Chapter 4
four
CALLUM
The Riverside elevations had been sitting on my desk for forty-five minutes. I'd reviewed exactly none of them.
Instead, my brain kept looping back to two days ago. To my office. To Willow's mouth against mine in what was supposed to be a quick, clinical practice kiss—the contact two adults could share without it meaning anything.
Except her lips had been soft. Warm. She'd tasted faintly of the vanilla syrup she dumped into her coffee, and when she'd leaned into me, I'd forgotten every rational thought I'd ever had.
I stared at the elevation drawing without seeing it.
A practice kiss. That's all it was. A necessary rehearsal to ensure we'd be convincing at Friday's gala. Nothing more.
So why had I replayed it approximately forty-seven times in the past forty-eight hours?
Real smooth, Hayes. You're forty years old. You've been married and divorced. You've closed deals worth millions. And here you are, mooning over a twenty-three-year-old barista who agreed to a business arrangement.
I forced my attention back to the plans. The roofline needed adjustment. The western exposure would create heating issues without proper shading. Richard Ashford would have questions about the sustainability features, and I needed to—
Her fingers in my hair. The way she'd risen on her toes to reach me. How her body had fit against mine as if we'd done this a thousand times.
I shoved the drawings aside.
This was a problem.
A knock at my door preceded Graham's entrance. He carried two cups of coffee and wore that particular look that meant he was about to say things I didn't want to hear.
"Got a minute?"
“Only that. What’s up?”
"You've been staring at that same drawing since I walked past an hour ago." He set one coffee on my desk and dropped into the chair across from me. "Your pen hasn't moved. Your computer's in sleep mode. What’s going on? Everything okay?”
I picked up the coffee. Took a sip. Said nothing.
Graham waited. The man had the patience of a Buddhist monk when he wanted answers—one of the qualities that made him an excellent business partner and an annoying friend.
“I’m fine. Just reviewing the Riverside proposal," I said.
"Uh-huh. Sure, I buy that.” He leaned back in his chair. “Let’s just cut to the chase. So. Willow Monroe. The coffee shop woman you've been not-so-subtly obsessed with for a year and now…suddenly you’re dating?”
“What are you talking about? I haven't been obsessed."
"You rearranged your entire morning schedule to hit that specific coffee shop at that specific time.
You complain about her foam art while simultaneously refusing to go anywhere else.
You once made us late to a client meeting so you could argue with her about espresso beans.
" Graham raised an eyebrow. "That's not obsession? "
“You’re exaggerating. We weren’t late. I would never be late to a client meeting.”
“To quote you, ‘On time is late.’ Usually, you force us to arrive fifteen, twenty minutes early to every meeting,” Graham reminded me.
“Your point?”
“Look, don’t get me wrong, I’m actually glad you found your balls and asked her out, what I find puzzling is that you never mentioned it to me. We’re partners, Callum. I thought we didn’t keep things from each other?”
Callum sent an incredulous look Graham’s way. “We’re business partners, not Siamese twins, joined at the hip. I’m allowed to have a personal life that’s not open to the scrutiny of others, even yours.”
Graham sensed he’d tripped on sensitive ground. “Point taken,” he said, raising his hands in mock surrender, “but forgive me for having questions.”
"You're forgiven. Feel free to keep them to yourself."
But Graham kept talking. “She seems great, by the way. When I met her the other day—all of thirty seconds before you practically shoved me out the door—she seemed sharp. Funny. Not your usual type."
"I don't have a type."
“Yes, you do, buddy. Your type is 'emotionally unavailable’ and ‘least likely to pester you for quality time’. Willow doesn't strike me as that.”
“Meaning?” I set down my coffee with more force than necessary.
“I know this is going to sound contradictive but I’m not sure getting involved with someone like Willow is the wisest idea right now. The Ashford deal requires your head in the game. Willow seems like a girl who…requires a lot of attention. You know what I mean?”
I mentally winced. “Because she’s twenty-three and I’m forty? Is that what you’re getting at?”
“Hey, I’m trying to be delicate here but…yeah.”
“Don’t worry about me. Nothing’s going to get in the way of the firm getting that contract,” I promised him, hoping that would be the end of this cringe-worthy conversation.
But it wasn’t.
“Callum.” Graham leaned forward. "I've known you for fifteen years. You're distracted. The question is whether you can compartmentalize long enough to close this deal, or whether Willow Monroe is going to cost us the biggest contract we've ever pursued."
"She won't."
"You sure about that? You've spent an hour staring at drawings you could review in your sleep. You haven't touched the material samples for the presentation. And every time your phone vibrates, you check it with the eagerness of a teenager waiting for a text from his crush."
“You need a hobby,” I growled.
"I'm not saying don't date her," Graham continued. "God knows you need a life outside this office. But the timing is... complicated. Ashford is watching everything. If this relationship implodes before you secure the contract—"
"It won't."
"How do you know?"
I met his stare. "I know."
Graham held my gaze for a long moment, then nodded and stood. "All right. I'll trust your judgment. But Callum? Be careful. We can’t afford to lose our heads when something this big is on the horizon.”
He left before I could argue.
I stared at the closed door, his warning echoing in my head. Like I’d ever lose my head over Willow Monroe.
Except.
Except I kept thinking about that kiss. Kept checking my phone for messages from her. Kept counting the hours until Friday when I'd have a legitimate excuse to touch her again.
I picked up my phone. Our text exchange from yesterday stared back at me—brief, polite, utterly lacking the spark of our in-person interactions.
Updated my wardrobe. Thanks for the card. When you see the bill, don’t say I didn’t warn you.
He already knew how much had been spent and he thought she’d underspent. See you Friday.
