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“Then I buy her a studio.”
“You can do that?”
“Mila, stick with me. There’s nothing this world has to offer that I can’t give to you.”
nine
MILANA
I stare at Jay as we ride in the back of his fancy SUV. “This thing is quiet.” I swear the thing doesn’t make a sound, which only makes the silence inside it seem louder, making me think I need to fill it.
“It’s electric.”
“Fancy. Like that Musk guy. Is it one of his?”
“No, this is something new. It’s more a test model than anything.”
“You built this?!” Now I’m really impressed. His lips twitch.
“I invested in the company that did. Teslas call for a lot of charging which can be hard when traveling long distances. This one can solar charge. It also has these special magnets in the wheels that spin to help create energy.” Super fancy.
“Cool” is my lame response. I partly understand what he’s saying, but most of it goes right over my head, and I think he already dumbed it down a lot for me, so I don’t want to make him explain it more. “You must be super smart.”
“You never have to be the smartest person in the room, Mila. You just have to be able to hire or invest in them.”
“That makes sense. I mean, you can’t know everything about everything. Though some men try to pretend they do.”
“And those tend to be the dumbest of all men.” I nod in agreement.
“So if you don’t build cars, what is it that you do?”
“I do a lot of things.”
“Oh no. Please don’t say you’re an entrepreneur. Lauren says that's a red flag on a dating app. That it means you probably can’t keep a job.” Dax muffles a laugh from the driver’s seat.
“I do investments, some exporting and some importing. A little bit of everything. Anything that catches my attention. I can be a bit obsessive when I focus on a new project.”
I stare at Jay’s handsome face for a long moment. Is that what I am? He does seem a bit obsessive. It should freak me out, but I’m oddly flattered. Now I’m not so sure.
“Then what? After you invest or do whatever and it works out? Is it on to the next great thing?” I’m so curious about this man. I want to know everything I can about him, and he seems more than willing to answer whatever I ask.
“When it comes to some things, yes. They run their course or you can see that soon they are going to be less useful, you sell or get out.”
“You make that sound so easy. To invest in something and then walk away when it doesn’t perform how you want.” I turn to look out the window. Jay’s hand comes to my chin, and he gently turns my head back toward him.
“I’m not talking about people.” He pauses. “That was a lie. I’m not talking about you.”
“I’m flattered, but do you usually dispose of other people when they're no longer useful to you?”
“Some need to be disposed of.”
My mind flashes to Tracy, who I worked with at a department store. She sucked and spent most of the time hiding in the dressing room pretending to be putting clothes back people didn’t want after they tried them on. She needed to be fired, so I suppose what he’s saying is fair.
“I guess if you have all these people working for you sometimes you have to fire them.”
“Fire them,” Dax mutters under his breath with another one of his laughs. This one is cut short when Jay hits him with a glare in the rearview mirror. Even I swallow when I get a glimpse of that expression on his face. It reminds me again that while I’ve gotten some things out of Jay, I don’t know a ton.
He said his name is Jay Eaton which sounds familiar, but I can’t place it. I’m sure it’s because he’s clearly mega rich and we live in the same city.
“We’re here, sir,” Dax informs us. I hadn’t realized we’d come to a stop.
I see the bakery I live above. A tug of disappointment hits me. I thought we might spend some time together, but he probably has work to do. He’s spent most of his day standing over me at the photo shoot. I’m not sure why he did but I’m not complaining. I’m finding that I enjoy having him around.
“Thanks for the ride. Walk me to my door. Maybe we could have another one of those—” I peek over at Dax, knowing he can hear everything we’re saying.
“You want another kiss, Mila?” My cheeks warm, but I nod.
“It was really good.” Way to play it cool. “I mean, it was okay. You know, like a normal kiss that girls have all the time.” Jay's eyes narrow in on my mouth, and I wonder how I keep making this worse. If only I could stop talking, but I know that’s not going to happen no matter how hard I try. “Not that I’ve had all these kisses but—”
