Page 43 of Hate To Be Mine

I wanted out.

I’d love to find another career that didn’t involve my father. I didn’t want to look for ways to deny people help when they needed it most. But my father would lose his mind if I tried to leave. He would absolutely disown me like he’d threatened when I’d mentioned graduate school.

If you turn your back on this family, this family will turn its back on you.

Maybe that wouldn’t be the worst thing.

Did I need him? No. Not really. I had enough money in savings to get by for at least six months. I would have to cut back, but I could do it. Financially, anyway. He was my only family. Could I really just walk away from the only family I had? Then again, was he really family? It’s not like he was super loving or we spent any time together.

I stared out at the jungle and felt a weird and terrible urge to walk in there. I wanted to do something that broke the rules. It would be my big fuck you to my father.

A shadow moved through the darkness and thoughts of encountering shadows in the jungle quickly left my mind. Maybe I was a bit of a chicken shit. I focused on the shadow moving toward me and realized it was a man. It was Sebastian, carrying an umbrella that was doing a terrible job of keeping him dry.

“Annika’s inside,” I said as he climbed onto the porch.

“I’m here to see you,” he said, shaking water from his hair like a dog.

“Oh.”

He collapsed the umbrella and set it aside, then sat in the chair next to mine.

“Here,” he said, pulling something from under his jacket. A plastic bag with two bottles of water and another bag of what looked like chips. “I found these earlier in the lobby of the resort. Taro chips. Local thing. I can’t get enough of them. Pretty sure I’m getting fat on this trip. All that clean eating before and I’m ruining it.”

I laughed despite my mood. “You’re not getting fat.” He was still a toned god, all lean muscle and perfect proportions. He probably had to work out twice a day just to maintain it.

“You’re sweet for lying.” He handed me the bag. “But seriously, try them. They’re amazing.”

I took the bag, touched by the gesture. “Thank you. Did you just come over to bring me water and snacks?”

“No, actually. Business.” He pulled out his phone. “There’s a chance we’ll have to do some shoots in the rain over the next few days. The forecast is looking unpredictable. Walk me through what we’d need to do to make that safe.”

And just like that, we were talking shop. I outlined the concerns that I had catalogued before we came. I knew rain was likely. He nodded along, occasionally stopping me to ask questions, and he actually opened his notes app and started typing things down.

I might have swooned a little.

“Okay,” he said after we’d covered the major points. “Doable but not optimal.”

“Yes. But you’re on a tropical island—rain happens.”

He nodded. “See? This is good. This is how we should have been working together from the start.”

“Yeah, well, we got off to a rough start.” I shrugged. “I don’t do a lot of client-facing work. So the rough beginning is probably my fault.”

“No, it’s my fault. I was defensive and stupid.” He pocketed his phone but didn’t get up to leave. “How are you holding up? Really?”

The question caught me off guard. “I’m... okay. Today was good. Better than I expected.”

“But?” He’d heard the hesitation in my voice.

“But my dad called earlier. He’s been hassling me about the shoot.” I left it vague, not wanting to admit what my father had actually asked me to do. “Family business pressure, you know?”

“Oh, I know.” He leaned back in his chair, his expression understanding. “It’s weird, right? Working for family. There’s all this extra weight to everything you do. You’re not just representing yourself; you’re representing the name. The legacy. All the expectations that come with it.”

“Exactly.” I looked over at him, seeing him differently in that moment. “Do you and I actually have something in common?”

“Careful. I don’t want people finding out.” He grinned, but it faded quickly. “Seriously, though. I get it. My brothers have been doubting me for years. My dad—before he died—he saw me as the face. The charmer. Not the serious one who could run things. When we all slid into the business, there was never any doubt I would be staying in front of the camera. Adrian does a little modeling here and there but that’s just to promote the Blackwell name. I just feel like they only see the guy in the pictures and not the guy standing right in front of them.”

I nodded as I listened and felt like I was getting a glimpse into the man under the beautiful mask he was born with.