Savannah obviously didn’t understand the assignment because she’s already gone off track.
The ballroom is buzzing with people, and the background jazz music is soft enough that it doesn’t drown out conversation. Expensive drinks flow, and the amount of money in this room gives no excuse not to contribute to the cause—a good one too, the food bank. My whiskey is on point, and the man from my corporate circles next to me is talking about a new restaurant, but it’s merely white noise. In this very second, all of those details are drowned out, because I’m trapped in a moment that I feared.
Savannah scans the room, and I’m lucky that it’s me that she’s searching for. Her dress? Well, that’s the part where she didn’t listen. While elegant, I don’t appreciate how the dark blue satin fabric drapes down her back, revealing the length of her spine, or the way it curves around her breasts, taunting the imagination. Her hair is half curled and falls softly around the shape of her face, with her dark red lips. I already notice a trust fund kid to my right giving her a second glance. The way she presents herself in this very moment should bereserved for only me. She broke the rule that she isn’t quite aware exists.
The moment she spots me, the corner of her mouth lifts faintly into a smile, and she walks my way. I knew I should have picked her up.
“Excuse me,” I tell the man next to me. I’m quick to grab a flute of champagne off the tray of a passing waiter before I meet Savannah halfway.
“Good evening.” She greets me brightly, as though she is oblivious to the fucking chaos she’s causing in my head.
“Evening.” I hand her the drink, and she seems appreciative. I clear my throat. “You look lovely.”
She raises her brows at me, amused. “Yikes. You had to force that out. Is something wrong?” She begins to assess herself.
I touch her bare arm to calm her. “No, it’s fine. It’s…” She waits patiently for me to finish the sentence as I formulate my words. “I can create a map of half of your body.”
She fights her smirk. “Well, be sure the compass direction is right,” she quips.
Lifting my nose in acknowledgment, I snap out of being the Julian that loses the plot around this woman. “Really, you look beautiful,” I calmy and genuinely compliment, and her response is an almost bashful smile.
“Thank you.”
“It’s refreshing to see a woman here not covered in jewelry that is ugly as hell but sends the message of their status.”
She giggles once. “Well, I’m not a huge jewelry person. I did have a charm necklace that came in a little blue box when I turned 18, but I unfortunately lost it. A mystery where.”
“That’s a shame. A particular charm?”
“A simple one. A key. Classic, I guess.”
She takes a sip of her champagne, and I give her an unimpressed look. “Uh-uh. How rude of you not to toast,” I tease her.
The way she rolls her eyes playfully is what I’ve become accustomed to. “What is it that we’re toasting? That you successfully persuaded me to come to this thing?”
I touch her glass with my own. “That will work.”
There is an odd moment of silence until she opens her mouth. “Julian, I’m here because you and I do this hot-and-cold thing. You’ve been a little frosty lately, so I’m hoping this will bring us back to a toned-down torment of each other phase.”
That is a spot-on explanation of us. “Playing psychologist today?” Her feigned glare causes me to press my lips and smile. “Agreed. Moving away from cold to hot in your words. So, are we doing warm ‘you need a sweater to cover your shoulders in that dress’ or sauna hot on the scale? I need to adjust my behavior tonight accordingly.”
Her eyes blaze at my comment, and she quickly takes another drink from her flute. My smile turns to a smirk as she searches the room, not uneasy, nor on a mission. When her eyes land back on me, she seems to ponder. “Nice tux. Not the one that I wasted my lunch hour on, but still, it’s nice.”
“Thank you. I have to be up to your standards.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Now, do we work the room, or have dinner, or hit the silent auction where you can pretend you want to buy lunch on a private yacht on Lake Michigan? What’s my assignment?”
I do appreciate her breezy attitude and humor. “Let’s stay away from the silent auction. Dinner is in a bit, and I guess this is the part where I need to be more social."
She looks at me peculiarly. “You’re excellent at schmoozing,but I’m not sure why I haven’t noticed before that you absolutely don’t want to be at these types of events.”
I tip my head to the side. “Solid observation.” These things are stuffy, often pretentious, and remind me of everything I hated growing up. However, these events are part of my life and keep my business network strong.
Savannah looks around my shoulder. “Over there. Oswalt Jones is here.”
A man who often visits the office due to his account with us. Saying hello is a must, and Savannah’s already on it. I turn slightly to check, and sure enough, the portly older man catches my eye, and we smile.
“Well spotted, Ms. May.”
