Party of Two

by Jasmine Guillory

  His big worry with this date tonight had been that he’d have to control the whole conversation himself. That’s what had happened the few times he’d gone out on first dates in the past two years—he didn’t know if it was because women were intimidated by him now, or because the type of women who were interested in dating a senator thought they should just shut up and let him talk, but whatever it was, those dates were boring as hell. But with Olivia, the conversation was easy; he didn’t have to think about it; he could just relax into chatting with her.

  “I started really thinking about it almost three years ago—I moved to New York a year after I graduated from law school, and I loved living there, but every time I came to California, it got harder and harder to go back. I decided in earnest about a year ago. I’m sure there’s a lot I’ll miss about New York, but it feels right to be here in L.A. now.”

  Oh good, now he could ask her something he’d been wondering about since the luncheon.

  “I’m impressed that you’ve only been here for a month and just opened your firm, and the community center already approached you about joining the board. Doesn’t that usually take a while?”

  She smirked at him.

  “Maybe for some people.”

  He let out a bark of laughter that made the tables around them stare. He really liked how cocky she was.

  “I liked your speech, by the way,” she said. “I don’t know if I mentioned that.” She had, but he was very happy to hear it again. “And I liked what you said about your criminal justice reform bill.”

  “Thank you, that means a lot.” He knew she—unlike many people who complimented him—wouldn’t have done so if she didn’t mean it. He reached across the table and touched her hand. It was soft, warm. “The speech itself was mostly my staffer Poppy, so I’ll pass along your compliments to her. And the bill is something I’ve worked really hard on. When I became disenchanted with the way we lock kids up, I spent a lot of time talking to advocates and experts about what we could and should be doing for these kids.”

  She kept her hand on the table right next to his. Just barely touching.

  “That’s as unexpected as it is refreshing. We need more politicians to do things like asking experts who have devoted years to thinking and talking about how best to fix problems. It’s sad that that’s so rare, but I guess it is.”

  He couldn’t tell if that was a backhanded compliment or not, but either way, he’d take it.

  “Tell me more about your job,” he said. “It must have taken a lot of courage to start your own firm.”

  She looked proud.

  “It did. Though it took a while for me to decide to make that leap. Ellie first brought it up . . . oh God, maybe five years ago? At first it was just a joke, and then it got more serious, but it really wasn’t until last year when I finally said yes, I’d do it.”

  He grinned at her.

  “That’s definitely the opposite way I make decisions; I’m much more of a split-second kind of guy. What made you finally go for it, after five whole years of thinking about it?”

  She opened her eyes wide and shook her head.

  “That sounds . . . like a stressful way to live. As for me, so many things finally came to a head.” She paused and looked at him for a long moment before continuing. “I was a partner at my old firm, but too often there were white male associates who got far more respect than I did, and the older partners loved to yell at me. I was just sick of it. I was tired of people doubting my ideas and intelligence, tired of just having to take the abuse, tired of working incredibly long days with no time for myself, and very tired of winter in New York. Finally, one day, after holding my rage in at work one too many times, I walked out of the building and called Ellie and told her I was in.”

  “I’m really sorry you had to go through all of that,” he said.

  He touched her hand again, and this time she slid her hand into his.

  “Thank you,” she said. “I appreciate that.”

  “You’re a month into the firm now?” he asked. “How’s it been so far? All that you dreamed of?”

  He rubbed his thumb back and forth over her hand, and she smiled.

  “I’m not really sure quite what I dreamed of, but it’s been great so far. Granted, it’s been stressful—it’s just me and Ellie, and we’re doing everything ourselves, from casework and meeting with clients to research to building bookshelves to updating our website to the seemingly endless amount of paperwork the State of California wants from us. But it’s incredible to be my own boss, and to do things the way I think they should be done, every single time.”

  Boy, could he ever relate to that.

  “Did you know anything about running your own business before?”

  She shook her head.

  “Nope, we’ve both learned on the fly. We both reached out to a lot of other women we knew who have started their own firms and their own businesses, and got a ton of advice, though—thank God for all of them. Some of that advice saved us from making some really bad and expensive mistakes.”

  She was so animated when she talked about her firm. He liked that.

  “You and Ellie have been friends for a long time, right? I bet it’s such a change to work with someone you can really trust,” he said.

  The waitress set their burgers and fries in front of them, but Max ignored the food.

  “Oh, it’s been great to work with Ellie—the two of us have such different strengths, but we still work really well together. And yes, I trust her implicitly, but we also signed a very detailed contract.” She grinned. “That was a very fun day, actually.”

  Max grinned back at her.

  “The true way to any lawyer’s heart,” he said.

  Olivia picked up her burger.

  “That’s all too accurate,” she said.

  They were silent for a while as they both dove into their burgers and fries, but he didn’t feel the need to rush to fill the silence. The table was just small enough that they kept accidentally touching each other under the table . . . though, after a while, it stopped being an accident, at least on his end.

