“What?”
“I literally said that exact sentence to my sister a few weeks ago.”
He smirks, his eyes consuming me, making my skin tingle with the absolute focus he aims at me.
“I guess great minds really do think alike. You’re going to be successful, Fiona. I can tell that just by looking at you.”
“How?” I whisper.
I feel as if a part of my mind has detached and is constantly looking for the punchline. I want to take a good look around the balcony, see if there are any cameras lurking, waiting to capture this moment, and broadcast it to millions of laughing viewers.
What would the show be called?
Naïve Virgin Fooled by the Billionaire?
No, that’s too wordy.
“Your passion,” he growls into the noisiness of my thoughts. “No matter what somebody does in life, no matter how talented they are, it doesn’t mean a damn thing without passion.”
“Are you passionate about real estate?” I murmur.
“I’m passionate about beauty,” he says.
My heart pounds in my chest, the sensations swirling through me, touching every part of me. I feel my toes curling as all the tension bubbling up inside of me becomes almost too much to handle.
I want to scream just to relieve some of it.
“Your buildings are very beautiful,” I say, my mouth dry, and yet my hands are too shaky to reach for my glass.
“I grew up in a trailer park,” he says. “We never had enough money. My family … They were broken in many ways. I never knew my mother or my father. They died shortly after I was born. But my uncle, he was a real son of a bitch. He was a cruel bastard and he—He did things, Fiona. Not to me, but to people I cared about.
“I saw a lot of horrible shit growing up. I always promised myself that I’d grow up and make beauty instead, and that’s what I try to do in my work. I’m not an architect. I tried to be. But I didn’t have the eye for it. What I do know how to do is make deals, twist people to my will, force people to play fair even if that means not always playing fair myself.”
I stare, captivated by this speech.
Something in the quivering quality of his words – the way his eyes cast away dreamily into the past – tell me he rarely talks about this.
His eyes focus and he smirks, gesturing with his steak knife.
“That was incredibly depressing,” he chuckles.
There’s a husky quality to his voice I can’t help but want to hear again, and again.
Forever.
“No,” I say quickly. “Thank you for sharing that, Forrest. It means a lot.”
“It’s not exactly the sort of thing you bring up on a first date,” he smirks.
I flinch at the word date, but he’s not looking at me anymore.
He stares down at his food as he cuts it, leaving me to wonder if I imagined it if I wished the word date into existence.
“This food is really delicious,” I murmur.
“Yeah,” he agrees.
I study him for a few more moments, wondering what’s changed. It’s like he’s suddenly put up a wall around himself.
Does he feel self-conscious because he talked to me about his family, about his perspective on life?
I want to tell him he shouldn’t be.
I want to scream, You silly man. We’re going to be together forever. Of course, I need to know every little thing about you.
But that would make me insane.
He’s probably annoyed that he shared something so intimate with a complete stranger, a dorky wannabe writer who could never satisfy his needs.
I need to stop torturing myself.
Chapter Four
Forrest
I lie in one of the spare bedrooms – I insisted that Fiona take the master – and stare up at the ceiling. I’ve got the curtains and the window open, causing the light to dance across the chandelier and the ceiling decorations.
I didn’t plan on sharing all that stuff about the trailer park with Fiona.
It came out before I could give it any thought before I could even decide the right way to frame it.
In the business world, I never allow myself to slip up like that.
My tactician’s mind is constantly whirring, searching for fresh patterns of attack and ways to defend against counterattacks.
Fiona did something to me, melted my defenses in a way nobody ever has before.
I glance at the clock, the hands just about visible in the low light.
It’s two o’clock in the morning, and sleep feels a very long way off.
I can’t stop thinking about the way her eyes lit up when we were speaking about her joy for writing, the cuteness of her smile when we bantered, the light budding up inside of her until I could feel the heat of her.
My balls ache when I remember the way her breasts heaved when she laughed, the round, full glory of them begging to be palmed.