I helped myself to a plate from the cabinet and another beer from the fridge before sliding some pizza slices onto the plate and taking my usual spot at the island. A television that had been previously hidden behind a cabinet door played the news at a low volume.
After downing my first slice of pizza and half the beer, I decided to broach one of the topics that had low-key been stressing me out. “Do you think we should get to know each other a little bit? For the boyfriend thing?”
Grey didn’t look away from his laptop. “I already studied everything there is to know about you.”
I let out a laugh before taking another sip of beer. “No, really. I mean we should share some basics in case anyone asks questions.”
He turned to face me. “I know what you mean, and I was serious. I already did my share of research. Ask me anything pertaining to Ellison Gareth York, date of birth—”
I stopped him. “I already know my birthday, and so does anyone who’s ever seen my driver’s license. How do I take my coffee?”
“You claim to prefer a salted caramel mocha, but you never order one. You actually drink regular coffee with plenty of cream and too much sugar. Next.”
Okay, that had been an easy one since we’d been together in the office all week. “What did I want to be when I grew up?”
He clearly didn’t know the answer, but he took a moment to study me. “When? Before or after college?”
“Before,” I said, since the last thing I wanted to do was talk about why my dreams had changed after college.
“Before college, you were still daddy’s boy. You would probably have assumed you’d go to law school like daddy wanted, but your little act of defiance would have been legal aid or public defender of some kind.”
“Wrong,” I said, lying through my teeth. “Ballerina. Next.”
He laughed, and I wanted to throw myself a party to celebrate the gorgeous look on his face.
“What’s the question?” he asked.
“Who’s my best friend?”
“Your sister.”
I swallowed. “Lucky guess. What’s my favorite kind of music?”
“You don’t really have one, and if you do, it’s instrumental. You prefer silence.”
I stared at him. “How the hell would you know that?”
“I’m not telling you all of my secrets. Why do you think I had them turn off the music at Neiman’s?”
Fucking hell, I was going to fall in love with the man if he didn’t shut his face.
“Okay, you know everything,” I said, desperate to change the subject. “But I don’t know shit.”
“I like my coffee black,” he said before turning back to his computer.
“No you don’t. You like plain coffee, but you get cranky if it doesn’t have at least some cream and sugar. You aren’t picky about how much of either one.”
He grunted. “I wanted to be a fireman when I graduated high school.”
“Bullshit. You wanted to be a venture capitalist or at the very least, an investment banker.”
He tapped a few keys on the keyboard. “I grew up the poor son of a sharecropper.”
“Be serious.”
He glanced over at me and sighed. “I never knew my father. My mother told me she didn’t know who it was, but I found out later she knew exactly who it was, but he’d gone to prison before she discovered she was pregnant. He got out three years ago. I hope to god he never finds out she had his baby and that baby grew up to earn more money in a day than he’ll probably ever see or steal in his lifetime.”
I stared at him. “Okay… I didn’t know that, but I’m hoping that subject doesn’t come up at the croquet match,” I teased gently.
The quirk of his lip settled me a little. “Let’s hope. What kind of topics might come up at the croquet match?”
“Do you lean more toward momentum trading or fundamental trading? Where is your primary vacation property located? Which clubs do you belong to? Where do you hold your money offshore?”
“When you have as much money as I do, you do momentum, fundamental, swing, scalping, and technical trading,” he said with a wink. “My primary vacation property is the chair in front of the next potential client. I belong to the Yale Club here in the city, Augusta National Golf Club in Georgia, Baltustrol Golf Club in New Jersey, and I might still be a member of Sam’s Club, but only because I mistook it for a gay nightclub on a business trip once and accidentally signed up for bulk discounts on paper products. And, finally, I hold no money offshore. As far as you know.”
He lifted that damned eyebrow at me, only this time it was sassy instead of judgy. I bit my lip against a laugh.
“I once went into the army on a drunken dare,” I admitted. “Thankfully it was the Salvation Army, and I got an incredible deal on a Calphalon frying pan while I was in there. I couldn’t believe someone had let that bad boy go. I still have it.”
“And what’s the official story of how we met?” Grey asked, lowering my giddy scale into the negative.
I stared down at my remaining half slice of pizza. “I saw you in Calculus class. Couldn’t keep my eyes off you. You had this…” I glanced down out of the corner of my eye to his bare ankle. “Little starfish-shaped scar on your calf. At first, I thought I was just bored in class and fascinated by how someone would get a scar in that shape. But then I realized I wasn’t focusing on the scar so much as the shape of your leg… the shifting of your muscles… the way the hair covered your skin. I followed your leg up to the edge of your shorts and wished I could see higher.” I swallowed. “I never would have gotten up the nerve to talk to you, but then one day, you asked to borrow my calculator.”
“I didn’t have one,” he admitted in a rough voice. “Those fuckers were like eighty bucks.”
I still couldn’t look at him. “And then… I guess… let’s say we ran into each other on the golf course at Baltusrol back in the spring. You were golfing with clients, and I was at my cousin’s wedding. Our conversation was fucking awkward as hell, but you graciously allowed me to apologize for everything that had happened back… you know. That night.”
“You looked damned good in that paisley bow tie and douchey seersucker suit,” Grey added with a slight grin.
“Hey, it was a linen suit, asshole. And it was an ascot, not a bow tie.”
His mouth dropped open until he realized I’d pulled his leg. “Fuck you,” he said.
“We talked longer than we realized, and when your client came looking for you, you gave me your business card and mumbled something about…”
“Wanting to touch base with you back in the city to ask you a legal question about a VC contract,” Grey added helpfully.
I nodded. “So we arranged a business lunch, but we spent more time talking about…”
“Yankees versus Mets.”
“Yes. Than the legal issue. You agreed the Mets were the devilspawn, and we talked about various players and random other topics until we realized several hours had passed.”
I watched Grey think through the next part. “You were relaxed and easy to talk to,” he said. “I was surprised. I decided I wanted to see you again, but I convinced myself it was only to get legal advice.”