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He swallowed thickly. “I’ll have to see if I can make that happen.Afterhours, of course.”
Of course. Because no one could know about us, especially those he worked with. Even if I always visited under the guiseof working on Elysium projects, I doubted we’d be able to stay a secret if they heard his heavy thrusts making his desk creak.
I cocked my head, studying his sinful mouth. “I look forward to it, sir.”
“You better stop. Or is punishment another one of your fantasies?”
“No, but I’m beginning to think I’d be open to anything with you.”
“Funny. I was just thinking the same about you.”
Before he could elaborate on that, our meals arrived, bursting the private bubble we’d been in. Archer unhooked his foot from mine but kept us touching as he cut into his duck.
I tried to behave myself, tried to stop squirming in my chair from the clear picture of us I’d been building in my mind. Since this was a date, that moved us past the realm of just fucking, and there were things I’d always been curious about but had never gotten a chance to ask him.
“Do you enjoy all these things you do?” I asked.
“Such as?”
“Your job. Running the Elysium. Are they things you enjoy, or did you get forced into them?”
Archer topped his duck off with a bit of the potatoes and took a bite. “I don’t think I’d work so much if I didn’t enjoy it. It was always my goal to own my own company. I just wasn’t sure what form it would take until college. I got a job at a talent agency, worked my way up, realized it was something I could see myself doing in the long run.”
“How did you know you’d be good at it?”
“I didn’t. Sometimes you don’t know what you’re good at until you try everything.”
His words struck a chord inside me that had my questions faltering. I’d never really had a choice to try anything. My path had been set my entire life, and like the good son I was, I’d neverquestioned it. Why would I? It was the easy road, the one already laid out for me to take and succeed my father.
But did I really want to be stuck doing something I hated when there was a chance I could find something I loved instead?
God, I didn’t want to think about that right now, because it would require asking myself hard questions I didn’t want to know the answers to yet.
I cut into my schnitzel and dipped a corner in the cream sauce. “And the Elysium?”
“That one I kind of fell into because I knew I was the best choice.” When I looked up, he winked. “Who else could corral a bunch of elitists and get them to part with their money? My contacts make it easier than most.”
“It’s not your contacts that get people to drop money at your feet.” When Archer lifted a brow in question, I said, “You also happen to be gorgeous. You think anyone can say no to you?”
He bit back a grin and shrugged. “It’s not a word I hear very often. I doubt it’s one you’re entirely familiar with either.”
“Ha, nice try, but we’re not talking about me.”
“That doesn’t seem fair.”
“Maybe not, but I’ve wondered about you far longer than you’ve wondered about me.”
Archer brought his napkin up to his lips, a curious look in his eyes. “You can ask me anything.”
I knew some of the details of how Serena had been born, that her mom and Archer had been young and it was a one-night kind of thing. What I didn’t know was if he’d ever been with other women.
“Are you gay?” I asked before I fully thought throughhowI wanted to ask him, and the look of disbelief on his face was comical. “Okay, let me rephrase: are you bi or gay or…?”
Amusement had one side of his mouth curving up as he swirled his wine. “Very, very gay. Do I have to guess why you’re asking?”
“No, that answer pretty much sums it up.”
He took a sip of his drink, and as he set it down, his fingers grazed mine. “Serena was quite the surprise. For both her mom and me.”
