When the music ended, she wished they could leave. She wanted to be alone with him, spend what little time they had left together, not in the midst of other people. Teddy noticed a woman looking at them. She smiled. The feeling that maybe the woman knew Adam suddenly made her jealous.
“Who is that?” she asked.
Adam looked in the direction Teddy indicated.
“She’s a business associate. She works for the Princeton office of a large financial corporation. Why?”
“She’s staring at us as if she knows a secret. Have you two dated?”
He smiled. “Jealous?”
The obvious hope in his voice wasn’t lost on Teddy, however, she suspected it was laced with sarcasm. She reminded herself they were only here because of a previous agreement.
“You didn’t answer my question.”
“The answer is no. I never dated her.”
Teddy looked back. The woman was gone. In her wake, she’d left a question in Teddy’s mind. She put it aside and concentrated on Adam.
“Is this party an annual thing?”
Adam nodded. “Stephen and his wife have hosted it each year since he came to work for me. Even before then.”
“Have you come each year?”
“Most of them. There were times when I was out of the country, but if I was in town, I was here.”
A steady stream of people came over to talk to Adam. He introduced her each time. He was the owner so it was natural that people would seek his attention. Teddy was getting a bad feeling as the night wore on. She thought they were more interested in her than in talking to Adam. Yet she didn’t feel that it was the kind of curiosity about who the boss was seeing. There was an undertone she couldn’t define.
After several conversations, Adam asked her to dance again. She went easily into his arms. That was where she wanted to be. They danced the same as before, only this time Teddy kept her eyes open and checked the other dancers. She noticed several people turning to stare at them and then whispering. She wondered what was wrong.
Excusing herself, she went to the ladies’ room to check her makeup. Before she turned the corner she’d been directed to, she heard two women talking. And then she knew the reason for all the stares.
“Did you see her?” someone whispered.
“I did. She’s stunning. I can see why Adam has her on his arm,” another woman spoke.
“I wish he’d put me on his arm,” the first one replied.
“If you have to compare yourself with her, you’d lose every time. This flavor has all the others beat by a mile.”
All the others, Teddy was appalled. Arm candy! They thought she was arm candy.
Teddy wanted to say something, confront the two women. She wanted to let them know that she had a brain and that she and Adam were not an item. But what could she say? She didn’t really know Adam. They had exchanged things about each other, about their pasts, but they hadn’t talked about common interests. She knew women fawned all over him, obviously staring at him even when she walked with him. She didn’t know his past. Other than Chelsea, Chloe and Veronica—and Veronica was definitely eye candy—Teddy didn’t know that he’d dated enough women that his employees considered them nothing but the current fruit of the season. This included her. And she didn’t like it. She didn’t want to be lumped together with an invisible class of women who were interested in nothing more than being seen with a good-looking man.
When she reentered the party, she ran into Stephen.
“Having a good time?” he asked.
“Wonderful,” she lied, but her smile was in place. Calling on her customer service background, she didn’t want to let him know how she really felt.
“Let me get you a drink.”
They weren’t far from a bar that had been set up for the night. “White wine,” she said, and Stephen raised his finger indicating he’d like one, too.
“Adam says you have this party every year,” she opened with the first thing that came to mind.
“We do. My wife says it reminds her of the parties she went to during this time when she was younger.”
“We used to go to a lot of parties during this season, too,” Teddy told him.