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“Welcome to your new home, future wife.” Ford gestures as the elevator dings and the doors slide open to a beautiful apartment near the top of a residential tower in a great neighborhood in downtown Dallas.
It’s everything I’ve always dreamed of: modern, spacious, clean. Hardwood floors, updated kitchen, incredible views of the city. It must’ve cost Ford a small fortune.
“Is this yours?” I ask as I move through the entryway and into the kitchen and living area.
“I bought it this week. I didn’t think you’d want to come live in the Arc family mansion and I figured I wouldn’t be welcome in the Stockton house. So here we are, neutral ground. Do you like it?”
I slowly nod as I turn circles and look all around. “I love it.” Everything is perfect and new and shining—except it’s nearly empty. “There’s not much stuff though.”
“No, you’ll have to furnish it.”
“And decorate.” I chew on my lip, already considering, thinking of styles and stores and boutiques I can hunt through, and excitement bubbles through my body. “Nobody’s ever asked me to decorate before.”
“You’ll be fine. I bet you have a dozen Pinterest boards ready and waiting. By the way, I like the colors black, white, and gray.”
I laugh and give him a look. “No big shock there.”
He drifts over to the windows. “I want you to feel at home here. We’re going to share this place for a while… for a long while. We’re going tolivetogether here. You might as well make it your own.”
“You don’t have any input on that?”
“I’ll have an office upstairs.” He gives me a look when my eyebrows shoot up. “Yes, there are two floors. Yes, it wasveryexpensive.”
“Great. You can decorate your office in black and white skulls or whatever you’re into… and I’ll do the rest of the place.”
“Except for the bedroom. We’ll do that together. Speaking of which, let’s finish the tour. Come with me.” He drifts down a back hall and up a staircase. I follow him at a distance with a knot in my gut.
Can I really do this? Move in with a man I barely know—a man I barelylike—and leave my family behind? It’s terrifying, this leap I’m taking, and I feel like I’m soaring through the air with no net beneath me, no parachute to break my fall, nobody down there to catch me. Only Ford and me, plummeting together.
It’s terrifying, but it’s also exciting.
I get to furnish and decorate this apartment however I want. It’s a blank canvas and I can go wild. I’m already spinning through ideas and dreams, and I’m itching to get started. The only drawback is I’m doing this withhim, with Ford, but if I ignore the fact that I don’t like him all that much then it’s really not so bad.
I’m dizzy as I reach the top of the steps. He looks back as I steady myself on the wall and his handsome lips quirk down. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. Just tired.”
He considers that for a moment longer before leading me into the master bedroom.
It’s bigger than I expected. There’s a huge king mattress with four tall posts and netting around the top like a princess’s bed. The closet is bigger than the one in my room back home and the attached bathroom is borderline absurd in its luxury. I run my fingers over pristine countertops and stare at the enormous shower with its dark tile. “You really do like black,” I murmur to myself.
“Come back out here,” Ford calls from the main room.
I stand in the bathroom doorway leaning against the frame as he watches me from the foot of the bed. My hands rub against my thighs nervously and I don’t know what to think. It’s beautiful and comfortable and nicer than I ever dreamed, but it’s also cold and impersonal and foreign and strange. I’m supposed to make this place a home, but how am I supposed to do that when I’m living with a man I barely know?
“Can I ask you something?” I blurt out before he starts saying whatever it is he’s thinking.
“Go ahead.”
“What’s your favorite TV show?”
His eyebrows raise. “Do you plan on decorating this place in the style ofSeinfeld?”
“Really,Seinfeld?”
“Seriously, Kat, I’m not into the whole retro ‘90s thing.”
“No, that’s not why I’m asking. My favorite show isThe Office, by the way.”
