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I gesture for her to take a seat and do the same for myself.
“So, Mr. Ives, what brought you to Chelsea this afternoon?” she asks after I order a scotch on the rocks from the server.
While I might’ve agreed to the interview, I didn’t necessarily make it easy on her. This afternoon, I officially tossed the ball in her court—giving her barely three-hours’ notice for an interview over dinner.
An asshole move? Possibly.
But it made her prove just how much she wanted this interview.
I didn’t create a thriving business without understanding how to test people’s drive and willingness to follow through.
“I had a few errands to run on this side of town.”
“Errands?” she asks, and amusement flashes within her gray eyes. “What kinds of errands does a successful man like you still run for himself?”
“I’ll have you know, I prefer to run most of my own errands when I have time. And when I don’t, I pay people to pretend I did them,” I tease. She laughs, thankfully. I’ve had more than one interview in the past where the journalist didn’t understand my sense of humor, and it made the resulting article pretty interesting. “Today, though, I was ordering flowers to be delivered for my mother’s birthday next week.”
Instantly, a visual of the beautiful woman at the Willises’ floral shop filters unbidden into my brain.
Gorgeous brown eyes. Long brown hair. Full, intensely pink lips, and the kind of body that could get a man in trouble.
It took every ounce of strength I had to fight my grin as she nearly broke the damn computer while she placed my order, but her fumbling only added to her charm.
Honestly, I’ll be pleasantly surprised if the bouquet actually makes it to my mom next week.
Maybe I should head back in tomorrow and order another…just in case.
The pure thought of another encounter with the awkward goddess with the big, brown doe eyes nearly makes me laugh out loud, but I swallow it back and revert my focus to the interview.
“Flowers for your mother, huh?” A soft laugh leaves Rosemary’s red-painted lips. “That’s really sweet.”
“There’s a reason she tells me I’m her favorite son.”
She quirks a brow. “You have brothers?”
“Only child.”
“Successful and funny.” Rosemary’s lips crest up into a grin as she taps the end of her pen on her notepad of questions. “Shall we get started?”
Oh, here we go…
I gesture a nonchalant hand toward her and mentally brace myself for the inquisitive onslaught.
Rosemary doesn’t disappoint.
Before I know it, she’s balls deep in her journalist spiel. “With a net worth just over one billion dollars, you were just named one of Forbes richest men in the world,” she states. “How does it feel to have amassed such wealth by the age of thirty?”
“That’s a fairly ambiguous question and not the easiest to answer.”
She quirks one perfectly shaped brow. “And why’s that?”
“Because the wealth isn’t my priority. I mean, sure, it’s great to have such financial stability, but the money has never been the focus.”
“What’s the focus?”
“The advancement of technology,” I answer without hesitation. “Fuse was developed from a passion for creating secure software platforms and collaboration tools for companies all over the world.”
Rosemary nods and jots down a few notes. When she eventually meets my eyes again, a sly smile spreads across her lips. “From what I hear, NASA is one of those companies Fuse has collaborated with…”
“It appears you’ve done your research.” I grin and take a sip of the fresh glass of scotch the server sets down in front of me.
“How long has NASA been a client of Fuse?”
I smirk at her very forward question. “When it comes to my alleged clients, I never kiss and tell.”
She furrows her brow. “So, it’s possible they’re not a client and it’s all just hearsay?”
“Like I said, I never kiss and tell.”
NASA is one of our clients. But Rosemary doesn’t need to know that information.
A small laugh leaves her lips. “You make interviews incredibly difficult.”
I shrug. “So I’ve been told.”
“Do you mind telling me a little bit about how you went from a college student at Yale to the CEO of a company that grosses enough money to get your name on Forbes’ list?”
“Three credit cards. Ten thousand dollars in debt. And a three-year diet of ramen noodles and Kraft Mac & Cheese.”
The space between her bright-red lips grows exponentially. “You’re not serious.” My bluntness has clearly surprised her, but this isn’t a question I’ve ever avoided. I want other people to know it’s possible to be where I am. That it’s possible to be a regular guy with a vision and seemingly no means to make it happen and to make it happen anyway.
“Oh, but I am,” I retort. “The company you now know as Fuse was founded on credit card debt and sweat equity. I worked seven days a week, eighteen-hour days for the first year and a half, just to get cash-flow positive.” I grin. “Though, the change in the bottom line probably had more to do with the ramen noodles than anything else.”
