by Gina LaManna
“Oh, of course. Probably needs to go over the updated schedule.”
Mrs. Dulcet gave a tilt of her head, then gestured for me to lead the way. When I reached the dining room, I found Dane sitting alone at his side of the table, a pot of coffee before him and two full place settings. He looked up, his eyes brightening when he saw me standing in the doorway.
“I hope you’re hungry,” he said, his lips turning to a genuine smile. “I waited to have breakfast with you.”
“Oh, Dane. Why did you do that?”
“I missed you,” he said simply. “It was no trouble at all. I’m glad you’re here.”
Everything else—the puzzle, the wondering, the despair—disappeared. The weight lifted from my shoulders, or at least lightened. I strode across the room and pulled Dane into a huge, awkward hug before he had time to stand.
It took him a moment to react, but when he did, he rested his hands on my shoulders and pushed me back a step. Then he stood, rising to his full, intimidating height, and pressed me hard against his chest. His arms wrapped around my back and I sunk into him, inhaling his spicy scent, feeling the hard, lean lines of his muscles.
“Thank you,” I whispered against his chest. “I needed that.”
“Needed what?”
I squeezed him tighter. “You.”
Chapter 22
BREAKFAST PASSED RAPIDLY. Too quickly, in my opinion, and after light chit chat and pleasant conversation, we found ourselves inevitably winding back around to discussing work.
“Sorry again about throwing off your schedule.” I glanced down at the newly printed and revised itinerary. “I can take care of everything you’ve requested here by mid-afternoon. Once I finish, I need to follow up on plans for the charity gala if that’s okay with you.”
“Lola.” His voice came out harsh. “Of course you may. You don’t have to ask permission like a child.”
“I didn’t mean to ask, I was just—”
“I wish you wouldn’t work for me any longer.”
I froze at his words, my heart thumping so harshly against my chest I could barely stay still. “What did you say?”
“I said I wish you wouldn’t work for me any longer.”
“But Dane, I love working for you. I have friends at the castle, and you are the best boss I’ve ever had.” I didn’t add that he was my only real boss other than Dotty Pink, but this was one of those moments where I didn’t need to see the grass on the other side—I just knew it wasn’t greener anywhere else. “I’m sorry if I’ve done anything to upset you. Is my work not good enough? No, you know what?” I stood up, my fingers gripping the table as I looked across at Dane. “I’m sorry, but I’m sick of apologizing.”
“Lola—”
“I work really hard here, Dane,” I said, my voice wavering ever so slightly. I hated that it wasn’t steady, but now that I’d gotten up on my high horse, I couldn’t seem to let myself get down. “I know I make mistakes, and I’m not a quarter—not even a fraction of a quarter as smart as you. I know that, you know that—we all know that. But I promise you, Dane, I care about you. Please don’t fire me.”
“Fire you? No, Lola—I would never.” Dane swooped up from the table and crossed the room in two seconds. He took my shaking hands in his and grasped them, firm and hard, as he sat me back down in the chair.
“But you just said you wished I wouldn’t work here any longer.” I pressed trembling fingers to my forehead. “I will go if you want. I understand if my work isn’t good enough for you, or maybe it’s because I screwed up this stupid charity gala—”
Dane interrupted me with a laugh. The sound was so real, so genuine and surprising, that it sent a bolt of anger through me for no reason at all.
“Do you think this is funny?” I asked. “I just poured my heart out to you. I thought we had a special connection, and then you just go and fire me over croissants. It’s not fair!”
“I’m not firing you, Lola.” Dane knelt before me, and for a moment, my heart stopped thumping entirely. He was on one knee, taking my hands in his, holding them to his chest. “I only said that because your working here complicates things.”
“What things?” My heartbeat was back, reluctant and strong, pitter pattering as if it was unsure whether to stop or go, like one giant game of Simon Says in my heart cavity.
