Total pages in book: 93
Estimated words: 89553 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 448(@200wpm)___ 358(@250wpm)___ 299(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 89553 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 448(@200wpm)___ 358(@250wpm)___ 299(@300wpm)
She links her fingers through mine, and we order a cocktail each. “I’m definitely getting the Sussex Vampire,” she says.
“Sounds bloody. I’ll take His Last Bow.”
“You want to take a picture to send to Katherine?” I ask when our cocktails arrive.
Our eyes snag, and after a beat she shakes her head. “I don’t think so. Let’s just . . . not.”
I take a sip of my drink to stop myself from smiling. We’re way past pretending, and we both know it.
“Are you going to grow fangs?” I ask as she sips her red drink that’s come in a martini glass topped with white foam.
“Oh, wouldn’t that be something?” She waggles her eyebrows mischievously. “Would you want me to bite you?”
I trail my gaze down her body. I want to bite her all over. “Not my thing,” I say. “But I think you know that. You know all my things.”
“Do I?” she asks. “I’m sure there’s loads about you I don’t know.”
I pull in a breath. “It doesn’t feel like that.” In fact, it feels like the complete opposite. It’s like she knows everything without me having to tell her. It feels like I’ve known Lucy much longer than I have—that we’re in a decade-old relationship or something. Maybe it’s because we started off hating each other and didn’t waste time trying to show carefully curated versions of ourselves to each other. Maybe it’s because the people closest to us love each other. Maybe it’s because it feels like she sees me. Really sees me.
“You don’t talk a lot about your parents. Are you close?”
I shrug. “We were,” I say.
“And your dad liked to fish?”
“Yeah. Still goes out.”
“But you don’t like it? Did you used to like it when you were a kid? You seemed to be pretty good at it, at least according to Ed and the guys.”
I chuckle, but it has a cynical tinge. “Lots of things change as you get older. How you see the world can completely turn upside down.”
“Can it?” she asks.
“Yeah, like most boys, I idolized my dad. He loved to fish, so I loved to fish. He used to like to grow vegetables, so I tried to grow the biggest carrots and the most potatoes.” My best memories of growing up all revolve around spending time with my dad. “He was my hero. I wanted to be just like him.”
“So when did he stop being your hero?” she asks.
I don’t ever talk about Bain Insurance. I told Ed before we went into business together, but that’s it. But something about Lucy makes me want to tell her. I want her to know everything about me. I don’t want to hold anything back. “Did I tell you I took over his business?”
She shakes her head but doesn’t say anything.
“I went to college to study finance so I could take over his life insurance business. Like I said, I wanted to be just like him. When I left college, I worked in the business for four years before he retired and left me in charge.”
“Wow,” she says. “You were young when you took over. Was it a big business?”
I nod. “Yeah. It was a lot of responsibility. But I was ready for it. I’d studied for a long time. I made sure that I’d worked in every aspect of the business before I took it over. I thought I was prepared.”
I glance up at her. Her expression of concern hits me in the chest.
“And I would have been.” I take a breath. “But the business was in debt. It wasn’t making any money—our costs were too high. Rent, payroll. Everything, really. We were weeks away from bankruptcy when I finally understood the mess my dad had handed me.”
“Hunter,” she says and squeezes my hand.
“I tried my best to save it. I really did.” I look into her eyes, trying to gauge whether she believes me. I worked so hard—negotiating with the landlord, trying to cut costs, letting people go. It was a brutal time. “Maybe I should have spent more time growing the business. If I’d been better at business development, maybe things would have gone another way. Some people only want to deal with people with more gray hairs. If my dad had still been in charge, then . . .”
“Hunter,” Lucy says again, firmer this time, “I know you. I know you worked harder than anyone to save that business. You wanted it to work.”
“I really did.” I pull in a breath.
“If you start off with high costs and a mountain of debt, you’re fighting a losing battle. What did your dad say?”
I pick up my drink. I only meant to take a sip, but I down the rest of it, trying to push away the feeling of failure that swirls in my gut every time I think back to that time.