Chapter 32
COLE
“Does that happen a lot?” Yasmine asks through the side of her mouth as I place my hand on the small of her back, ushering her through the path between the dining tables.
“Does what happen a lot?” I question, confused as we follow the hostess.
“Where they have a dozen people waiting for a table because they don’t have any, then you appear, and miraculously they do.”
“I own the restaurant.” Along with several others.
“Of course you do,” she mutters, looking like a million dollars in a black pantsuit.
Only it’s no ordinary pantsuit. While the pants might be wide and black, she’s paired them with a fitted white long-sleeved shirt and a black tie that hangs straight down the front of a black, structured corset that contours her waist.
The outfit is like her: sharp and sophisticated.
Even if she doesn’t notice everyone looking at her, I do. How could they not see her? She’s in a class of her own.
“Thank you, Flora. I’ll take it from here. Please bring water for the table.” I subtly place a tip in her hand as we head toward my usual table, which is always free, just in case I arrive unexpectedly, like tonight.
I pull out a chair for Yasmine to sit, then once she’s settled, I sit across from her.
Forget the scenery of the inky ocean and sky painted in molten gold and orange to my left. The one I’m looking directly at is the best view in the house. Yasmine’s not only the most beautiful woman I’ve ever laid eyes on, but she’s the most interesting too.
“Is this the little seafood place by the ocean you said you would bring me to?” she asks, looking around.
It surprises me that she remembers our conversation from the Wildcard app.
“The very one.”
“I’m having the lobster salad and crab risotto,” she says confidently without looking at the menu, because it’s what I recommended in that very same conversation.
I didn’t have to pressure her into coming with me; she willingly agreed, and I can tell she’s at ease and relaxed around me.
Maybe it’s because she’s seen me naked and sucked my cock, so we’re past the nerves stage, or maybe it’s because she likes me and wants to be here.
I don’t know, whatever it is, I’m fucking excited that she’s with me, beside me, smiling at me… just here in front of me. Finally.
“And can I ask how many times you have changed your shirt?” Her tone carries a teasing undercurrent.
“What?” I ask, confused, as I remove my suit jacket. I have no idea what she’s talking about.
She begins by recalling how I mentioned on the Wildcard app that I’d pick her up in my fancy car, then adds, “You said your nerves would be high because it would be our first proper date, and you’d probably feel a mix of excitement and anxiety and would have changed your shirt six times just to make sure you looked good for me. ”
That’s almost word-for-word. How does she recall that?
“I changed it twice,” I say honestly. “Once to go to work this morning, and after court, I changed again to come to your office.” I wanted to look good for her. I’m so head over heels for this woman, it’s unreal.
“Only twice? I don’t know whether to be offended or not.” She tucks her lips into her mouth to hide a smile.
I rest my forearms on the table and lean closer to her. “You do make me nervous, Yasmine.” No other woman has had me overthinking what I wear to dinner.
“You make me nervous too,” she says shyly.
I reach across the table and lay my hand out for her to take. When she places her warm hand in mine, I give it a squeeze.
“I want to date you properly.” Do things right.
“What about work?” Her eyes bug out.
“I wasn’t joking when I told you that your boss said it was okay.”
“I believe David might think that if you and I are dating, FusionTech would automatically win the contract. However, he’s completely mistaken. I will secure the contract because I am the most qualified. There will be no favoritism involved.” Confidence bounces off her in droves.
That smart brain of hers is sexy.
“Plus,” I jump in, “your proposal and presentation will be considered not just by me but also by my three brothers and the IT team. The final decision is not mine to make.”
“I’m going to win them over.” Her whole face lights up, and I believe her.
She’s already won my heart, there’s no doubt about it.
“I have something to tell you.” Her confidence takes a bit of a nose-dive.
“Please don’t tell me you have a boyfriend.” That thought makes my guts knot. She’s haunted me since the morning I woke up in that hotel room alone, and if she’s already spoken for, I might die because deep down I know she’s the one for me.
The one and only.
And seeing her again this week only bolstered that feeling in my chest and thoughts in my mind. She’s a drug I don’t want to find a cure for.
While those memories of our one night together keep replaying in my mind, I want to create new ones with her.
Ones where we spend nights like this one, walk on the beach hand in hand, go on vacations to exotic places…
preferably by boat or car because she hates flying…
No matter what I do, I want to do it all with her.
She gives my hand a gentle, reassuring squeeze and says, “I don’t have a boyfriend.” Then she chuckles.
It’s a sound I love and commit to my memory bank immediately to replay later.
Her eyes, as dark as midnight, flicker to mine, full of humor and mischief. “Even if I had a boyfriend, I think you might challenge him to a gladiator-style duel. No one has ever pursued me the way you have.”
“There’s something about you, Yasmine…” I stop myself from saying something that sounds stupid or too much, then I restart.
“There’s something about you that stopped feeling like a coincidence and started feeling like fate.
The flight, the night in the hotel, the app.
All of it has me wanting to choose you always, and to be the man who shows up every day.
Because being with you feels right in a way that I can’t ignore. ”
She considers my words, contemplating, letting them sink in before she says, “I feel the same way.”
“So, stop pushing me away. Don’t fight this anymore, Yasmine.” I brush my thumb back and forth across the back of her hand.
“Okay.”
