AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Wanting to delay the inevitable, I just raise my eyes. “How?”
She smiles, proud of herself and believing she discovered the magic bullet that will make me happy. “Okay, well Frank found her,” she says just as my traitorous best friend enters the office.
I had asked Frank to find her. I had given him all the information necessary.
“Really, Frank?” I ask as he sits down without a care in the world. Frank has been my best friend since high school, but now he’s also my driver and right-hand man. Or at least I thought he was until he betrayed me.
“What? I found her like you asked. Don’t look at me like that,” he says as he rolls his green eyes. Frank is one hundred percent Irish, and his shaved head and tattoos give off the vibe that he doesn’t give a fuck. And he doesn’t.
Gripping my drink in my hand, I glare at him. “Yeah, I asked you to give me the information. Not involve my sister.”
He shrugs as he looks over at the victorious Cat. “She’s better looking than you.”
Cat smiles and turns back to me. “Cash, why don’t you seem more excited? We found her!”
Cat flings a piece of paper onto my desk with a picture of Grace and a biography from her company website. I don’t pick it up. I can’t bear to look at her image, to read about her life, or to know anything more than I already do.
“You don’t know me. That was intentional.”
The memory of Grace’s words cut like a machete.
With no way around it, I plow forward with the truth.“I found her too. Unfortunately, I also discovered she’s married. So, that ends that.”
I look at my computer screen, avoiding my sister’s penetrating gaze and Frank’s inhale. Not for nothing, if he was going to find her and present her to my sister, the least he could have done was vet her as well. Why the fuck do I pay him so much?
“That doesn’t…” my sister starts but then falters, “but…No, that’s not right.”
I understand how she feels. It took me a few minutes to wrap my brain around what Grace had done as well. I’d been so convinced she was good. So good that she wouldn’t have a one-night stand. She wanted to get to know me. She wanted to take it slow. I thought we had time. I thought she was the one.
And like a fool, I’d shared all those feelings with Cat. She knew exactly how I felt because I’d detailed our entire weekend. There is nothing I don’t tell Cat. We were always like that—inseparable, each other’s champions, and we hide nothing.
I take another sip of my whiskey. “It’s fine. It’s done.”
Cat’s brown eyes plead with mine. “Don’t do that. Don’t shut down. You’re hurt. You can be hurt and take the time to feel this for a minute. You don’t always have to keep it all together.”
I laugh bitterly and sweep my arms around the office. “Actually, I do. I just took over the reins of this company. I don’t have the time or the luxury to worry about a woman who doesn’t care about me.” The pressure mounts on my shoulders. I don’t have time to wallow. I don’t even have time for this conversation or this drink. It’s too early in the day for me to be losing myself in alcohol. I push the glass away from me and buzz my secretary. “Lucy, can you bring me a coffee? Get one for Cat and Frank too.”
“Of course, Mr. James.”
Frank is oddly silent. Likely embarrassed that he fucked this up so bad. Good, let him stew. Meanwhile, Cat watches me like a hawk. “Why don’t we grab lunch rather than having a coffee? Or I think Carter is back from visiting the distillery. Why don’t we all grab dinner tonight? Maybe I can even get Chase to come.”
I don’t entertain the idea. I’d be terrible company. Somehow, I have to go home tonight, forget all my feelings for Grace, and prepare myself to meet with her tomorrow to get this ridiculous dog and pony show over with. All while running my family’s company and preserving the ship that provides for all of them. “Rain check?”
Cat gives me a look that lets me know she knows I’m blowing her off and why. But because she loves me, she lets it go. “Fine. But you and I are doing lunch tomorrow! Put it in your calendar now. I need to make sure you’re eating and not working through lunch every day, little brother.”
I grind my teeth over the knowledge of where I’ll be having lunch tomorrow. Or more accurately, with whom. I avoided lunch with Grace today but agreed to meet her tomorrow. “Can’t. I have a lunch appointment.”
“Fine. Dinner tomorrow then. And don’t you dare tell me you have another appointment. You only just took over the company; it’s impossible you’re already booked up.”
I laugh at her insistence. Cat knows how to get what she wants, and if she doesn’t she’ll bang you over the head with her persistence until you agree. “Fine. Dinner tomorrow. But don’t bother Carter and Chase with this. I don’t want them knowing I was fooled as well.”
Cat stands up and walks around the desk and kisses me on the cheek. “She did the wrong thing. Not you. Don’t beat yourself up about this. You’re not him,” she says, referring to our dirtbag of a father.
No, I’m not. But part of me wonders how long it will take me to become him.
“And Cash, don’t be too hard on Frank. We both thought we were doing the right thing.”
I nod at her and look to Frank, who accepts a kiss on the cheek from Cat and then waits for her to leave. He and I both know that is not the end of this conversation. Not by a long shot.
