His Forbidden Love (Manhattan Billionaires #2) - Ava Ryan Page 0,16
he’s self-aware. “I would have settled for thirty,” I say. “Not that I’m working for you.”
A glint of wicked amusement from him. “I would have given you eighty to seal the deal. And this is your office, by the way.”
My heart contracts. Hard.
I glance around again, loving the yellow and the Monet. The view.
“My office?”
“If you want it,” he says, shrugging.
If I—
This time I can’t even get my mouth open. I have no words. No hope of words.
There’s no room for words to coexist with the sudden soaring hope inside me.
I think of the special misery of trying to land a fellowship in plastic surgery, which has the distinction of being one of the most competitive fields in medicine. I think of all the interviews and the weeks and months of uncertainty about which city and hospital I might land in. I think that this setup is beyond my wildest dreams in terms of both fit and opportunity.
Most importantly, I think that this is all too good to be true. Events in my life just don’t come together like this, so I’d better not get my hopes up.
I decide to focus on the obvious. “We haven’t even discussed salary.”
He doesn’t say a word. He gives me a narrowed look instead, reaching out and grabbing a sticky note with the dramatic flourish of a conductor walking on stage and raising his baton at the beginning of an orchestra concert. He scrawls several numbers, pauses to frown and consider what he’s written, then conspicuously adds another zero before passing the note to me.
I gape at him, heart thundering out of control.
He leans back in his chair, laces his fingers across his taut belly and raises a brow, waiting.
I finally look down at the number. And gasp.
I can’t help it.
A number like this is life changing. A number like this will help me pay off a huge chunk of my student loan debts in the next year, even while living in one of the most expensive cities in the world. A number like this will allow me to replace my geriatric Camry if I want to and pay cash for something new. A number like this is beyond my most absurd fantasies at this early stage of my career.
I glance up with a thousand questions at the ready, only to hesitate when I see how closely he’s watching me. Most of my thoughts scatter, leaving only the one big issue.
Am I a good surgeon and getting better every day? Sure. But I’m not this special.
“Why would you pay me this kind of money?” I ask.
He hesitates. His expression becomes so still and inscrutable that I decide that whoever nicknamed him the Sphinx was a fucking genius. My intuition whispers that whatever he tells me next won’t be the truth. Or if it is the truth, it’ll only be a small part of the truth.
I know it. I just can’t do anything about it.
“You’re the kind of person I want on my team, Harlow,” he says quietly. “We’re older and wiser now. I think we can make a fellowship work for one year. Don’t you?”
No, I don’t think.
A lot can happen in a year. A lot did happen the last time we spent a year together.
And when it comes to him, I think I’m older and wiser, but it’s not the kind of thing I want to test out any more than I want to test whether lake ice is solid enough for ice skating by driving a tank across it.
Some things just aren’t a good idea. At all.
“Yes or no, Harlow?”
The correct answer is simple: Thanks, but no.
There’s no way I can work with this man. I emerged from my last work experience with him battered, bruised and with a broken heart entirely of my own making. He has a unique and profound effect on me that other people do not possess. I think about him. His presence in a room makes my skin sizzle. I’ve never been able to control my reactions to him, and there’s no reason to believe I’ll be able to start now.
He’s divorced now, Ally.
So? Who cares? His current marital status is absolutely none of my business and has zero effect on my life. He shut me down before. Ruthlessly, I might add. I’d be a fool not to learn from my past mistakes. I may be many things, but I always try not to be a fool when I can help it.