Chapter 16
SOPHIE
Finn had texted me the address of a little hole-in-the-wall place that supposedly had an amazing Chinese buffet.
I loved Chinese and I loved a buffet, and by the time I walked into the restaurant, I was ready to devour everything under the heat lamps.
The place was really little, with two small plastic-covered chairs by the cash register, clearly meant for people waiting on a pick-up order.
One of those chairs was where I found Finn, his too tall body contorted in a way his legs didn’t stick into the walkway.
He was dressed—I imagined—for work, with charcoal gray slacks that hugged the muscles of his legs and a white button-up, cuffs rolled a couple of times and resting neatly against his forearms. No tie.
He held his cell phone, frowning down at the screen until the door swung closed behind me and sucked the air out of the lobby.
When he saw me, his mouth split into a wide, if not nervous, smile, and he stood.
God, how had I already forgotten how tall he was?
“Hey,” he greeted me with an outstretched arm. I hugged him back, smiling against his chest when he brushed a kiss across the top of my hair. “You’re even prettier than I remember.”
“Flattery will get you everywhere,” I teased, stepping back to look up at him, my fingers still settled against the small of his back. “You’re taller than I remember.”
“I make my best impressions on my back.”
I chuckled, pinching his hip before pulling away from the embrace. “Don’t sell yourself short. You make quite an impression on your knees too.”
“Two for lunch?” a hostess interrupted, and with good timing if the flush on Finn’s cheeks was any indication.
“Buffet,” he said.
“Anywhere you like.”
Finn led me to a small table against the wall. It, and the chairs, were wrapped in the same plastic as the seats in the front. I hung my purse over the back of one and turned my attention toward the buffet.
“What’s good here?” I asked.
“All of it.”
He ushered me toward the plates, we each picked one, and I followed Finn down the buffet line, listening to him rattle on about what entrees and sides he liked the most, which were good but not reliable, and which he’d tried once and sworn off forever.
We ended up back at the table with overflowing plates, and I dug in before Finn had even managed to get his chopsticks out of the wrapper.
He eyed me with amusement, waiting until I chewed and swallowed at least three bites of food before saying, “You good?”
I laughed and wiped some sauce off my lips. “I didn’t have breakfast.”
“No? Daniel seems like the kind of man to not send you out into the world hungry.”
“What gives you that idea?”
Finn was right about Daniel, but I was curious what had fed his perception. We’d spent limited time together, most of it focused on physical things and not the caretaking aspect of my relationship with Daniel.
“The way he watches you, for one. But also just…from my own experience with him. He…he’s very generous.”
My lips pulled into a smile that I quickly smothered with a stir-fried green bean. Finn watched me eat, waited like he knew I had something to say.
“He does like to be needed.”
“That’s one way of looking at it.” Finn moved some chicken around his plate. “It’s probably bad form to take you on a date and talk about him the whole time.”
“He’s a very important part of my life, and I think it would be kind of silly if we didn’t talk about him,” I said.
“I’m having dinner with him tomorrow night,” Finn blurted, and my heart swelled, knowing the two of them had managed to connect after all.
I opened my mouth to tell Finn that Daniel had it on his calendar to call, but I bit it back before the words came out. That wasn’t something for me to share, and damn if this new dynamic wasn’t going to be complicated to maneuver.
“Is that okay?” Finn asked.
“I mean, that’s between you and him, isn’t it?”
He picked up a straw from the table and fidgeted with the wrapper before tearing it off and rolling it into a ball. He dropped the straw into his drink and frowned at it like it had offended him.
“Right, yes. I just mean—”
“It’s between you and him,” I reminded. “Just like this is between you and me. I’m sure there will be things between the three of us, but it doesn’t need to be everything. Unless we want it to be.”
Finn’s brow knit together and he nodded, stare locked onto a pile of chow mein at the top of his plate. I reached over and flicked the top of his straw. He looked at the straw, then at me.
“Nothing we need to figure out right now,” I promised.
That earned a wary smile, which I committed to memory.
“One last question and then we can move on.” He cleared his throat and looked like he wanted to die. “When are you two getting married?”
I shrugged. “We haven’t set a date yet.”
“Soon?”
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “We have a cake tasting after work today, and we’re supposed to talk about it. Daniel would marry me tonight if I told him that’s what I wanted, but I think it should be more special than that.”
Finn nodded his agreement.
“Before the end of the year.”
It was April.
“Why?” I asked. “Are you preemptively convincing yourself that once Daniel and I get married, we won’t want to date you anymore? Or that we won’t want whatever this is?”
He clenched his jaw and exhaled a long breath. It was confirmation enough, even without a verbal agreement.
“Nothing between me and Daniel is going to change after we’re married,” I promised, and I knew it to be true. “At least, nothing besides paying a little less on our taxes.”
Finn laughed at that, and some of the tension broke.
“If you go into this expecting it to fail, though, maybe you shouldn’t go into it at all,” I suggested gently, reaching across the table to cover his hand with mine to soften the blow.
