Despite all of my confused feelings for Oliver, I slept well that night. The next morning, I woke up early but well-rested and stretched hugely. Mm, I might stop by the bakery for a muffin on the way in to work . . . It wasn’t something that I did often, but I figured I deserved a reward for not having gone home with Oliver.

Except that no, I didn’t—there had never been a question of whether I would. I might be attracted to the guy, but there was no way.

I slipped out of bed and shook my head, determined not to start the day in a sour mood.

There was something flattering about being desired in that way by a man like Oliver, but we had nothing in common. Our worldviews were totally different; he was used to having the world just handed to him. Except for that little thing that Jeri had said about him building his business from nothing . . . He did seem very passionate about his work after all . . .

I pursed my lips and looked around my apartment, wondering if Oliver and I were really all that different. I didn’t live in a sleek penthouse with views of the city, but I had a nice place, all exposed brick with high, beamed ceilings. I had worked hard for it, and spent months working with a realtor as I searched for the perfect place. Still, the furniture, although warm and cozy, could have come from the same catalogue as the one Oliver’s interior decorator no doubt used.

I thought back to my parents and wondered suddenly if they would have been proud of the things I’d done with my life. I had been old enough when they died that I remembered what they’d been interested in, what they’d been like as people. But I had a hard time reconciling those memories with ideas of what they would have wanted for my future. I hadn’t been old enough to have been talking about colleges or careers or anything like that, not in any concrete sense. Back then, I’d still foolishly wanted to be an actress. I hadn’t realized that what I really wanted was to help people.

I did know, however, that my parents had always wanted me to have a family. Mom had teased me about boys every so often, but as I got into high school and didn’t show any interest in having a boyfriend, I’d noticed that her teasing became more . . . concerned, almost.

It was something that I was still struggling with, I supposed: balancing my personal life against my professional life. The past few years especially had been so devoid of romance.

Would I change things, if I had the power?

I sat back down on the edge of the bed, thinking that over. I wasn’t getting any younger. And there had been some great guys—guys who had been ready to settle down, tie the knot, have kids. I knew those were rare finds, but every time, as soon as things started to get serious . . .

Well, I’d gotten cold feet. I hadn’t been ready to settle down.

I snorted when I considered that I was thinking of settling down because of a date I’d been on with Oliver. Even if I went out on another date with him, it wasn’t like he and I were going to settle down. He wasn’t that kind of guy, and I guessed I wasn’t really that kind of girl.

And other than that, we were just too different.

“Your father and I were completely different people when we first met,” I suddenly remembered my mother saying. “He was just some loud American in Paris to drink wine, and I was a French woman.”

I smiled, remembering how proud she had been of that, being French. Then I shook my head and pushed myself to my feet, moving into the bathroom so that I could start getting ready for work. Just because they had managed to overcome their differences and start a wonderful relationship, it didn’t mean that Oliver and I would be able to do the same.

* * *

Much to my surprise, Jeri was already there when I got to work. I held up the bag from the bakery. “I brought you a muffin, but I didn’t have them heat it up because I didn’t expect you’d be here while it was still warm,” I told her apologetically.

Jeri waved that away and followed me into my office. “Well?” she asked.

“Well what?” I asked her, raising an eyebrow at her.

Jeri rolled her eyes. “You forget I have access to your personal calendar,” she reminded me, and it suddenly occurred to me that I should have used some sort of code for the previous night’s date. Not that it was any of her business either way.

I blushed brilliantly. “Jeri, my personal life is private,” I told her.

“Oh, come on,” Jeri scoffed. “You know it’s going to end up in the tabloids anyway. I’m surprised there aren’t a dozen blogs already posted about what the two of you got up to last night.”

“We didn’t get up to anything,” I snapped. I took a deep breath and let it out slowly, knowing that getting frustrated with her wasn’t going to get her out of my office any faster. And she was probably right: she’d find out all the details eventually anyway. I should just be grateful that she hadn’t tipped off the tabloids to follow me.

“It was fine,” I told her. “He picked me up at my apartment and we went to dinner. I had a risotto; he had fettuccine alfredo. We talked. Then I went home alone and went to bed.”

Jeri sighed and slumped down into the seat across from my desk. “Come on,” she repeated. “I want the details. I don’t usually get to live vicariously through you. What kind of car does he drive? What did you talk about? Who paid—did he offer, or did you split it? Did he kiss you goodnight?”

“None of that’s any of your business,” I told her. But I realized suddenly that I kind of wanted to talk about it, to dissect the whole night and try to sort out this mess of feelings that I had for this strange, charismatic man. I didn’t particularly want to talk about it with Jeri, of all people, but who else was I going to talk about it with? If my life had been lacking in romance lately, it had been equally lacking in friendships, unless you counted the hairdresser whom I saw every other month or the produce woman whom I chatted with once a week, whose name I couldn’t actually even remember.

I winced and then shrugged, deciding I might as well go for it. “He picked me up in a chauffeured car,” I admitted. Jeri sat back down—I hadn’t realized that she had already started to leave, clearly expecting that the conversation was over. I sighed and organized documents on my desk. “We talked about . . . all sorts of things, I guess. My work, his work—“

Jeri groaned. “Of course you spent the whole date with Oliver Lewin talking about work,” she said, rolling her eyes. “If I had been there . . .” She sighed.

