26. Winner, winner, take me to dinner
CHAPTER 26
WINNER, WINNER, TAKE ME TO DINNER
EMMA
I can barely contain myself. The rush of convincing the Engineering VP— Me; I did that —has me near euphoria. Below the worn and sticky vinyl-topped table we’re sitting at, I can’t stop tapping my foot.
It’s like I’ve had too much caffeine, or I’ve just taken the first sip of a perfectly light champagne. It’s the rocket jump of my heart when Charlie touches me.
“God, when he called the standard useless, I almost lost it.” We’ve been at Roger’s (I don’t care what Charlie says, these burgers are amazing) for the past hour, and I’ve been rehashing the meeting since we arrived.
Charlie settles back in the booth, his smile easy and warm. As though he’s enjoying my work rant. It’s so unlike the glazed-over look Logan used to get. It makes me a little giddy.
“You don’t need me at all, do you?”
“Of course I do. I couldn’t do this without you.” Please don’t go. I like having you here. I didn’t know how lonely I’ve been until now.
“We both know that’s a lie, but I’m happy to help.”
It’s a far cry from where we started. Now, the idea of not doing it together, not seeing him every day, turns my stomach over.
“You do help. More than you know.” With an elbow on the table, I angle closer. “What would you be doing if you weren’t here?”
“Still fixing cars. The older the better, especially if it’s a restoration. There’s nothing like getting your hands on a classic. Bringing it back to life.”
It’s impossible not to zero in on those hands as he speaks. Capable. Clever. Strong. Just like him.
I clear my throat, cool it down with a long sip of water. “Yours certainly left an impression at the party. My dad hasn’t stopped asking me about it. I haven’t seen him this excited since he discovered HGTV.”
“He’d love the antique place I go to. Next time he’s up this way, tell him to give me a shout. I can help him fill some of those blank spaces in the house.”
If only he could. My father would be a kid in a candy shop, and Charlie seems genuinely interested, which twists the knife a little deeper. Because there’s no way to say no without explaining why or rejecting him, and I can’t bring myself to hurt him. Not anymore.
“One trip to that store, and he’d come home with replacements for all the things we just got rid of.”
Charlie might play around most of the time, but he’s incredibly smart, and I see the way his eyes go sharp at the word we .
“Bit of a sore subject, I take it?”
“That’s putting it mildly.”
“Does it have anything to do with why you live one step up from Fagin’s lodgings and take the bus everywhere?”
See? Smart.
I trace a watermark on the table, averting my gaze. “Yes.”
He hums. “Thought so. I picked up on the tension at the party.”
“Let’s just say my parents like change about as much as Baxter does.”
“And look how well you handled that. Have you talked to them?”
“Oh, I’ve talked to them.” I’ve lost my breath trying to get them to understand. “But they won’t listen to me. All I want is to stop worrying. If they just moved to a smaller place, stopped with the lavish parties, lived more modestly…”
I trail off. Who am I to complain about anything after having the world at my feet?
But he asked, and I feel compelled to tell him.
I let out a slow breath, hardly knowing where to begin. Dealing with the fallout has swallowed up my whole life (and most of my wages).
“The first thing you should know is that the profits Nana made from selling the company set her up for life. She did the smart thing. She bought a house—the one you’ve seen—and put the rest away as a nest egg. That money was meant to provide for our family for generations. But with a safety net that big, Dad never had to work, and then he didn’t want to. Our family money was always managed by a professional, and he trusted it would always be there.”
“Ah,” Charlie says, probably already a step ahead of me like he always is.
Maybe I should stop there, but I’ve never talked to anyone but Ivy about this before, and I trust Charlie. He’s remarkably easy to talk to now that we’ve stopped taking swipes at each other. So I let the rest spill out of me.
“The thing is, in those circles, all the material things you have? They’re never enough. Why have one house when you could have five? Why stop at a million? Twenty? A hundred?” Endless cash seemed like fun when I was a kid, until I learned that there was no way to have that much without taking it from others. Nothing came without a price. “Between the bad investments and the reckless spending… well. It was bad enough that it necessitated the swift liquidation of almost everything.”
Including my post-college plans.
“Your parents didn’t seem the type to embrace the blank-on-blank lifestyle aesthetic.”
I offer him a sad smile. “No, they’re not. But in the same way it caused the problem, it also solved it, because they had so much to spare.”
“They weren’t the only ones to clean house, though.”
Why, oh, why did I ever think Charlie was ignorant?
“No,” I admit, swallowing thickly. “Harvey managed it all through various contacts, some auctions, some private sales. Everything I have left is in my apartment.”
Our plates get cleared away, the bill left between us with no urgency. There’s a low rumble of conversation around us, no one paying us any mind, but it doesn’t lessen how exposed I feel.
I couldn’t talk about this with Logan without his parents finding out. Charlie is safer, but I can’t stand the thought of him looking at me differently.
He shifts, leaning in, talking low.
“I’ve never told Reese this, but I keep two emergency funds, one for each of us. She hasn’t needed my help in years, especially now that she has the shelter and Mae, but I still put a little away each month. We lived so long with nothing. I never want to go through that again. I don’t think I’ll ever stop worrying about her or needing to know I have the means to help if she ever needs it.”
It’s another glimpse of the real Charlie under all that swagger, another clue to solving the mystery of him. And it makes my heart clench tightly in my chest.
