Laughing with a combo of pure raw nerves and excitement, I nod.
He chucks my chin. “Have coffee with me before I go?”
“Yes.”
“I’m knotted up.” He twists his neck side to side as we walk out. “You really know how to tangle up a man in bed,” he says, patting my butt affectionately as we walk to the kitchen.
I inspect every inch of him leisurely as he makes coffee and—trying to be a good girlfriend—I reach out to massage his hard shoulders.
It doesn’t last long. Easing behind me instead, coffee in one hand, me in the other, he stares out at Chicago like an overlord surveying his land. I lay my head back on his shoulder and let him rock me slightly as we look at the city. The city, the world, the horizon. I sense he has most of that, but he wants more, everything we see out there, and what we can’t see.
Everything he thinks he can accomplish, he’s going to get.
When I go pour my coffee, I spot a crisp, white, posh-looking invitation on the kitchen island near one of his sets of car keys. It reads:
Malcolm Saint +1
I smile when I read the invitation to one of the city’s grandest galas. “Are we going?” I ask his back.
“We’re always going.” He brings his coffee cup to the sink, his eyebrows drawing together as he looks at me. “And that smile?”
“I was just thinking that . . . it’s nice.”
He kisses my temple. “Get a dress.”
“Saint, I have a dress.”
“Get one on me.”
He sets down his credit card. I leave it on the granite counter, knowing he’ll kick up a fuss when he sees that I didn’t take it. I’m humming as I put the invitation back in place.
I can’t wait to see where our relationship is going. People speculate on what I am. His girlfriend, his four-month girl, his lover, his fling, his obsession, his one sole error in judgment, his mistake. They can call me whatever they’d like, it doesn’t change anything.
I’m his plus one . . . and he’s my everything.
EPILOGUE:
OUR LIFE NOW
It’s a busy day at Face.
Face is my baby—brand new and still taking its first steps into publishing, both online and in print. I teased Malcolm about calling it that as a play on Interface, and when he chuckled in that amused way of his that tells me he kind of liked what I just said, I knew it was the perfect name.
Valentine, Sandy, and twelve other reporters are busy outside my office today.
It’s great. But it’s difficult to be in the same building as the guy I’m dating.
Sometimes I spot him leaving out the window, his hair and suit dark as the gleaming Rolls-Royce parked outside. Sometimes I watch him arrive from a business lunch, a conference, a board meeting at one of the multiple companies he advises—it’s hard to keep my Saint hormones from running wild.
Sometimes we accidentally meet in the elevator as I ride up to my floor . . . and he rides to his. He’s good at showing no emotion. But when our eyes lock, there’s that inevitable spark I see light his green eyes. Our companions move as though by instinct to let him get close to me. We don’t touch. At least, I don’t. But he sometimes stands so that our hands graze. Sometimes his thumb comes out for mischief, brushing the back of my finger—the tiniest bit. Other times, he laces our fingers for a heartbeat.
A most delicious, achingly sensual heartbeat.
And there was this one time when he hooked his pinky to mine and rode the entire way up to my floor standing there, tall, quiet, among the bustle of people, nobody but me knowing that this man—this man really loves me.
Sometimes I go up to his office or he comes down—and somehow we both know why we’re there. To talk, sometimes.
But sometimes to be quiet.
Superduper quiet as he kisses my mouth red, and red, and red, and simply coaxes me to promise him that I’ll come over to his place tonight.
At his place, we fuck all night long.
In mine, we fuck quietly so that Gina doesn’t hear us.
It’s perfect. I wouldn’t change a single thing.
Not of him, not of us.
I took the leap, and Malcolm caught me.
So we have this arrangement. During the week, we generally sleep at my place because I don’t want Gina to feel lonely. The weekend, we’re in his. This Thursday he has offered to drive me home, but he makes a five-minute stop at the bank. I stay answering some last emails on my phone and then peer curiously out the window when he comes out with one of the managers, who shakes his hand goodbye, then he climbs on board and asks Claude to take us to his building.
He’s holding a suspicious envelope in one hand as he settles into the seat across from mine and slowly gets rid of his tie and tucks it into his jacket pocket.
“This is so not the arrangement, mister,” I chide him, scowling.
He smirks. “Are you mad at me now?”
“So absolutely mad,” I exaggerate.
“I’ll make it up to you easy.” He leans forward and runs the pad of his thumb down my jawline. “I have a surprise.” He waves the manila folder in his hand in the air, and the butterflies respond.
“What is that?” I pry.
“Something.”
“It’s clearly something. But what?”
“Patience, grasshopper.” He leans back in the seat with this infuriating smirk, the very image of patience itself, and stretches his arm out behind him, a very self-satisfied look in his eye as he watches me squirm to find out his surprise.
We head to the top of the building. At the very top, there’s a pool exclusive to the penthouse. It’s an infinity pool, where the water seems to blend out into the twinkling lights of Chicago.
We’ve used this pool a couple of weekends, but this evening, the luxurious white chaises have been removed. They have been vacated to make room for one lone table at the center platform that crosses the pool. Connected, also, to the pool is another platform featuring the only lounge area that seems to have been left untouched.
The one Saint and I always sit in to enjoy the view.
The paths toward both the table and the lounge are littered with electric candles that glow quietly as we pass.
It’s so breathtaking—and so unexpected—that I spin around with wide eyes.
“So this is how you’re making it up to me?” I catch him watching me a little too closely, and I kiss his jaw and whisper, “I like it. Make me mad again.”
His hand engulfs mine, then he leads me forward to the lounge. “Dinner comes after the surprise.”