Sean watched his bride-to-be head into the room she’d taken as her own, at least for the next three days, and couldn’t help but admire the lush swing of her ass. They might just be comfortable jeans, not that he had anything against jeans — this was Texas after all — but they cupped her curves perfectly and made his hands ache to touch her. His mouth watered and his dick twitched in his slacks as he thought about her peeling those jeans off as she changed. The bounce of her full breasts as she tugged the shirt off over her head.

Shit, it was going to be a rough three days at this rate. He pushed thoughts of her out of his mind as he adjusted his pants and tried to find something else to occupy his attention. He went to the fridge and opened the door. Crap, she’d been right. There was nothing there but condiments and a new gallon of milk that Brenda, his housekeeper, must have gotten so he could have cereal before work. He’d been in such a hurry this morning after finding the letter that he’d skipped breakfast. Now, his stomach rumbled and he realized they’d skipped lunch as well.

He turned to look toward the room Sabrina had taken and wondered why she hadn’t said anything. A quick survey of the freezer and cabinets told him he was in desperate need of groceries. Now he was embarrassed he’d left her without checking on it earlier. The almost bare cabinets made him go check the bathroom and laundry room to make sure he wasn’t missing anything and by the time he made his way back to the front room, Sabrina was standing in the middle of the room wearing a loose, flowing black skirt that fell just shy of her knees and a stunning flowered blouse that made her dark eyes shine. Her low heels were just high enough to define the muscles in her calves and leave his hands itching to slide up them.

“Ready?”

“I am.”

He couldn’t help looking her up and down one more time and wondering how they’d managed to send him a woman he found more attractive than most of the women he’d dated in the last ten years.

“What’s wrong?” she looked down at herself as if he’d made a complaint.

“Nothing.” He smiled. “I was just thinking how nice you look. Come on.” He offered her his arm. She wrapped her hand under it and held on next to his elbow. He walked her to the door and out. On the way to the elevator, they passed two of the few other tenants on the floor.

“Hi.”

“Hi, do you have a minute?” he stopped and Sabrina stopped beside him.

“Sure, what’s up?” the woman asked.

“I just wanted to make introductions.” He looked at the woman beside him. “Sabrina this is Becca and Rick Santori. Becca, Rick,” he nodded to them, “this is my fiancée, Sabrina.”

“Oh, so nice to meet you.” Becca gave Sabrina a hug.

“Congrats, man.” Rick shook his hand. “When’s the big day?”

“The eighteenth.”

“Wow, that’s almost here. Are you excited?” Becca asked Sabrina, who smiled.

“I am.”

“How have you been hiding her from us this long?” Rick said to him.

“I met her in Florida, we’ve been seeing each other there. This is her first time here.”

“Well, that explains why you’re there so much!”

Sabrina’s stomach rumbled and he flushed, remembering he’d left her an apartment with no food, no way to contact him and no way to get back in if she left.

“We’re on our way to dinner now, but I wanted to say hi and introduce you since you were here.”

“Oh, go ahead. We don’t want to keep you,” Becca said.

“Have a good night, and congrats again,” Rick said as they continued their way down the hall.

Sean wrapped an arm around Sabrina’s waist and guided her toward the elevator. “I didn’t realize how bare things had gotten. I’ve spent more than half my time gone over the last few weeks. I guess when I was home I got take out or delivery more than I bothered to worry about getting food.” He waited while the elevator closed with them inside then hit the button for the ground floor. “Why didn’t you say anything about lunch? I’m not trying to starve you. I just didn’t think about it.”

“I didn’t either until after you were gone. That’s when I realized I didn’t have a key or even your phone number. Since I didn’t think about any of those either, I really couldn’t blame you.”

“Still. I’m sorry. It wasn’t my intention. Now you have a key and my numbers. We’ll get groceries tonight and I will have someone set up accounts for you, so you can get groceries and clothes and whatever you see fit.”

She looked at him a moment. “What would you say if I want to totally re-decorate the penthouse?”

“Go for it, make it your home. But before you get rid of what’s there call down to the front desk. I rented the place furnished.”

“Oh.” She blinked a couple times. “That explains a lot.”

“Like what?” He watched until the elevator doors slid open, then stepped off, with her right beside him, her hand still tucked against his arm.

“Well,” she turned a pretty shade of pink. “I know I only spent a few hours with you this morning, but the white furniture and mirrored surfaces just didn’t seem to match. Especially not with someone who wants children.” She met his gaze. “Children are messy, white and mirrors show it the worst.” She gave her head a little shake. “Added to the fact you’re in construction. And this,” she lifted his hand and ran her fingers over the palm sending sparks of heat through his entire body, “tells me that while you might own the company and spend part of your time in the office, you still spend a significant amount of time on site, swinging a hammer or some other manual labor.”

“I get the kids are messy part, but what do my hands have to do with anything?” He closed his hand around hers and kept it there as he walked them both to the restaurant only a matter of feet away.

The maître d approached as they stepped in the door and seated them right away. Sean waited until they were seated, with semi-privacy as there were people around but no one close, with menus before he was going to ask again but he didn’t have to.

“Construction is a dirty job, at least parts of it.” Sabrina shrugged. “I couldn’t see someone who chooses manual labor when they don’t have to picking out furniture like is in the penthouse.”

Sean was intrigued. He didn’t care much for what was there, but he also didn’t care enough to shop for something else.

