Ben sighed. “Tell me the assistant just arrived without telling me the assistant just arrived.”
I rolled my eyes. “What did you ask?”
“I asked what you’d given him to invest that much because whatever it was—”
“I took Ava with me. I find that going to these types of dinner with a feminine partner helps keep the atmosphere a little more relaxed.” I leaned back on my chair, looking up at the ceiling. “It worked a little too well.”
“In what way?” he asked warily.
“She is going on a date with him tonight.”
“He paid one hundred and forty million just for a date with her?”
I frowned, not really liking the dismissal in his tone. I also didn’t like how much it bothered me.
“It feels like I’m selling her and it’s wrong.”
Ben laughed and then stopped. “Oh, you’re serious? Since when do you have any type of moral qualm about a woman serving your interests?”
I sighed, shaking my head. How could I explain something to him that I barely understood myself?
“I don’t think he’s forcing her, is he? I’m sure any woman would quite literally fall on their knees for a man spending that much money just for a date with her.”
“He’s not forcing her,” I muttered as my hand tightened around the phone at the mere thought of her on her knees, looking up at him the way she’d looked up at me.
“Let her then.” He stopped for a second. “Ah, but that’s the problem, isn’t it? You don’t care about the whole ordeal. You care because it’s her.”
“You’ve decided to play Sherlock Holmes?”
“I’m American. I see myself more like a sexy Columbo.” He let out a low chuckle. “Are you ready to admit it now then?”
“Admit what?”
“That she is so much more than just an assistant.”
I opened my mouth to deny it but I shook my head. “She’s opinionated, untrained, she is not from my world. She knows nothing about how to behave in our society. She’s wrong in every aspect.”And yet she feels so right, but to everyone else’s eyes she is Ethan’s, I added to myself as the insane, unjustified jealousy hit once more.
“She is all those things, but let me ask you something—don’t you think this is the reason why you never saw yourself as the relationship kind of guy?”
I took the phone off my ear and looked at it as if I could see him on the screen. “Have you been watching some daytime TV? We know what Oprah does to your brain.” I let out a humorless laugh. “Also, it’s quite bold coming from you,Mr. Eternal Bachelor.”
“Ah, see, that’s where you’re wrong. Yes, I’m single and even living that life, I’m not opposed to meeting the woman that could change my mind. I’m not saying ‘never’, whereas you’ve been saying that it was not for you since the moment I met you.”
“What are you getting at with that?”
“Maybe it’s the way of life you are rejecting, or the women that you are supposed to be with. Maybe you want a space in your life that’s not always under careful control.”
“She would never be accepted.” I felt horrified as the words he’d said resonated much too clearly in me.
“I still don’t see the issue.”
“She’s pregnant.” I was not sure why I admitted that to him, but it felt like I had to say it out loud to someone who was not part of the equation, someone who didn’t see me as the devil, and it felt good.
“Ah, thatisa problem. Who’s the bastard who’s not claiming his blood?”
I pursed my lips and remained silent.
“Hugo?”