by Kaci Hart
“I know. Hey, I am going to get cleaned up and if you are still awake, I’ll tell you all about the date in detail.” She started to walk off when she remembered Phaedra. Turning back to her roommate she spoke. “Not that I really cared, but wait till I tell you about ...”
She had meant to get up after a minute and shower but she was wrapped up in everything she was telling Sasha. She hadn’t realized how much he had charmed her and how much she had liked it until she was telling it to her friend. She was convinced that she didn’t care about his money, or his friends. If he kept treating her like that, she would spend as much of her time with him as she could. Forty-five minutes later she had wrapped up the story, highlighting how she didn’t need Sasha’s help in making Phaedra cry.
When she finally did get up to shower, she was certain of one thing. She was really looking forward to their next date.
***
Ryder parked his sports car in one of the parking spaces in front of her brownstone apartment. It was a nice place. They had been on several dates since they had started talking a few weeks back and he was well aware of how smitten he was becoming with her, catching himself stealing glimpses at her when he hoped she wasn’t looking.
Ryder got out of the small sports car and held her hand, assisting her as she set her stiletto clad feet one after the other on the pavement. On the one hand he hated how he kept looking at her all night long. He was normally never one to stare at a woman but he found it nearly impossible to keep his eyes off of her. No matter what she had on, she was stunning. Then there were the special days, like that one.
He was so caught up in how pretty she was that it would have been easy to not pay full attention to her. Ryder didn’t though. He did his best to stay in tune with her all the time and tonight things were off the slightest bit. Behind her smiles, laughs and words he could sense that something may have been bothering her. After he helped her out of the car he took her hand and walked with her towards her front door.
“Are you alright Chelsea? There were times tonight when you seemed like you were miles away during dinner. Did I do something wrong?”
“I’m sorry, it has nothing to do with you. To be totally honest, today has been a really long day. No offense, but I’m just looking forward to crawling under the covers, unplugging my alarm clock just in case, and sleeping the rest of this perfect night away. I had half a mind to actually tell you that we should do it on another night when you first asked but you had a look on your face that told me that I would be hard pressed to get to say anything else to you but yes.”
Ryder grabbed her hand and started to walk towards the door with her.
“Well you know, when I see something that is worthwhile, I make sure that I do everything in my power to achieve it. You have me figured out pretty good because had you said no, I would have had to pull out all the stops.”
“That sounds like it might have been interesting.”
He really didn’t want the night to end. The past three weeks had been filled with dinner dates or lunches here and there and he had been enjoying his time with her drastically. He was hoping that one day soon she would be willing to be his girlfriend exclusively. He was well aware that most people took more time before they entered into a serious commitment but he found Chelsea to be enticing on so many levels and he didn’t really enjoy playing games of the heart. For now though, he had smaller plans.
“It certainly would have been fun, that’s for sure. Hey, I wanted to ask you something. I need you to show me a few ballroom dances.”
“Huh? Why the sudden interest in ballroom dancing?”
“That brings me to the other thing I wanted to talk to you about. I want you to . . . meet my parents.”
He saw the look of full blown surprise on her face.
“Ryder we’ve only been dating for a little bit of time and you already know you want me to meet your parents? Oh my God that’s a big thing. What if I embarrass you?”
“I’m sure you won’t do that Chelsea. I’d be proud to show you off to my family. Besides, it’s not like I have much of a choice.”
That was one hundred percent true. Of course, he didn’t expect her to meet his family so soon but circumstances just worked out this way. If she were any other woman, he would probably go alone but there was something beyond special about Chelsea.
“Oh you’ve always got a choice Ryder. You know that.”
“Well yeah, but it’s not that simple in this case. See every few months my mother throws a dinner party. I mean the whole works. Food, music, dancing. Everything. She’s really into them and my dad really has no choice but to go along for the ride even though he’d much rather be in the office making money. She’s the one person he can’t say no to. Regardless, the reason I’m springing this up on you is that my mother always tries to set me up with some woman there and I’m pretty sure that my current girlfriend wouldn’t want me being set up with another lady. What do you say? Will you be my date?”
She laughed at him.
“What do I say? I say that I don’t have much of a choice but to meet your parents because if I hear that you’ve been dancing with another woman, it’s not going to be good for this relationship and I have been rather enjoying you.”
Ryder smiled as the opportunity to discuss how far they were in their relationship presented itself. He hadn’t planned on doing that until sometime in the future but the timing was too good.
“I’d hoped as much but then I realized that we are technically just dating.”
“Just dating?”
“Yeah. Right now we are just two people having fun. Unless you want to be exclusive. I guess that depends on how much you have enjoyed the time that we’ve been spending together.”
He saw her look on him in a way that was very clear about how stupid she thought his statement was.