  She was gorgeous, she was smart, and she was funny, but more than anything, she was interesting. He felt like he could talk to her for hours. And holy shit did he want to kiss her.

  “You were correct,” Olivia said as she put down her burger. “The burgers are great, but the fries need some work.”

  It wasn’t that Max would have liked her less if she hadn’t agreed with his french fry opinions, but . . . well, he was just very relieved she did.

  “It’s so hard to find a place that has a good burger-and-fry combination—one is almost always significantly better than the other one, and I don’t understand why.”

  Olivia picked up her drink.

  “Put that on your platform.”

  They grinned at each other.

  “Is your family still in Northern California?” he asked.

  “Yeah, my parents and my sister,” she said. “They’re thrilled I’m in L.A. now, let me tell you. You and my sister would get along well—she’s also obsessed with both food and politics. She emailed me a long list of all of her favorite places in L.A. before I got here, but I’ve been so busy I haven’t been able to get to them.”

  She had a tiny dimple in one cheek that only appeared when she smiled really big. How unexpected and charming.

  “Now I want to see your sister’s list,” he said. “That must be weird for you, to be in a new place and needing advice from other people to figure out daily life, after being in New York for so long. I imagine you built a whole life there, with friends and work and everything else.” He hated the sad look that came over her face, so he hastened to give her an out. “Sorry if that’s too personal, we don’t have to talk about this if you don’t want to—I was just thinking about it because of how I sometime
s feel in DC.”

  She shook her head.

  “No, it’s okay, you’re right. That makes sense you would feel that way, too—I can only imagine how weird life is for you.” She was quiet for a moment. “It was hard to leave a place where I built a whole life to go somewhere brand-new. I do have some friends here, and of course I work with one of my best friends. But she’s been living in L.A. for a long time, and she’s married, and has a kid, and has her own life here, so . . . it’s different, you know?” She shrugged. “Is that how it is for you, too?”

  He nodded.

  “It is. I’ve been in DC for . . . I guess just over a year now, but I feel like I barely know the city, and then when I come home, life here has gone on without me. I have a handful of good friends I’ve known for years, but these days my schedule is so weird I barely see them, and . . . well, it gets lonely.”

  He hadn’t said this out loud to anyone. He’d barely even said it to himself. He didn’t know why he’d said it to Olivia, except she looked at him like she was really, truly listening to him.

  “Yeah, that sounds hard.” She reached her hand back across the table, and it felt natural for him to slide his fingers into hers. “You can’t really say, ‘Yes, you should book a sitter so we can all have dinner two weeks from Friday,’ then two weeks from Friday you’re still on an airplane, because you couldn’t leave the Senate until some asshole finished spouting his nonsense.”

  He laughed so hard at that people turned to stare again.

  “That’s a very accurate way of describing my job.”

  She grinned at him, then popped another fry in her mouth and made a face.

  “I can’t stop eating these, even though they’re not very good. Kind of like In-N-Out fries—we all know they’re terrible, but that doesn’t stop me from eating a whole order.” She shook her head. “Maybe I just need to find some hobbies, or something.” She took a sip of water. “You grew up in L.A., right? Whereabouts?”

  He was surprised she didn’t know this about him. Most people did.

  “I did. In Beverly Hills.”

  Her eyebrows shot up. She opened her mouth, paused, and then continued.

  “I’m impressed that you know the Eastside so well, if you grew up over there.”

  He shook his head at her.

  “We both know that’s not what you were going to say. Come on, out with it.”

  She looked down at her plate, then back up at him with a grin.

  “Sorry, was I that obvious? I can’t help it, I grew up in the Bay Area in the eighties and nineties, I have a single reaction to hearing that someone grew up in Beverly Hills, and it’s—”

  “90210,” they said in unison, and laughed again. He used to hate telling people he grew up in Beverly Hills, but now that his whole background was on the Internet for the world to see, it made it easier.

  “Anyway, I don’t live there anymore—I went to college at UCLA and have lived all over the L.A. area since then.”

  “All done here?” The waitress didn’t wait for an answer and picked up their plates and swept them away. There was one last bite of burger on his plate he’d wanted. Oh well—they did have five pieces of pie coming.

  “UCLA, of course. That explains the hat. I’m disappointed in this poor excuse for a disguise, you know. The same UCLA hat every time, and that’s where you actually went to college? Didn’t you ever think about something like a Yankees hat, or a USC hat, or something?”

  He pulled the cap down over his face.

  “Over my dead body.”

  The waitress came back and slid the five plates of pie on the table.

  “Here you go.”

  Olivia stared at the pie-laden table.

  “I can’t believe we actually ordered five different kinds of pie, but at least I wore a red shirt instead of a white one.” She shook her head. “But I have a feeling this pie will stain no matter what color the shirt.”

  He pushed the cherry pie toward her.

  “Stick with me, kid. One of the first skills they teach you in politician school is how to eat food around other people without spilling—even the messiest food.” He handed her a napkin. “Maybe if you’re lucky, I’ll teach you.”

  She picked up her fork and grinned at him.

