“Please.” I laugh. “I spend my evenings extracting microscopic details from a tight-lipped twelve-year-old. If I wanted to break you, I could.”
He huffs a low laugh. His hands move over the steering wheel in a slow, controlled rhythm, forearms flexing under the cuff of his jacket. He looks unfairly good while driving. Jaw shadowed, mouth set in that calm, confident line he wears so well. A man who knows where he’s going. A man who could toss me over his shoulder and take me with him without breaking a sweat.
“I think you’ll like this place better,” he says. “I know I do.”
“Really?”
“Mm-hmm.” He switches lanes with a smooth, practiced ease. “Less pretentious. More affordable. And much less crowded.”
I picture us pulling into the mall parking lot. Part of me actually hopes for it. I could destroy a food-court hot dog and fries right now.
But we keep going. Past the familiar districts. Into an area I don’t recognize, though everything still looks very…expensive.
Arthur parks and we step out into the cold again. The air bites at my skin and steals my breath. He falls into step beside me, close enough that the heat rolling off him feels like a small mercy. He leads me toward an upscale-looking building and there goes my dream of a hot dog.
A man in a perfectly pressed uniform appears out of thin air and opens the door for us.
“Good evening, Mr. Stetson.” He nods politely at me. “Ma’am.”
Ma’am.I’m a thirty-two-year-old woman with a hole in her pantyhose and shoes that clearly hate me. But sure. Ma’am.
“Hi,” I chirp as Arthur guides me through the glossy marble lobby and toward the elevator. My mind is still snagged on the doorman’s greeting.
The doorman knows his name?
“How often do you eat here?” I ask as the elevator doors slide shut.
Arthur glances down at me, one corner of his mouth lifting. “Most days.”
We step into the gleaming elevator and Arthur presses the top button. Nothing happens at first, but then he lifts his phone and holds it near a small black sensor. The elevator gives a soft beep and begins its smooth, silent ascent.
A penthouse restaurant that requires a pass key? So much for being less pretentious.
The enclosed space folds around us. Warm light. Polished steel. The faint scent of him, all clean cedar and something darker underneath. That low hum of tension flickers between us again. I peek up at him through my bangs. God, he is beautiful in that quiet, break your heart and never apologize for it way. The kind of beautiful that belongs to people who have survived things and learned how to stand taller because of them.
He must sense my stare. His gaze finds mine and holds. And holds. And holds, until the need to climb him like a sycamore tree pulses through me in a hot, ridiculous wave. I remind myself that when the elevator doors open, there will be people. Witnesses. And I should not be clinging to him like a koala when that moment arrives.
The corner of his mouth lifts. Barely. As if he can hear every chaotic thought tumbling through my head.
Mercifully, the doors slide open.
I brace myself for a polished host or a velvet rope or at least a podium. Instead, Arthur steps into a quiet foyer. Plush dark carpet underfoot. A tall window framing the city in shimmering blues and silvers. No restaurant in sight.
The only light spills from the window, soft enough that everything feels dreamlike.
“Lights.” His voice is low and even.
Soft, warm illumination rises overhead. Not bright. Just enough to outline the edges of the space with a golden glow. I follow him farther inside, hesitant. Like I’m half expecting people to jump out and scream “surprise!”
Something clicks when he stops near a bench and begins removing his shoes. He places one large hand on the wall for balance and slips one shoe off with the other foot, then repeats the motion.
Mypulse skips. “Is this…do you live here?”
He smirks, and the expression should be illegal on a face like his. “Last time I checked.”
I look around, finally understanding what I am standing in. Not a restaurant. Not a hotel. A condo. A massive, impossibly expensive penthouse condo. Floor-to-ceiling windows stretch across the far wall, offering a panorama of the city. The living room is wide and open with sleek furniture in shades of charcoal and cream. A long fireplace made of black stone flickers to life along one wall. The kitchen, visible just beyond, is all stainless steel and white marble with backlit shelves that look like they belong in a design magazine.
Holy shit.
