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Or at least one more time.
“I’ve decided to retire,” she blurts, an embarrassed smile pulling at her lips. “God, that’s sad. Retiring. When did I get so old?”
Her head drops to my shoulder, effectively hiding her face from mine. It takes my brain a second to catch up. Not because I think she should be embarrassed for retiring at her age but because she’sretiring. She’s leaving the company.
She isn’t going to be my boss anymore.
“Your silence is reassuring,” she grumbles.
“Hey.” I chuckle and grab hold of her face to force her to look at me. “You should not be embarrassed that you are retiring. Do you know how many people would kill to be able to retire at your age? You are probably one of the youngest women in corporate America to retire.”
“That’s an overstatement, Gregory.” She groans, but I can see my words have had some effect. She’s less embarrassed now and more just…shy.
I spin her out and back in, over and over again until she’s smiling again, and pull her back into my body tightly. She collapses into me with anoomph, but she’s still smiling, and I’ll take that as a win.
“I’m just tired of it,” she explains. “I gave up a lot to get to where I am today. I ruined relationships. I spent way too much time away from my family. I gave up kids. All for this job that made me a lot of money, but not a lot of happiness.”
“If you weren’t happy, why’d you keep going?”
She shrugs.
“What else was I going to do? I was good at it—really good at it. And when I was younger, I was happy just making money. I thought I would never get sick of it. I had never met anyone that made me want to leave it, and I saw so many women hating their lives with a baby on their hip and a man on their arm.”
She breathes out a laugh and looks away.
“That sounds so incredibly sexist against my own gender, I know. But I was adamant I would never want it. And I know plenty of women who are like me thatstilldon’t want it.”
Her eyes swivel back in my direction.
“But I do.”
“You do,” I repeat back to her like an idiot. I’m dumbstruck.
“I do. Maybe not the babies,” she says, clearing her throat and forcing out a laugh. “That ship has probably sailed. But I’d like to have a social life. To be able to date who I want to date without looking over my shoulder.”
“Ivy.” I drawl her name out, feeling my lips curl up into a grin. My hands tangle into the soft strands of her hair, and her head tips back just slightly. She wets her lips. “Are you saying you want to date me?”
Her eyes dip down to my mouth and then back up to my eyes.
“Are you saying you would?”
Instead of answering her with words, I answer her with a kiss. I’m gentle at first, testing the waters to see if this is what she actually wants. But the moment I pull back to check, she yanks me closer. Her mouth opens, and her tongue fights with mine for control. It’s always like this, and I fucking love it—the fight for dominance.
Her hips roll and press up against mine, forcing a growl from deep in my throat as I devour her. There are people making all sorts of encouraging noises from behind me at the bar, and I can only assume it’s the rowdy bunch that we came here with. Ivy breaks the kiss and flips them off over my shoulder. They all laugh and go back to whatever it was they were talking about.
“Want to go home?” Her fingers play with the ends of my hair at the back of my neck.
“Is that what you want?”
She laughs and rolls her eyes.
“I forgot,” she says, curling her fingers through my belt loop. “You like it whenI’mthe one in control, don’t you?”
She kisses me again, this time with more force. This time, she’s not taking any fucking prisoners. Her tongue works mine over until her teeth come down and bite hard on my bottom lip. When she pulls away, I taste blood, and my cock is threatening to burst through my zipper.
“Well?” she asks. “You know I don’t like to repeat myself.”
“Yes,” I say on an exhale. “Yes, I do.”
