Buy lots of Danish.
She selected a treat from the box and took a monster-sized bite. I followed her lead, taking a chocolate croissant from the box and examining it.
“I thought you might like to see the city. It’s a beautiful day, and you’re new around here, so I thought…”
She grinned. “You’re getting soft, boss. I kind of like it.”
She licked a fleck of glaze from her bottom lip, and I resisted the urge to show her exactly how soft I wasn’t. I’d been irritated all morning because I wanted to get to know her a little better. Lying in bed all day, as awesome as that might be, wasn’t going to scratch this particular itch.
“Anyway,” I pressed on. “You’re only trying to distract me from the fact that you live in the gateway to hell. This neighborhood isn’t safe. You should let me find you a place in one of the buildings I own. Something with cameras and 24-hour security. And buzzers.”
“It’d be nice to have packages delivered someplace they wouldn’t get stolen,” she acknowledged, glancing around with a satisfied grin. “But to be honest, I sort of like this place. It has character.”
I surveyed the old wooden framework around her windows and scrubbed a hand over my jaw in irritation. “That’s one word for it.”
“I’m not talking any more about this. I want to hear all about your big plans for today.” She took another bite of her Danish. “Where are you taking me?”
I sure as shit wasn’t just going to drop it, but I wasn’t going to let it ruin our day, either.
I tucked it away to chew on later that night and turned my attention away from the dingy windows back to her.
“I don’t really have any, exactly. I don’t really know what you like to do.” I glanced around her apartment again, looking for some sign or hint of where to start. There was no video game system, and while there were a few paintings hanging on the walls, the place was mostly covered in family photos. I walked toward one of them and pressed my finger to the glass as I examined a girl who looked almost exactly like Piper.
“Who is this?” I asked.
“My sister,” she said. “She’s the one who set up the, uh, dating profile.”
“Right,” I laughed. “So, tell me, what do you want to learn about our fine city?”
“How to get Hamilton tickets?” she asked cheekily, eyebrows raised.
“Try again,” I said dryly. “I’m pretty spectacular, but I’m not magic.”
“How about we hit the streets and just see what we see, huh?”
“You? Miss organization and plan-every-second-of-the-day-out wants to wing it?” I considered for a moment and then gave her a solemn nod. “Okay.”
I was careful to make sure she locked all her doors and windows before we started on our journey. As we passed the doorman, he was still leaning against the wall outside. Piper grinned at him.
“Hey, Lou.”
“’Sup, Pipes?” he asked as she kept going, not noticing—or, more likely, choosing to ignore—my grimace of displeasure.
“He’s not going to do his job if you act like what he’s doing is okay,” I said.
“Lucky for me and him both, I’m not his boss.” She winked. “Now come on. Did you come to fight with me all day or to show me around the city?”
“A little hard to show you around the city when I don’t know where to start.”
“How about with your favorite place?” she offered.
I thought about it and then nodded.
“Yeah, okay. Come with me.” And without even thinking about it, I grabbed her hand and led her off into the heart of the city, feeling better than I could remember feeling in months.
Chapter Thirteen
Piper
I wasn’t sure what to expect. Maybe that he’d whisk me away to some underground jazz club or to his favorite tailored suit shop. Maybe just to some hole-in-the-wall burger joint that nobody had ever heard of. With a guy like Jackson, I could never be sure.
But, as we sailed down the avenue, I had a few guesses.
“The M&M store in Times Square?” I asked, grinning at him.
“Nope,” he said, squeezing my hand.
“What about, um, the Ferris wheel in the Toys ‘R’ Us?”
“Not there either,” he said.
“I’m running out of guesses,” I complained.
“Good news for me.”
“Hey!” I popped him lightly on the shoulder, but he pressed on, turning the corner and trying to hide his ever-widening grin.
“So no place touristy?” I asked.
“I didn’t say that either.”
“You haven’t said much of anything. At all.”
It was true—from the moment we’d left my apartment, he’d barely uttered more than a few words, though most had been in answer to my never-ending questions about where exactly he was taking me. But as much as I was peppering him with constant questions, I was walking on air.
He’d come to my apartment building, and not only was he concerned for my safety, he’d whisked me off on a date.
A real, relationship-style date, complete with the breakfast of champions and handholding. My heart felt like it was going to explode. I hadn’t had this kind of male attention in a long while, and while screaming orgasms were nice, I had missed this casual comradery more than I had been aware.
“I want it to be a surprise.”
We turned a corner and walked past booths of street vendors selling pottery and scarves. Jackson barely looked at them, but I paused, my eyes wide, and inspected the cute creations.
“Come on,” he said.
“Fine, fine, I’m coming.”
In front of us stretched the vast, wide steps of the Museum of Modern Art, though the street in front of it was flanked by vendors and lines of tourists.
“We’re here.”
“What do you mean?” I looked around. “The food trucks? We’re going to wait in this line for an hour.” The food did smell delicious, but I’d just scarfed down a plate-sized Danish and was hardly ready for lunch yet.
He shook his head and then gestured to the huge, pillared museum. “You told me to take you to my favorite place in the city. Here it is.”
“The Art Museum?” I blinked at the building and the flood of families coming and going through the wide-open doors. Of all the places I’d expected him to choose, this wasn’t even on the list.
Keeping me on my toes, aren’t you, Jackson?
He considered me for a minute and then said, “Let’s go inside.”
Placing his hand on the small of my back, he led me up the wide marble steps until we reached the atrium. On a sunny Saturday like this, it felt like almost every person in the city was trying to get inside the place, and we waited as the queue in front of us thinned and people took up their walking-tour headphones and joined still more groups. To the side, a bunch of kids were assembling for what looked like a church field trip, and I grinned as one of the little boys lightly pulled a girl’s pigtails.
I almost pointed them out to Jackson, but then his hand found mine and he was giving me a small blue button to pin to my shirt.
“Thanks,” I murmured and affixed the little circle to my clothes before stepping into the first room.
I had to admit, it was a good showing from Jackson. For the next ten minutes, I strolled around the room in awe, marveling at the paintings and sculptures.
“So this is your favorite place in the city,” I said again, and Jackson gave me a solemn nod.
“What’s your favorite part?”
“There are so many.” He shrugged. “The exhibits change all the time, and then there’s the exhibit with the old sixties and seventies furniture that looks impossible as a functional piece in someone’s house. There was an Andy Warhol exhibit I liked here once.”
“Andy Warhol? Really?” I raised my eyebrows.
He nodded.
“Affinity for Campbell’s soup?”
“Just the tomato,” he shot back.