Total pages in book: 136
Estimated words: 135847 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 679(@200wpm)___ 543(@250wpm)___ 453(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 135847 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 679(@200wpm)___ 543(@250wpm)___ 453(@300wpm)
He grinned at her.
She carried on, “But I get the impression there are some underlying issues you haven’t dealt with.”
At that, he laughed, loud and long. So much, some of the patrons turned to look.
If they recognized him or Elsa, they didn’t show it. This was off the beaten track. Not a destination for tourists. They were around true locals, who couldn’t give that first fuck the richest man in the world and his gorgeous, social-media-famous date were in their midst.
Yes, New York had its advantages.
“Yeah, sweetheart,” he confirmed when he got his shit together. “There are issues I haven’t dealt with.”
He was surprised she had a dazzled look on her face that she didn’t try to hide as she said, “Okay.”
“Eat, while I play amateur psychologist,” he ordered.
“Fantastic,” she muttered, but he could tell she was joking.
“Your mother is jealous as fuck of you,” he told her.
She had onion bhaji in her mouth, so she chewed and swallowed before she said, “Ah, the don’t feel bad someone is treating you like shit, they’re just jealous excuse.”
He nodded. “In this instance, I think it’s true. You look like her. You’re of her. But you’re already more successful than she’s ever been, or at least in her estimation. Sadly, she doesn’t see maintaining a decades-long marriage to a good-looking, solid guy and creating three beautiful children as the accomplishments they are. I sense you’ve always been driven, even as a child, and she always knew there was a possibility you’d outshine her. And you do.”
“It’s annoying that this diagnosis both holds merit and is complimentary so I can’t refute it.”
He smiled at her and went after his own onion bhaji.
“And your take on Oskar and Emilie?” she prompted.
“Emilie is spoiled and was never allowed to grow up,” Hale said. “She also suffers from pretty-girl syndrome, erroneously operating under the assumption her good looks will get her everything she wants. This might be the case, at her age. But she’s going to run into some ugly truths when society deems her unworthy after she hits thirty-five. And she isn’t going to be prepared to face those, since she hasn’t put any effort into being more than what genetics gave her at birth.”
“Agreed,” Elsa replied.
“But I’ll never in my life understand a man like Oskar. He’s a chauvinist and a bigot. He obviously didn’t get that from his dad, and he’s educated, so he has no excuse not to be more enlightened. For his part, I think he has much deeper issues he’s grappling with that my amateur analysis can’t decipher.”
“Pity,” she said.
“Or maybe some men are just born assholes,” Hale went on.
That made Elsa laugh, genuinely, no-holds-barred, and Hale found the dichotomy of it sounding both cultured and abandoned fascinating.
When she sobered, she really sobered, because it was heartfelt when she said, “Thank you, Hale, for taking my back tonight. I’ve never had anyone but Dad do that, and none of them respect him, so it never really had an effect. I know I wasn’t appreciative of your offer to do it, but please know now how much I appreciate you being with me tonight.”
“My pleasure, sweetheart.”
She dipped her gaze as she took a sip of her wine, and the gesture was conspicuously shy.
It was also so not her, but he liked it so much, he felt it in his chest and his dick.
“Don’t eat too much,” she told him, putting her wine back on the table. “There’s a bakery a block up that has the best lobster tails you’ll ever eat, and they stay open until two in the morning, putting out fresh all day.”
Another advantage of New York.
“That’s a plan,” he agreed.
She smiled at him, and there was something shy about that too.
And it was confirmed.
He liked that ambitious, together, focused Elsa Cohen got shy around guys she was attracted to.
He liked it a fuckuva lot.
CHAPTER 7
ALL ELSA COHEN ALL THE TIME
Elsa
My alarm sounded, my eyes opened, I turned and stared at it, confused for a moment because I was groggier than normal, and the numbers didn’t make sense.
And then I remembered my studio was in Manhattan now, so I was waking up an hour earlier. That was why the clock said it was 4:30, not 5:30.
I needed to get up.
I did not get up.
It was Wednesday after my Saturday night with Hale.
He was leaving town today, I knew, since he told me after I sent him the final cut of our interview yesterday, and he’d approved it.
But I hadn’t seen him since he walked me up to my apartment after he drove us to Pebble Beach, where we sat in the cold, ate our lobster tails and talked until after midnight.
At the time, I wasn’t paying attention. I was in a haze of all the wonder that was him.
I was in the haze of finding myself in the best date I’d ever had in my life.