Page 55 of The One

“You are good at those things. Not everyone is meant to be a boss. Mark seemed to think you could be.”

“I think I could. I wanted the job but wondered if I wanted it because I was trying to make so many changes in my life at once. I’d left Mike. I was helping to raise Ben. I think I was just looking for something for myself and maybe it wasn’t the right time.”

She’d told herself that in the past few months.

Sure, she wanted the promotion, but she’d been honest that Debra wasn’t a bad boss. That her time would come.

“You’ll figure out when the time is right just like I did,” he said. “Or maybe I waited too long, but in the end it worked out.”

It wasn’t the first time he’d made comments in the past about when the time was right. She just wasn’t sure what that was about. If there was more to the story or not.

Though really, what more could there be? She’d felt he’d been honest with her.

He’d told her he was ultimately working two full-time jobs and it paid out in the end. That he thought his life was passing him by, he was burned out and obviously not healthy, though he didn’t know that until recently. And that his sister had a child.

All those things made sense so she shouldn’t doubt what he had to say.

She had to stop looking at what happened to her in the past and start focusing on the future. Because the future was looking much brighter than it ever had before.

“I’ve found that life has a way of doing that.”

Their food was delivered and they ate. She liked that he wasn’t so worried about his choices anymore when he was with her. That he could splurge a little.

He’d told her about lunch with Robin and that he’d felt bad eating it and she’d laughed at him and said life was for enjoying things. Having something not healthy like mayo on one sandwich in a month wasn’t going to kill anyone.

So yeah, she was good at encouraging people.

“I haven’t had a good steak in a while. I never cook it well,” he said. “And filet is the best and it’s small.”

“I don’t cook a lot of red meat,” she said, but she’d gotten steak tonight too. “I can’t seem to do it the way I like it either. It’s better on a grill, which I don’t have at the house.”

“Grilling is the best,” he said, cutting into his petite filet. “That is one thing I miss about California. Not that I grilled there, but if I had, I wouldn’t have to worry about the weather controlling it.”

“Maybe you can show me the art of grilling this year then,” she said.

“I’d love to,” he said.

At first when the words were out of her mouth, she wished she could have taken them back. That would seem like she was making plans when she’d told herself to take things day by day, but it didn’t seem Rick cared all that much.

They finished their meal, and Rick paid which annoyed her. She wanted to pay and he’d told her no. She did bring food to his house to cook at times, but mostly they shopped together.

The last thing she wanted was for him to think she wanted a free ride. She wasn’t concerned about it all that much mostly, but there were times she couldn’t forget that he was a millionaire.

Just one more thing she’d have to get past because it almost never came up and she got the feeling it wasn’t an issue with him.

They got back to his house and rather than go into the room and get George out of his crate, Rick put his finger in front of his lips for her to be quiet and like two rebellious kids snuck upstairs to his room.

“What was that about?” she whispered.

“I need to see you naked and if I take care of George first then he wants the attention and I have to shut him down there alone anyway. No reason to tempt fate and have him get annoyed and destroy something because I came home and then ignored him.”

“You’re sliding into this parenthood thing well,” she said, giggling and pulling her shirt over her head.

“More like trial and error,” he said. “I did that the other day. Came home and then started to do my laundry and left him down here and heard some noises but ignored them. I came back and he’d found one of my sneakers and had the laces out and it was covered in slobber.”

“Eww,” she said. “Stop talking and get undressed.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he said.