I very much wanted to explore whatever this interest between me and Finn was, but I didn’t want to let myself get attached to someone if he was always going to have one foot out the door.
The partners I’d taken when Daniel and I were long distance had mostly been sexual in nature, not emotional.
There had obviously been some people where things ended up more serious or more involved, but nothing that had ever felt lasting.
I hadn’t wanted anyone for my heart besides Daniel, but from the first time I saw Finn in the paint store…
“It’s not that.” He turned his hand so our palms touched. “Just a little wounded still. I’m sure Daniel told you.”
“He hasn’t told me anything.”
That gave Finn pause, his stare drifting to something behind me before making its way back to my face. “We don’t…we don’t talk about you. At least, not like that.”
“Oh.” He pulled his hand back and resumed eating. He’d grabbed at least as much food as me, and neither of us had even started to put a dent into our plates.
The mood between us was tentative but interested, and those were both things I could work with.
I didn’t know Finn’s history with his last relationship, at least not beyond the basics that he’d shared, but the man was a golden retriever who wore his heart on his sleeve.
He just wanted to be seen and to be loved.
“So, you’ve said you have a handful of brothers. What’s that like?”
Finn made a dismissive sound. “They’re not brothers in the way you’d expect. We weren’t raised together. I mean, kind of we were. It’s messy and complicated and none of us have good parents. The day our dad dies, I’m sure we’ll all have a party over the whole thing.”
“Bottle of champagne in the fridge waiting to go?”
He nodded. “I learned about the kind of love I wanted because it was the opposite of what I was given growing up. I get attached sometimes because of it. Needy.”
What a gift, I thought, to be needed by a man like Finn Covington.
“Well, sounds like you need someone who can keep up,” I said. “Who can provide?”
Finn cracked his neck and gave me a long look from his side of the table. “And can you provide?” he asked me simply.
The unspoken part of his question was louder than the words.
You’re about to be married, Sophie. Can you give me the attention I want? The attention I deserve? Or will you get tired of it after the novelty of a third wears off?
The worry was etched across his face, deep in the lines around the corners of his eyes. I wished we were anywhere besides a public place because the need to take this man’s face into my hands and kiss him until he relaxed was a very real thing, threatening to consume me entirely.
“I can provide,” I whispered, worrying my tongue across my lower lip. “But I’m not a mind reader.”
“Fair.” He shoved his hair back from his face, forearm muscle flexing in a very indecent way.
God, I was such a slut for a good forearm. For a good man.
“So, what do you need right now?”
“Nothing I can say out loud,” he muttered.
I reached into my purse and pulled out my cell phone, set it on the table, face up. “Text it.”
Finn chuckled, rolling his eyes at me, but he reached into his pocket and dug out his phone.
He made a show of clearing his throat, adjusting himself like he was about to give a presentation at work.
His fingers flew across the keyboard and then he pressed send.
I held his stare until my phone vibrated on the table, only looking away to pick it up to read the message he’d sent me.
Finn
I need to taste you again. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about your cunt since Saturday morning when you let me bury myself between your legs.
I want to make you come and then I want to bend you over the back of my couch and fuck you until you come again.
I want you shaking and boneless and as much as I want to do that just you and me, I also want Daniel there too.
I want your fiancé to watch me take you apart, and if it makes him jealous, I want him to take that out on me after I’m through with you. I want it to be messy, Soph.
My tongue stuck to the roof of my mouth and another text message came through immediately after. I hadn’t even seen him pick up his phone again.
I also want to know your favorite color. Favorite movie. Favorite late-night snack.
If this was needy, let the man need.
“Marigold,” I rasped, clearing my throat and setting my phone back down on the table. “The Dreamers. Daniel’s nachos.”
Finn’s gaze danced across my face, the corner of his mouth twitching into the slightest hint of a relaxed smile.
“Yours?”
“Navy blue,” he answered. “Eurotrip. Also Daniel’s nachos.”
My cheeks burned. How was it so easy for this man, this practical stranger, to undo me so easily.
With Daniel, I’d never felt out of control.
There’d never been any doubt in my mind about which one of us had the upper hand.
It had always been me, and neither of us made any secret of that.
It was what we both wanted, what we needed, what worked.
And then Finn showed up with his little sad boy eyes and his quick tongue, and there I was, questioning everything.
Well, not everything.
I still loved Daniel, still wanted to marry him, still wanted to spend the rest of my life with him. But Finn.
Finn.
“Did the other message go through?” he asked with a sly grin, glancing up at me from the fan of his lashes before popping a slice of Mongolian Beef into his mouth. He chewed, swallowed. “Did you need me to send it again?”
“I got it.”
“And?”
I took a drink of my soda, hoping it would be enough to clear the desert out of my mouth. It was a shame we both had to go back to work, a shame we had lives that required anything other than whatever Finn wanted from me.
“And I think maybe we should talk about what our plans for the weekend are.”