“Geez, are they passing out pamphlets about it orwhat?”
Luciano laughed. “So was it the best sex ornot?”
I thought of how Sebastian had brought me to the brink of orgasm, then flipped me over to get the job done. He’d looked me in the eye and hadn’t shied away, even when intimacy had overwhelmed the moment. “It was the most, I don’t know . . . connected,” I said. “It was special, and I have a feeling we only scratched thesurface.”
“If you want my advice, which you do, don’t write him off so easily. We can’t ignore that he apologized, which Neal never would’vedone.”
I picked at invisible lint on my skirt. “I thought you’d be proud of me for sticking up formyself.”
“I am, I just don’t want you to go the opposite direction and let your past with Neal scare you into being alone. Then it’s kind of like you’restillnot calling the shots, you know? Heis.”
I looked up, eyes wide. “That’s like what Sebastian said before he walked out of the breakroom. That by running away, I was letting my fear make my decisions forme.”
“He has apoint.”
I chewed my bottom lip. The fact that I’d been so tempted to forgive Sebastian in the breakroom had only scared me more. He could’ve walked when I’d pushed him away, but he’d stood where he was and given it right back tome.
He made sure I knew he wanted me in hislife.
And if I was honest, I wanted him inmine.
It was the simple truth, but now, things were even more complicated than they’d been that morning. “That’s not all,” I told Luciano. “Dionne offered me a newposition.”
He perked up. “Apromotion?”
“Yes. All the way toBoston.”
“What?” he screeched. “Why?”
I covered my ears with a light laugh. “These past couple months got me thinking about how I’m ready to take on new challenges, but where I am now, there’s not much room for me to grow. I told Dionne all that earlier tonight, and she wants me to go to Boston to open a newbranch.”
“Like, permanently?” He soundedworried.
I nodded. “But, Lu, lately I’ve been feeling like a change would be good. Maybe different scenery, maybe learning some newthings.”
“Don’t you know enough already?” If not for Botox, wrinkles would’ve formed between his eyebrows. “You can’t leave now. We finally became official NewYorkers.”
I wrinkled my nose. “When?”
“It happens automatically once you’ve been here long enough to not only map out but pee in every acceptable public bathroom between fourteenth andthirtieth.”
“We’ve done that?” Iasked.
“Probably.” He pouted. “Do you actually want this? Or could it be that something else ismissing?”
“I think I might want it,” I said and purposely didn’t ask about the “something else” he was referring to. “Besides everything I already mentioned,” I reasoned, “I’ll make more money and get more space for what I pay now. Plus, I’ll basically be my ownboss.”
Luciano narrowed his eyes. “I’m not convinced. Something stinks here, and it’s not that grandma perfume I warned you not tobuy.”
“Hey,” I said, sniffing my wrist. Damn him and his keen sense of smell. The commercial for the fragrance starred Aliana Balik, the model on Sebastian’s desktop and the one woman he’d never been able to score for the cover ofModern Man. It wasn’t that I wanted tobeher, but it wouldn’t hurt to at least smell likeher.
“This is all a little too convenient, Georgina. You were on the verge of starting something new and fabulous with a luscious Latinman—”
“I don’t see how that’srelevant—”
“And suddenly you have to leave?” He took a deep breath, his expression sobering. “Are you sure you’re not looking for ways to sabotage this relationship before itstarts?”
It wasn’t as ifI’dpicked the one place Sebastian would never return. Or had evenaskedto be promoted. “Yes, it would be easier to leave town than risk getting hurt again, but that’s not what I’m doing. Maybe I was wrong this morning, but does having feelings for Sebastian automatically mean I shouldn’t take thisopportunity?”
