Page 65 of Off Limits Mogul

“You promised me fun, and you delivered in spades, Rhys.”

Her girlish attitude is a throwback.

I’m fourteen again and she’s the excited six-year-old standing in front of me, grinning from ear to ear after completing her first round on roller skates without assistance. She’s wearing the same wondrous expression. Noah and I used to drag her along to the matinee circuits at our favorite roller-skating rink when he’d wake up to find his mother’s latest boyfriend in her bed.

“I have many talents, but that fun-filled adventure was courtesy of Mother Nature,” I say. “Seriously, are you okay?”

“I might have to scrub my body for a solid twenty minutes because I swear dirty water is running down my back, but I’m okay.”

“Nothing hurts?”

She wiggles like a ragdoll.

I can’t help my laugh.

“Nope. I’m in tiptop shape.”

“Let’s get you home.”

It’s a long ride back to Manhattan Beach, but we make it safe and sound.

We hop off the bike and make our way to the house, leaving behind us a trail of wet footprints.

“I can’t get over your eye-popping toys,” Keira says as we pass my collection. “You have several millions sitting here.”

“Crazy, huh?” I say. “It’s unfathomable that six years ago I hit rock bottom and now I have a dozen-and-a-half luxury cars and a handful of pricey custom bikes lined up in my expansive garage.”

Other than one bike I would’ve died for, I lost everything before entering rehab. Money, mansion, cars, friends, status, and dignity. All gone. My parents, Noah, and Keira were the only ones who didn’t turn their backs on me.

We enter the house.

She glances up at me. “Are you going to get your bike serviced?”

“Absolutely,” I say. “No doubt top-of-the-line Harley Davidson bikes are built to weather whatever, but I don’t want to take a chance. That was a lot of water.”

“Yeah.” She looks down her body. “And I’m still drenched in most of it.”

I chuckle.

“I’m soaked down to my socks and boxer briefs.”

“Same here, minus the boxer briefs,” she says. She wipesthe back of her hand across her forehead, smearing mud there. When she looks down at her hand, she rolls her eyes. “It’s all over my face?”

“Yup.”

“I’m pretty sure I smell like mud, so why not have it all over, right?”

“I’m not faring much better. We’re in this together. I’m sure I stink.”

“At least we don’t smell likeEau de Vage.”

My eyes hit my forehead.

“Then, we’d stink like skunks.”

I laugh.

She narrows her eyes at me. “You know what I’m talking about?”