“You have Jackson,” I pointed out, my tone a bit too sharp.

Jeri gave me a look. “Yes,” she agreed finally, getting to her feet and tossing back her hair. “I have Jackson.” With that, she stalked out of my office, and I slumped back in my seat, no closer to sorting out how I felt about the date.

I had to wonder what it would have been like, if our date had ended the same way that all of his other dates no doubt did. If we’d gone back to his apartment. If I’d let him kiss me and strip me down to nothing, both literally and figuratively. If I’d let him have me.

It wasn’t only a physical attraction that I felt for him, I suddenly realized. There was something inside me that was searching for a mental match too, someone who would keep me interested and maybe, somehow, pull me away from work sometimes.

But that was silly. I loved my job. Why would I want someone to pull me away from it?

It didn’t really matter either way, I finally decided. Given the way things had ended—fighting over the check and going home alone—I doubted Oliver would want to go out with me again, even if he had hinted that he might.

Where would I even take the great Oliver Lewin on a date, anyway? I didn’t have his connections; I couldn’t take him to one of the nicest restaurants in the city, unless he wanted to wait months and months for my reservation to get to the top of the list.

But then again, I wondered what Oliver would be like in a more relaxed setting anyway. What if I took him out on a classic date: dinner at a casual restaurant followed by a movie? Or . . . Suddenly, I thought of the perfect date, and I couldn’t help smiling. Either Oliver would be really uncomfortable or . . . we might just have a good time.

Not that it mattered—I wasn’t about to call him. He couldn’t possibly want to go out with me again, and I could just imagine how long it would be before I got the guts to ask someone else out on a date, even if it was Oliver Lewin, someone who by all rights should never have been interested in me in the first place.

I shook my head, put on some quiet music, and forced myself to focus on work.

I barely stopped for lunch, knowing that as soon as I broke my concentration, I would start thinking about him again. I didn’t give myself the opportunity to find out. Instead, I sent Jeri across the street to bring me a sandwich from my favorite deli—she grumbled something about slave labor, but I sweetly reminded her that if it were slave labor, I wouldn’t be paying her bills.

I had just finished my sandwich when there was a knock on the door. I looked up, expecting to see Jeri, maybe come to dump some work project on me in retaliation for using her like . . . well, like my assistant. Instead, it was a messenger from the same company as before.

This time, the man only held one single rose, but even that spoke volumes. I swallowed hard as I signed and then lifted the envelope with hands that were, I noticed distantly, shaking slightly.

“So stupid,” I muttered under my breath, opening my desk drawer and dropping the envelope inside, unopened. I stared at the rose for a long moment, trying to figure out what to do with it. I couldn’t just throw it away, I finally decided. Whatever my feelings for the man, the rose hadn’t done anything to offend me.

And I kind of liked getting to be the woman with flowers in her office for a change.

I tried to go back to work, but I found that I kept reading the same report on one of our projects, the same two lines—over and over and over again. Even once I noticed that, I couldn’t seem to make sense of the sentences that I was reading. They were as foreign as if they’d been written in a different language.

I looked up as Jeri entered without knocking. “Nice rose,” she said, smirking. “You know, I read in The Latest once that Oliver sends those to every girl that he hooks up with.”

“We didn’t ‘hook up,’” I said, my ears flaming.

“Sure,” Jeri said, giving me a knowing look.

“Jeri, was there something you wanted or did you just come in here to . . .” I trailed off, unable to think of a good word for what she was doing except ‘be a bitch.’ I wasn’t about to say that to one of my employees, though.

Jeri shrugged. “I just was going to offer to help you out with shopping, if you and Oliver are going to be a thing,” she said. “I know all the latest fashion trends, and you . . . Well, let’s just say that your style could get you put in the tabloids, but not for the reasons you might want.”

“Jeri, get out of my office,” I said, fighting the urge to actually throw something at the woman. I didn’t understand what her problem was. Well, I could tell that she was jealous, but she was with Jackson. Besides, she’d had her chance with Oliver, back at the party. Apparently he was more interested in me.

Or more interested in humiliating me, I thought worryingly.

I glanced back towards the rose and thought again about the envelope in my desk. When Jeri shut the door behind her, I crossed the office to lock it and then went back to my desk. Whatever was in that envelope, it wasn’t appropriate for work, but I wasn’t going to be able to be productive for the rest of the day until I read whatever it was.

I gave a guilty glance towards the door and then pulled out the envelope.

There was just one line on the card inside: The suspense is killing me—are you going to ask me out or not?

There was no question of who it was from, and I felt a little tingle go through my body. Lust, anticipation, nervousness—I had no way of knowing what it was. I bit my lower lip, remembering the date that I’d been thinking of earlier. No. If anything, this day proved unequivocally that I couldn’t get tangled up with Oliver. It was too distracting, and it was affecting my work.

Again, I had that stupid thought about a guy who could pull me away from work for a while. I thought of all the times people—my mother, my friends, my colleagues—had told me that I was too serious, that I needed to lighten up and have a little fun. Besides, the first date with Oliver hadn’t exactly been unpleasant. I could make the second one even more fun, I was sure.

I took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Then I called Oliver’s number for the second time.