That was it. No banter. No teasing. No reference to the fact that we'd kissed in my office and I'd admitted I was attracted to her and she'd confirmed the feeling was mutual before walking out the door.
The shift in her tone bothered me more than it should have. At the coffee shop, Willow was all sharp wit and quick comebacks. In text, she'd become tentative, almost like she didn’t know how to act with me anymore.
I typed a message. Deleted it. Typed another.
What color is the dress?
Stupid question. Who cared what color the dress was? I deleted it.
Looking forward to Friday.
Too eager. Delete.
We should discuss logistics for the gala.
Too formal. As if we were colleagues planning a conference.
I set the phone down. Picked it up again. Put it back down.
Forty years old, Hayes. Act accordingly.
I settled on practical.
I'll pick you up at 6 on Friday. The gala starts at 7. Let me know if you need anything before then.
Her response came twenty minutes later, during which I accomplished absolutely zero work.
Sounds good. See you then.
Two sentences. No emoji, no sarcasm, no suggestion that she'd spent the past two days replaying our kiss the way I had.
Which was fine. Good, even. This was a business arrangement. Polite distance was appropriate.
I kinda hated it. I’d work that out later.
The afternoon crawled by in a haze of half-finished tasks and wandering thoughts. I reviewed the Riverside materials—really reviewed them this time—but my focus kept slipping. Every time I tried to concentrate on load-bearing calculations or sustainable materials, my mind drifted to Friday.
To Willow.
Graham was the social one. He lived for this shit. Meanwhile, the champagne and canapés and endless circulation through rooms full of strangers pretending to find each other fascinating made me want to jump from a balcony.
Richard Ashford's charity gala would be no different. Three hours of schmoozing and handshakes and careful navigation of social landmines, all in service of a contract that would define our firm's trajectory for the next decade.
I should have been dreading it. Should have been reviewing my talking points, strategizing my approach to Richard, preparing for the careful dance of impressing a client without appearing desperate.
Instead, I was thinking about Willow in a dress I hadn't seen yet.
About my hand on her lower back as I guided her through a crowded room.
About introducing her to Richard and watching his face when he realized the workaholic architect had found someone worth making time for.
About kissing her when people were watching and having a legitimate excuse to do it.
This was a problem. A significant, potentially catastrophic problem that I was choosing to ignore in favor of anticipation I had no business feeling.
I knew the warning signs. The way my thoughts circled back to her no matter what I tried to focus on. The checking of my phone. The replaying of moments that should have been forgettable.
This wasn't how I'd felt about Jessica, not even in the early days when our relationship had still held promise. This was different. Sharper. More consuming.
And it was fake. The arrangement, the relationship, the reasons she'd agreed to any of it—all fake.
Except the attraction wasn't fake. She'd confirmed that herself, standing in my office with her fingers still tangled in my hair. And the way she'd leaned into our practice kiss hadn't been fake either. The soft sound she'd made when I'd deepened it, the way her hands had fisted in my shirt—
I needed to stop.
I pulled up the client presentation on my laptop and forced myself to review each slide with the attention it deserved.
Richard would ask about the environmental impact assessment.
He'd want specifics on the timeline. He'd probe for weaknesses in the proposal the way he probed for weaknesses in people.
I needed to be sharp. Focused. Ready.
I needed to stop thinking about a woman I'd agreed not to fall for.
The irony wasn't lost on me. Three months ago, if someone had suggested I'd be fake-dating Willow Monroe, I'd have laughed in their face.
The coffee shop barista who criticized my orders and mocked my suits and pushed back against everything I said with a stubbornness that should have been infuriating?
It was infuriating. And exhilarating. And addictive in ways I hadn't anticipated.
A year of verbal sparring across a coffee counter. A year of pretending the highlight of my morning wasn't watching her create foam art I'd inevitably criticize. A year of telling myself the attraction was inconvenient, inappropriate, impossible to act on.
Now I had permission to act on it—within limits, within rules, within the confines of an arrangement that would end in three months regardless of what either of us felt.
Three months. That was the deal.
And then what? We'd stage a breakup, return to our respective corners, and I'd go back to ordering black coffee from a woman I'd kissed?
Pretend the arrangement hadn't happened?
Resume our bickering as if I didn't know how she tasted, how she felt pressed against me, how her breath had caught when I'd—
Stop.
I closed my laptop harder than necessary. Stood. Walked to the window.
The city sprawled below, steel and glass and the ordered geometry of buildings I understood better than people. Architecture made sense. Materials had properties. Structures followed rules. You could calculate load and stress and failure points with mathematical certainty.
People were unpredictable. Relationships doubly so. And whatever was happening between me and Willow defied every attempt at rational analysis.
I wanted her. That was clear now, undeniable after two days of failing to think about anything else.
I wanted her, and she wanted me, and we had three months to explore that want within carefully negotiated boundaries.
I wanted her, and I was going to spend Friday night with my hand on her back and my mouth near her ear and every excuse in the world to touch her.
I wanted her, and I knew—with the certainty of a man who'd already failed at one marriage—that this would end badly.
Arrangements built on pretense didn't become real through wishing.
Connections forged in deception didn't survive exposure to truth.
Whatever we built in the next three months would crumble when the structure supporting it vanished.
I knew all of this.
And I was doing it anyway.
The sun was setting over the city, painting the buildings in shades of gold and amber. Friday was two days away.
Two days until I saw her again.
Graham was right. Maybe this was a bad idea.
But for all my rigid attention to detail, the seemingly stiff adherence to rules and structure, there was a voice inside me that teased me with the allure of doing the opposite of what was good for me.
I should listen to the warnings…
But I knew I wouldn’t.
Because sometimes bad decisions tasted sweeter than candy.