Want, Need, Love Read online

  He snorted in derision as he rose and wiped his mouth with one strong hand.

  “Take some time. Gain some perspective. And when you feel ready to move on I will be more than happy to match you up—”

  “Here the hell we go,” Anson balked, throwing his hand up in the air. “Destroy a relationship and then pick up two new customers for this sham you’re running.”

  Mona jumped to her feet, sending her chair toppling back with a wham. “Get out,” she snapped, pointing one red spike-shaped fingernail at the door.

  “No problem.” He turned and stalked to the door.

  “What you need to deal with is what doubts brought her through that same door you’re about to walk out of,” she said, her cold voice filling the silence as she glared at his broad-shouldered back.

  He paused with his hand gripping the handle.

  Mona’s chest was still heaving with anger and indignation. “Your fiancée came to a matchmaking company, Mr. Tyler, on her accord. I didn’t seek her out. She was supposed to be in the midst of her happily-ever-after. What brought her here? Now you go somewhere and deal with that reality you’re running from.”

  He looked over his shoulder at her. His eyes were filled with the truth of what she’d said, and Mona felt regret for her harshly spoken words.

  “Go to hell,” Anson said, his voice soft but filled with meaning.

  Her regrets evaporated. “I have been there for the last ten minutes.”

  With long strides he walked through the door, slid on his shades, and moved to his car. Moments later his vehicle took off down the street.

  Mona shook her head as she turned and bent to set her chair upright. She dropped down into it and pressed her elbows into the top of her knees. “Well, that’s a first,” she drawled before releasing a deep breath.

  In college, Mona had discovered that she had a natural instinct for matchmaking her friends. Her gift of premonition had just been a confirmation that she had been right. Among her family they all liked to joke that they were descendants of Cupid, and the Ballingers used their strong intuition to ensure that those who were worthy were gently nudged toward their one true love. In time, people she didn’t even know would come to her for help in finding love. What began as her helping out friends became a hustle to make ends meet and then a small business that she aggressively expanded when she graduated from college. With the combination of her personality, her belief in love, her gift, and the marketing and business skills she’d acquired in college, the business was a success.

  She truly loved love. To have someone question that and her integrity shook her a little bit.

  Not that it was the first time.

  Mona leaned forward in her chair and picked up the gold gilt frame holding a photo of her parents, her twin aunts, and her sisters. She smiled softly. Her Aunt Millicent, whom they all called Millie, had pleaded to take the photo right after the “big talk,” when Mona and her sisters had learned of their gift.

  That day her aunts had also stressed the importance of keeping it all a secret from people not in their family. Something Mona had never quite understood. They didn’t do voodoo or root or spells. They were not witches. They had no superpowers. They couldn’t read crystal balls or change the future. Hell, they didn’t even know what to do with a tarot card.

  They were just able to see a clear image of a person happily in love with someone else. And if they had not been trained to detect it they would have thought it was just their imagination working overtime. Two-second visions that were a snapshot out of someone’s life. That’s all. No biggie.

  So why the secrecy?

  Mona shifted her eyes to her middle sister, Reeba. Unlike her youngest sister, Shara, who was off traveling around the world, Reeba lived in Holtsville as well, but Mona spoke to Shara more. Reeba felt that Mona was disrespecting their ability by making money with it. It took nothing but a blow of wind for them to flip a happy-go-lucky convo into a full-blown argument. Nothing at all.

  Sighing, she sat the frame back among the few others filling the front left corner of her desk. Her intentions were—and would always be—the best. It was up to others to believe that. The words she spoke to Anson Tyler had been the utmost truth.

  I know exactly who and what I am.

  She sighed as she readjusted her chin in her left hand and used the other one to scroll through the documents displayed on the touch screen of her computer. The pictures and profiles of the men who had submitted their info to Modern Day Cupid were in the hundreds. She had three times as many women also seeking her matchmaking services. Everyone was looking for love.

  And they weren’t the only ones.

  The only problem was, like every other woman in her family, Mona could not use her intuition to help herself or anyone else in the family make that love connection. After a string of horribly disappointing relationships, she was beginning to believe that her ability to help others was so strong that she drew anything but the “right one” to herself.

  She reached over to strike her inner wrist where she had the word “Believe” tattooed. It symbolized her belief in herself. In her business. In her dreams. In love.

  But above all she absolutely believed in “the one.” That folks were meant to be in a special relationship. How could she not when her gift was a testament to that? And so she had to believe in it for her clients as well as herself.

  Chapter 2

  Focus, man. Focus.

  Anson cleared his throat, sat up straighter in his chair in the waiting room of the two-story corporate offices of Jamison & Jamison Contractors, Inc., and rearranged the papers inside the leather folio he carried. He was ten feet from a very important business meeting, and his disappointment over Carina ending their two-year relationship and his annoyance at the woman who advised her to do so was just a hindrance. And Anson was always about his business. He had no choice. Failure was not an option.

