Page 49 of His Good Girl

“It’s not my only motive.”

She looked surprised by herself. A little color came into her face, and she reached for her water with too much concentration.

There it was again.

The awareness.

What I was feeling was mutual, perhaps. Or perhaps I was reading what I wanted into every blush and pause becausewanting had made me vain. Either way, the responsible course was clear and I let the moment pass.

“Then I’ll make sure dessert is worth your continued tolerance,” I said.

Avery exhaled, and the smile returned, but softer at the edges. “You’re very generous with dessert for someone who made me discuss my career failures before lunch.”

“It builds character.”

“I have enough character.”

“No one who says that does.”

She narrowed her eyes at me, and I felt the intoxicatingly dangerous pleasure of being challenged by her.

The rest of the dinner continued well enough that I almost wished it had gone badly. If she had been awkward, childish, entitled, or overly grateful, I could have put her back into a safe category and left her there, but she was none of those things. She was nervous, yes, but not weak. Young, but not foolish. She had a self-protective streak I would have to watch in the office, a habit of translating hurt into humor, and a pride that could either ruin her or save her depending on what she did with it.

She was also, God help me, so easy to talk to.

By the time the waiter brought dessert menus, I had learned enough to know the struggle would not lessen with proximity. It would worsen. Tomorrow she would be in my building and even on my floor sometimes, as well as in meetings with me, eventually. I would see her in the mornings and in the afternoons. I would hear her laugh at something Benjamin said and wonder whether she saved that softer smile for everyone oronly for me. I would watch her learn. I would watch her either rise to the challenge or fold under it, and if she rose, wanting her would become harder, not easier, because competence and excellence had always been the most dangerous kind of beauty.

I looked across the table at her as she pretended to study the dessert menu while clearly calculating whether ordering something would seem greedy.

“Get the chocolate tart,” I urged.

Her eyes lifted. “Bossy.”

“Experienced.”

“I thought tonight wasn’t boss-and-employee.”

“It isn’t.”

“Then you can’t boss me.”

I leaned back, letting a smile touch only the corner of my mouth. “No?”

She blushed.

There was a brief, charged silence, and that charge struck me lower down than I should have allowed.

Then I looked away first, because I was the older man, the one with power, the one who knew better. The one who had invited her to dinner and therefore bore the responsibility for every line between us whether avoided, toed, or crossed.

“Order whatever you like,” I corrected myself in a gentler tone.

Avery was quiet for a second. Then she said, “I’ll get the chocolate tart.”

I nodded once and closed my menu.

Good girl, my treacherous mind supplied.

I did not say it.