Page 31 of Make Me Want it Too

I shake my head, narrowing in on the computer. “Where were you?”

“Oh this.” He lifts his laptop and shrugs, giving me a lopsided smile.

Crouching, he gets a case out of his bag and puts it away. “Working. Monday morning meetings are sort of non-negotiable. Most of my clients are on the east coast, so they start around five and go to seven or eight. But I’m done for the day and mostly for the week now. Didn’t want to wake you so I found a room downstairs. Walter brought me tea.”

“I didn’t—I mean, what do you do for work?” This is the first I’m hearing of a job. Clients? Wood has clients?

He shrugs again. “I designed some security software just before I graduated college, and several big companies were interested in using it. And, yeah, my dad does have connections at many of those companies, I’m well aware. After about a year, I got an offer from a competitor wanting to buy the rights to it. Honestly, I’m not super into the corporate thing and the price was right, so I sold it. It was enough for me to invest and buy my apartment in Seattle.”

He stands, stretching, a sliver of tanned and toned stomach peeking out from under his shirt, before he sits at the end of the bed.

“I do some freelance security consulting for a few companies now. I charge a high fee, and they pay it. It’s more than enough to live off of, and I usually only work five to ten hours a week unless something bigger is happening, like a merger or something. I’m pretty happy with it. Why, did you think I just lived off a trust fund or something?”

“No,” I say, too quickly.

He smiles, waiting.

“Sorta,” I admit.

Wood laughs, and why does he even laugh handsomely? It’s weird. And unfair.

“Well, I don’t,” he says. “Okay—I do have a trust fund, but I can’t access it until I’m thirty-five, I think. And I figure by then, I’ll have a wife and maybe even kids and I’ll want to use that for college funds and buying that dream house out in the suburbs, you know?”

“You think about getting married and having kids?”

“Of course. Don’t a lot of people?”

He doesn’t even have a girlfriend, and he’s thinking about a wife. Meanwhile, Spencer thought I was rushing after six years together if I even brought up the M word.

That little hollow pit in my stomach I’ve been nursing since the breakup starts to bleed again.

“Some men don’t,” I say quietly.

Wood isn’t smiling anymore. A look passes between us. His eyes are a bright blue in the direct morning light, and they’re looking right through me. But not past me—it’s like he’s looking inside, precisely at that bleeding wound.

He knows. Maybe everyone does.

After a second he quirks up his lopsided grin again. “Maybe it’s because I’m an only child,” he says. “I’ve always wanted kids—two, three, five—as many as my wife wants, honestly, but at least two.”

“Why did your parents only have one? Do you know?”

He smiles with lots of teeth. “Guess they knew to stop when they created perfection—me.”

“Ah, right.” I nod and smile along.

He sits up and scoots in a little closer. “That’s what I tell people sometimes, but do you want to know the truth?”

I lean in.

“My mom wanted more kids, badly. She almost died having me, and the doctors told her she shouldn’t try to carry any more. She probably would have disobeyed but my dad wouldn’t have it. He loves her too much. They tried IVF with a surrogate, but after three failed attempts, they decided it wasn’t meant to be and moved on the best they could.”

“Good thing they already achieved perfection, then,” I say, trying to lighten the mood.

“What about you? I never really hear you talk about your family. I think you’ve mentioned an older brother?”

“Yeah, I have an older brother and sister. They’re twelve and fourteen years older than me. I was the ‘oopsie’ baby. They’re both married with kids—he lives in Colorado and she’s in Arizona. My parents are divorced and both retired and remarried to new people. They seem happy. My mom’s in Arizona and my dad’s in Florida living out retired life. And I came here for school and stayed here because of my job and friends and?—”

I don’t want to finish that sentence.

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