I swallowed again. Be strong. Do not fall for this shit. I shook my head emphatically.
“You can’t say no, sweetheart,” he said softly. “Because I love you, and I’m not taking no for an answer.”
What? What did he say? What?
I shook my head again, only this time it was in a desperate attempt to keep my eyes from filling with tears. I would not get mushy and emotional in front of my colleagues.
“You don’t,” I croaked. “You can’t.”
He raised a hand to cup my cheek. I closed my eyes to savor the familiar warm caress before I realized what I was doing.
“I do. I will. Forever. I was wrong to leave. I was wrong to believe what your dad told me. And I was so very fucking wrong not to give you a chance to explain.”
I nodded. “Yeah,” I breathed. “You were. Asshole.”
He chuckled in that deep, vibrating voice that made my insides dance and twist for him. His smile dropped. “But I was scared. So scared of my feelings for you.”
I leaned down and rested my forehead against his. I just wanted to go home with him and fall asleep in his arms, take a time-out from hating him so I could love him for a little while.
“I hate you,” I said with all the love in my heart.
He cupped the back of my head. “I know, baby. And I deserve it. But I’m not going away this time. That’s how I realized I’d fucked up. You said you wouldn’t walk away. I should have believed you.”
I heard someone sniffing behind me and turned to see Nessa and one of my attorney friends both waving hands over their faces to fight back their own tears.
“Kiss him, you idiot,” Nessa said.
I turned back to Grey. His face was full of love. I couldn’t pretend he didn’t mean what he’d said, even though there were so many things left to say.
“Kiss him, you idiot,” Grey said softly. Even though he was smiling, I could still see the fear of rejection in his eyes.
I leaned forward and kissed him for several long moments, not noticing until I came up for air that everyone else had finally left the conference room to give us privacy.
“Did you get the building?” I asked. His face lit up, and he nodded.
“Yes, but I don’t want to move ahead on the project without your help. Hopefully, you can leave this place and come work with me. Unless you want to go back to Warrington.”
My excitement dropped several notches. “I can’t. I’m… contractually obligated to work for York Capital for five more years.”
His forehead crinkled as he moved back to sit in a chair he’d pulled in front of me. He clasped my hands in his. “Why?”
“It’s a long story,” I said, not wanting to get into it and risk upsetting him.
“Do you want to be here? I thought you didn’t want to be a lawyer anymore.”
“I don’t. But I signed a contract.”
“With York or with your dad, specifically?”
“With York. It’s an employment contract.”
Grey frowned again. “Then let yourself out of it.”
The man knew how contracts worked, so why was this so confusing. “I can’t.”
“But you own the company. You’re under contract with yourself.”
“No, my dad…” I saw the smile overtake Grey’s frown. I was missing something. “My dad owns York Capital.”
“Does he?” Grey asked. “Or does Warren York LLC own it?”
His hands tightened on mine, and he winked at me. “How much do you want to bet Warren York doesn’t actually own Warren York LLC?”
Oh my god.
“Who does?” I whispered, already guessing the answer.
“His son. If I recall correctly, the deal was getting York back in the family for legacy reasons. I saw no harm in saving everyone the paperwork by transferring it to the younger generation a little early, so I went ahead and passed it down to you. You know, for legacy reasons.”
I let out a laughing groan and tackled him, nearly tipping his chair over in the process. Grey’s arms came around me and held me tight while I kissed his face off.
“I love you too,” I confessed softly when we both finally stopped laughing.
“I know. I feel it. I’m only sorry it took me so long to believe in it.”
Grey kissed me again as tenderly as if I was his most precious treasure. I lost myself to his kisses as usual and didn’t pay any attention to the world around us. When we finally pulled back to take in a breath, I noticed Grey looking a little sheepish.
“What is it?” I asked.
He shifted over to reach for the strap of his messenger bag. “I dropped this when I came in, so I hope I didn’t screw things up.” He dragged the bag closer, and I moved my butt back into my own chair but stayed as close to him as I could.
He opened his bag and pulled out a brown paper bag with a familiar logo on it. Sunday Orchard. I opened it and peered inside to find half a dozen perfectly ripe Honeycrisp apples.
I looked up at him with way too much emotion pressing on my chest for a simple bag of apples. “This kind isn’t usually ready till late September,” I said softly.
“I know. Gigi said if I wanted to grovel, I needed to splurge on the good stuff. So I drove up to the best orchard in the area and begged the guy to work a miracle since I knew Honeycrisp was your favorite variety. He walked me out to the trees and spent an hour searching for a few that were good enough to pick.”
The man in front of me, who owned several multinational companies, a private jet, a penthouse on Fifth Avenue, and millions of dollars sitting idly in a “just in case” fund had bought me the one thing that cost very little but meant so much.
“How did you know Honeycrisp was my favorite kind?” I asked, even though I knew the answer already.
“Because you told me. And I always listen when you talk,” he said, leaning in to kiss the spot on my neck he seemed to like best. “Sometimes it just takes a minute for what you say to really sink in.”
I shuddered.
Here was a man who acted like a stoic, unfeeling bastard intent on conquering the corporate world one hostile takeover at a time, when in reality, he was the kind of man who paid attention to the people around him. He looked out for them, cared about them, and listened.
The men I’d grown up with were callous fools who used people and things, then discarded them. But Grey took things over so he could make them better. Make them stronger.
That’s what he’d done for me.
Grey Blackwood made sure I had running shoes when I wanted to move, extra food off his own plate when I wanted to eat, and strong arms around me when I needed reassurance. The boy who’d never quite fit in had grown into a man who’d cleared the obstacles from my path and taught me what love truly meant.
I’d spent the last fifteen years daydreaming about a practical stranger, and now I was wide-awake, living my dream with the love of my life.
“I hope you didn’t want me to share,” I said, teasing him but really hoping he didn’t want any of my perfect apples.
Grey’s eyes danced as they met mine. “I’ll trade you back your father’s 1968 Cobra for a bite of one of your juicy apples…”
I laughed and held the bag close to my chest. “Hell no. Why would I agree to that when I can have both?”