“You must know what I mean, Lola—don’t you?” He pulled me closer until our foreheads touched. His icicle eyes bore holes through to the back of my skull, but in a meaningful way—as if he needed me to understand. “What you and I have here—it’s hardly a normal working relationship.”
I cleared my throat, bobbing my head back and forth in agreement.
“Things are hard enough for me as it is. I can’t seem to get a read on you, and it’s driving me crazy. Anytime you walk into the room, I want to do this.” Dane let go of one of my hands, reached for my chin, and tilted it forward. His lips met mine with an incredible softness.
My free hand reached for the back of his head, my fingers finding thick, silky locks as I pulled him closer to me. He deepened the kiss, sighing with a hint of longing that sent my heart back to the races. If I didn’t get a handle on my emotions, I’d be in the cardiac ward before long.
“Then, I have to do this.” Dane dropped his hand and retreated, standing before me. He pointed a finger to the schedule on the table. “We talk about business. We pretend there’s nothing between us. I have to introduce you to my parents as an assistant when you’re so much more than that.”
My chest constricted, and I found it harder and harder to breathe. “What are you suggesting, Dane?”
“I’m not firing you; I don’t even want you to quit—you’re the best personal assistant I’ve ever had, and not just because you make me laugh, or because you entertain me, or because you care about me more than any normal person should.” Dane’s lips curved into a tender smile. “I’m just explaining that I wish things weren’t like this—that I didn’t have to separate our time between business and...whatever else we are.”
“What are we, Dane? What do you want us to be?”
“I’m in love with you, Lola. I don’t know what that makes us, but I know it’s true. Before, I didn’t understand the word. I didn’t know what it meant, and I didn’t expect I’d feel it for anyone at all, let alone this soon.”
“I love you, Dane.” I felt my eyes tear up as I stood and moved closer to him. “I love you, Dane—I really do. But I don’t know where to go from here.”
“Will you be mine, Lola?” Dane held my hand in his. “I’ll marry you, if that’s what this all means.”
“We’ve only known each other a few months. We can’t get married yet.”
“Why not?”
“Because—” I stopped, unsure of the correct response. “Because we’re still getting to know one another.”
“But I want to spend my life getting to know you.” Dane’s hand came up and pushed my hair back from my face. “You’re so wonderfully unique that I don’t think a hundred years of being with you will allow me to learn everything about you. I don’t want to wait any longer.”
“But it’s not practical. I’m—I’m your assistant, and we’re in the middle of this murder investigation, and—”
“You’re fired, and you know I’m innocent.”
“True, but...” I hesitated. “Hold on a second, did you just fire me?”
“Isn’t that what you want? Don’t you want to be with me?”
I stood, the smallest fingers of despair threatening to shred my hope, my love for this man, to ribbons. “I’m not wealthy. I’m not well-off naturally, and I have a house I’m trying to fix up, and I need to eat food, and—”
“Move in with me. Be my wife, and you won’t need to work. I have enough money to last us forever.”
“I-I can’t do that.”
“You don’t want to marry me?”
“It’s not that simple. I enjoy working. I don’t want to get married just to
become a housewife—not that there’s anything wrong with being one, but it’s not my dream. I enjoy working with you.”
“Then that’s settled. You’ll work with me, not for me.”
“I don’t understand.”
“If you marry me, the Clark Company will be ours. You won’t need a salary, and we won’t need to tiptoe around business because everything will be shared.”
“You can’t possibly want to give up that much control. You barely know me. Don’t get me wrong—I love you, and I care about you, but what would your parents think?”
Dane considered this for a long moment. He took a step back from the table and turned to face the window, beginning a stare that lasted for quite some time. When he finally turned back around, his face was passive.
“Lola Pink—in all my years on this planet, I never thought I’d find someone I wanted to share my life with.” He held up a hand as I started to interrupt. “I’m not good with feelings and emotions, or knowing the right thing to say at any given time—especially in front of women.”
I inched forward, the desire to reach for him almost too great. However, I knew he needed space.