“Okay?” Just like that, she agreed? Holy shit. “Well, that’s settled then.”
“But you might think differently when you hear what I have to say next.”
I let go of her hand and hold my hands up. “Have at me, I can take it, whatever it is.”
She shifts in her seat and lets out a nervous cough. “Well, remember when I told you I had a secret and that I was working on something big and I would tell you about it one day?”
“Yes.” I do. I’ve been wondering what that was about.
“I wasn’t just a member on the Wildcard app, but I designed it.” She adds for clarity, “I own it.”
The first question I can think of shoots out of my mouth. “Did you know it was me?” I don’t think she did, as she was as shocked to see me this week at the firm’s staff conference. But if she did, that’s just sneaky.
“No. Never.” She draws a firm line through the air with her hand, decisive, leaving no room for doubt.
“We’re a professional organization with high standards.
My assistant, Becca, matched us. She handles all the administration and locked me out of your profile so I couldn’t see anything on the backend of the app.
I promise I never, no…” She shakes her head vigorously, her words coming out in short bursts as she becomes flustered, defending her code of ethics.
“I designed the app to work a certain way, no photos, build a foundation, no dick pics…”
“Pity.”
Color creeps into her cheeks.
“You know you want to see him again,” I tease.
She bites on her bottom lip, pressing her hand to her face as if trying to hide the sudden heat. “Maybe.”
Definitely. But not yet.
If we’re doing this, I’m doing it right, regardless of our one-night stand. We did things backward, but we’re starting from scratch, and I’m determined to show her I can be a gentleman.
“I believe you about the app,” I tell her. It’s weird that I trust her so soon, but she makes me feel safe, and her boss, David, has nothing but great things to say about her.
She clutches her chest and lets out a relieved laugh. “Thank you.”
“So tell me all about this app. Do you have others you’ve designed?
” I ask, signaling to the waiter to take our order.
Then, for the next hour, Yasmine and I eat, talk, laugh, and get to know each other even better than we did before, and I struggle through the whole meal not to move my chair to her side so I can be closer to her, but I don’t, although it takes everything within me to restrain myself.
“What do you recommend for dessert?” Yasmine asks, studying the menu, tapping her shiny dark red fingernails against the table.
Nails I would most definitely like to feel running down my back again.
Not now, Cole.
“How can you eat dessert when you barely ate dinner?” I ask. She said she’s had a dodgy stomach today, which is why she couldn’t eat it all.
“Dessert is the best part of any meal. Surely you know that?” she teases, not looking up, too engrossed in the sweet treats. “What’s the chocolate cake like?”
“The best.”
“Of course you’d say that, you said that about the whole menu.”
“Because it’s true.” We get incredible reviews consistently.
“What made you invest in restaurants?” she asks softly, lifting her nose out of the menu.
I can tell she’s confused, and she’d be right to think that it’s a bit of a left-field business for me to invest in, but the answer is simple. “There were never any good seafood restaurants in the city that I liked.”
Her jaw drops open in shock. “So, you bought several and created what you craved.”
“Yeah.” It was that simple.
“I wish I could get in front of the right people who would invest in my app,” she mutters, almost to herself rather than to me.
“Who might that be exactly?”
“Douglas Zenon.”
“And what would he do for your app?” I’m genuinely interested.
“Growth to scale the marketing, investment to hire developers. My app is hyper-focused on local. I want to roll it out to every city across the map, but I need more people to do that. Cloud infrastructure, support systems, subscription pricing, analytics tools, app store optimization, and PR to increase our visibility… I could go on.”
I wish she would, so I could understand it better myself, but I let her move on.
“One day it will happen,” she says hopefully, “but I need another six months of data under our belt to test that it works, then I will be in a much better position to approach investors.”
And she’ll have Douglas Zenon eating out of her hand, I can feel it.
I swirl the last of my ice around my glass of water, then ask her, “What are you doing tomorrow?”
“My mom is going in for surgery tomorrow. I’m not looking forward to it. She’s the most important person in my life.” She tucks a lock of hair behind her ear. “We leave early in the morning, and they are keeping her in for the night.”
“If you don’t mind me asking, but what is she having done?”
“She’s having a stent fitted tomorrow. She’s diabetic, and her arteries are narrowing, so she’s having this cool stent fitted that is coated in medicine to reduce scarring and prevent the narrowing.”
“Who is taking her?”
“Just me.”
I don’t like the thought of Yasmine being by herself. “I’ll pick you both up in the morning and take you,” I counter confidently.
“What? No. You don’t have to do that,” she splutters.
“I don’t, but I want to.” I go on to explain my offer. “It will be stressful enough for your mom, but if I drive you there, you can focus only on supporting her and keeping her calm. You won’t need to worry about parking or where to drop her off. Let me handle that part.”
I know what it’s like with my own father when he’s had falls in the past, and it’s worrying for everyone involved, and I would never expect my mom to drive anywhere in a state of stress.
“I will pick her up on Sunday, too, and take her home.”
“That’s what I’m there for. You don’t have to do that.” She shakes her head vigorously.
I wish she understood that she doesn’t need to do everything by herself now because I can carry some of the burden.
I fell for the same woman twice, once on the flight and then on a dating app. Does she really think I won’t stick around? Fuck contracts, I’m throwing my code of ethics out of the window.
“It’s done.” And I won’t take no for an answer.