When I met him, I was blinded by the clothes, the attitude. I assumed I knew him, his type, all the while hating when others made similar assumptions about me. I hate how wrong I was, but more than that, I hate how I treated him because of it.
“Charlie—”
“I already told you: don’t you dare apologize.”
“I guess that means I’m always going to be right,” I say dryly. He may not want to hear my apology, but he deserves to. “I shouldn’t have judged you before I knew you. I never thought I’d say it, but I’m really happy Roberts forced us together.”
“Me too,” he says, catching my hand in his and adding a soft wink. The plush curve of his mouth detonates a series of explosions in my chest, helped by the heat of my hand in his.
Today might just be the best day of my life.
“You know,” I say. “When I was nine, I decided I wanted to be the first woman to climb Everest.”
He looks surprised. “But you hate the cold.”
“Don’t interrupt,” I tease, and revel in Charlie’s laugh. “Of course, I was quickly informed I was much too young, and there was also the small fact that I was too late to be the first, or even the tenth. Do you know how many women have climbed it?”
“Not a clue.”
“Hundreds. Maybe thousands by now.”
“I bet you’d look cute in all that gear, though. Perfectly windswept at the peak, pink parka and everything.”
“Honestly,” I say, thinking back, “I only said it because Amy Lynne was bragging about visiting Versailles, and I wanted to one-up her. I picked it because it was the farthest place on the earth anyone could go.”
“You’re really holding a grudge against Antarctica, aren’t you?”
I laugh freely and, feeling bold, turn my hand and thread my fingers through his. Like a sense memory, my thumb finds the scar there, stroking softly. It’s presumptuous and familiar, but Charlie doesn’t stop me.
I can’t remember ever holding Logan’s hand, now that I think about it.
“I always wanted to go to Venice,” he admits.
If I could charter a plane right now, I would. I’d give him the world. “You should. It’s beautiful.”
He stares intently at our linked hands. “Reese and I used to sneak magazines home anytime we were forced to go to the dentist. Didn’t matter how old they were. We’d pore over them, pretend to shop the clothes, plan trips to Tahiti or Tulum, get to the out-and-about section and pretend we knew everybody. ‘Oh, did you hear about Gustav? He lost his ostrich.’ Shit like that.”
“What a swelegant, elegant party it must have been. I’m sorry I missed it.”
“If I’m Sinatra,” he says, getting my reference and pleasing me far more than he should, “you know that makes you the Princess of Monaco.”
Gorgeous and untouchable. Is that how he sees me?
“But the real prize,” he says, “was the thick store catalogs. We’d sit for hours and shop for our someday house. Reese had one of those old-school calculators and everything. Size of a brick.”
“For some reason, I’m picturing those ticker tape machines.”
Charlie laughs. “You’re watching too many old movies, sweetheart.”
I can almost picture the two of them huddled together at the dining table, or perhaps sprawled across the floor, circling the items they wanted.
It’s about as far from my own childhood as he could get.
“As someone who once got to go on those shopping sprees for real, your way sounds more fun.” Maybe he can teach my parents to enjoy fantasy spending for a change.
He hums the same way he did the other night, and my blush heats up into a tingle.
“Emma,” he says, and why does he have to say my name like that? Like a beloved souvenir? “I won’t ever know what it’s like, being rich, but I don’t care about any of that. What you did today? It had nothing to do with money and everything to do with you. I’ve seen guys older and scruffier buckle under Baxter’s scrutiny. You were hot as hell in there. You should be proud of yourself.”
I’m a firm believer in not needing anyone’s validation but my own. It’s what made me such a terrible fit in school, what’s gotten in the way of most of my relationships, what drives me to work so hard.
On my best days, I’m a phenomenon. A warrior. Every path is a catwalk, every room my stage. On my best days, I’m unstoppable.
So the wild joy that hits me under Charlie’s praise is a shock.
I could face an army of Robertses right now, because the man next to me—this wisecracking, sweet-talking, larger-than-life man—believes in me.
He’s a wonder, beautiful and confounding. I take a shaky breath. “Why are you helping me?”
He squeezes my hand and levels me with a serious look. “Something you need to know about me? I don’t do anything I don’t want to do, and I’m never anywhere I don’t want to be.”
My na?ve heart knocks against my ribs, ready to jump into his arms. But I don’t trust it. “If this is about last year, I’ve already accepted your apology.”
“It’s got nothing to do with that.”
I want to believe that more than I can say.
The car idles, growling in a way that’s become familiar and reassuring. We arrived at my apartment five minutes ago, but haven’t moved.
“Do you want to come up?” I finally ask, hands clenched in my lap.
Charlie brushes his fingers along the back of my neck and leans in close, the soapy sweetness of his aftershave surrounding me, pulling me farther under his unique spell.
“The answer to that question will always be yes, but I can’t tonight. I’ve got a plan for the next time I get you naked, and it involves giving you some homework.”
It’s almost impossible, holding myself back from kissing him, with his tie loosened, voice rough, ripe for the taking. I want to curl that silk around my wrist, drag him the last few inches, bite down.
I want to pull and push and needle my way under that shirt. I want to slip under his skin until his blood is roaring in his ears and he can’t think beyond the sound of my name as it leaves his lips.
But I’ve been told before that those aren’t things I should want. I need to sit back, wait my turn, and be responsive, not aggressive.
So I tuck the urge away and say good night, waiting until I’m alone to let it out. And if I come from the memory of Charlie at my feet, hair tight in my grip, that’s between me and midnight.