The impulse to say something I haven’t ever said out loud rises in me after a while. “I want to own my own firm one day,” I say. I keep my face down towards the roast duck on my plate like I can’t bear to look at Tomas while I admit these ambitions. “I’m smart enough. I’m capable enough. I can do it.”
Tomas says nothing, until at last, I force myself to look at him. That half-smile grows a tiny bit warmer. “Then do it,” he says gently.
What is it about that tenderness from this man that makes me want to leap across the table and mount him right here and now? We’re in a white tablecloth restaurant with dozens of people and staff around us, but if he keeps looking at me like that and saying these soft, gentle things, I might just go through with that urge.
I hold his gaze for a long momen
