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There was a long pause before his little brother spoke. “She doesn’t know I took it.” Nash glanced at him, but he continued to stare out the window. “But I’ll get her to sign the release. I’ll make it worth her while.”
“I’m not sure money will sway her. I tried to offer her some before she got off the plane, but she refused to take it.”
Grayson nodded. “So do you think she went back to him?”
“Probably. But she’s over eighteen, Gray. Old enough to make her own decisions.”
“Even bad ones?”
“Sometimes people need to learn the hard way,” Nash said. He was a perfect example of that. Rather than take help from other people, he had thought he could handle things on his own. It had taken a person like Eden—a person who refused to give up on him—to make him see that. Hopefully, Chloe would find someone like that as well.
Not wanting his little brother upset, Nash hooked an arm around Grayson’s neck and gave him a shake. “So be truthful, little brother. What has you so distracted? Are you crushing on Madison?”
Grayson frogged him in the ribs and twisted out of the hold. “Not likely.”
Nash play punched him in the arm. “Oh, come on, I saw you two talking during the photo shoots. I’ve never seen you talk so much.”
“Madison is just a friend.” Grayson blocked the next punch and threw one of his own that was not quite as playful as Nash’s had been. It caught him on the chin and stung like hell. It looked like Grayson was getting better at boxing. Which made Nash more than a little proud.
“Come on, you two,” Deacon called, “quit horsing around. We need to finish picking the photos for the catalog.”
They spent the rest of the morning arguing over the pictures that would go in the catalog and then broke for lunch. Over deli sandwiches, Nash brought up the new line of functional bras to go with their collection. Deacon balked at first, but after listening to Nash’s points, he agreed that they needed to have a design meeting as soon as possible to discuss the idea with Samuel and Olivia.
But before he could make a call to the design studio, Olivia walked in the door. She looked like she had been crying, which had Deacon dropping his sub and coming out of his chair.
“What happened, Livy? Is it the baby?”
Tears welled in her eyes. “Samuel’s taken the first day off in his entire career, and it’s all my fault.”
Deacon moved around the desk and pulled his wife into his arms. “Now, honey, I’m sure you had nothing to do with it. After all these years, he probably just needed a day off.”
Olivia shook her head. “No, it has nothing to do with that and everything to do with me meddling in things I had no business meddling in.” She pulled back and looked at Deacon. “If I hadn’t forced Samuel to go to the ball, he would’ve never eaten the Huckabees’ magic brownies and had sex with my mother.”
“Your mother and Samuel had sex?” Deacon asked. “But I thought Samuel was gay.”
She sighed. “He is. Which is why he’s so devastated, and why my mother has gotten a new lover.”
That wasn’t what Nash expected to hear. Last time he’d talked with Deirdre, she was on her way to explain things to Samuel. Obviously, something had gone awry. “Your mother has a new lover?” he asked.
She nodded. “I called her this morning, and I definitely heard a man’s voice in the background, calling her Dee Dee and asking her to come join him in the shower.”
Nash grinned. He probably should’ve informed Olivia who Deirdre’s new lover was, but he figured that Olivia would hear it soon enough from her mother. Although he couldn’t help trying to make her feel better.
“I wouldn’t worry too much about it, Livy. These things have a way of working out.” He got up and pulled out a chair. “Now sit down. I want to talk to you about bras.”
Olivia loved the idea for a new line of comfort bras, and as soon as the meeting was over, she headed back to the design studio to work on some mock-ups. Grayson went with her, although he didn’t seem too excited about helping with the designs. Since Nash had been gone for a week, he headed to his office to take care of e-mails. But when he got there, he didn’t boot up his laptop. Instead, he called Eden. She answered on the first ring, which for some reason made him smile.
“I thought you had to work all day,” she said.
“I do. I just thought I would check in and see what you were doing.”
“Actually, I was job hunting.”
“So did you get fired from The Lemon Drop for taking the week off?”
“No, Jen covered for me. But I need another job if I want to pay my landlord.” There was a smile in her voice.
Nash leaned back. “I’m sure you could work something out with him.”
