Page 26 of Resist

“And only under certain conditions,” Foxy adds over another bite of her salad.

“Well.” He sighs. “Now I have even more questions.” He shakes his head. “Thank you for sharing, Cecelia. I appreciate you letting me in a little.” He sounds so formal, stiff, and his mouth purses like he wants to ask more. But his eyes seem sosincere that I’ve given him a morsel of information about myself, it’s tempting to give him more.

I mean, we talked kink last night at the bar. Isn’t that way more intimate a conversation than knowing that someone doesn’t like egg yolks?

“I’ll eat them scrambled, or in an omelet, or in cake, obviously.”

“Obviously.” He’s still trying not to laugh.

“But I’ll cut them out of a fried egg, a boiled egg, and if you give me a poached egg, I might cry.”

“Can confirm.” Phoenix waves her fork again.

Sterling pauses as though he’s thinking of saying something else but decides not to. “Thank you for sharing, I appreciate it. Eggs aren’t all they’re cracked up to be.”

Phoenix snorts, I groan.

“What? Can’t take a yolk?” He wiggles his eyebrows. “They’re hard to beat.”

Phoenix coughs around a piece of lettuce, her eyes watering as I shake my head. “You’re insufferable.”

He shrugs. “Omelet that slide. But only because I can tell you’re laughing on the inside.” He takes a few steps back. “See you ‘round, ladies.”

I’m usually not a fan of the wordladies.From anyone else that could come off icky, suggestive, patronizing, but the way he says it... I don’t know, I kind of like it.

I give him a little flick-of-my-wrist wave goodbye. “Bye Sterling.”

His stare rests a long moment on my lips before he turns and walks away. Of course I watch his ass retreat from me, because when a fine, denim-clad ass is right there for you to stare at, it would be rude not to.

Plus, if he didn’t want me to stare, he’d have gone the other direction.

He wanted me to look at his booty.

So I am. And my bestie is watching me, watching him.

“Have you heard from Maddie?” I try to distract her.

“No.” Phoenix’s voice is so sharp it brings my attention off the cute butt and to my friend. “I’m not letting you distract me yet again from the fact that you’re goo-goo over Sterling fucking Montgomery by talking about our friend.”

I huff out a sigh. “I wasn’t trying to do that. I’m worried about her.”

The third member of our tiny, little girl gang is Madeline. Her grandmother is sick in Iowa so she’s been spending more and more time there trying to help her prepare for the end of her life, I guess. She’s turned down all our help, but one of these days Phoenix and I will just drive down there and inflict hugs on her. It’s kind of what we do.

Not this weekend. We have a couple of new hires on Monday morning, and according to the board I should probably be there to meet them, and get my feet wet. They seem more convinced than I am that I’ll be married in short order, but the board also doesn’t know that I dumped Paul before Dad died.

Not only that, but when his will was read and his wishes about me marrying before I officially take over the publishing house were made clear, I did try to call him again.

I’m not ashamed to admit that I momentarily considered going back to my ex-boyfriend, accepting one of his many proposals, and living in a completely vanilla, loveless, dull marriage for the sake of a business that’s been in my family for years.

Except—and this one’s a doozy—ex-boyfriend, Mr. “I love you so much and can’t live without you, you’re my whole world and the apple of my eye,” had already moved on to the next apple of his eye and is already engaged, too.

He wasn’t even important to my story. A fact I’m notproud of, but sometimes it’s easier to simply go-with-the-flow than to take a stand and put yourself first.

It’s been a short matter of weeks since Dad died. Fucking weeks. Maybe two months or so since I ended it with Paul. And he has already moved on to greener pastures? I mean, fair fucking play to him, I guess. Says more about me that I contemplated, even for a hot minute, going back to him more to satisfy my dead father’s wishes than any other reason.

No rest for the wicked, or weary, or horny, whatever the saying is.

I don’t quite have the same faith in finding a replacement husband for Paul as the board seems to. I heave out a sigh. It’s not a normal requirement for inheritance by any means, and it’s the most patriarchal bullshit I’ve ever smelled.

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