Page 7 of His Secret Virgin
My daughters did make that part easy. Neither of them ever got into any trouble. No drugs. No partying like so many other rich kids. No promiscuous behavior. They could’ve been just like their mother, and that would’ve given me a reason to worry. But they didn’t act like her in that regard.Thank God!
However, I knew if I ever tried to bring a woman around, there’d be trouble in my little slice of paradise. My daughters would turn into nasty little weasels then. I knew that for sure.
They weren’t shy about telling me that it was their mother or no one for me. And not even their mother unless she turned over a new leaf.
Funny how they’d turned the tables on me. As their father, I should’ve been the one to give them hell about who they dated. But I stayed out of their love lives, preferring to remain ignorant on that score.
It might’ve been nice for the girls to butt out of my love life. But I didn’t have one, so it never occurred to me to tell them off. And the fact that I had no desire to date made the idea of putting up a fight with my kids feel like an unnecessary chore.
Things were simple, and I adored simple.
Simple things always appealed to me. I liked Scotch neat, my favorite color was white, and hands down, I always prefer a peanut butter and strawberry jelly sandwich over any other food.
As I sat there thinking about what a simple man I was, a bit of anger began to seep in to me towards my ex-wife. She didn’t have it bad with me. We rarely fought about anything. I let her have her way all the time. I gave her expensive gifts when she left hints about what she wanted. And I gave her everything and then some in our bedroom.
The slightest zing of pain shot through my heart.
With a sigh, I released the pain, letting it all go. “No reason to be hurt by what she did, old man. Selfish people only ever think of themselves. Don’t take it personally.” I’d made it through all the divorce ugliness by using those words.
Not taking things personally was the key for me. Those words had kept me sane for the last five years, and I had a firm belief that they’d continue providing me with peace of mind for years to come.
Another soft knock at my door, and Mrs. Kramer peeked her head in again. “Excuse me, Mr. Taylor. I wanted to ask you if you thought you could come back here around nine tonight for that Skype meeting? Mr. Wong and Mr. Lee will be available at nine in the morning, Beijing time.”
“That’s not a problem at all. Set it up.” Getting out of my chair, I put on my jacket. “I’m going to go home and get some lunch. I’ll take the rest of the day off then come back up here for the meeting.”
“Since I’ll have to be here for that meeting, too, may I also take the remainder of the day off, sir?” She looked at me with hope-filled eyes.
I had no idea how it had happened, but my assistant, the one who’d been with me from the very beginning, seemed to not know me at all. “Of course, you can take the rest of today off. I won’t be here anyway. I’ll see you at about eight-thirty then.”
“Yes.” She nodded then turned to leave. “Thank you, sir.”
Reaching out, I put my hand on her shoulder, feeling like she needed a bit of reassurance. “Mrs. Kramer, you’re a valued employee here at Global Distributing. I want you to know that.”
“Thank you, sir.” She looked at me with pale green eyes. “I’ve started worrying so much lately, wondering if the job I do could be done better by someone else, someone younger.”
“Stop wondering. It can’t be done better by anyone else.” Patting her on the back, I hoped to make her feel more like herself. “Mrs. Kramer, not only are you a tremendous asset, you’re a wonderful person, and I love having you as my right hand.”
I thought I saw a glimmer of unshed tears in her eyes. “Thank you, Mr. Taylor. That’s wonderful to hear. I don’t know what’s gotten into me lately. I just keep thinking about how I’m the oldest person working here and how I don’t belong.”
“You most definitely belong here, Mrs. Kramer. Please, never doubt that.” Now I really felt bad about how much I’d been shutting people out of my life. “I know I’ve been distant for the last few years. I need to make some changes in myself. If I’m so closed off that I haven’t noticed you feeling insecure, if I’ve been contributing to this issue of you feeling out of place, then I need to do something to change that. Thank you for opening my eyes. See you this evening.”
Maybe my life did need to be punched up a bit, but how was I supposed to do that?
