BWWM Interracial Romance 1: Professional Relations
boss was already struggling to keep her on, already stressed out. She could go to Abigail with the information she had gleaned, but apart from general advice—and vitriol at Richard—Regina knew that Abigail couldn’t exactly help her.
    Finally, Regina’s thoughts turned to Bradley. He had to be unaware of the situation—she had just received confirmation that he was not behind the slander to her name as she had suspected him of being. He also had some clout with the upper level management, a certain amount of seniority and a reputation within the company that made him hard to shake when it came down to it. Regina started to get up out of her chair, and then faltered. She had pushed him away. She had broken up with him over an ultimately trivial reason, and had never so much as intimated since that time—almost four months—that she wanted anything to do with him.
    Could she trust him to help her? Even when they had been together, Regina had kept her previous marriage a secret, never trusting him enough to divulge what a monster her husband had been. If she went to him with the news of what she had discovered, would he even believe her? Regina was as filled with doubt and worry as she had previously been with anger and indignation. She thought with regret over the effort she had made to forget him, over the fact that she had never given him the trust that he had ultimately deserved. She had questioned his every motivation when they were together, even as she had accepted his affection.
    She left exactly on time that night, knowing that she needed distance and time to think. She would have to find someone to talk to, someone she could trust. As she drove home, Regina’s thoughts turned again and again to the way that Bradley had always made her feel. She skipped her workout for the evening and spent the night remembering their times together, remembering his daughter and the pain he had gone through. If anyone could understand why she had behaved the way she did, Regina thought, it would be Bradley. If he didn’t believe her—if he couldn’t bring himself to help her—she had lost even more than the security of her career. She realized as she fell asleep that if she had really lost Bradley for good, she had lost one of the best things that had ever happened to her. She didn’t know if she could bear it.
     

Crisis and Solution
     
    After thinking about the dilemma she faced for several days, Regina realized that the only person she could conceivably talk to about her problem and how to solve it was Bradley. The thought of it made her incredibly nervous; she had, after all, rejected him, and she couldn’t blame him if he had bad feelings towards her after the way she broke things off and how she conducted herself afterward. She debated with herself how best to approach him. As she thought about it, Regina’s mind turned more and more to the good times they had had in their relationship. Even if she hadn’t tried to let herself get too attached, she realized that the difference between Bradley and her husband—and between him and any other man she’d ever been with—were night and day. She had to hope that he still had some good feelings towards her.
    She decided to send him a text message asking him to meet her after work.
    I know I’ve been awkward and downright disrespectful about our relationship, but I really need your help on something, and I can’t talk about it at work. You’re the only person I can talk to about this, and I hope you’re a kind enough person to at least hear me out.
    Regina sighed as she sent the message, a lonely lifeline in the maelstrom of her life. She didn’t expect to receive an answer at all. She told herself that she would deal with things herself if she didn’t hear from Bradley. She wasn’t sure if she was more anxious that she would get no response at all, or at the very real risk that Bradley would reject her outright.
    When her phone pinged announcing a message,

Similar Books

CassaStorm

Alex J. Cavanaugh

Primal Fear

Brad Boucher

Nantucket Grand

Steven Axelrod

The Delta

Tony Park

No Such Thing

Michelle O'Leary