But I was here now, so there was no use complaining about it. Instead, I just shrugged at her. “My personal life will remain personal, I’m sorry to say.”
Erica sighed and put a hand over her heart. “No hope for any of us, ladies,” she said to the audience, and there was plenty of applause. Then, she grinned wickedly at me. “But we will see you at the opening of Shade, won’t we? The dance floors have been so empty without you lately.”
I smiled at her, trying to look like I was aggrieved, just as much as she was. “It’s terrible,” I told her. “But being a public figure has been all consuming in the past few years. Or really, ever since I took over the company from my father. It’s been impossible to strike a healthy balance. But I want that now.”
Erica’s eyebrows shot up toward her hairline. “A balance between work and your personal life?” she asked, and even I could tell how agitated she sounded. She looked out at the audience again, as though trying to make it a joke that she shared with them. “But where does that leave the rest of us?”
I pasted on a fake smile to go with the fake response I’d made up before she had ever asked the question. “I’m still waiting to see where I end up with all of it,” I told her. “I’ll let you know when I know.”
I could read the disappointment clear in her face. Of course, she still thought that she was going to get to go home with me at the end of the interview. That was there in her eyes as well. They were all the same, all the people who interviewed me. But she wanted just what Ivy had wanted. She wanted to date me, to take a dozen pictures with me and post them all over her social media accounts. She wanted the whole ten yards.
My pronouncement that I was going to be even more private in future called all of that into question for her. But she was sure that she would prevail. That I would find some reason to give her what she wanted.
I hated her certainty. I wished I could just tell her the truth about all of it, that I had absolutely no interest in her that way and that I never would.
That I was with someone special now.
To be honest, though, things between me and Abby had been pretty difficult over the past couple of weeks. We?
?d had a long and serious talk after we had slept together the second time. We both doubted our ability to keep away from the other. But at the same time, we were working together every single day, along with some of the most important people who backed the company. I had to check myself in every last one of our meetings; it wasn’t like I could reach for her or tell everyone how much faith I put in her judgment of our latest projects.
But at the same time, those feelings swelled inside of me every time I looked over at her. I couldn’t imagine not working next to her anymore, but at the same time, I knew that working next to her just had so many more complications than I ever could have foreseen.
Not least of which because she didn’t want anyone in the press to even know that she was still working for me, let alone believe that we might possibly still be dating each other.
It had forced me to be creative on the rare occasions that I had taken her out. But it had also meant that more often than not, we ended up going to my place rather than going out. I chafed against that. I wanted to take her out on the town, show her off on my arm. I at least wanted to go out and get drinks with her and Austin again.
But I knew that it wasn’t safe to do that. Get her in another media storm, and she would never come back to me for a third time. Even if there was nothing I could do about any of it.
Things were difficult. But I wanted to explore this relationship with her. See how things went between us. And if that meant that I needed to be careful and do stupid things like this interview I hated, then so be it. I would do it. Whatever it took to keep Abby in my life.
Because I also couldn’t help fearing that if I screwed things up with her again, she wouldn’t be coming back to work for me next time.
Fortunately, before I could let that melancholy affect the interview, our time slot was over and Erica was waving a cheerful goodbye to her audience, saying something inane about how we’d just have to see how things played out with this new work-life balance of mine. She said it like she thought she could change my mind on it. I hightailed it out of there the moment I was cleared by the cameramen.
I hustled back to my dressing room before she could catch up to me, shutting the door behind myself and locking it. I knew that there was no way that she could corner me now, not if I hurried out of there. It would be beneath her for her to wait outside for me to change and wash off the stage makeup, but at the same time, she wasn’t going to hurry through her own shower and changing procedure for someone like me.
They were all the same, all these women who interviewed me.
I called Abby as I was on my way out to the parking lot. “Hey,” I said, noticing myself how soft my voice got as I chatted with her. “I’m on my way to pick you up.”
I couldn’t help feeling excited as I headed over there, behind the wheel of one of my luxury sports cars. It was going to be a good weekend, I was sure. The interview was over, and the only thing left in my plans was time with my favorite woman, away from everyone else in the world.
I smiled to myself as I roared down the road away from the television studio.
Chapter 14
Abby
I SMILED TO MYSELF at the thought that Daniel was on his way over here already. I didn’t know exactly what he had planned, and I honestly just hoped that it wasn’t anything that was too...extravagant, maybe? I was still trying to get used to what it felt like to date someone who was not only so obviously rich and in the public eye, but someone who just wanted to spoil me so much.
Not that I’d never been on a nice date before, but in the couple of weeks since Daniel and I had decided that we had to figure out a way to make things work between the two of us, it felt like he was constantly trying to one-up himself as well as any other romantics that might be out there in the city.
It was cute, really, but it left me feeling like I owed him something, especially after our initial cooling-off period had been at my insistence, because I didn’t want the media to know anything about the two of us.
I was still trying my best to keep out of the public eye, as much as I could. To be honest, it was both easier and more difficult than I had expected it would be. Daniel did his best to keep our dates private, but I could also tell that he was getting a bit impatient with all of our dates ending up in his bed.
“You know, I exist outside the bedroom too,” he complained the last time we’d had sex together.