  His life was the epitome of hard-knock. Both parents lost to a drug addiction that left him and his younger brother, Hunter, with memories of living from pillar to post with plenty of missed meals in between. A surprise visit from social services had underscored the squalor, the filth, the lack of necessities. The neglect. He didn’t know what stung more deeply—his parents’ neglect or their inability to get their acts together after losing their children. As a twelve-year-old boy he could have forgiven them anything if they had just shown up and reclaimed their children.

  Anson took a deep breath, hating that the pang that came with the memories was still so sharp after more than twenty years.

  He was well aware that his past and the fact it was still stuck in his craw fueled his desire to succeed and never go back. He’d fought hard to turn his life into a success story after being aged out of the foster care system at eighteen. There were many battles he’d had to fight and defeat to gain custody of his brother and raise him while working two jobs and attending first community college and then Clemson University. During that time, and even many years after he’d graduated with his Bachelor of Architecture, they had survived on the very basics. Oodles of Noodles and Dollar Store groceries had been their lifesavers. They’d worn clothes until they were threadbare. He had held his little pickup truck together with metal coat hangers and duct tape. They had come through it . . . thankfully together.

  Started from the bottom—now we’re here.

  The song lyric from Drake’s “Started from the Bottom” was his anthem. Now fourteen years later after earning his degree, he was a successful architect who also owned a dozen small businesses. He was far from the days of wondering where his next meal would come from and sometimes he would sit back and be amazed at the wealth he’d accumulated. His brother, Hunter, had earned his doctor of medicine from Morehouse School of Medicine in Atlanta and had been accepted into their surgical residency program there as well. Anson couldn’t be more proud.

  All of his plans had come to fruition.

  Except for his desire to be married a
nd start a family.

  An image of Mona Ballinger’s face filled with anger as she ordered him out of her office replayed in his mind.

  Curly-headed troublemaker.

  “Right this way, Mr. Tyler.”

  Anson looked up at the tall, full-figured secretary before rising to his feet and smoothing the front of his clothing. He picked up his monogrammed leather portfolio where it leaned against his chair before he followed her past her station in the metal building housing the offices of Jamison & Jamison Contractors. He cleared his throat and straightened his double-knotted silk tie just before she opened the double doors and stepped aside to allow him to enter the large conference room.

  Devon and Deshawn Jamison both rose to their feet from their seats at the conference table and extended their hands in gestures that were as identical to each other as their DNA.

  Anson firmly shook each hand. “Good morning, gentlemen,” he said, his voice deep and serious. “I know you’re really busy and I appreciate the opportunity to meet with you about this new business venture.”

  Devon and Deshawn briefly glanced at each other and smiled before reclaiming their seats. “Nice suit . . . Junebug,” Deshawn quipped, pushing up the sleeves of the lightweight plaid shirt he’d tucked into well-worn denims.

  Anson stiffened.

  Devon chuckled.

  Anson eyed them both before he too smiled.

  While Anson had been in college he worked as a laborer for the men sitting before him. In fact it was during those summer days and the fall nights and weekends that his love of architecture was born. These two men who were his senior by just eight years had become his mentors of sorts. He looked up to them, admired them, and appreciated not just the work and skills he’d acquired from them but the time and effort they took to guide him on and off the work site.

  Now here he was interviewing to be the architect for their expansion into multimillion dollar commercial properties across the East and Southeast. “This is an important meeting. I just wanted to show you both I respect you and the next level you’re approaching in your business,” Anson said with a slight tug of the knot of his tie as he lightly cleared his throat. “I would never want to disrespect either of you by strolling in here with anything less than what I bring to every meeting and interview.”

  Anson lived by the mantra: “Nothing personal. It’s just business.”

  “And we appreciate that, Anson,” Devon said. The elder of the twins by minutes, he reached for the portfolio and unzipped it.

  Anson sat back as they flipped through his organized documentation of his architectural work over the last decade. He was extremely proud of everything from the rough drawings and blueprints to the prints of the completed construction of the buildings. There were also several features in regional architectural magazines and an award or two for his innovation.

  Anson was not just a former worker looking for a handout. He was a talented architect looking to bring just as much to the table as the opportunity they offered. He’d worked to establish himself. He’d made plenty of sacrifices. This was his legacy.

  All three men looked up as the double doors to the conference room opened and two women came in, smiles on their faces. Anson rose to his feet.

  “We’re in a meeting, babe,” Devon said, looking on as his wife, Chloe, came straight to him to press a kiss to his lips.

  “With Junebug? Puh-lease,” Anika said, before going around the opposite end of the table to kiss her husband Deshawn as well.

  And then they both came back around the table to hug Anson close. First Chloe, the former supermodel who was still tall and svelte and gorgeous, looking far younger than her forty years.

  He turned as Anika playfully swatted his arm before hugging him, her thick and shapely frame womanly and soft. Anson had nothing but respect for either woman. Like their husbands of more than a decade, the women had also nurtured him and given him invaluable advice over the years.

  “How’s my house?” Chloe asked, leaning against the edge of the table.

  Anson smiled. “My house is just as beautiful as it was when you sold it to me three years ago,” he countered.

