20.
ELIZABETH
Sweet baby Jesus. If I’d known that telling Daniel that story would get me rewarded so sweetly, I might have shared it with him the night we first met.
No, I wouldn’t have.
“Are you okay?” I asked.
I couldn’t pretend not to notice the way his chest was inflating and deflating quicker than normal and that his jaw had been clenched since he sat back down on his side of the table.
“Me? I’m fine. What about you? You’ve been living with that shit in your head for how many years?” His tone was angry as he reached for the bread that had arrived shortly after the wine.
“Eight. Are you mad at me?”
His eyes widened in surprise. “At you? Why would I be mad at you?” His teeth ripped through a piece of the bread. “I’m mad at the dickhead who said that to you, the guy who put that in your head and allowed you to believe it.”
“So, you don’t think it’s true? Guys don’t really want that?”
It would take a lot more than one conversation to erase eight years of being brainwashed.
His light eyes met mine as he spoke, “Some guys want that, yes, but not me.”
“Why not you?”
“Because I want you.”
I huffed out a quick laugh. “Be serious.”
“I am.”
“Then, tell me why.”
“It doesn’t appeal to me. Listen, Elizabeth, some guys want their wives to stay at home, take care of the kids, have dinner ready every night, and basically, provide for their families.”
I nodded my head, familiar with the wives of the executives at my office. Almost all of them were stay-at-home moms. That was a fact that had only fueled my belief that Ben was right.
“I’ve never wanted that,” he continued.
I felt almost blessed with the truths he was about to share with me.
“That’s why I think it’s been so hard for me to find someone. I don’t want the woman who has no ambitions of her own. I don’t mind taking care of and providing for my family, but there’s something innately attractive about a woman who makes shit happen.”
His eyes closed for a moment before reopening. “You know, maybe it was because my mom stayed home while my dad worked. Sure, she volunteered at my school, and she was on quite a few charitable committees, but none of that shit paid her any money. While she was content and felt accomplished for a bit, she eventually wanted more—something for herself, something she earned. You know what I mean?”
I hummed out a yes in understanding.
“But she was over forty by then, and I watched as she searched to find her place in a world that wasn’t made for a woman with no experience in the workforce. She eventually gave up her search and continued doing what she had always done, but I could tell she wasn’t really happy. So, I offered her a job.”
A smile spread across my face. “You did? Doing what?”
I finished off my glass of wine, and he filled it up.
“I started her off as the receptionist in my first company, but that didn’t really work out well. To be honest, my mom is a bit of a snob. She answered all the phones, and she would get a lot of calls, way more than I’d ever realized, asking for charitable contributions. So, she convinced me that I needed someone to oversee the charities I donated to, and she helped me start up my own organization. It was the perfect fit.”
“That’s fantastic. I bet she loves handling that stuff for you.”
“She does. Plus, she likes feeling like she can still tell me what to do sometimes, and I humor her.”
Heather appeared with our food. It smelled amazing, but I wanted her to leave because this conversation was doing more for me personally than anything had in years.
When our waitress disappeared, I started right where we’d left off. “You’re a good son.”
“Even if that didn’t happen with my mom, I don’t think I could be happy with someone who didn’t want to have her own thing.” He took a man-sized bite of pasta.
“Really?” I felt my expression soften as my heart started to lighten its load.
“Oh God, this is really good.” He stabbed at his plate with his fork before directing it toward me.
I leaned forward, taking the pasta in my mouth, and I moaned. “Holy smokes. Delicious.”
He raised his eyebrows in response and continued, “I respect ambition, Elizabeth—not that I don’t respect women who want to stay at home with their families because I do. That’s hard work, and I’m not trying to diminish that at all,” he emphasized. “But when it comes to me and the qualities that I’m attracted to, I look for that inner drive in a woman.”
His hand balled into a fist, and he placed it over his heart. “When I look at you, I see that fire. Maybe I respect it so much just because I can relate to it. I don’t know, but I do know that I want someone who gets what I’m going through every day. I want someone who knows how to build me up and make me a better man. Because that’s exactly what I want to do for her.”
My heart swelled inside my chest with his confession. I nodded my head so vigorously along with everything he said that I was certain I looked like a bobblehead doll. My eyes started to water.
“Oh, jeez, babe. Don’t cry.”
I waved him away. “I’m fine really. That’s just the most…” I paused as I wiped away the few tears that had escaped. “You’re amazing. I would never have thought that you would be like this.”
“Because you’re ambitious and judgy,” he teased.
“Only because you’re arrogant and annoying.”
“Touché,” he said with a cocky smirk. “I knew I’d have you, Elizabeth. I just didn’t know it would be so soon.”
I admitted, “Me either.”
“To which part?” He cocked his head to the side, and his hair moved slightly with it.
“I didn’t think you’d get to me this quickly.”
“But you knew I’d eventually get to you?”
“Of course I fucking knew.”
“No one hotter…no one has ever been hotter than you are right now.”
“I kind of want to climb over this table and have my way with you.” I toyed with him, taking our flirtation to the next level.
He looked all around him before yelling, “Check, please!”
“I was kidding!” I swatted at his arm. I was so not kidding.