“Your mom is on line two,” Helen announces as she pops her head in through my door.
“Ugh. She called my office?”
“Yup. And why do you think that is?”
“Because I wouldn’t pick up her calls on my cell phone.” I glance at the screen again. “She’s called three times in the last hour.”
“Maybe it’s an emergency?” she suggests.
“I doubt it. She would also text if it were.” Sighing, I slide my chair across the carpet and move to pick up the phone on my desk. “If I’m not off this call in fifteen minutes, I need you to pop in here again with some excuse as to why I need to get off the phone.”
She salutes me. “You got it, boss.”
Picking up the receiver, I brace myself for what this phone call entails. “Hello, Mom.”
“Charlotte! There you are. You are just the hardest person to get a hold of sometimes, I swear.”
“Well, I’m working right now, Mom. I can’t just answer the phone whenever you call, you know.”
“I know, but this is important. I need to know what time you and Damien want your breakfast delivered in the morning during your stay in Hawaii.”
I can feel my face drop. This is my mother’s idea of something that she can’t wait to talk to me about until after five o’clock. “Um, I don’t know, Mom. Eight is fine.”
“Are you sure? Wouldn’t you rather eat right when you wake up? I hear it’s better for your metabolism if you eat earlier in the day.”
“That’s fine,” I say, shuffling some papers around while pretending to listen to her at the same time.
“I need a time, Charlotte.”
“I honestly don’t care, Mom. Seven is fine.”
“Okay, okay. I’ll put you in for seven.” I can hear her scribble something down on a piece of paper, the scratch of the pen echoing through the line. “All right, and then I had another question for you.”
“Yes?” I say as I try to read the contract in front of me.
“How would you feel about Damien walking you down the aisle during the ceremony?”
I drop my pen on my desk. “What? Why?”
“Well, because now that you two are a couple, I thought it would be sweet if you didn’t have to walk by yourself. Besides, we’ve known Damien for practically his entire life, so it would be meaningful to us if he did this as well.”
My heart pounds violently at the thought of him doing this—out of anxiousness and a little excitement. “Well, I guess I could ask him.” I wonder how he’ll react to that? Is asking him to walk me down the aisle too much?
“I think it would be perfect, and it would answer the question of whether you’re still single or not.” And there it is—the real reason she wants him to do it.
“Oh, heaven forbid there should be any speculation about that,” I admonish.
“Charlotte, you finally have someone, and that should be celebrated. Plus, it will give you practice for when you two get married.”
I nearly choke on my saliva. “Uh, Damien and I are not getting married, Mom.”
“Well, not now. But I imagine soon, right? I mean, no one is getting any younger, and it’s not like you two don’t know each other already. That little fact in itself would cut down on the length of time you needed to date.”
Jesus Christ, this conversation just took a turn that I wasn’t expecting. “Listen, Mom. Things are still new, and the last thing I need is for you to put any pressure on him, or me, okay?” Especially since this won’t be lasting beyond Hawaii—because that was the plan, right?
Well, it was until I slept with him last night, and now my brain is wondering if my vagina is getting a little too attached to all of the orgasms he’s given me. Plus, having a warm body next to me last night wasn’t awful either.
“I’m not. I’m just saying…”
“Mom, I love you, but I really can’t talk about this right now. I have a meeting in ten minutes and I need to make sure I’m prepared.”
“Okay, okay. I’ll book your breakfast delivery time, but please talk to Damien about walking with you.” And then she squeals. “I am just so excited to see you next week, honey. This trip is going to be so much fun, especially now that I know you have someone to share it with.”
Sighing, I stare out the window when I realize I feel the same way. It is kind of nice knowing I’ll have someone else to share in my misery and perhaps enjoy the scenery and some relaxation with too.
You’re getting too attached, Charlotte. Your vagina is drunk on Damien’s dick. Remember, he’s just scratching a physical itch you had. You’re getting in too deep. But then again, you both confessed that you like each other last night, so what does that mean in regards to this situation now?
“We’re looking forward to it. I’ll talk to you soon, Mom.”
“Love you, Charlotte. And make sure you increase your cardio for the next week,” she says before hanging up.
Extra cardio, huh? I think I can figure out a way to make that happen.
After a long day at the office—where it was difficult to concentrate because I kept reliving every moment from last night—five o’clock finally comes around, and my entire body is buzzing with the thought of seeing Damien again.
I rush home, change my clothes, restyle my hair, and start a load of laundry before he’s hitting the buzzer for my apartment. When I open the door to see him standing there in a plain black t-shirt, grey shorts, and a megawatt smile on his face, my heart does backflips.
“Hey.”
“Hi,” he replies before stepping through my door, closing it after him, and then spinning me around so my back lands up against it. Before I can get a word in, his lips are on mine and my body ignites once more for this man.
Our hands roam over one another, grasping for leverage as our mouths say the words we don’t have to—I missed you today.
Breathlessly, we part, and I peer up into his light blue eyes. “Well, that was quite the hello.”
“I’ve been thinking about that all day.”
“Do you wanna just stay in tonight?” I ask as I cup his dick through his shorts, reveling in how hard he already is and how I can almost feel him inside of me again just standing here.
He groans and then weaves his fingers through the hand I was just touching him with. “Don’t tempt me. Believe me, we will be fucking later, but tonight I want to take you somewhere, and I think you’ll love it.”
“Really?”
He reaches for my door, opening it and then leading me through as I grab my purse from the table by the door. “I know it.” And with a cocky grin, he takes my hand in his as I follow him out of my building and to his car, eager to see how well Damien thinks he knows me—because I’m beginning to realize that I never really knew him at all.
We drive for about fifteen minutes until we pull up to a brick building that has a sign on the front that says, “The York”.
“What is this place?”
Damien parks the car and turns to face me in his seat. “It’s a craft brewery and restaurant, and tonight, they’re hosting a trivia night in the private event space in the back.”
“A trivia night?”
“Yup. And we’re gonna win.” Opening his door, he rounds the hood of his car and then opens my door for me.
Taking his hand, I let him help me up. “You seem awfully confident about that.”
Damien shuts my door, locks the car, and then leads me toward the front door of the building. “I am. You and I are two of the most competitive people I know, Char. We have to be unbeatable as a team.”
I laugh at his thinking. “Just because we’re competitive, doesn’t mean we’re going to know the answers to all of these questions, Damien. And I’m pretty sure they make you hand over your phones for things like this so you can’t Google answers.”
“Well, we’re definitely not going to win with an attitude like that, sweet pea. Now, turn on your positive thinking, and let’s go win some prizes.”
When we enter the restaurant, my eyes drift over the space. Exposed brick walls covered in chalkboards displaying the beers on tap catch my eye first, and then I turn to my right and see a bar with glass shelves covered in bottles of liquor and televisions hanging above the mirror behind the alcohol. Dark leather booths and chairs line the walls, and matching stools perch under the expansive bar.
“This way,” Damien says, leading me toward the back of the building where I see another chalkboard sign outside of an open doorway that says Trivia Night in hot pink writing.
I take a deep breath as Damien smiles back at me over his shoulder and squeezes my hand in his. Guess it’s time to see if the person I’ve always competed against is a better teammate than an opponent.
* * *