up, it couldn’t idle down enough to go to sleep. Does that make you feel better?”
I grinned. “It does. And I’m glad to know you didn’t sleep either.”
She rolled her eyes. “You made sure of that with your texts.”
Good to know. I reached out, took one of her hands, and brought her knuckles to my lips, allowing my tongue to graze over the soft skin.
“I wasn’t kidding today when I answered Eve’s question about what I’m obsessed with. You’re all I can think about for the last month.”
“I won’t insult you by trying to claim it’s a one-way street. From the moment we met on Match, I’ve spent an inordinate amount of time thinking about you, too.”
I still had her hand in mine, so I squeezed. “Doesn’t that tell you something?”
Valentina looked down at her feet for a moment before she spoke. “I started dating Ryan when I was fifteen. I got pregnant at seventeen and married at eighteen. When I was thirty-four, I caught him cheating on me. Instead of leaving, I spent a year trying to make it work. I blamed myself—I’d gained a little weight, didn’t put on makeup half the time. I thought if I got myself in better shape, kept the house nicer, paid more attention to him as a man, things would be okay.”
She shook her head. “Obviously, they weren’t. It took me a long time to accept that my failed marriage wasn’t all my fault. But it’s taken me even longer to figure out who I am. When you become an us at fifteen and then suddenly you’re an I for the first time at thirty-five, you need to take some time to really be an I.”
She squeezed my hand this time. “I’m incredibly attracted to you. Painfully so. But even if we were the same age, I’m not ready for a relationship yet.”
My shoulders slumped. I could argue she was wrong about the age difference, but how could I argue with needing to find herself? For the first time, I felt a sense of defeat sink in.
I nodded. “Okay.”
Val smiled half-heartedly. “I’m sorry.”
I leaned in and kissed her cheek, knowing it was time to bow out and call it a night. “Me, too.”
***
My dick was just as depressed as I was.
Unlike the other nights I’d come home from next door, I didn’t feel the need to beat off. I took a quick shower to wash the sand and salt off and slipped on a pair of sweats.
It was Saturday night and not even ten o’clock. I should’ve gotten myself dressed and gone out to find someone interested in perking both my limp dick and me up. But let’s face it, there was only one person either of us was interested in.
We wanted Valentina.
So instead, I fired up my laptop and started to answer some work emails. The first few were from my assistant—confirming appointments and asking what day I wanted to meet with the lawyers about converting one of the storage buildings to office space. Then I opened one from the VP of marketing. He gave me an update on our Match.com advertising campaign—the amount of the budget spent so far and which ad targets were performing the best.
Apparently, our temporary office space appealed most to divorced singles between the ages of thirty-two and forty who were not looking for a serious relationship.
I scoffed. It must be me.
Though it made sense. It was logical that people who had just come out of a bad marriage liked the idea of temporary office space. Their lives were in a state of flux, and the last thing they wanted to do was make a new, long-term commitment when that was happening. That’s what made our office space so attractive—you could use it anytime you wanted and walk away whenever you wanted.
Use it anytime you wanted and walk away whenever you wanted.
That thought smacked me right in the face.
Jesus Christ. Am I that big of an idiot?
I’d been going about things all wrong with Valentina.
She’d told me straight out she wasn’t ready for a relationship.
And what did I do? Go home to sulk.
I needed my head examined for not proposing an alternative.
Grabbing my cell, I shot off a quick text.
Ford: Can you meet me on the beach?
A minute later the dots started to jump around.
Valentina: Now?
Ford: Yeah. I need to ask you something.
Valentina: What is it?
Nope. Not happening. This was a conversation we needed to have face to face.
Ford: It will only take a minute.
Valentina: Okay.