What a Woman Wants by Brenda Jackson Read Free Book Online

meet her father’s family as well as the godfather she hadn’t known existed. It was an incredible night filled with amazing people. Since then, she’d forged a close relationship with her paternal grandparents, uncle, and his family, as well as her godparents and the cousins she’d been introduced to. But nothing came close to the impact that Zach Wainwright had made on her life. She’d felt initially overwhelmed by the magnitude of love pouring forth from virtual strangers, but he had been right there for her, just a glance away, reassuring her that he was a friend she could count on. She had believed him. She’d trusted him, and eventually she fell in love with him.
    She began folding up her underthings, utterly contented. Zach was not a hard person to love. One of the brightest and most sought-after attorneys in D.C., he was the subject of speculation: Zachary Wainwright. Would he eventually follow in the footsteps of his father, the senator from Florida, and choose a political career? Adri-anna couldn’t help noticing that whenever anyone brought up the possibility, he was quick to deflect the rumor.
    It was also her opinion that Zach was extremely handsome, always the perfect gentleman, soft-spoken, caring, and private in certain ways. According to his sister Noelle, whom Adrianna had also gotten close to over the year, Zach had developed an extremely disciplined social life since his wife’s death five years ago, on September 11. She had been a flight attendant on the Washington-to-Los Angeles American Airlines Flight 77 that ill-fated day.
    Adrianna sighed deeply. No one knew about her inner feelings for Zach, and she planned to keep it that way. There was no telling what her newfound family would think if they were to discover her secret. And there was certainly no telling what Zach would think. He saw her as a close friend and nothing more. And she refused to do anything that would ruin that friendship, despite the voices she sometimes heard in her head:
Go ahead, take the first step. Let him know how you feel.
    But she couldn’t take that step. She had been rejected once by the family of a man she had intended to marry, and she couldn’t risk another loss like that, especially not with this family, a family she could finally claim as her own. So when it came to Zach, she had to keep a good head on her shoulders and never act reckless.
    Adrianna continued to fold up her clothes, taking slow, deep breaths, trying to rein her overjoyed heart. Zach would be coming to see her in a few weeks, and that alone made her extremely happy.
    Washington, D. C.
    Zach Wainwright turned away from the window when he heard his parents enter the room. He met their curious gazes. It was late afternoon, and he knew they were wondering why he had called that morning with such urgency in his voice, asking to speak with the both of them.
    He studied them before speaking. Noah and Leigh Wainwright were always such a striking couple, even after thirty-seven years of marriage. His tall, handsome, and dashing father, Florida’s senator Noah Wainwright, and his beautiful wife, Leigh Murdock Wainwright—lovely, vivacious, and the most gracious hostess in all of the District of Columbia and surrounding areas. Zach knew how very much in love they were. Over the years they had given him and Noelle strong role models for healthy relationships. He had always wanted to bring what his parents had in their marriage to his own, but he hadn’t been given the chance. He had lost Shaun after only a couple of years of marriage, and for the longest while, all his hope and dreams had died with her on board that plane. Only strong family support and love had gotten him through that time intact.
    “Zach? Are you all right?” The concern in his mother’s voice matched the worried look on her face.
    His father, on the other hand, just continued to stare at him with those intense, dark eyes of his, and not for the first time did Zach wonder if Noah