“You came into my life, and I frankly don’t even recognize it anymore sometimes. I haven’t had a proper schedule since I met you, and somehow, it’s the best schedule I could ask for. Where I’m order, you’re chaos, and—I need you. A completely ordered life is boring.”
“And complete chaos is overwhelming,” I whispered. “I need you, too, Dane.”
“You don’t have to answer me now, but I want you to think about it.” Thankfully, Dane closed the gap between us. He pulled a chair next to mine, and we sat close, his hand skimming my thigh. “I love you, Lola. I am ready to be married to you, if you’ll have me. You already know what people say about me—that I’m cold, or ruthless, or—”
My hand on his cheek silenced him. “You’re not any of those things. Not with me, and not in here.” My hand skimmed down his face and landed on his chest. “Let’s think about this, okay? I don’t want you to make this decision and then regret it. Because it’s one you’re stuck with for the rest of your life.”
“It’d be an honor to be stuck with you for the rest of my life.” He held my hand over his chest, stuttering to a complete stop when he realized what he’d said. “I mean—I didn’t mean stuck with you, I meant—”
“I know.” I laughed, leaned in, and pressed a kiss against his cheek. “About that schedule—do you have some wiggle room on there?”
Dane lifted the sheet of paper and tore it in half. “Mrs. Dulcet—have Nick handle my calls and cancel all of my meetings for the day. Including urgent matters.”
“Mr. Clark, is everything okay?” Mrs. Dulcet stepped into the dining room to find Dane and I standing, hand in hand, flushed cheeks glowing brightly. “Oh, yes, dear—I see. I’ll take care of it.”
Dane led me through the castle until he reached the common area in the living quarters. Staff rooms lined one hall along with several guest bedrooms, and the Clark quarters lined the other hall. Instead of taking the usual route to my sometimes-bedroom with the space shower, Dane gripped my hand harder and pulled me toward his.
When we reached the door to what I could only assume was were Dane’s private quarters, he pulled me tight against him, our bodies perfectly aligned. My hands wound around his neck, and as he began to speak, I interrupted him with a light kiss.
He looped his arms around my waist, his fingers settling on my skin there—any awkwardness or uncertainty between us long gone. He held me tight, possessive against him, and when he broke our kiss to look into my eyes, there was a darkness in those irises that signaled a hunger for more.
“Are you sure you want to do this?” Dane asked. “You can say no, and I’ll try to let things go back to normal.”
“Dane, stop.” I pressed a finger to his lips. “I quit.”
“What?”
“I can’t do this anymore. You can’t either. I quit.”
“But you wanted to work—”
“You fired me already, so my quitting is just a formality,” I said with a smile. “We can figure out the rest later. For now...”
Dane rested his hand on the knob and turned. “I love you, Lola Pink. I don’t know what I did to deserve a chance with you, but I’m the luckiest man in the world.”
“My, you’ve become suave, Mr. Clark,” I said, leaning playfully into his arms as my eyes raked over a bedroom fit for royalty. “You have made falling in love with you very, very fun.”
“I hope things are about to get better, Miss Pink.” Dane Clark closed the door, then turned the lock. “I’m going to ask one more time if you’re sure before—”
I took two quick steps toward him, my arms coming around him the second our bodies touched. My words were a breath across his cheek. “I’m sure.”
Chapter 23
“HAVE YOU EVER DONE this before?” I rolled over in bed and faced Dane, watching as his eyebrow crept upward into a cute arch over his blue eyes. My cheeks grew hot. “Not that. I’m talking about blowing off your schedule to do nothing.”
Dane’s hand trailed over the bare skin of my back as he pulled me closer to him. “I wouldn’t exactly call that doing nothing.”
“Dane!”
“No,” he said with a light laugh. “Then again, there are plenty of things I’d never done before you entered my life.”
I inhaled a fake gasp. “Have I corrupted you, Mr. Clark?”
“Feel free to corrupt me all over again if you like.”
