My brow pinched, and I shifted a little so I could look at him better. “Isn’t that the same thing?”
“No.” There was no hesitation, just the grim set of his mouth. “Dreaming only ever gets you hurt. A goal is acting on a calculated risk.”
Confusion wound through me, and I shifted more so I was almost completely facing him. I had the overwhelming urge to dig deeper, push through, feeling myself butting up against a wall.
Taking a chance, I reached out and played with a lock of that soft, soft hair.
“I don’t even know what you do,” I told him, inviting him to let me in. To ask me to meet him there. I let my attention traipse around the luxury of his bedroom. “Although whatever it is, it looks like you’re doing just fine for yourself.”
He’d been there at that fundraiser, no doubt an investor or bigwig at some corporation, doing exactly what he’d assumed about me that night.
Putting on a show.
Making himself and whatever company he owned look good.
What had struck me most was how bitter he’d seemed about it. As if he were angry anyone would show up there at all.
His fingers roamed down my side, his voice casual. “I’m an attorney.”
That was the thing about shock.
It was instant.
And that was the very second my heart froze in the middle of my chest before it took off at a sprint. Running wild. It dragged the thoughts in my mind right along with it.
He is an attorney.
Oh, God, he is an attorney.
Ian must have caught onto the way my world had started to spin because his tone twisted into what was close to a question. “I’m one step away from being partner at Millstrom, Garcia & Grant. But I won’t be stopping there. Soon, I’ll be in control of everything. The firm, the biggest clients, making sure I’m getting a cut of the biggest cases. Everyone in this city will come to me.”
It was strange that I’d never even considered it. He just seemed so . . . different than what I’d anticipated of one of the stuffy attorneys I’d been hunting down.
And I definitely hadn’t come across his name, considering I’d only looked up the names of partners at firms when I’d gone on my search. Seeking out powerful names that might be willing to take down an even more powerful empire.
When I’d been crawling around on my knees begging for anyone to listen.
To hear.
To understand.
It felt like my throat was a landslide of jagged rocks. “And that’s your goal you were talking about? Becoming partner. Becoming the head of your firm?”
He gave a tight nod. “Since I was seventeen, I wanted to be an attorney.”
“And you chased it?” I asked.
Something fiercely sad wove through the sharp lines of his stunning face. “I guess I did, didn’t I?”
He smiled softly, and I was pretty sure that was gonna be the end of me.
Because when he tucked me into his side, his big body wrapped around me from behind, I knew I’d come to a crossroads.
Too late for a detour, Grace.
I was already there.
Falling.
And I knew this was going to hurt. But there were some things in our lives that were so much more important than anything else.
It wasn’t even a question.
The admission I was initially going to make fell silent on my tongue as my heart and mind processed who Ian was. Somehow, Ian found comfort in it, and I could feel the rigid lines of his body slowly relax.
His breaths evened out, even though he didn’t lessen his hold, and when I carefully extracted myself from the cradle of his arm, he groaned and rolled fully onto his stomach.
I sat up at the edge of his bed, looking down at him, eyes memorizing every line of his muscular back, all of it again covered in ink.
My stomach pitched.
Tossing me into a freefall.
No parachute.
Nothing under my feet.
Praying he might be there to catch me when the man was completely unprepared for what I was going to ask of him.
All of it felt so wrong and so right.
But I guessed he’d been spot on when he’d sat in my chair at the salon and teased that it was fate.
I hadn’t believed him. Hadn’t even given the idea a smidgeon of credit.
After all, I’d taken a chance on a stupid party and then had Kenneth Millstrom laugh in my face.
I’d run because of him, my things scattered on the ground. And this mysterious, dangerous man had been the one to help me back onto my feet.
My heart expanded, overflowing with hope.
A chance.
One my gut told me had always been worth taking. I just hadn’t fully been prepared for what kind of chance that it would actually be.
I slipped off his bed and quietly sneaked out of his room, nothing but longing in my gaze as I paused at the doorway to peer back at him sleeping.