“What would you choose for me?” He held up one hand. “Just out of curiosity. Not what you’d get for us, but what do you think I would like?”

“Hmm.” She narrowed her eyes and watched him across the table for a moment. “Natural. Polished woods but medium golden tones, not dark or too pale. Think honey oak, something a few shades lighter than the floors. Rich deep colors like burgundy and emerald green. I like the hardwood, but a few rugs here and there would be good so your feet don’t get too cold in the winter. I imagine you tend to wander around barefoot when you can.” He had to admit, she wasn’t far off. He probably would choose natural wood and dark colors, reds and greens. Add in a little blue and he’d be in hog heaven.

“What about you? What do you like?”

“Natural woods are good, and I like red, green and blue, but I’d go for lighter tones than I’d chose for you. Something bright. But not pastels.” A fine shudder went through her and he smiled at how expressive and transparent she was. “I like jewel tones, strong colors and pastels are watered down, in my opinion. They’re okay for babies and the people who like them. I’m not one of them.”

Sean smiled as he watched her talk. He liked that she knew what she liked and wasn’t afraid to say it.

“On a related, but only tangentially, topic, tell me a little more about you. Why marry a stranger?”

She looked down at her hands. “I already told you. I want to be able to raise my kids myself. I wasn’t having any luck finding anyone who was interested in me the way I am, much less in me staying home with the kids.” Sean suspected there might be more to it than that, but he let it go.

“So, you’re from Arizona and you like to read and watch movies? What more is there to know about you?”

“I have a degree. I’m also fluent in three languages, counting English.” She looked away to stare out the window across the park that butted up against the building. “I’m not lazy. I plan to teach our children as much as I can. I just know what I want.”

That she felt like she needed to tell him she wasn’t lazy made him wonder who had accused her. He knew she had a degree, that had been one of his requirements. He wanted his children to see the value of an education and wanted their mother to see it as well.

“What’s your degree in?” That he hadn’t specified.

“Early childhood education.” She looked back at him. “I wanted to have the best shot at teaching my — our — children as best I could.”

He was impressed, few people would have thought that far ahead.

“Can I guess your languages?” He smiled and hoped she realized he was trying to be a little playful.

“Sure. Let’s see how well you’ve figured me out,” she shot him a playful look, “or think you have.”

“You’ve already said including English,” he held up one hand with one finger lifted, “so I’m going to guess Spanish, because you’re from Arizona and I’m sure there’s as many people there as here who speak only Spanish.” He lifted another finger and looked at her. She had a good poker face. It gave nothing away. “The third is a little harder, but I’m going to guess Japanese.”

“Why Japanese?”

The waiter appeared and took their orders. Sean waited until he’d gone then answered.

“I chose Japanese because while Spanish makes sense locally, I thought Japanese would be more useful for the world business market.”

“It would make sense, if that was why I’d chosen it. But that’s not why I learned it and while I do speak Spanish, Japanese isn’t my other language.”

“Hmm…” He narrowed his eyes and wondered for a moment what might have motivated her if it hadn’t been teaching her children, which seemed so far to be why she did most things. “Italian?” he wasn’t sure why he’d picked that but her dark hair and tanned skin could be from an Italian family.

Sabrina shook her head, a smile frozen on her lips as she waited to see if he would guess again.

“Okay, final guess. French?” the only reason he chose French was because so many women seemed to think it was the language of romance. As far as he could tell, that was kindness. Just that. Kindness.

“Nope. Not Italian or French.” She looked pleased with having been able to stump him. “My third language is German.”

“German?” He knew a frown flashed across his face before he could stop it. “That seems like an odd choice. Why German?”

She took a drink from her water and set it back on the table.

“It wasn’t really a choice. I started it as a child from my Oma. Well, technically she was my great-grandmother, but that’s what we called her.” A smile curved her lips as she remembered. “She came to the US in the forties, and while she spoke English, it was heavily accented. She preferred to speak German with the family, at least when she could. Her daughter, my grandmother grew up in a bilingual household before there was a name for it. In turn, my mother learned some, enough to talk to Oma, as did I.” Sabrina’s smile turned a little sad. “Oma died when I was sixteen and I missed her so much. You see, she’d lived with us since I was a baby.” She took a deep breath and licked her lips.

Sean reached across the table and covered her hand with his. “You don’t have to tell me.”

“I don’t mind. It’s just that I still miss her so much when I talk about her. But really, it’s a good memory.” She licked her lips again and Sean wanted to do the same. To taste her and see if she was as sweet as she looked. “I had taken Spanish in high school because there were enough kids around who were native speakers I had plenty of people to practice with. But when it came time to take my language for my degree I wanted to do something different. Mom was against it, she said it was more work than I needed to do, I already had a language and I could just CLEP out, but I didn’t want to. I wanted to take German to honor my Oma and my legacy.”

“That’s sweet.” He wanted to move closer, to pull her against his side and hold her. Not only because he saw the ache of the loss in her eyes, but her sentiment spoke to him. He wasn’t a descendant of recent immigrants, at least not that he knew of, just the only son of a carpenter. Granted, Sean wasn’t a carpenter, but he’d learned the basics along the way, just as he’d learned the basics of plumbing, sheet rock and plastering.

Their dinner arrived, and they continued to get to know each other while they ate, talking about movies and music until Sean was eager to get them back up to the apartment. He was tired of all the eyes on them, he wanted to have her all to himself.