Total pages in book: 93
Estimated words: 87601 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 438(@200wpm)___ 350(@250wpm)___ 292(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 87601 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 438(@200wpm)___ 350(@250wpm)___ 292(@300wpm)
She winces and bares her teeth in something too pained to be a smile. “Wow. And you didn’t break from the guilt and tell him I was under the table?”
“No, but I was close,” I confess. “Would you have killed me?”
“No, but I’m glad you waited. He has enough going on right now. I think we should wait until after things settle with Gigi, at least a little.” She presses her lips together for a beat before she adds, “And I think I should be the one to tell him. I think it will be easier to digest coming from me. I can even make it clear that I seduced you.”
I arch a brow as I draw her closer. “Oh yeah?”
“Yeah. I’ll tell him that you tried to resist, but I was a virgin on a mission and practically leapt on you like a starving animal.”
I snort. “Yeah, that’ll go over well. I think the less said about virginity or anything else remotely sexual, the better.”
“I know.” She loops her arms around my neck. “I was kidding. Mostly. I do think I should be the one to break the news that we’re dating, but we can discuss that further at a later date.” Her lips turn down. “I’m going to miss you. When do I get to see you again?”
“Tonight?” I ask, my hands drifting down to squeeze her ass through her robe. “As soon as Adrian leaves, I’ll text you with the all clear?”
Sydney grins. “I think I need to sleep in my own bed tonight, but I love the enthusiasm.”
“Do you?” I ask in a softer voice. “I’m not coming on too strong?”
She shakes her head. “No. Am I?”
“Not a chance. I want as much of you as I can get while I’m in the city. I’m extending my trip indefinitely. Any night you want to get together this week, let me know. I have an early meeting in Brooklyn on Wednesday, so I’ll have to leave the apartment by six or so, but you have a key now. You can stay as late as you want and lock up on your way to the office.”
“I have a key to your place,” she says, sounding as delighted by that news as I feel. She sighs. “Life surprises you in good ways sometimes.”
“Which is good. Helps make up for the bad surprises.”
I kiss her and we sway inside, bound for the bedroom despite her insistence that she needs to go, and I forget all about “bad surprises” for a while.
But I really shouldn’t have.
Whenever my ex is within a two-hundred-mile radius, bad surprises are always right around the corner.
twenty-seven
SYDNEY
I don’t think I’ve ever been so sad to see a weekend end.
Not even back in Maine, when the girls and I spent an amazing weekend kayaking, having bonfires on the beach, and sleeping over in the lighthouse’s lamp room.
But not even the ultimate girls’ weekend can compare to Gideon.
Elaina would chock that up to the power of new peen and assure me the infatuation will fade in a month or two. But when I told Noelle how much I’m dreading being apart from Gideon, she just hugged me tight, whispering, “Isn’t love amazing?”
Love…
I don’t know if it’s love yet. Surely, love takes longer to develop than a few days. But who knows? I’ve never been in love before.
Maybe when you know, you just…know.
All I know for sure is that I’m daydreaming about Gideon’s touch, his kiss, the soft rumble of his voice in my ear as he tells me I’m his “good girl” all the way to work. I arrive in an agitated state that isn’t kosher for Monday morning at the office and grab an iced coffee from the coffee bar downstairs instead of my usual hot Americano.
Clearly, my inner sex fiend needs something to cool her off before I head into Dad’s office for our weekly, Monday morning battle strategy meeting.
On the way up to the forty-fifth floor, I make a mental list of all the things I’ll need to delegate if I’m going to take more of a role in the Bronx shelter project. Though that could be putting the cart before the horse. Dad hasn’t given me the green light to get more involved yet. He might decide my time is better spent going full bore on my corporate structure investigation.
But in any event, the mental list has the desired effect—it gets my mind off Gideon under the tablecloth and back on business, where it belongs.
For now, at least. Barring a work emergency, I’ll be up close and personal with Gideon’s fabulous hands and lips and brain and all his other parts later tonight. He texted me first thing, asking if I’d be able to meet him for dinner at six-thirty at his favorite steakhouse in the Village. I, of course, said yes.