Chapter 8 #2
“Because you don’t need a larger production company. You need senior event leadership, vendor coordination, and one accountable operating plan. I’m keeping fixed overhead low so the client pays for the expertise and the actual event, not a permanent production staff they don’t need.”
Good answer.
I do not say that yet.
“What happens if one of your key freelancers drops out forty-eight hours before load-in?”
“I contract redundancies for critical roles and maintain backup labor agreements. Also, I don’t sell staffing I can’t replace.”
“What happens when the client expands scope after signing?”
“Written change order, revised fee, updated schedule.”
“What if they refuse?”
“Then they do not receive the additional scope.”
I smile.
She points her fork at me.
“Don’t be encouraging. Be capitalism.”
I remove the smile.
“What if I tell you another planner bid twenty percent less?”
“Then I would compare scope before price. If they’re genuinely offering the same work for twenty percent less and can perform it responsibly, you should hire them.”
I sit back.
She narrows her eyes.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“That is a lie.”
“It was good.”
“I told you not to be encouraging.”
“That wasn’t encouragement. It was evaluation.”
“Fine.”
She takes another bite.
I ask questions for twenty minutes.
Staffing.
Cancellation.
Travel.
Weather.
Vendor failure.
Payment schedule.
Insurance.
A client executive who decides at the last minute that fire code is a creative suggestion.
Nora gets stronger as we go.
Not because I teach her anything.
Because each answer reminds her that she already knows it.
By the end, the woman across from me does not look like someone asking permission to start a business.
She looks like someone irritated that the business is not moving faster.
I love watching it.
The thought arrives cleanly enough that I stop breathing for half a second.
Not love.
Too soon.
I know that.
But something adjacent to the word has started building infrastructure.
This is worse.
Nora notices the pause.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“Your face did a thing.”
“My face doesn’t do things.”
“Incorrect. It did one.”
I stand and collect the plates.
“I was thinking.”
“About?”
“How good you are at this.”
Her expression softens.
“Thank you.”
No joke.
No deflection.
Progress.
She carries the wine bottle into the kitchen and sets it beside the sink.
“I may actually get this job.”
“Yes.”
“And if I do, I will have to open a business bank account, finalize insurance, probably apply for a line of credit, and explain to my parents why I have apparently founded a company in the middle of apple season.”
“Yes.”
“Can you stop agreeing like a witness under oath?”
“No.”
She smiles.
“Terrible fake boyfriend.”
“Real dating seems to be going better.”
The smile disappears.
Not badly.
Just because the words land.
Nora looks around the kitchen.
“About that.”
I put the plates down.
There are phrases capable of raising a man’s heart rate faster than about that.
This is one.
She sees my face and laughs.
“Oh my God.”
“What?”
“You looked terrified.”
“I did not.”
“You absolutely did.”
“I was attentive.”
“Corporate euphemism.”
I lean against the counter.
“What about dating?”
She tucks a strand of hair behind her ear.
“I wanted to come here because I wanted to see what your life looks like when you aren’t at the orchard.”
“And?”
She glances around.
“I think your life looks like airport lounges.”
That is not what I expected.
“Explain.”
“You have expensive places to sleep and no evidence you live in them.”
I look toward the living room.
The decorative books suddenly feel accusatory.
“My apartment in New York has evidence.”
“Such as?”
“Art.”
“That you picked?”
“Some.”
“Food?”
“Usually.”
“Neighbors you know?”
I hesitate.
Her eyebrows rise.
“I know the doorman.”
“Grant.”
“What?”
“That is not a neighbor.”
“I travel.”
“I know.”
She comes closer, stopping on the other side of the island.
“I’m not criticizing you.”
“It sounds slightly like criticism.”
“It is maybe eight percent criticism.”
“Thank you for quantifying.”
“You’re welcome.”
Her fingers trace the edge of the counter.
“You keep talking about privacy like the goal is making sure nobody gets access to the real part.”
“It often is.”
“But where is the real part?”
That lands harder than I want it to.
I look at her.
She immediately softens.