I laughed and curled against him, savoring the warmth as his arms tightened around me and held me close. With his semi-marriage proposal, it wasn’t all that difficult to imagine spending our nights like this—wrapped in one another’s embrace, surrounded by sheets softer than clouds and beneath a comforter as delicate as a sigh.
We faced the window, watching fat clouds drift by to a backdrop of pale skies with the slightest hint of mountains in the background. Treetops glistened at the lower edge of the window, and my mind went to the heavy forest that surrounded the castle beyond the snowglobe-esque setup of the Clark Company.
“If we were to get married,” I began, the moment feeling dreamy and surreal, “would we still have secrets?”
I could almost feel Dane frown, though my back was to his chest. “What sort of secrets?”
“There’s so much I don’t know about you.”
“Well, what do you want to know?”
“I know everything I need to know.” I took a step backward as I recalculated. “I just mean—the extras. I don’t know exactly what it is that you do here, for example. Then again, I probably wouldn’t understand even if you told me. You have the uber-mysterious Warehouse 11. Heck, I’m sure there are things I don’t know that I don’t know about you.”
“That’s very deep and broad, Miss Pink,” Dane said. “I will explain everything you’d like to know. As for the business, I don’t think it’s possible to keep you posted on everything that goes on around here on a daily basis as that’s a full-time job for more than one person. Even I have to let go of that control.”
“Yeah, right.”
“It’s true. Most of the Warehouses are contained. As for your question to Warehouse 11, that is my...personal project. A passion project, pet project, whatever you want to call it.”
Something about the almost defensive way Dane spoke of it raised a tiny hint of alarm. “It’s legal, isn’t it?”
“Very much so.”
“It’s not creepy?”
“Is that what you think of me?” Dane’s breath trailed across my neck as his fingers ran in thin lines through my hair. “That I have a personal ‘creepy’ space for my hobbies?”
“No, but—” I stopped talking, forced a glance over my shoulder, and was rewarded with a brief kiss from Dane’s lips. “Mmmm.”
“But?”
“But nobody around here seems to know what’s inside of it. It’s just—odd.�
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“Don’t you have anything in your life that’s just yours? That is nobody else’s but your own, even if it’s nothing but a book, or a place you go to think, or a memory?”
I flicked through my memories of Dotty Pink and realized there were a few I held onto with a ferocity that was mine alone. Memories I couldn’t—or rather wouldn’t—share with anyone. Except maybe Dane when the timing was right.
“Yes,” I answered quietly. “I suppose you’re right. I’m sorry to pry.”
“You’re not prying, Lola—you’re curious. And that’s one of the many qualities I love about you.” Dane leaned in and pressed a kiss to the back of my head as his arm snaked over my stomach to reel me in even closer. “If I seem evasive, I don’t mean to be. I’d just prefer to show you rather than explain, if you don’t mind.”
“You don’t have to do that. I really was just curious—I trust you, Dane.”
“I know, and that’s why I’d like to show you. When the time is right.”
I rolled over to face him, my head resting on the pillow at the perfect vantage point to stare into his eyes, my hair spread wildly across the sheets after he’d pulled out my hairband. He said he liked it that way.
I meant to thank him, but the flash of vulnerability in his eyes required so much more. Instead, I leaned in toward him, my lips coming to rest against his cheek, then his forehead, then finally I pulled back and pressed my lips to his.
He sighed, closing his eyes. I realized that, for the first time, he looked relaxed. Calm almost, peaceful—despite the fire burning behind those brilliant eyes and the urgent way his hands gripped me close. He’d always been a beautiful man—confident and proud, brilliant and surefooted. He was even more beautiful like this: vulnerable, open, and warm.
I felt a prick in my eyes at the thought that he’d let down his guard for me. I recognized how difficult the risk must be for him. To see him here—bare-chested, hard-muscled, soft-spoken—before me, giving up a day to be with me when he had a billion things to do and not enough time to do them, made me sigh.