“Seriously? We have been dating for weeks now and all of a sudden you ask me now if I want to be exclusive? Um hello. You better not have been dating anyone at the same time as me.”
He was happier than he realized he would be at her response. Not that he expected her to want space. It was nice to make it official.
“No, I haven’t, but the lawyers at the firm always tell me to get a solid affirmative on every deal. So with that out of the way, are you going to take me under your wings and teach me a few steps?”
“Of course. As long as you are a good student. And since you are already such a good boyfriend, I am going to teach you for free. How about we start next Tuesday with the waltz.”
“That would be great.”
“Good. You are going to need to dress in loose pants and a t-shirt please. You are going to need to be able to move freely.”
“That’s a relief. I thought you were going to insist on the whole leotard thing.”
“Nah. I don’t take you for the leotard type.”
She laughed at him.
“Do you have any idea how pretty you are when you smile.”
He watched as her cheeks flushed red.
“I have been told that quite a lot, even outside of the probably thirty times you have told me tonight.”
“I’m sorry. I just can’t deny it. With you I start to talk before I realize it. Just some kind of effect you have on me.”
He hugged her closely and backed away, hoping she understood how attracted he was to her.
“Well I guess we should call it a night. I’ll talk to you soon then?”
“Alright, goodnight Ryder.”
Chapter 6
“Well that was just too easy Ryder. Here I was thinking it was going to take a bunch of lessons but you picked everything up like nothing. I can’t believe you learned so many cornerstone dances in that short a time.”
Chelsea looked back at Ryder as she walked across her studio floor and grabbed a bottle of water, to rehydrate. It had only been two lessons that she’d given him and in such a short time he’d become almost an expert at every dance she threw his way. She was beginning to think th
e guy was some kind of dance prodigy.
“Are you sure you didn’t already know how to do all this? I swear that you either have to be the quickest learner in the world or I am the best teacher.”
He flashed his pulse pumping smile at her once again.
“Well Chelsea, I for one know first-hand that you are a great teacher but I may have cheated a tiny bit.”
“Ryder Chatham cheated? This I have to hear.”
“Yep. I already knew the basics of some of these dances. My mother made us learn how to do a few of them as kids but I never liked it so I didn’t pay attention. I haven’t needed it for years, really don’t now but if you were going to be my date at my parents, I figured you would probably want to dance at least once.”
“No way!”
“Sorry.”
“No biggie. So I got an assist and I’m not the greatest teacher of all time. Even so, if you haven’t danced since being younger, I’d still say we did pretty well.”
“I guess you’re right there.”
Chelsea stopped for a second. She was confused by something he’d said.
“Wait a minute. What did you mean when you said ‘if you were going to be my date’? I seem to remember that you didn’t ask me to be your date until you asked me to teach you to dance first.”
“What can I say? I had a feeling you would say yes.”
“Oh so you had a feeling.”
“Hey I’m just glad you said yes.”
“Like I had a choice. You used your extreme cuteness to your advantage. But I’m not upset about it. She walked over to him and kissed him on the cheek. “It gave me the chance to spend more time with you, and I can’t complain about that.”
“I might have considered that as well when I asked you to teach me.”
“You might have, huh?”
“Maybe a tiny bit. You can’t blame me for wanting my family to meet you. That way they get a chance to see what I see in you.”
It was still a bit daunting to her that she was going to be meeting the family of her billionaire boyfriend. She didn’t worry about it that much though. She figured if they were the ones who raised Ryder, they couldn’t be that bad. Besides, she was never one to worry about things that she couldn’t control and there wasn’t going to be much she could really do to make sure that they liked her.
“Still can’t believe it’s this Saturday.”
“Wait, this Saturday is the fifteenth? I didn’t even realize how close we were to it. In that case, I need to tell you about my folks.”
Chelsea felt a bit of trepidation when he said it.
“That doesn’t sound good.”
“Don’t worry. Most of my family will be nothing for you. It’s my dad though. Everything is a test for him and he’s constantly watching people’s actions and motives. He can be a bit pushy and might seem stuffy. I just want to let you know before we go so that when he says or does something that I will most likely be embarrassed about later, you go easy on me afterwards.”
“Gee. What a way to put a little pressure on a girl. You make it sound like I should be afraid. Don’t you think you might be exaggerating a little bit Ryder?”
“Not in the least. If anything, I’m not making him mean enough. I mean it’s always with good intent but he just does things wrong sometimes. You’ll see what I mean. I just feel like it would be wrong to send you in there and not give you a little heads up about him. And like I said, mom and my brothers will probably be eating out of the palm of your hand so don’t worry about them. Just trust me, don’t take anything my father says as being meant to offend you. He thinks about things differently than most people. He’s a real straight shooting, priority led individual. The kind of person that puts business first...well after his family. He’s not a bad person, just ... well the only way to explain it is that he’s just dad.”
