Page 36 of The Billionaire's Second Chance
“So that’s it,”I concluded, my pencil hovering over my notepad, Charlie’s eyes fixed firmly on his laptop screen as he sat across the table from me. Every once in a while, my foot would brush his calf, and I’d startle. “Decor is set, bartending is set; musicians, set; auction items, mostly set, we’ll see how the Aspen trip shakes out… if it doesn’t work, we don’t need it… soundsystem, set; RSVPs, set; location, set–”
“The New York Public Library,” Charlie said, raising his eyebrows at me over the top edge of his laptop. “The place one Samantha Scott finds…irresistible.”
I pursed my lips. “I do not.”
“Oh?” he said, smirking, half-closing his laptop and leaning over it. The toe of my high heel bumped his calf again, and I was too distracted by his smug expression to move it away. “If it’s not the venue, it must be the man, then.” My face warmed. “Ah. There she is: Sami.”
I looked away. “I don’t know what you mean.”
He laughed softly, but didn’t push it, just nodded. “That’s fine.” He righted his screen, returning to our task, but he didn’t move his leg. The warmth of his calf through the leather of my shoe was distracting. I could feel him looking at me, the weight of his gaze on the top of my bent head. “Yes?”
“Catering…” I said, glancing up from my notebook at him. Was that a smile at the corner of his mouth? I swallowed. “Catering is set.” I forced myself to look up. To meet his eyes. But I couldn’t stop my next words from escaping. “Tally told me you were flirting with Flora’s sister at the wedding,” I blurted out. “The caterer. Hazel.”Ourcaterer, the one we’d booked for the gala. Onhisrecommendation. I swallowed back the unfamiliar flavor of uncertainty.
“Was I?” he said. “I don’t know when I would have had time to do that.”
“That’s what I thought,” I said. “But you’re very efficient, when you want to be. Just look at this,” I said, gesturing between us.
“WhenIwant to be?” he asked. “Me? You think I’m the problem here?” Three months ago, he would have been serious. Tonight? That wasdefinitelya smile teasing his lips.
“You know what I mean,” I said, and rolled my eyes.
“That’s right, I think I do, Samantha.” His focus narrowed, and I couldn’t help the flutter in my chest. The warmth in my stomach. “Accusing me of flirting withmy best friend’s wife’s sister–I mean, really, Sami.Flora’s sister. Heryoungersister, at that.”
It wouldn’t be the first time, I thought. I was his friend’s younger sister when he slept with me. Was he thinking the same thing? I thought, perhaps, that he was, the way his smile turned strange for a moment. Then his grin was back, as if it had never left. “You’re jealous.”
I leaned forward. “No, I’m not,” I said. “I’m greedy.”
He didn’t laugh. “You already told me,” he said, his voice dropping lower. Charlie’s shoulder dipped down, and suddenly, I felt a firm hand wrap around my ankle, grabbing it tightly, holding it still. “You have all those manuscripts, but you still want to have me. A real-life billionaire, whenever you want, wherever you want, is that right, Samantha?”
I nodded slowly. Was it my pulse or his that beat in the soft hollow of my ankle?
“And how do I compare?” he murmured. “You spend all day reading about falling in love with the perfect man,” he said, and now I was sure it was my pulse that beat so wildly, because it had missed a beat hearing that word from Charlie’s lips, even in jest. “So tell me. Do you prefer your men between the pages? Or between the sheets?” His tongue darted out over his lower lip, wetting it, and I leaned in closer without meaning to, the table between us far too wide. My blood felt sticky and slow, my heart beating in double time to compensate.
“Ahem.”
I jumped, my heart jackrabbiting against my ribcage, my eyes wide. I glanced at the door to see an older man standing there. He wore a navy coverall and held the handle of a wide dust mop. The janitor.
“Excuse me, miss,” he said in a low voice, tipping his head down at me. I checked my watch. Eight o’clock. “Time to lock up.”
“I’m so sorry,” I hurried to apologize, sliding my planner into my work bag haphazardly. Next to me, Charlie had pulled his backpack onto his lap and was shoving his laptop inside. “We didn’t–”
“Lost track of time,” he said. “I understand.”
I stood, checking around myself self-consciously for loose papers or pens or… anything that wasn’t the janitor’s face.
“Got everything?” Charlie asked quietly, pushing his chair under the table neatly. I nodded, doing the same, following him past the janitor and into the hallway. “Sorry, sir,” Charlie said as we were escorted to the front of the building. He grinned. “I didn’t mean for you to have to sweep us out, too.”
The janitor just nodded. “I understand,” he said. It was dark, the lights turned down low, and the scent of cleaning products was sharp in the air. My heels clicked.
“Thank you,” I said as he held the front door of the school open for me. He nodded again. “Sorry for the inconvenience.”
“‘Night, miss, son,” he said, pulling the door closed behind us, looping the thick chain around the door’s handles and locking the padlock. He slipped the key into his pocket.
“‘Son,’” Charlie said as the man walked off around the side of the stone school building, huffing out a laugh. “It’s been a while since I’ve heard that.”
“Your grandfather didn’t call you son?” I asked, smiling ruefully. The Martin family patriarch had died years ago, but his memory loomed large for everyone in our circle.
Charlie chuckled softly again. “No.” He was quiet for a while, and I listened to the comforting sound of New York City at night: the passing cars, the taxis beeping, the footsteps and conversations of strangers. Somewhere, faintly, music was playing. As a child, it had always taken me several nights of restless sleep to acclimate myself to the absence of this soundtrack when I used go to with my family to the Hamptons in the summer. “My dad did though.”