  “I might have to take you up on that.”

  They both dove into the pie, pushing the plates around the table as they alternated bites. She ate with such enjoyment—she would pause and close her eyes after the first bite of each piece, as if she needed to shut the world out to concentrate on it. He wondered if she brought that kind of concentration to everything she did.

  He would bet on it.

  As they ate, they talked about pies they had known, which led to a discussion of best and worst meals they’d had while traveling, which led to airplane horror stories.

  Finally, Olivia put her fork down with a sigh.

  “Those were all delicious, but I can’t eat another bite.” She looked down at her shirt. “I should quit while I’m ahead anyway; I managed to keep this shirt cherry-free, I don’t want to push my luck.”

  When the waitress dropped the bill on the table, Max pulled out his wallet.

  “My treat? As a welcome to California?”

  Olivia withdrew her hand from her purse and smiled at him.

  “Thank you. And thanks for introducing me to this place; you were right about that pie.”

  He smiled to himself as he tossed bills on the table. He hadn’t been at all sure she’d let him pay for dinner. He hoped that meant she liked him some. Because he already knew he liked her a lot.

  They walked out to the parking lot, and Olivia pulled her phone out of her purse.

  “Well, I should get a car to get me home, so . . .”

  Max put his hand on her shoulder.

  “You didn’t drive? Can I drive you home?”

  Please let her say yes.

  “I didn’t drive, no, because . . . I still haven’t bought a car. So yes, I’ll take that ride home.”

  He took an exaggerated step backward.

  “Wait. You still don’t have a car?” he asked. “And you say you’re from California?”

  He’d hoped to make her laugh, and he’d succeeded.

  “I know, I know, but I’ve been so busy ever since I got here. I haven’t had time to buy one yet.”

  He led her toward his car.

  “That’s something a New Yorker would say.”

  She glared at him, but he was pretty sure he could tell she was smiling behind that.

  “It is not,” she said. “A New Yorker wouldn’t even have a driver’s license! They’d just complain about the public transportation here forever.” She bit her lip. “And I hate to say this, but they’d have a point.”

  He opened the passenger door for her, and she got in.

  “I hate to cede the point to the New Yorkers, but you’re right about that.”

  They smiled at each other as he closed the door.

  * * *

  * * *

  Max spread his big, firm hands on the steering wheel, and Olivia couldn’t keep her eyes off them. Or her body from remembering every single touch from those hands—when she’d first walked in and he’d put his hand on her arm and then her back; when he’d touched and then briefly held her hand at the table; when he’d handed her napkins and pie and ketchup, and his fingers had lingered for a few extra seconds on hers . . . or had that been her imagination? And then just now, when he’d put his hand on her shoulder, and she’d wanted it to stay there for so much longer.

  She smiled to herself. Tonight was going to be good.

  “What’s your address?” he asked.

  She gave it to him, then double-checked in her phone.

  “Okay, yes, that’s the right address. I still only half know it.” Sh
e shook her head at herself. “I lived in the same place the entire time I was in New York, so I almost gave you an address that was a few days’ drive away.”

  He smiled at her and pulled out of the parking lot.

  “No problem, this is probably a good time of night to start a cross-country drive anyway. No traffic getting out of L.A., so we could probably get to Colorado by morning.”

  She narrowed her eyes.

  “Are you sure about that? How fast do you drive, anyway?”

  He threw her a grin.

  “Don’t you worry. You’re very safe with me.”

  She bit her lip as she glanced sideways at him—that arrogant grin was far too sexy for his own good. Hell, Max was far too sexy for his own good. She’d expected to flirt with him a lot tonight, but she hadn’t expected to talk to him, with him, that much. He looked right at her when she was talking like she was the only person in the world, and that he was fascinated by what she was saying. And then he asked follow-up questions that made it clear he’d been paying attention! Which in turn made her want to rip his clothes off right there in the restaurant.

  That whole focused-attention thing was a politician trick; she knew that. He had some specific professional skills that also happened to be exactly the right way to get into a woman’s pants, and he was using that skill for all it was worth.

  Well, it was working.

  He took his baseball cap off and tossed it in the back seat, and ran his fingers through his hair. She shook her head. She’d been right—perfect tousled waves, even after being under a baseball cap all night.

  “Do you like being a senator?” she asked him. “What with the different schedule and the security concerns and the travel and everything else.”

  Why had she asked him that? Probably because his charm offensive had gotten to her enough that she really wanted to know what he would say.

  “That’s a hard question to answer,” he said after a few moments. “Am I glad I ran and won? Absolutely yes. Is it hard as hell? Harder and more frustrating than I ever imagined it would be. But I think I’m making a difference, which has been my ultimate goal from the beginning. I think—I hope—I’m helping to move the country forward, helping to improve people’s lives, here in California and across the country. And I care more about doing a good job than I’ve ever cared about anything. So . . . I don’t quite know if I can say I like my job, exactly; at least, not all of the parts of it. But I’m really honored to be there.”