I don’t really want to be out at dinner right now, but I’m glad to be with Daniel.
He lets me order for myself this time, but not before giving me his top three recommendations. I don’t fight him on it, simply because he does seem to know what I like. I choose one of the dishes he suggests, and I’m not disappointed one bit when it arrives. Even the wine he picks to pair with it is perfect. He’s a man of many talents, semiprofessional sommelier being one of them, apparently.
He pours the last of the wine into my glass as the server clears our plates. I’m pleasantly warm without being drunk, so a little more won’t do me in. Once he sets the empty bottle down, he picks his own glass up, though he doesn’t take a sip yet. He’s too busy watching me.
For the past hour, he’s been like this—quiet and assessing. He’s answered all the questions I’ve asked, about timelines for my physical books and all the way to what he does for fun on the weekends. He even responded to a joke about having more dates lined up with girls who work for our competition by unlocking his phone and sliding it across the table to me.
“No dating apps,” he said, inviting me to swipe across the screen. “No dates on my calendar.”
I pushed his phone back to him without a peek, but the message was clear. He trusts me to look. Wants me to know I really am the only one. “You don’t have to prove anything to me.”
“No, I don’t have to,” he agreed. “But I will. I want you to know.”
“Why?”
It was the only question he didn’t answer. He took a sip of his wine instead. From there, I turned the conversation back to safer topics, or as safe as talking about work could be.
We’ve just finished shitting on the latest movie JotNote produced and silence has fallen between us, but it’s not awkward. There’s tension, as always. The kind I shouldn’t welcome yet absolutely do.
Maybe it’s the quiet or maybe it’s the wine, but I find myself again asking the question that’s been on my mind since our first night together. Last time, his answer was vague; I’m determined to get the real story this time.
“You never did tell me why you went after me.”
Daniel finishes off his wine, leaving the silence to hang a little longer. A faint hint of red lingers on the rim of the glass as he places it on the table. When I look up at him, I find the matching shade on his bottom lip. I want to kiss it off.
“I did say you were interesting,” he reminds me.
“That’s not enough of a reason to fuck someone you hate,” I counter.
“You think I hate you?”
I hesitate, because the answer is an obvious no at this point. He wouldn’t be making this much of an effort if he did. And I can’t say I hate him either, even if my feelings toward him sway in the intensely dislike direction every so often.
“I don’t know,” I lie. “Do you hate me, Daniel?”
He’s quiet again as he takes a moment to scan the restaurant around us. A few beats later, he says, “I remember the first time you came into the Naiad office. You were wearing what was possibly the most hideous sweater I’ve ever seen. It had all these ugly little hearts on it.”
His confession surprises a laugh out of me. “Oh my God, you’re such a dick,” I say, covering my amusement with a scoff. “That sweater was cute. You just have boring taste in fashion.”
A ghost of a smile touches his lips as he shakes his head, still not looking at me. “You’re missing the point, Selene. I wouldn’t have remembered what you were wearing that day if I hadn’t been paying close attention to you.”
“It sounds like the sweater alone was enough to make an impression,” I say dryly, swirling the remaining wine in my glass.
“You were the one who made the impression. The ugly sweater just made it stick.”
I roll my eyes at his continued insults. “What exactly are you trying to tell me? Do you hate me or not?”
“I hated you immediately,” he answers, his eyes snapping to mine. The intensity in them makes me want to draw back a little. “I thought you were brash and annoying. You made my job even more difficult, and all I wanted was for you to shut up every time you opened your mouth to demand something else.”
“Be very careful with what you say next, Santiago.” I can already tell I won’t like it. “There’s still wine in my glass. It could end up in your face.”
He doesn’t even blink at my threat. “I knew you were a great writer and added value to the company, but my God, every day I wondered if you were worth the hell you brought into my life.”
“Funny, I felt the same way about you,” I drawl, back to swirling the wine, prepared to toss it if need be.
“Turns out you were absolutely worth it.” He leans in and plants his forearms on the table, leaving me unable to escape his gaze. “I started to realize how brilliant you are over the summer. You have a way of dealing with authors like no one else can. You’re the only person who can keep these stories going for thousands of chapters without complaints that they’re boring. You always expect the best of yourself and everyone else, no exceptions, even if it nearly kills you to do it. And despite your terrible taste in sweaters, I’ve been attracted to you since the first second I laid eyes on you.”
My heart thuds hard and fast as I take in his words. “But you hated me,” I point out. “What does it matter if you were attracted to me?”
“Because I finally realized my attraction was beginning to outweigh my hate.”
Once again, I could say the same thing about him. I wouldn’t be sitting here tonight if my hate for him hadn’t waned. But I have to protect my heart. I have to make sure all of what he’s saying is real before I let him in. What he’s done and said so far has cracked open the door, but I’m waiting for him to push it all the way open and step inside.
“So you realized I wasn’t so bad over the summer,” I lay out. “But you didn’t make a move on me until the holiday party.”
