Page 13 of Wrong Place, Wright Time
“Correct,” I say. “Although you’ll never catch me saying no to a nice apricot danish with just the right amount of custard and almond flakes on it.”
“That’s very specific,” he says as he drops his empty coffee cup in the trash. “You see somewhere selling them?”
“Sure do. That little place over there. Handcraft. I like to stop for breakfast here when I’m avoiding going into the office.”
“You do that a lot?” We continue talking as we cross the road and head for the busy café.
“Not really. Just when I’ve been working a lot of late nights and I just really want the chance to spend some time outside the same four walls. I didn’t inherit my father’s workaholic tendencies.”
“You don’t talk about him much.”
“That’s because there isn’t much to say. He wanted his legacy to be his son’s, and Ash didn’t want that, so it fell to me. And try as I might, I don’t think I could ever measure up.”
“Is that something he said to you?”
We step inside and join the line. “No in so many words. But it doesn’t take a genius to work out when your voice isn’t worth much. It’s why I’m in the PR department instead of wheeling and dealing with my cousins, father and uncles upstairs. As a member of the board, I have to sign off on a lot of things, but I’m never included in the decision making process.”
“That seems a little unfair. Why do you continue working there if they treat you that way?”
I shrug. “Because it’s what I know. Because I get paid way more than my job is worth. Because it’s expected…”
“You know, I didn’t grow up with a lot of expectation,” he says, stepping forward as we get closer to the front of the line. “Keeping out of trouble was probably the biggest hope my mother had for me. So the pressure I put on myself to achieve was all my own. So, as my next getting to know you question, what would you have studied if you were to choose your path?”
We stop when we get to the front of the line and Banks orders two apricot danishes. But I tap my card before he can, insisting I pay. Then we leave the café with danishes in hands, smiles on our faces and a question still unanswered.
“Art,” I say just before I bite into the sweet flaky pastry.
Banks looks at me in surprise. “Art?”
“Yeah. I have a real thing for giant puzzles that depict beautiful paintings. I’d love to be an artist and create something to put on them. But it doesn’t even have to be art on puzzles. It could be art on the cover of notebooks, gift cards…even placemats. The possibilities are endless. And I think it would just be a really nice existence, you know? Sitting in a room with dappled sunlight coming in through the curtain, surrounded by paints and canvases. I could be happy like that.” I take a massive bite of my danish and savor the sweetness along with the cozy feeling my words just gave me.
I’m so caught up in my own fantasy that I don’t realize Banks still hasn’t said anything. But when I look at him to make sure he didn’t keel over from being bored to death, I find him looking right back at me with a bemused smile. “Then why don’t you do that?”
I almost choke on a pastry flake. “Quit my job and become an artist?” I shake my head. “That isn’t…No. I can’t. Especially not when I know that if I just hang in there a little longer, I’ll be in the driver’s seat of my career again. Dad is turning eighty soon, and his brothers—my uncles—are talking more and more about finally handing the company over to the next generation of Wrights. If I walk away now, I miss out on being the first woman with a controlling interest in Wright Media. I want to be part of the change instead of just blindly allowing the old ways to continue because I couldn't hack it anymore.”
Banks stops walking in the middle of the busy sidewalk and catches me by the arm so I stop alongside him. Then he just places his hands on either side of my face and leans in to kiss me. I’m caught between surprise and acceptance as the sweet honey and butteriness of the danishes we just ate fill my senses completely as his tongue meets mine and moves in a soft caress. I can’t help but let him completely take over as the world falls away around us. The hustle and bustle of the city disappears along with the jostling of pedestrians who are forced to walk around us, and all there is is us. His mouth on mine. His tongue gliding next to mine. His scent. His heat.How have I managed to make it an entire month without falling into him again?
“That wasn’t very friendly,” I whisper, almost completely out of breath as we pull apart and the city bursts back into my periphery again.
Banks smiles. “It wasn’t meant to be.”
I suck in a sharp intake of breath, knocked off balance as he slides one hand down to mine and entwines our fingers, starting to walk again like stopping me and kissing me during a conversation is commonplace for us.
“Wh-why did you do that?” I ask, stupidly just walking along holding hands with him.
“Because you have more substance than any woman I’ve ever known before and am likely to know going forward. I also did it because I don’t just want to be your friend anymore.” We stop in front of my building and he releases my hand, again turning to face me. “Have dinner with me.”
I press my lips together and look up into his dark and inviting eyes. During these morning walks, I’ve come to really enjoy his company. But compared to the passion of that first night we spent together, this is all very benign. I like benign. Banks strikes me as a man who enjoys a little pizazz. Most men in suit vests and tailored shirts do. “I’m not an exciting person, Banks. I don’t club. I don’t even travel much. I’m just…I’m me.”
“You seem plenty exciting to me.”
“No. I’m serious here. When I said I like puzzles, I genuinely meant that that’s like, one of my favorite things to do.”
“OK,” he says, completely nonplussed. “Then let’s do a puzzle together. I’ll bring the Chinese takeout.”
Pulling my lips between my teeth, I try to swallow down the nervous feeling in my belly and force back the walls of protection in my mind that are acting like a little angel sitting on my shoulder reminding me of all the ways I’ve been hurt by charming men before.
“I don’t know,” I say, a memory of puzzle pieces flying across the room and hitting the wall surfacing despite my warring to hold it back.
