question as best he could.

“Okay.”

“Okay?”

She could see the concern in his face that he might have done something wrong. But she couldn’t be unhappy with his answer. No, it wasn’t a confession that deep down he’d been pining for her for the years they had been working together. They both knew that wasn’t true.

This was something else entirely. He’d wanted her. He’d lusted after her. And that desire had been strong enough to make the great and almighty Ben Tyler break his hard-core rules.

All things considered, it was a pretty complimentary answer. Who knew she looked that good in yoga pants.

“I’m tired,” she announced. It happened this way sometimes. Suddenly. Just like the nausea. All of a sudden she felt as though she could lie down where she was and take a nap. Given that they were in the middle of a museum, she figured she needed to rally a little bit longer.

“Me, too.”

That was nice, she thought. That he’d admitted his fatigue rather than tried to