At that, a little of his intensity fades, then a spark of humor reappears in his eyes. “I’ve been calling you oblivious for a reason.”
I freeze and think back, searching my memory for moments when Daniel might have hinted that he was into me. There’s only one recently that comes to mind.
Steal all of my time, if you want.
But before that, before we returned to the office, were there other clues?
A memory hits me hard. Back in June, when we were still negotiating terms with Kimmy Petes and spending six hours a day brainstorming ideas, Daniel sat in on a few of those meetings. Usually, only production team members joined, but to my absolute annoyance, Daniel insisted on involving himself.
Since Kimmy was almost always late to our meetings and the other production girls didn’t bother to join the Zoom call until Kimmy was ready to start, I was often the only person in the room for the first few minutes…until Daniel appeared.
Kimmy had gotten snippy with us the day before, worse than she usually did, going so far as to insult my abilities to create a captivating storyline. I wasn’t looking forward to spending another full day with her, and I’d been psyching myself up to keep a straight face every time she shot down one of my ideas.
My exhaustion must have shown, because the first thing Daniel said to me that morning was, “Don’t lose sleep over someone who isn’t as talented as you are.”
I snorted at his words, sure he didn’t mean them. Or if he had, it was only for the benefit of the company—he didn’t want me walking away from such a huge project lest Naiad lose money because of it.
Then there was the entire month of July when he randomly put a series of one-on-one meetings on my calendar. Those half-hour chats had been a waste of my time. Daniel used them to check up on my progress regarding the stories I was working on so he could report back to their respective authors. I had gone along with the check-ins until I complained to the other production girls about it, hoping to commiserate with them, only to find out that none of them were being forced into the meetings like I was.
“He’s not our boss,” Nikki pointed out. “He has no right to demand those kinds of updates from you. He can wait until our weekly team meeting for that information. Why’s he singling you out like that?”
“Because he hates me,” I replied, then pulled up my calendar and declined the invite for next week’s one-on-one. He didn’t send another after that.
Then in August he— Well, it doesn’t matter what he did. I see the pattern now.
“You’ve been trying to get my attention this whole time.” I say the words, but my brain hasn’t caught up yet. It’s still too twisted by the realization.
“Like I said,” Daniel murmurs. “Oblivious.”
I adjust in my seat, trying to ignore how flustered I suddenly am. “Or you were just too subtle,” I huff.
He shrugs, frustratingly at ease, while I’m over here barely resisting the urge to fan myself. “It worked eventually.”
I drain the rest of the wine in my glass and slam it down. I have been oblivious, and I only see what he was doing now because he forced me to stop and think back. “All those times I thought you were being condescending and smirky,” I say, trying to fit all the puzzle pieces together in my head. “Were you flirting with me?”
“Not all the time.”
So I wasn’t completely clueless. That makes me feel a little better.
“Sometimes you really did annoy the hell out of me,” he finishes.
“But other times…definitely flirting?”
Daniel clasps a dramatic hand to his chest and tilts his head back. “Finally, she notices.”
I scowl and nearly flip the table as I shove back my chair. “Oh my God, Daniel. That wasn’t flirting. That was trying to start a fight!”
He drops the theatrics and stares me down, but his hand stays over his heart. “Same thing for us, no?”
I take a moment to consider that. “You know what?” I grudgingly admit. “True.”
It’s so fucking true. It’s like we don’t know how else to act around each other. But can we learn? If not, this is bound to spiral into some sort of toxic nightmare we’ll never survive.
But haven’t things already changed? We still throw barbs at each other, and I don’t see that ever ending, but we know when we’ve gone too far and when to walk it back. We’re learning about each other and the boundaries we can push. That’s normal for any type of relationship, sexual or not, even for people who used to truly hate each other. Things between us are already lighter, and yet the heat continues to simmer.
I shake my head and run a hand through my hair. After hearing all of this, I don’t know where we go from here. It’s clear that this is no longer casual—and from what he’s divulged tonight, it likely never was for him. I don’t think it has been for a while for me either, no matter how much I tried to fight it.
But how do we go from no-strings hookups to bringing our real feelings out in the open?
As if reading my mind, Daniel asks, “Where do we go from here, Selene?”
Already, it feels like he knows me better than I know myself. I’ll take it as a sign that we’re doing something right. “Why do I have to be the one to decide?”
I throw the question back at him to deflect, even though all I want is to drag him back to my hotel room and have my way with him. From there, though? I don’t know, but I’m excited to find out.
“Because, out here,” Daniel answers, lifting a hand to lazily motion to the world around us, “you’re in charge of what happens. You tell me to leave you alone, I leave you alone.” He angles closer, his arms on the table again, and pitches his voice low. “But if you let me take you back to your hotel room, you won’t be in charge anymore.”
A shiver rolls down my spine at the promise in his voice. God, how I’ve missed what he does to me, even without a single touch.
“So, what’s it going to be, mi amor?” he asks. “What do you want from me?”