“You don’t have to answer.”
“No. It’s fair.”
I think about New York.
The condo.
The office.
Hotels.
Rental houses.
A house outside Denver I use six days a year.
The apartment I bought my mother.
My life contains many addresses.
Home has mostly been wherever nobody needs anything from me for an hour.
“I don’t know,” I say.
Nora does not rescue the silence.
I appreciate her for that too.
“I thought success would create more room,” I continue. “For a while it did. Then the company got bigger, and being known got stranger, and I got good at building places people couldn’t enter unless I invited them.”
“Bunkers.”
“Yes.”
She comes around the island.
“Do you want that?”
“I want privacy.”
“Not what I asked.”
I look at her.
She is very close now.
Close enough that I can see the tiny freckle near the corner of her mouth.
“I don’t think I want to live alone inside it anymore.”
The words feel dangerous once spoken.
Nora’s eyes change.
Warmth first.
Then something more careful.
“That is a very serious sentence for a Tuesday.”
“I can take it back.”
“No.”
Her hand touches my chest.
“I like it.”
I cover her hand with mine.
For a moment, neither of us moves.
Then she says, “I still need to be at the orchard by seven tomorrow.”
“I know.”
“You know my schedule?”
“I run a company. I identify hazards.”
She laughs.
I kiss her.
There is no audience.
No ex.
No reporter.
No reason except that I want her and she moves into me before I can wonder whether I should ask.
Her arms go around my neck.
Mine settle at her waist.
The first kiss becomes a second without a break between them.
Then another.
Nora presses back against the edge of the island.
I stop.
Immediately.
Her eyes open.
“What?”
“The counter.”
She looks behind her.
Then starts laughing.
“You stopped because of countertop safety?”
“It has corners.”
“Jesus Christ.”
“I am trying to keep you alive.”
“I work on a farm.”
“Then you understand workplace injuries.”
She catches my sweater and pulls me back.
“This is not currently work.”
The kiss changes.
Her mouth opens under mine.
My hand slides up her back.
She makes a quiet sound, and every sensible part of my brain resigns simultaneously.
I kiss along her jaw.
Her fingers tighten in my hair.
“Grant.”
I stop.
Not move away.
Stop.
“Yes?”
She is breathing hard.
So am I.
“I changed my mind.”
My entire body goes still.
“About?”
“Slow.”
I search her face.
“Tell me what you want.”
“You.”
The word hits with physical force.
She touches my jaw.
“Tonight. If you still want that.”
I laugh once because there is no dignified response available.
“Nora.”
“What?”
“I have wanted you since you threatened to feed a fake apple tree to a wood chipper.”
“That was very early.”
“It has been a difficult week.”
She smiles.
Then the smile fades into something more vulnerable.
“I don’t want tomorrow to be weird.”
“It probably will be.”
Her eyebrows lift.
“I mean because we’re us. We can make breakfast weird without sex.”
“Excellent clarification.”
“I don’t want you waking up and deciding this crossed some line you didn’t mean to cross.”
“I won’t.”
“You can’t know how you’ll feel.”
“No. But I know I am not doing this accidentally.”
Her eyes stay on mine.
Neither of us jokes now.
I touch her cheek.
“If we have sex tonight, it is because I want to have sex with you. Not because we’re pretending. Not because Celeste is in Vermont. Not because Landon exists. And not because I think it buys me anything tomorrow.”
Nora swallows.
“Good.”
“Do you still want to?”
“Yes.”
I kiss her again.
This time there is no restraint pretending to be uncertainty.
We make it halfway to the stairs before Nora pulls my sweater over my head in the hallway.
She looks at my chest.
Then at me.
“Your sweater was hiding an unreasonable amount of information.”
I laugh.
“You’ve seen me in T-shirts.”
“Not like this.”
“Like what?”
“Available.”
That word nearly ends me.
I take her face in both hands and kiss her until she backs into the wall.
She pulls me closer.
My mouth moves to her neck.
Her head tips back.
“Bedroom,” she says.
“Upstairs.”