Total pages in book: 130
Estimated words: 123579 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 618(@200wpm)___ 494(@250wpm)___ 412(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 123579 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 618(@200wpm)___ 494(@250wpm)___ 412(@300wpm)
I inch back into my seat with a grin, digging into my own food.
“It was nothing. Just steak and a salad.”
Her moan of pleasure sends my blood pressure through the roof and has me wondering if she’ll moan for me like that when the time comes.
“Artichokes.” She closes her eyes, relishing the forkful of her salad. “My favorite.”
She’s not the only one who remembers details. Point one for Bishop.
“What made you decide to cook dinner for me at home for our first…date?”
I wanted you all to myself.
“I thought we gave New York enough of a show this morning.”
I expected her to grin, to laugh about it, but she puts her fork down, wipes her mouth at the corners, and looks at me directly.
“I want to apologize again for the things I said.” She studies her hands in her lap. “I just…I’m not the kind of woman you’d usually date, and I’m not sure what you want from me. Guess I overreacted.”
“How would you know what kind of woman I usually date?” I set my own knife and fork down.
“Maybe I don’t.” A small smile teases her full lips. “I just assumed.”
“Well, tonight is about us getting to know each other so we don’t have to assume anymore.” I give her a straight look, no smile, but not hard. “You won’t ever have to wonder what I want, Sofie. I don’t play games. I told you I want to get to know you, and that’s what it is.”
Her eyes probe mine for a few more seconds, trying to discern the validity of my statement. She finally picks up her fork and resumes eating, gobbling up the artichoke salad without another word.
“I’m sorry.” She laughs, covering her mouth with one hand. “I’m so greedy, but I skipped lunch today by mistake, and I love artichokes.”
She narrows her eyes.
“But you know that, don’t you?”
I grin, going at my steak without acknowledging her comment.
“You know a lot of things,” Sofie continues, taking a sip of the red I pulled from my sister’s cellar. “How’d you get my private number, for instance?”
“Oh, that.” I lean back, sipping my wine. “I can be very resourceful.”
“Now that I don’t doubt.”
Her husky laugh does things to me. Caresses my ears. Drifts up her throat and over my skin like the pads of her fingers might—lightly. Most of all it just makes me want to laugh, too.
“And my barre class?” She frowns even while a smile plays around her mouth. “How are you feeling, by the way? Jalene’s class is no joke.”
“I’m sore in some unusual places,” I admit, capturing her eyes over the rim of her wine glass. “But it was worth it.”
She blinks a few times before setting her wineglass down.
“We’ll see if you still think that by the end of the evening.” She leans forward, propping her elbows on the table and resting her chin on folded hands. “Now that you have me, what exactly do you want to know?”
I’m like a kid in a candy store, not sure where to start, so I figure I’ll start at the beginning. Or close to it.
“What did you want to be when you grew up?”
I find that this question sometimes tells me a lot. Not what people say, but how far from it they landed in adulthood. It helps me get to their dreams and the things that drive them.
“You want the honest answer?” Her brows are all the way up, eyes serious.
“I want nothing but honest answers.”
“When I grew up I wanted to be Walsh Bennett’s wife.” Her lips lift at one corner, bitter on one side, sweet on the other. “That’s what I thought I was supposed to be almost from the beginning.”
“I knew you two dated briefly,” I say with a frown, “but I didn’t know it was that serious.”
And I don’t like it. It’s unreasonable how much I resent that she had deep feelings for Walsh. She told me to my face she was fucking Rip, and it didn’t feel like this. Maybe because I know Walsh could handle her, and Rip never could.
“My mother raised me to believe that Walsh would be king and I would be his queen, and we would rule Bennett Enterprises and as much of the world as we could acquire.” Sofie shakes her head. “I accepted that as my path, and decided I would love Walsh till the day I died.”
Her bitter laugh disrupts the quiet of the house.
“Except he fell in love with someone else.” Sofie shrugs her slim shoulders. “But even before Kerris, it wasn’t me. Not really. He’d always been in other relationships, and so had I. I thought we’d sow our wild oats and then settle down together. Only he’s settled down, and I’m still sowing.”
“Should I worry that you’re still in love with a married man?”