The question came out of her mouth before she realized.
“Is that why you are like you are?”
Ryder looked at Chelsea and she could tell her words didn’t come out right.
“That came out completely not like I wanted it to. I’m not saying that I think that there is anything wrong with you because you know I like you. A lot in fact. It’s just that since I’ve known you, I’ve found you to be a very by the books kind of guy. Maybe a little predictable in your routine of what you will do.”
Chelsea looked at Ryder as he considered her words.
“Okay, so I like a little routine. You make it sound like I do the same thing all the time.”
“Come on now Ryder. You are totally predictable. For instance, let’s say we go to a restaurant for dinner. It’s going to be at seven pm on the dot and no matter what it is, you are starting off with a water to drink. Your meal will be a nice steak and potato dish with a complimentary red wine. If they don’t have those things, you won’t be in that restaurant. Anyway, you are tipping twenty-five percent exactly and God forbid you would ever use poor English. Those last two I like a lot by the way.”
“That’s not fair. You’re around me all of the time these days. Of course you’re going to learn my little idiosyncrasies. But you are spot on in thinking that it’s from my dad. He practically ruled me with an iron fist.”
She looked at him as he thought about his father. She saw from the nostalgic look in his eyes that he did care what his father thought of him.
He’s a good son.
“That was all my older brother Ramsey’s fault. He’s my dad’s namesake and I’m pretty sure dad really wanted him to follow him into the family business, eventually taking over. Ramsey had different plans though. At a young age he was pretty sure that he wanted to go into politics. He wanted to do what he thought would make a big difference in the world so dad let him. That was when he was fourteen so I guess I was almost ten then. That was when dad started grooming me to take over.”
“Wow. Isn’t that a little young to know what you want to do with your life?”
“You would think so. I remember that of the few times I remember ever knowing of my parents arguing--it was about me and the way he was so hard on me. He told my mother that he absolutely refused to let the business not be in the hands of a Chatham man. Believe it or not, it meant a lot to me.”
“Yeah?”
“Mm hmm . . . and I don’t know. Maybe I wanted to make him proud. Or maybe I didn’t want to hear he and mom arguing about me. No kid ever wants to be the reason they hear their parents arguing so I chose to like it. I made my self like the business so that my mother could see it as what I wanted to do and my father could have a successor. At the same time, it was a win for me. I don’t think you could have ever found a father more involved in their son’s activities than mine was. He was always over my shoulder, making sure I did my homework and pushing me to make sure that I achieved higher than . . . well everybody else. I was to be his example of a Chatham man.”
She reached up, running her fingers through his hair. She felt so bad for this man that she was falling for. He had no childhood. How much fun could that be? He answered her question before she asked.
“Don’t you dare feel bad for me Chelsea. I wouldn’t change my childhood for the world. And I still had friends. One of my closest was my best friend Trent who I have been best friends with since high school.”
“Well that’s good then.”
“I choose to think so. What about you, miss freedom first? What’s behind you choosing to not take the traditional route of life.”
It was her turn to share her personal family details and even though she didn’t really like talking about it, she felt like she owed it to him after he’d been so wide open with her about his.
“It’s funny, and I never would have guessed it in a million years before hearing that but our stories are pretty similar except that I’m an only child. My parents were really strict Christians and kept a tight leash on me as a kid, especially my dad. Nothing but studying and hard work. Just like you, my grades weren’t allowed to be less th
an excellent. No boys or dating until I was sixteen and even barely then. I only had one extracurricular activity and that was dancing. Even though it was expensive and likely broke the bank for them a few times they made sure the money was always there for my dance classes and I’ll always be grateful to them for that.”
Chelsea paused in the middle of her thoughts. It was easy sometimes for her to forget the many sacrifices that her parents had made for her. Ones she wasn’t so sure that she would have been able to do for a child had she had any. She guessed that was what it meant to be a parent and why they were so upset that something they’d paid for her to enjoy as a recreation was what made her decide not to go to college. She continued.
“What they never banked on is the idea that I would love dancing as much as I did. I mean I was a thirteen-year-old girl completely crazy about dancing in any and every way. I liked it so much. It just made me feel . . . I don’t know. Free I guess. After all the rules they’d put on me, I liked dance. It had rules but they were bendable and often breakable. So, to their surprise and disappointment, I shunned the traditional academic routes after high school to take up the arts full time. Needless to say, that decision didn’t fly too well with my parents especially since I had waited until after applying for and getting admitted to several really nice schools. I’d done my interviews with Stanford, and Harvard, your alma mater. They were overjoyed to find that I’d gotten accepted into both but I didn’t care. I decided that I wasn’t going to let anyone dictate my life to me.”