“Damn, Dyer,” Connor said with a grin as he pulled away from her. “You drive a hard bargain. Kiss me like that and I’ll go on a date with you every night of the week and twice on Sundays.”
He pulled her car door open and waited as she climbed inside before shutting her in. Emerson started the car and lowered the window.
“Sunday, any day next week. I don’t want to wait for next weekend,” Connor said.
“I’d like that,” she said.
“Message me when you get home, and drive safe,” he said, tapping the roof of her car.
The gravel of the driveway crunched as she pulled up in front of her home twenty minutes later. She stepped out of the car and took a deep breath of fresh air. She loved the vibrancy of the city. The noise and hustle and bustle. But she preferred it here, where she had room to breathe, wide-open spaces to hike, and a less polluted sky.
Quietly, she let herself into the house and dropped her keys and purse on the bench. She pulled out her phone and pondered what to say as she walked to her bedroom.
It was too late to come up with something super inspiring…something flirtatious. Instead, she stuck with simple and straight forward.
Dear Connor. Thanks for a wonderful evening. I really enjoyed your company. Have a great weekend.
She completed her bedtime routine as quickly as she could and climbed into bed, fresh-faced and thoroughly moisturized. There was a message on her phone.
Me too. I’m going to fall asleep to the thoughts of your hands on my body again and mine on yours, even if that doesn’t happen for a while. Sleep tight.
How on earth did he expect her to sleep tight with thoughts of what his hands would feel like racing through her mind?
Chapter Four
Connor placed his father’s sixtieth birthday gift on the table just inside the doors of the opulent hotel ballroom they’d booked for the celebration. It was momentous. Not just because of his father’s milestone, but because it marked the start of his father’s handover of the business to him. In eighty days, on the first day in January, the business would be officially his.
The gold theme was ostentatious. Gold cloths, gold balloons, and more white flowers than the state was capable of growing.
While he knew his father would expect him to join his table, he couldn’t face an afternoon of work talk with his father and constant opposition from his uncle just yet. He needed some space from their opinions and his uncle’s overinflated sense of self-importance. On a table to the left of the stage, he found his mother, Alyssa, and stepdad, Derek. Derek wore a short-sleeved shirt and a black tie, the mechanic’s token gesture to the black-tie dress code.
Connor opened the button on his favorite black custom Tom Ford suit jacket.
“Connor.” His mother’s face lit up when she saw him. “Come, come.” She pulled out the empty chair next to her. “Derek will get you a drink.”
“Beer?” asked Derek.
“G and T, please. Dyer’s Medallion if they have it,” Connor replied.
His mother raised an eyebrow. “Living dangerously?” She looked around for her ex-husband to ensure he couldn’t overhear. “Your dad would give birth to a cow right now if he found out you were drinking the enemy.”
Connor grinned, wondering what his father would say if he knew Connor’s thoughts were more in line with sleeping with the enemy. He’d likely have a heart attack if he found out that Connor had jerked off in the shower before coming here. Overwhelmed with memories of Emerson’s lips on his and the way their bodies had fit together, it hadn’t taken long. “I was persuaded to try it and really liked it. Plus, Dad is pissing me off.”
“What did he do now?”
Connor shook his head. It wasn’t worth getting into. “He’s clinging on to the business until the bitter end.”
Alyssa placed her hand on his arm. “It’s just a few more months, sweetheart. What’s that after all these years?”
Derek placed the gin next to his elbow. “There you go, kid.”
The use of the familiar term touched Connor more than anything his real father ever did. The majority of his childhood had been spent in Derek’s split-level. Despite his father’s wealth, he’d never paid Connor’s mother a nickel more than he was legally obligated to. While she’d looked after Connor and tried to build a home while his father forged his business, there had been little profit to go around by the time of their divorce. It had taken time for Finch Liquor Distribution to take off and become the success it now was.
Only after Donovan’s profile increased, only after people asked about the son he had, did his father realize he wanted Connor to follow in his footsteps, to keep the business in the family like the Bacardi family had. Connor kept that in mind every time he renegotiated his salary with his father.
The dinner came and went. Connor hid a smile when brownies and ice cream arrived for dessert. Sure, they were some high-end brownies with sea salt from the ends of the earth and vanilla bean-infused ice cream in perfectly as of yet unmelted spheres, but they were still brownies and soon-to-be melty ice cream. He wondered what Emerson Dyer would have to say about it. He refused the plate, thinking of the way her eyes had fluttered closed as she’d eaten the chocolate dessert.
Shortly after the last plate was cleared, his Uncle Cameron clinked the edge of his glass to get everyone’s attention as his father stepped up on the stage.
Donovan tapped the microphone. “Is this thing on? Can you hear me in the back?”
A few whistles and cheers went up around the room.
“Great,” his father said. “First, I want to thank you all for coming out. You know, the funny thing about turning sixty is that
