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I curl my hair in my best retro do. I check my reflection. Yep. That girl in the mirror can sell the hell out of chocolate. I slick on some lipstick, then some gloss, then spritz on the tiniest bit of perfume—the same cherry kind I wore on Friday night, courtesy of a Samira trade for salted caramels. I put on my lucky jewelry too, just like I wore that evening.
I leave and head over to the place where I sat on my business partner’s face seconds before our date ended.
He’s impossible to look away from, leaning casually against the entrance to the hotel courtyard. Gage looks the part too. Dark jeans, motorcycle boots, a tight, and a trim black short-sleeve Henley that shows off the lotus flower on his arm, and the swirls of black ink climbing up his skin. His tattoos are all black, fine linework and intricately drawn.
He whistles when he sees me, shaking his head in admiration as he walks over to me like a lover, even though he can’t be anymore. “Damn, woman. I don’t think I’m good enough to be seen with you,” he says with an approving hum.
I jut out a hip, enjoying the compliment. “Amanda picked it out. She’s into the whole outfit-of-the-day thing. Do I look the part?”
“You look like a piece of chocolate, and I want to eat you.”
“Good. Because we’re selling an image. We’re selling a partnership. The tattooed bar owner and the va-va-voom chocolatier.”
“We are. But I’m going to need to steal one last touch,” he whispers, then he runs a hand down my arm, warm under the October sun. That’s San Francisco for you. Sometimes it’s freezing here in October. Sometimes it’s summer.
His touch makes me shudder. He groans too. “Fuck, am I really giving this up for business?”
It’s rhetorical. It’s for the universe. Still, I answer for the universe and me. “Yes, because there’s one rule of business—don’t screw your business partner.”
“Amen,” he says, letting go of my arm. “So basically it was special edition sex we had.”
“But did we even have sex?”
“You came on my face. I’m counting that as sex.”
“Well, aren’t you just an evolved male,” I say.
“I don’t have to whip my dick out to have sex. You know what counts as sex?”
“Do tell.”
“If you come, we had sex. That’s all that matters.”
“I guess there’s a whole new meaning to if a tree falls in the forest. I’m just really sorry that a tree didn’t get to fall in your forest,” I say.
He laughs, then his laughter burns off as he nods toward the courtyard. “But that’s just the way it goes.”
I have a feeling it’s not the first time he’s said those words. I have a feeling that Gage Archer has become accustomed to life hitting him in unexpected ways. I have a feeling he doesn’t even think he can have it all.
I suppose he’s right.
Who really can? You simply have to pick what you can handle at any given moment in time. There’s no way I can handle more than this.
I march into the meeting, leaving sex behind me.
10
JUST A LITTLE COMMITTED
Gage
Felix waits in the courtyard for us with a look in his eyes that says this is practically a done deal. At least I sure hope that’s the look. “I had a feeling this place would be too hard for the two of you to resist,” he says with the confidence of a seasoned businessman. I feel some of that confidence. I crave all of it.
“You were right,” Elodie says to him, then follows as he leads us into the hotel lobby, down a hall, and into his office.
Turns out Felix isn’t simply the guy sweeping the courtyard. He’s the owner of The Escape and the coveted retail space it leases.
His office is unassuming. A simple oak desk. Some blue chairs. A vase of fresh flowers in fall colors. A couple framed photos on the desk, including a shot of three women on the deck of the San Francisco Ferry with crinkles in the corner of their eyes and bright smiles. “My daughters,” he says, proudly. “My granddaughter took the shot.”
