Page 51 of One Last Thing Before You Go

I smile proudly at her. “Definitely. I’ve told her about a thousand times.”

She snorts. “Of course I’m good at this.” But I can tell despite her confidence that she wasn’t expecting the compliment.

He rolls his eyes at her. “I just think you’re making a mistake.”

“A mistake? What are you talking about?” She crosses her arms in front of her chest, leaning forward in her chair, pinning Daniel with a glare.

I sit back in my seat watching the interaction quietly, realizing that there’s something beneath this conversation that I don’t quite understand.

“You know exactly what I’m talking about, sis. I’ll obviously help you list the place if that’s what you want, but is going back to New York really something you want to do? You wanna go back to living like that? To be surrounded by the same people who turned their backs on you when things got difficult for you?”

“So what are you saying? That I should just take over the store and stay here for the rest of my life, stuck?” Her voice is sharp, cold—but Daniel looks unbothered by it.

“Stuck?” He laughs once, humorlessly. “You keep thinking it’s this town’s fault that you’re stuck.”

“Daniel.” There’s a clear warning in her voice.

“I don’t get it. Why are you holding on to a life that never seemed to want you to begin with?”

She looks away, but I catch her red-rimmed eyes glazing over with unshed tears.

What the hell?

A shot of adrenaline courses through me, so I reach out to her. But she pulls her hand away. Always pulling away. “Lottie⁠—”

“Can we not talk about this anymore?” she whispers.

“I’ve spoken to Brandon about this and… We want to offer you the money. As a loan. To buy out Knox and Jenn.”

“What?” Her head snaps up to him.

“I believe in you, Lottie. We all do. So, if you want to take the money, it’s there for you. Buy them out and do your own thing. You just need to believe in yourself again. And when you finally do, just know your family will be here to help you through it.”

They enter into a stare-off, glaring at each other with the fire of a thousand suns. We’re all quiet for a beat, the tension palpable. Finally, she breaks the silence: “Knox, would you mind leaving us for a sec?” Her eyes never leave Daniel’s.

“Of course. Yes. I still need to shower after the demo, so…” I push out of my chair, simultaneously wanting to get the hell out of there as fast as I can and wanting to be a fly on the wall for this conversation. Ultimately, though, I know the latter isn’t a possibility, so I hustle back upstairs to shower as quickly as possible.

Once I’ve washed all the dust and sweat from my day demoing, I bounce down the stairs hoping to catch Lottie before she heads home. But as I reach the office door, I hear voices— Lottie and Daniel’s—uttering my name.

“Now that we're done discussing that, would you mind telling me what's up with you and

Knox?” Daniel asks her.

I inhale sharply, freezing where I stand, hoping they didn’t hear me come down the stairs. I know it’s wrong, but I need to hear this conversation. I press myself against the hallway wall and do my best to listen. Am I finally going to get the unfiltered opinion of what Lottie thinks of me? For a moment, I hesitate. We all know what they say about eavesdropping: you’re bound to hear things that aren’t nice about yourself. But when I hear Lottie sigh, gearing up to deny everything, I decide I don’t give a shit.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” she says, her voice sounding almost innocent.

I almost snort at the sound of her voice, at the fact that she thinks Daniel is going to let her get out of this one unscathed.

He scoffs once. “Please. You know exactly what I'm talking about. I’m talking about how obvious it is that you like this guy. How obvious it is that you want to jump his bones.”

“Shh! Are you insane?” she hisses, shifting in her seat. “He’ll hear us! And you've only seen us together once just in this meeting where all we did was talk about Real Estate for an hour with you and Jenn. I didn't even flirt with him once. So how would you know that I like him?”

Daniel laughs softly. “So you admit you like him, then?”

My heart races in my chest as it fills to the brim with happiness. I knew she liked me—and not just for sex. But having her admit it out loud—even if it was an accident—feels great to know. It gives me hope, it tells me there’s something I can work with here, and it tells me we’re not a lost cause.

Lottie is incredibly special, and if there’s even the slightest chance that she’ll let me be a part of her life that way, then I sure as hell am gonna try.