The plaque has the name of the most exclusive new restaurant in town on it, complete with the chef’s name.
“We’re eating here?”
“You’ve been here before?”
I shake my head, my fingers closing on my compact. I’ve heard about it. This is the apocryphal restaurant that the celebrity chef created for friends, family, and few of her closest Boston billionaires.
When I look in the mirror, my lipstick’s half gone. Where did it go?
Andrew looks down at me and I find my answer.
“You look good in red,” I say, pulling on his arm. He gives me a puzzled look and I reach up, using my thumb to wipe some of the lipstick off his mouth and show him.
He laughs, then reaches into his suit jacket for a handkerchief, removing the evidence of our limo encounter. At least, the visible evidence.
I look at my reflection and he gently takes his handkerchief and presses it into my hand. Our eyes lock.
“I must be a mess,” I say, suddenly self-conscious, dabbing at my smeared makeup.
“You’re gorgeous,” he murmurs, bending down, so close his words send shivers down my spine. “And you’re even more beautiful when you’re a mess, because I know I made you that way.”
No man has ever talked to me like this. I’ve never even imagined conversations like this, the kind that cut to the chase. He’s so direct, so virile and masculine, filed with the warrior’s gaze and the lover’s tenderness as he stands there beside me, just...there.
He’s finally here. It only took him two years.
And I don’t know what to do with him now that he’s decided to show up.
Andrew takes me to a tiny elevator. It’s quite literally just a door, and if I didn’t see him wave a small card, like a hotel key, in front of a little circle, I’d think the elevator appeared via magic.
“What’s this?” I ask.
“A secret door.” We enter it and the elevator lifts us up at a snail’s pace.
“How do I know you’re not really some kinky billionaire who’s taking me to an illicit sex club and I’m about to disappear into an underground world of sexual torture?” I tease.
“I typically save that for the third date,” he answers.
The elevator halts and opens onto a rooftop garden. As we step out, I murmur, “Then I have something to look forward to.”
The smile he gives me makes my toes curl. A maître d’ appears in a suit tailored so well he looks like he just flew in from Milan.
“Mr. McCormick. Ms. Warrick. Welcome.”
How does he know my name? Probably the same magic that allows limo drivers to effortlessly glide through the streets of Boston, that gives Andrew cards he can wave in front of sensors to open doors no one else can see, that gives him access not only to luxury, but to the convenience of shaping the entire structure of his life around getting from Point A to Point B with as little friction as possible.
That is the power of money. It’s not about buying things. It’s about gaining access to shortcuts the 99% can’t even fathom. And that buys you an advantage. The McCormick men don’t just live in a different economic class—they quite literally function in a completely different world.
One that Andrew has just invited me to visit.
As we’re walked to a small table, surrounded by large candles in shimmering glass olive jars the size of toddlers, I realize we are one of only four tables in the entire restaurant. Each has its own pergola, wine grape vines snaking through the wooden slats above us, entwined with strings of pale white lights that give the rooftop an ethereal sense of being a world apart.
Which is pitch perfect for how every second with Andrew feels.
His hand takes mine, fingers slipping into the grooves between my own, palms pressed together like hearts trying to find a common rhythm. Soon we’re seated, and as I settle in to my spot I look up, then gasp.
The view of the ocean stretches on into the night, inky and rolling, offering endless possibilities and terrifying enormity.
“It’s beautiful,” I say, completely smitten with the view.
He looks over his shoulder, as if the panoramic scene behind him were nothing. “Oh. Yeah.”
And for him, it probably is nothing. Shannon’s talked about the everyday luxuries Declan takes for granted, from having groceries delivered and stocked to never touching a cleaning supply or a broom. How he has tailors who come to his office. Dry cleaning picked up dirty and brought back and hung in his closet, neat as a pin.
How the limo driver just delivers him where he needs to go and appears when called. His schedule is managed by people who work for him and he never makes a single logistical arrangement. The McCormick men live a life crafted not so much by whim, she says, but by choice. Other people make their lives run like a well-oiled machine so that they are never, ever inconvenienced by the small tasks in life that trip the rest of us up.
Their lives are fixed by people like me.
Wine appears with a first course of grilled octopus and chive aioli that almost tastes as good as Andrew’s kisses.
Almost.
We’re quiet. He holds one of my hands. We don’t really talk for the first few minutes. We don’t need to. Either this is super awkward and I’m too clueless to realize it, or we’re seamlessly fitting together in a way that is far too easy.
The spectrum is maddeningly long here, and the pendulum has more than enough room to swing in whatever direction fate chooses.
I finish my first glass of wine. Andrew stands and removes his jacket, sliding his arms out of the sleeves and rotating, his form on display. Minutes ago, that body was atop mine, pinning me in place against leather and lust. I enjoy the display, watching the lean stretch of his forearms, the subtle bulge of biceps as they twist and he slips the jacket over the back of his chair, the curve of his legs as he resumes his seat, moving the chair closer to the table, then reaching once more for my hand.