Chapter 4
4
CALL IT GENERAL CURIOSITY OR CALL IT A GLUTTON FOR PUNISHMENT
I really need to dust that damn fan.
I’ve been staring at the ceiling fan going ‘round and ‘round in circles since I laid my head down to go to bed two hours ago. I wanted nothing else but to close my eyes and drift off to sleep but every time I lowered my lids, the image of Amelia kept clouding my thoughts.
I can’t remove the image of her sitting on that bench looking down at me from my mind. The way the dim streetlight casted shadows across her face, showing off long lashes that feather across chocolate brown eyes, a slender nose perfectly symmetrical to the rest of her features, and the outline of her lips accentuating the fullness of them.
Fuck. She was beautiful.
Beautiful and guarded.
I could sense it in the way she analyzed each situation. From debating on having drinks with me at the bar to even crossing the damn street. She didn’t make a move without knowing what, why, and how. I couldn’t put my finger on what it was about her that made me so damn curious. All I do know is that I want to know everything about her, even though getting involved with anyone right now is the opposite of what I should do.
Isn’t that the funny thing about what you want to do and what you should do. They tend to be at odds with one another. Story of my damn life.
I should’ve gone home after drinks with Ben Huxley, my first client after I became a full fledged B.A.R. passing attorney. We went to undergrad together. While I was busy studying my ass off to get accepted into law school, he was cruising through his core classes while building an online platform streamlining his family’s vineyard business.
Right after I graduated and passed the B.A.R. he contacted me asking me for legal help. He wanted to acquire a smaller, somewhat established vineyard on the west coast that had no internet presence and wanted to expand his family’s business past the east coast. After signing him on as a client and this deal being my first time meddling in Mergers and Acquisitions, I had finally found my niche. The thrill of going to battle to win my client the company they wanted or the partnership they needed was one hell of an adrenaline rush.
It’s been eight years since then. My life seemed to have been going according to plan. I followed the family tradition and became a lawyer. Met a girl, bought a home, tried to live a life worthy of what my grandparents would’ve wanted for me.
But now, here I am.
While I love my job because it reminds me of my grandfather, I have to work day after day next to a group of people that might as well be considered more strangers than family. Single, although most would argue, a bullet dodged. And lying in bed alone, awake at who knows what hour, staring at a fan to keep from daydreaming of a girl I’d just met at a bar.
A girl that, one, didn’t even ask to exchange numbers even though I felt like she was interested in me, and two, seemed to have such thick walls around her I would be a fool to try to tear down. And yet, I was curious as hell about who she was.
Usually I could read the truth about a person within minutes of meeting them. That’s what made it so easy to do my job, the majority of the population wears their wants, needs, and lies across their features without realizing it. Even when they think they’re hiding it all behind a facade of perfection.
Amelia seemed different, as if she spent her whole life perfecting this mask she projected to the world. The rational half of me could appreciate the determination she had to remain in control at all times in this unpredictable world, but the other, insoluble, half of me wanted nothing more than to pull that mask from her to reveal who she truly was. I want to be the one to show her who she could be if she were able to embrace who she is with and without the disguise.
Damn it .
I do not need to be thinking about her.
After Cecelia left, the ex that I had no business being with for so long, I said I was done with the opposite sex for a while. I should’ve walked away from that relationship years ago. I was too busy building my career and she was too busy dreaming of a life far fancier than I had time to give her.
Which is why I need to keep Amelia out of my thoughts before I drag her into my mess of a life. I’m not in a place to give someone like Amelia Thatcher anything close to what she deserves, and yet I still couldn’t help myself from practically begging to spend the last few hours of what was left of the evening with her.
Call it general curiosity or call it a glutton for punishment. The moment that five foot four brunette pummeled her way into me on her way to the bathroom I knew I needed to know her. The night had gotten so derailed from my original plan.
I was supposed to go out, meet Ben to discuss his next acquisition, then go straight home. Not step into some sort of Love Island episode and steal the girl like some knight in shining armor. And definitely not spend the next couple hours trying to get to know her.
I’m glad I didn’t make the stupid mistake of asking for her number and I’m glad she had enough sense to not ask for mine. I know the right thing would be to leave her the hell alone, let her carry on with her life, and I can continue living mine.
I’m too busy building my reputation as the best damn M & A attorney in the city so when I’m ready to leave the firm that no longer feels like home, I won’t have to worry about a damn thing because my reputation will land me a job anywhere on the fast track to named partner.
I just need to stay focused long enough for that to happen. And focus is what I would lose if I had decided to make a move on Amelia. In the span of four hours with her, I could only focus on the way her hair fell in waves down her back and I wondered what it would feel like tangled between my fingers or the way her body molded to mine when I caught her before she fell. If that wasn’t asking for a lengthy distraction, I don’t know what is.
I made the right call.
All thoughts of Amelia Thatcher need to be contained to the memory of tonight and nothing more.