Andrew held up a hand to halt my babbling defense. “That's fine,” he said, turning to the waiter as he approached the table and shooting off our order in rapid French. “What?” Andrew asked self-consciously as the waiter walked off and he noticed me staring at him.
I shook my head. “That was impressive, is all. I feel like I should applaud.”
He laughed. “For most people, I guess their high school French classes never really come in handy, but Orinoco has acquired a couple French companies over the past couple years. So I've gotten a lot of practice recently. Of course, they all speak English, but it always impresses them when I can talk about the nuances of trade with them in their native language.”
“I can imagine,” I said.
“So, what about you?” Andrew asked, leaning back and studying me.
I frowned at him. “Clearly, I don't speak French or else I'd have been able to read the menu,” I said, causing him to chuckle again.
“Not what I meant, although I suppose I wasn't clear. What I was asking is, you know my entire life's story. All that I know about you is your name and that you're an insurance analyst for Albright.” He paused. “No, wait, let me guess about you, and you tell me what I've got right and what I've got wrong. You're a numbers person. You're not really into languages. You're probably a bit of an introvert, and the last time you were on a date was a while ago.”
“Hey!” I protested, even though it was true.
Andrew looked amused and continued. “You're probably really close with your parents, and you don't plan on living here in the city for the rest of your life, but you need a job because you just graduated college not too long ago, and you need to pay off your student loans.”
I laughed. “Wrong on all of that,” I said. “Not the part about being close to my parents, I guess. Just my mom, though. My dad isn't in the picture. And I did graduate college not that long ago. But I grew up here in the city, and I got scholarships for most of my college tuition. My mom's an artist, so it's not like she was able to contribute all that much, and my school recognized that.”
“Your mother is an artist?” Andrew asked, sounding truly interested, for the first time that night. “She must have been upset to hear that you were going to study whatever numbers stuff you studied in order to become an insurance analyst.”
“Statistics,” I said. “That's what I studied.” I shrugged. “I never really knew what I wanted to do. I've dabbled in a lot of different types of art, but I think the statistics stuff is really interesting, too, and I figured it would make a good fallback plan if the art stuff never panned out for me.”
“That is smart,” Andrew agreed, nodding sagely. “I was never all that interested in art, to be honest, but I've taken more of an interest in it in recent years.” He smiled as the waiter poured us each a glass of wine. “Art and wine, my two biggest hobbies at the moment.”
I snorted. “Purely because they show off your billionaire status?”
He looked taken aback by that. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, are you actually interested in art and wine, or are you just interested in showing off your wealth?”
Andrew was silent for a moment, seeming to consider this. “Does it matter?” he finally asked. “Even if I'm faking it, I'm still supporting culture. I contribute funds towards the arts, and I promote sophistication and class. Isn't that a good thing, regardless of what my motives are?”
“Maybe,” I agreed, mulling it over as well. “What kinds of art are you interested in, anyway?”
“At the moment, black and white photography,” Andrew said. “There's a really interesting gallery that just opened on Thirteenth Street, Téchni. It's a phonetic spelling of the Greek word for art. Anyway, the gallery is really cool. It's all these black and white film photographs that have had various distortions applied to them, things like light leaks, but also some that have had their corners burnt or holes cut in them or things like that. I could spend hours there.”
“I'll have to check it out,” I said, making a mental note.
“If I'd known you were interested in art, we could have gone out on Sunday evening instead, to the Member Nights at the Seattle Art Museum.”
I raised an eyebrow at him. “We could still do that,” I pointed out.
Andrew coughed lightly. “Lexi, this is fun, and you're a nice enough girl, but let's just see where the evening takes us, all right?”
“Oh, yeah,” I said, feeling stupid for having even suggested it.
He probably wasn't even considering going on a second date with me. I doubted he was really the type of guy to date women. He was probably just hoping to end up in bed with me by the end of the night. And even though that wasn't really the type of girl that I was, at the same time, I couldn't deny that I was having fun.
“So, what do you do when you're not crunching numbers and looking at art?” Andrew asked.
I shrugged. “I guess just the usual,” I said. “I studied at UW, so I have a lot of friends who still live in the area, and we hang out regularly. And to be honest, even though I grew up here, I have a soft spot for the kitschiness of Pike's Place. I do a lot of hiking in the summer, too.”
“You and I have a lot in common, it sounds like,” Andrew said, smiling over at me. Our food arrived just then, and Andrew rubbed his hands together, looking excited. “This is one thing that I forgot to mention before,” he said. “My two main interests are art and wine, but I'm also a pretty avid foodie. Looks like w
e're in for a real treat, too.”
We continued to chat as we sampled the incredible food, and by the time we got to dessert, the conversation was easy between us. So, when Andrew asked me back to his place, just like I'd suspected he would, I found myself agreeing.