  “Ladies,” Devon interrupted to end their casual conversation in the middle of their business meeting.

  “How’s Carina?” Anika asked, turning the portfolio so that she could flip through the pages.

  Anson stiffened. “We’re not together anymore,” he admitted after a pause.

  Both Chloe and Anika made sad faces. “Ohhh,” they said.

  “We’ll have to find you someone new,” Anika said, looking over at Chloe.

  “You know what, I have somebody in mind,” Chloe said.

  “Who?” Anika asked.

  Anson bit back a smile as Devon and Deshawn shared a brief glance before each moved around the table to lightly touch his wife’s lower back to gently guide her toward the door.

  “Dominique, the shampoo girl at the beauty shop,” Chloe said.

  “Nooooo, no no no no,” Anika insisted with a wave of her hand. “She cut her last boyfriend with a razor blade. Forty-five stitches across his back.”

  “What?” Chloe gasped, her eyes widening. “Why didn’t you tell me about it?”

  “You know I don’t gossip.”

  Both women paused and then broke out into laughter.

  The men each kissed their wife’s cheek and then stepped back to close the double doors.

  “You’re lucky we have a meeting of our own,” Anika said with a feigned hard stare at Deshawn.

  “This is rude,” Chloe added.

  The men continued to close the doors.

  “Bye, Junebug,” both women said just seconds before the doors shut.

  Anson chuckled.

  “Don’t laugh . . . You’re in for a string of bad dates,” Devon said, going back around the table to turn the portfolio toward him to continue his perusal.

  “Real bad,” Deshawn added dryly, running his hand over his low cut that was lightly sprinkled with silver.

  Anson held up his hands. “The last thing I need is another matchmaker—or two—in my life,” he said. “Trust me on that. Help a brother out.”

  “I’ll control my wife,” Devon said, taking his seat.

  “Say what?” Deshawn balked. “Ms. Ex-supermodel turned business mogul with a dozen different product lines banking millions every year?”

  “And you can do something with tough as nails Anika flying around the country giving domestic violence seminars where a part of the program is martial arts training and selling pink Tasers in the lobby?” Devon countered.

  Deshawn laughed. “My baby tough as nails, boy,” he admitted.

  Anson looked at the two men, both married for well over a decade, with kids. Stability. Love.

  He wanted that.

  He thought he’d been close to it with Carina.

  Maybe not a deep, soul-searing love, but a sincere caring and concern and a desire for her to be his wife and bear his children. He’d been so close to the family he wanted. He still wanted that. He didn’t like detouring off his plan. Not at all.

  Devon tapped a page of the portfolio with one strong finger as he looked over at him. “What was your inspiration for the design of this gymnasium in Summerville?”

  Anson loosened the knot of his tie as he sat up straighter in his chair. He was ready to get back to business. The resolution of his personal life had to wait. For now.

  Hours later, Anson was in his media/game room watching the NBA playoffs and sipping a snifter of his treasured bottle of seventy-year-old brandy when the doorbell sounded. He slid the crystal into the cup holder of one of twenty leather recliners before the hundred-foot projector screen as he rose to his feet in nothing but the low slung pajama bottoms he wore.

  He started to check the surveillance cameras he’d had installed just last month, but padded barefoot across the polished hardwood floors to the front door instead. Anson opened the extra wide entry door and started in su
rprise to find Carina standing there. He eyed her as she smiled and breezed past him to enter the spacious foyer of the uniquely designed single level home.

  What now?

  Anson closed the door and slowly turned to face her. The few days since they last spoke or he’d seen her had done nothing to dull her prettiness and lessen the curves of her thick frame in the white wrap dress she wore. “How can I help you?” he asked, crossing his arms over his bared chest.

  Carina giggled lightly and ran her hand across her eyes as if to see clearly. “Why so rude, Anson?” she asked, leaning against the wall as she rested her eyes on him.

  “The last time I called, you made me feel I was harassing you and then hung up on me,” he answered with ease.

  Carina kicked off the gold-tipped heels she wore and walked over to wrap her arms around his waist and rest her head against the deep groove between his pectorals. “I was trying to be strong and you calling made me weak,” she said.

  He felt her words blow gently against his chest. “Allowing some woman with an agenda to change your mind about us when she didn’t even know us was already a sign of weakness,” he said, reaching behind his back to unclasp her hands and push them back down to her sides.

  Carina took one step back and eyed his bared chest and the way the pajama bottoms hung low on his hips and clung to the length of his member. “I missed it, Anson,” she admitted softly, untying her wrap dress and exposing the sheer bra and thong panties she wore beneath it as she reached to take his inches into her hand.

  He gripped her hand tightly.

  She looked up at him with a lick of her lips.

  “Just it or me too?” Anson asked.

  “Sex wasn’t our problem, Anson,” she said. “Right?”

  He stiffened as his eyes searched hers.

  “Your fiancée came to a matchmaking company, Mr. Tyler, on her accord. I didn’t seek her out. She was supposed to be in the midst of her happily-ever-after. What brought her here? Now you go somewhere and deal with that reality you’re running from.”