Chapter 14 #3
My heart kicks hard in my chest. She tears her gaze from mine to smile at the Albrights.
“That’s clear,” Gage says. “But, don’t underestimate the importance of romance too.”
Ginny’s cheeks get pink, and she simply says, “I hope you have a wonderful time tonight with your wives.”
“Thank you,” Connor says. “I hope you both have a nice evening.”
She nods. “The room service menu at the hotel looks amazing.” She laughs to lighten the moment and the men smile as they lead us out of the conference room.
But now I’m hit with the idea of her in her hotel room. Alone. Eating room service by herself. Me down the hall doing the same.
And how stupid that seems.
She’s practically bouncing as we get on the elevator a few minutes later. “That went well, right?” she asks.
“It was perfect,” I tell her sincerely. “You were amazing.”
She beams up at me. “It felt good. They listened to everything, asked great questions, took notes.” She sighs happily. “God, I love when people listen to me.”
I chuckle. “It was impossible not to. You were passionate and perfect.”
“I’m glad.” She sighs again. “I’m so glad they agreed right now, today, to get on board.”
Fuck, me too. This was one huge hurdle crossed to my plan to leave IES.
We get into the car a few minutes later, and Paul heads for the hotel.
“So about that room service,” I say. “We should have dinner together. In the hotel restaurant. There’s no reason to sit in our rooms alone, right?”
She looks over. “I don’t know.”
“You don’t know what?”
“If we should have dinner together tonight.”
“Why not?”
“It’s Valentine’s Day.”
“So? For people celebrating that, it matters, but there are plenty of people in the world for which this is just a Friday night. And we have to eat.”
She doesn’t say anything for a long moment. But finally she agrees. “Yeah, that’s true. It doesn’t have to be a thing, unless we make it a thing, right?”
“Exactly. It’s just a meal.”
“Right.”
“And we don’t need to change our clothes or anything,” she goes on. “We’ll just walk into the restaurant in our work clothes, straight out of that meeting, just a couple of colleagues having dinner after a meeting.”
“Okay. Sounds good.”
Paul pulls up at the hotel a few minutes later, and we get out, heading into the lobby. I notice the red and white roses everywhere, the low romantic music playing, the many couples smiling, hand-in-hand, milling about. But I don’t say a thing.
For them, it’s Valentine’s Day. For us, it’s Friday night after work.
We head for the restaurant without a word.
“Good evening, two for dinner?” the hostess asks.
“Yes,” Ginny tells her.
“Do you have a reservation?”
“Um, no. I’m in room eighteen-oh-two,” Ginny says, dropping the number of one of the most expensive suites. “I was hoping—”
“Oh! Is the last name Riley?” the woman asks.
Ginny glances at me, then says slowly. “Y-e-s.”
“Your table is ready.”
Ah, Graham made a reservation right here.
The hotel’s restaurant is award-winning, and I can imagine he thought it would be easier to dine here.
Or it’s possible Margot made the reservation because Graham didn’t think about needing a reservation on Valentine’s Day.
Or maybe they just thought they’d want to be close to their room after dinner so they could go straight up and…
I don’t need to think about that.
The hostess takes our coats, then leads us into the restaurant and to the gorgeous wall of windows.
She doesn’t offer us menus. “Your five-course meal will start shortly,” she says with a bright smile, then she turns and heads back to the hostess stand.
Ginny looks at the table. There’s a rose at her place.
There’s champagne already chilling. There’s glittery gold confetti sprinkled over the black tablecloth and a gold candle flickering in the center of the table.
Our cloth napkins are blood red, or, I suppose, Valentine’s red, and as our waiter appears, introduces himself, and opens the champagne, Ginny starts to laugh.
She covers her mouth with her hand, but she doesn’t stop. In fact, when our eyes meet, she starts laughing even harder, until tears are shimmering in her eyes.
I can’t help but grin watching her.
“Do you…need a moment?” the waiter, Dan, asks.
“What is our first course?” I ask.
“I’ll be bringing out smoked salmon blinis with dill.”
“Fabulous,” I tell him. “Let’s start there.”
“Very good.”
He moves off, and I pick up my champagne flute. “Are you okay?” I ask her, taking in the vision of her laughing, her eye makeup a little smudged, her leaning back in her chair, completely relaxed. She’s so damned gorgeous.
She’s sobered a bit and wipes under each eye, then picks up her flute as well.
“I’m fine. This is just so…” She shakes her head and tips her flute back, draining the champagne in one long gulp.
Then she meets my gaze. “I’m having the most romantic dinner in a gorgeous hotel, in one of the best cities, on the most romantic day of the year with a guy that I’m absolutely, completely, crazy about, who is also crazy about me, and no matter how hard I resist, no matter what I say, the universe just keeps saying nope, you’re going to be with this guy. ”
My heart squeezes hard. “Ginny, I didn’t mean for—”
She leans in and pins me with a look. “So, I’m just thinking, fuck it.”
I stare at her. My heart squeezes again. “What?” I ask. “What does that mean?”
“It means, fuck it.” She shrugs. “We’re in New York City on Valentine’s Day. We’re done with work. There’s no way you’ll get away with firing me for…anything. And I trust you. I do. I’m not worried about you changing anything about my job because of our relationship.”
I definitely won’t do that. It’s not her job I intend to change.
I nod. “Good.”
“So…fuck it. Let’s eat this amazing meal, enjoy time together the way we’ve been resisting, and then let’s go upstairs, and just…get this out of our systems.”
I realize I’m gripping the delicate champagne glass too tightly and force myself to let go of it. But I lean in. “Get what out of our systems?”
“This urge to tear each other’s clothes off and fuck each other’s brains out, Everett,” she says. “That is what we need to get out of our systems. And this is actually the perfect chance.”