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There were a lot of words on the tip of my tongue before I bit them back with all the willpower I had. If it had been anyone else, I’d have argued, especially since he’d brought up my home life. But Jeff and I had history, we had this yacht deal, and I knew I’d struck a nerve.
“That all came out wrong. Forget I said anything,” I said, holding up my beer. “Anyway, what were you saying earlier about Rhett and that trip to Dublin?”
After a moment’s hard stare at me, Jeff finally relented and clinked bottles with me with a smile before launching into one of his own stories about our old teammate. The night went on with the two of us chatting about old times and old glories, but from then on, I was just going through the motions.
I knew that Jillian was just going to keep tearing me up without even being there.
Fuck, this was going to be rough.
8
Jillian
The next week flew by in a rush of color and sound. Rolling wheels. The flutter of paperwork. The click of my briefcase closing. The annoying beep-beep-beep of my hotel room alarm clock and the crackling of coffee percolating across the room as I put on my makeup each morning.
Luckily, I hardly had to deal with Bruin himself at all. His broker was a perpetually exhausted man in his fifties named Robert Browne. He had what seemed like permanent five o’clock shadow and bags under his eyes. He walked with a slight stoop and rarely smiled. I got the sense that he was more of a wrangler, a handler for Bruin, rather than a consultant. It had to be hard work, dealing with such a rowdy, reckless guy. If Bruin was anything like the way he used to be when he was in college, he was a lot of work.
Sometimes my parents even warned Jeff about hanging out with him, afraid that he would be a bad influence on my brother. And to be fair, he kind of was. Jeff was a straight-A student when Bruin suddenly transferred over to Harvard in the middle of their freshman year. They were put together as roommates, two guys with opposite personalities. At the time, Jeff was a studious, quiet guy who was wholly focused on his schoolwork. He was dedicated to graduating with honors, because that was exactly what our parents expected of him. And of me, too.
At first, Bruin and Jeff didn’t get along well. Jeff was an early riser, getting up at five in the morning for a brisk run before coming back to get ready for his classes. Bruin, on the other hand, routinely overslept and missed classes. He stayed out late and stumbled into their room buzzed and sloppy, making a lot of noise. He brought home girls. He played his music loudly. He was a thorn in my brother’s side for the first semester they spent together. Jeff would call me on his run in the morning to complain about the awful asshole the university paired him with. At that point, I had never met Bruin. I knew him only by name and reputation. And to be quite honest, I wasn’t his biggest fan.
But then, when the second semester began, something changed. One night, Bruin convinced Jeff to go out to a bar with him. And I don’t know what all happened that night, but after that, they were suddenly best friends. They influenced each other, in a lot of ways. Bruin stopped skipping his morning class. Jeff started actually going out and having fun instead of being cooped up in his dorm studying all the time. They quickly became best friends, and before we knew it, Jeff brought Bruin back for Thanksgiving, to meet all of us. Apparently, Bruin’s family was never very close. And as soon as Bruin walked through those doors, I was a goner.
He was, and still remained, the hottest guy I had ever seen.
He walked into the room and my heart skipped a beat. No, several beats. I forgot to breathe for a moment. I felt my jaw drop and my eyes go wide. I was just a high school student, still wearing braces and struggling to figure out how to dress for my newly changing body. In short, I was a hot mess. It was glaringly obvious to everyone that I was smitten. Infatuated. Over Thanksgiving dinner, I could hardly eat. I was too afraid I might accidentally spill gravy on my shirt or drop a biscuit on the floor. I was so distracted by the hulking hunk of a college guy sitting across from me that I could hardly hear anything being said. Apparently, Bruin reined himself in and was for the most part respectful and dutiful. But my parents were still wary of him. They could see the sparks in his eyes, and they were worried he would knock Jeff off his A-game. Still, Jeff was pretty much an adult by then and they couldn’t stop him from being friends with somebody.
And they couldn’t stop me from having a crush on him.
Today, I was finished with my work and back in my hotel room. I had ordered a cobb salad and a glass of red wine from room service and was busy running a hot bubble bath while I watched some stupid cooking show on TV. I decided to FaceTime Anna Kate, since I hadn’t talked to anyone back home since I left.
To my relief, she picked up on the first ring, and her pretty face popped up on the screen.
“Jillian. Hey,” she said cheerily.
She was wearing an apron, her kitchen cabinets visible behind her. Much like Jeff and Bruin, Anna Kate and I had been friends ever since we roomed together at college. Even though we no longer lived together, of course, she still lived in Atlanta, so we hung out whenever we actually had time out of our busy schedules. Anna was a pastry chef for a very successful indie baking company, a job that took up a lot of her time.
“Hey, Anna Kate,” I said, sitting on the bed. “What’s up?”
She gestured toward the kitchen behind her. “Just working on a new recipe for work. As always. I’m covered in flour.”
She moved the phone so I could see the front of her apron smattered with white. I laughed.
“Cute,” I said. “That’s a good look.”
“Thanks, I made it myself.” She giggled. “What are you doing? And where are you? Still in Florida?”
“Yep,” I groaned.
“Lucky.”
“Lucky?” I retorted. “Anna Kate, it’s like ninety degrees here.”
“In November?”
“Yes. This place is like hell, but hotter.”
“It snowed here this morning,” she said. “Just for a couple minutes, but still.”
