But he wouldn’t let up. “And yet you don’t believe you’re good enough for a billionaire.”
“It has nothing to do with being good enough.”
“It has everything to do with it,” he said gently. “You think that my being a billionaire makes me better than you.”
She shook her head, her hair flying. “It’s about our lifestyles.”
He told her exactly what his lifestyle entailed. “I get up. I work out. I take a swim. I go to the office. I do my job. I come home. I work out and swim again. I might even watch a little TV. What’s your lifestyle?”
Instead of answering, she countered with, “What about all the galas and the shows and the gallery openings and the billionaire cocktail parties?”
He had his own counter. “What about feeling like I’d rather talk with a youth group than go to a gala? Or that I go to gallery openings only to support my friends?”
Her eyes shuttered then, as if she realized she was being churlish. As if she had no other barbs to throw, she said, “The reality is that you’ll get tired of me because I don’t fit in.”
His mind chopped off the last part of her sentence, leaving only her belief that he’d tire of her. That slammed into him more than anything else she’d said. It was like making a misstep on the diving board and belly flopping into the water. It stole his breath, made him ache in his gut and even his very bones. Because that said it all.
“Which means you don’t believe in me or in anything I’ve said to you. You don’t even believe in how good our lovemaking was. You don’t believe that night meant anything at all.”
Part of him wanted to grab her, kiss her, make love to her right there on her desk and show her exactly how good they were together. But he’d already made love to her, and she hadn’t seen that for what it was.
Maybe she never would.
Maybe trying to use their lovemaking to make his case was the worst thing he could do. But he had nothing else to give right now.
He backed toward the door, keeping his eyes on her. When he found the knob behind him, he said, “We’re not done. I’ll find a way to make you believe in me and how I feel about you.”
He left with that parting shot. Without another word. He didn’t try to kiss her. He didn’t try to touch her. He didn’t even try more pretty words to convince her.
Though she wanted to huddle into a ball, Michaela sat in her chair and rolled it back to the desk. He hadn’t signed the papers. She’d need to send them and have him sign electronically. She should have done that instead of having him come to her office.
What hadn’t she? Especially since the owner had already signed that way.
But she knew why. Because no matter what she’d told herself, she’d wanted to see him.
And now his words wouldn’t leave her alone. I’m in love with you.
He couldn’t possibly mean it. She didn’t think he was a liar, but she suspected his feelings had moved so fast that he could be deluding himself. You couldn’t fall in love in a month. People only fell in love in a week or a month in the movies. And movies weren’t real. Even her matches, which she knew were perfect, took longer than that.
But what about the ones that hadn’t worked? There’d been a few. Ones where she’d sent someone on a date and they hadn’t clicked. She didn’t call it failure. She called it learning her client.
But if they could figure out in one date that they weren’t meant to be together, what did it mean for the opposite? Could a person know on that first date that it would work?
No, that was lust. Love came later. Troy was mixing up lust with love.
And she had to go on with her day, business as usual.
Yet she heard his words all over again. We’re not done.
Half of her hoped he wouldn’t follow through, that she could now put this episode behind her.
The other half was dying for him to make her believe.
Troy sat in his office, squeezing stress balls, not two but four. His hands were cramping.
Michaela had sent the contract electronically. He’d read everything through and signed it. Now he was tempted to storm back over to her office and make love to her, to show her how he felt about her. And to get her to admit how she felt about him.
Instead, he tapped a few keys on his computer and made a video call.