“And then I ran into you.”
Phoenix leaned closer, his forearm nudging away his drink. His intensity tempted her to look away. His magnetic power won.
“Exactly,” he said. “And here’s the thing. I’ve been thinking about us. I get how it looks bad, and I’m not denying my responsibility or my actions. But… do you believe in destiny?”
“Destiny? Like fate?”
“Yeah.”
Orchid searched her mind for a moment. “When my parents died, people talked about God’s destiny, and they said it was their time. Even then, I didn’t buy it.”
Phoenix nodded. “Sometimes there are senseless accidents. And I’m sorry about that.” His palm turned like he wanted to reach for her hand.
“I believe in free will,” she said.
“Me, too. I don’t think every minute of our lives is preordained. It’s just that, do you ever wonder, maybe some people were meant to meet?”
She filled her lungs with air, and then said, “Sometimes I tell myself that I picked my parents in another lifetime—even knowing how little time I’d have with them.”
When he spoke, his voice was deeper. “I haven’t felt it often, but I wonder if sometimes the people we meet… it’s kismet.”
She nodded. “I guess anything’s possible.”
“Think about it: my dad kicked off my search for you, but then actually you found me when you came to the bathroom. That was your doing. Still: destiny.”
She’d wondered the same thing. Now, this path of thinking was leaving her vulnerable. She had more questions. “Destiny? But you could’ve left well enough alone after that.”
“Except you wanted to go to China, and you wanted to learn Mandarin, and I could actually help with that.”
“I see that, but how’d you end up at my office?”
“The same time I hired the PI, I saw where you worked. So, I called Joan, because we’d worked together in another job. She checked in with me a few weeks later and asked me to present my ideas. I hoped you’d be there, and—”
“You’re not going to believe this,” she said, interrupting him, “I went to Joan with the idea to have agencies come pitch, because I was looking to work on a campaign. And she said she’d call some people she knew.”
“She must’ve called me because you asked. So, it looks like half of it was luck.”
“Or destiny,” she said, her insides warming with the idea.
“Yes. Like, you staying after the presentation and walking me to the elevator.”
Orchid measured the candor in his face as she sipped her drink. “I can’t help but think it must’ve affected how you saw me, because of your dad.”
Phoenix stared down into his cup, then lifted his eyes to meet hers. “I don’t know. But couldn’t I ask you the same thing? How much of your view of me is informed by my being able to help you? Could it be misplaced gratitude?”
She considered this. From his view, she could be another hanger-on, using him for his brains and connections, like his fellow classmates had in high school. “Or worse,” she said, her perspective shifting. “It could even look like selfishness. Taking advantage of.”
Phoenix nodded once, a terse conservation of motion. “Not to take away from my culpability in not telling you, but you see how things can look bad… even when intentions are good?”
She nodded, and could feel her defenses melting.
“My dad set things in motion, that’s true. But what I did afterwards was my choice. Please believe me,” he said.
Again, she was struck by the sincerity in his voice.
She looked at his hand, and the freckle that winked from under his left shirt cuff. He had abandoned a client pitch to take her call, and then he’d come directly from the airport to see her. “I believe you,” she said.
His shoulders relaxed, and a low breath left him. “Thank you.”
