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Another laugh.
I feel like I’m helping even though she wants to deal with Topper on her own. If she won’t let me stand in front of her or beside her, at least I can help bolster her up and offer support.
“Thanks, Carson. You really are the best.”
“See, I knew you could say it right,” I praise, still giving her shit about calling me the worst when I’m obviously an amazing brother.
“Shut up,” she sighs, but it sounds much better now.
We talk a bit more, and when we hang up, she seems more like her usual perky-with-a-touch-of-crazy self. I feel a bit more centered too, even though we didn’t talk about my issue with Dad. There’s no need to, really. It’s happened before and it’ll happen again. Today’s just one more instance of my not being what he wants but what he’s stuck with.
CHAPTER 10
JAYME
“We did it!” I shout, rereading the email on my laptop. My eyes flick to Carson. He’s sitting at the head of the table, working on his own laptop. His black tie is loose, and he undid the button at his collar and rolled up his sleeves hours ago. When he looks up, there’s a blankness in his eyes as though he didn’t hear me or maybe didn’t process what I said.
“We. Did. It!” I repeat, this time louder and with the addition of a shoulder shimmy shake.
Excitement rushes through me and I can’t contain it. I stand up from the chair I’ve been poured into for hours and dance around the conference room I took over days ago as my work zone. My feet are bare, my heels long forgotten, and the carpet is stiff beneath my toes, letting me twirl and tap dance, though both are awful considering I’m neither a ballerina nor a tap dancer. But I am an excited, happy, successful woman. And that requires a victory dance.
Carson leans back in his chair to watch me, and a smile blooms across his face, flashing his white teeth amid the dark scruff of a beard he’s grown this week as we’ve worked round the clock to do damage repair.
“Did you hear me?” I ask, rushing for him. I spin his chair around and he lets out a whoop of surprise. “Get up and celebrate with me!”
I grab both of his hands, pulling one then the other, forcing his body to move back and forth. It’s not quite a dance, but it’ll do.
Carson grunts in good humor. “What are we celebrating? What’d we do?”
I freeze, wanting to see his expression when I tell him. “We, and by we, I mean me, but I’m a team player like that, so I’ll say we . . . got Jazmyn Starr to sign on for the summer concert series. Ahh!” I let loose a playful screech of joy, glad there’s no one in the office this late because they surely would’ve already come busting in to make sure everything’s okay with the racket I’m making. “And she wants to meet with us! Just a formality for signing, so effectively . . . We. Did. It!”
I realize I’m jumping up and down by myself while Carson looks at me like I’ve lost my ever-loving mind. It’s possible that I have, given the long days of back and forth I’ve had to go through to get to Jazmyn Starr’s agent’s assistant, and then the agent himself, and then for him to present the opportunity to Jazmyn. She was one hundred percent not on board at first, and getting her to listen to what we’re doing with the summer series was a process itself. I had to drop Taya’s name just to get Jazmyn’s attention.
Annoying, frustrating, and ridiculous . . . but I did it and it worked!
I make a mental note to send Taya a thank you basket of her favorite candy bars, 100 Grand bars. She could have fancy truffles and Swiss chocolate at the drop of a hat, but I know the one candy that reminds her of how far she’s come. She told me once that she’d see those bars at the bodega by her apartment and try to figure out how much money that was, but she couldn’t conceive of it. Now, she could spend that in a day without her bank account feeling a pinch. Plus, chocolate, caramel, and crunch? Who could turn that down? Not Taya, for sure. Though my favorite has always been Toblerone.
“Was there ever any doubt?” Carson asks. “I knew you could do it.” He tilts my chin up with his finger, his eyes tracing my smile. He’s wearing that same look he had when he talked about his sister . . . pride. He’s proud of what we’ve done. Of what I’ve done for him and Americana Land.
“Oh, yeah, never any doubt,” I say sarcastically, feeling warm now that I’ve stopped dancing all over the place. Or maybe it’s because I’m so close to Carson.
