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“I decided to get us a driver,” she said casually, like it was no big deal.
The Silver Mountain Resort was only a little over an hour from where we lived in Red River California, but Krista liked to do everything in style.
“Nice touch,” I told.
The driver, an older man wearing a suit, helped me place my luggage in the back and then opened the SUV’s door for me to climb inside.
“Thank you, Henry,” I said, looking at his nametag.
“My pleasure,” he replied with a smile.
“Emma, you look hot,” Krista said, squeezing me in a hug. “And to be honest with you, girl, I thought maybe you forgot how to do your makeup. So glad you didn’t.”
“Thanks,” I said, the word dripping with sarcasm. “So, the driver?”
Krista clicked on her seatbelt, so I did the same as the driver pulled away from the curb. “Well, I wanted to pull out all the stops for you and make this as easy as possible. The relaxation can start right this second because neither of us have to drive.”
“You’re the best,” I told her.
Krista’s family, the Beckfords, were wealthy. They had more money than us growing up. They went on fancy vacations every year, lived in a huge house, and spent their summers boating and jet skiing, but they were never hiring a driver and own a ski condo rich. Those things must’ve started with Kyle. Krista and her boyfriend, Dante, both had good jobs teaching at a large school district, but they lived in my neighborhood, not in a gated community.
“Yeah,” Krista said. “Plus, Kyle’s company has multiple drivers on staff. I started using the service a few months ag and Kyle hasn’t said anything yet, so I figured why not, ya know?”
I laughed. That seemed more like Krista. “It makes perfect sense. And speaking of Kyle,” I hedged, “he has a car service on call, a brand-new ski condo, I heard on the news he just made some huge deal developing a business park downtown.”
Krista and I had an unspoken rule in our friendship— we didn’t talk about Kyle. Krista knew I had a huge crush on him when we were kids. She also knew that I tried to kiss him one drunken night when we were all home from college and Kyle had dismissed me so unceremoniously, I never recovered. It was weird to have such mixed emotions for not only my best friend’s brother, but her twin brother, but Kyle never moved back home after college, instead deciding to stay on the East Coast, it was easy to pretend he didn’t exist.
Until now and we were on our way to Kyle’s ski condo.
But, I was a grown adult now. I’d been married and divorced since then. I’d become a mother since then. Not that I would be seeing Kyle any time soon, but I could handle being in his house.
“It’s all kind of hard to wrap my head around, you know me I’m not the type A twin, but Kyle just became a billionaire,” Krista said then laughed. “Can you believe that?”
“Billionaire? With a B?” I asked.
Krista nodded, her chestnut curls bouncing with the movement. “Billionaire,” she repeated. “It just happened last week with this deal, so we haven’t celebrated yet, but my mom said he called to say he’ll be home soon. He wants us all to move into one house together or something. You know him, he had all these grand ideas.”
“None of this surprises me. Kyle’s drive and passions is what always attract—“ I stopped myself. I didn’t need to go down that road. Besides, I hadn’t seen Kyle in years. There was no way to know if I would still be attracted to him.
Who likes a hot billionaire anyway?
“I foresee a lot of tropical vacations in our future,” Krista said, being kind enough to pretend I wasn’t just talking about her twin like I was a little girl with a crush. “I think I’m going to ask Kyle for a new vacation home somewhere beautiful every year for our birthday.”
“Now that is an excellent idea,” I agreed. “And I’ll be invited?”
“Of course. Lily, too. And hell, why not your parents? They can babysit so we can go out at night and dance.”
“I like the way you think Krista Beckford.”
We managed to avoid talking about Kyle for the rest of the drive. I settled into being chauffeured around seamlessly. It was a new feeling for me, to only be taking care of myself, and not Lily. I’d wanted to be a mom for as long as I could remember, but I never dreamed of being a single mom. I loved my life with Lily and would’ve picked being with her over Brendan a million times over, but that didn’t make it any easier.
I was still young, I’d only turned thirty a couple weeks ago, so I knew I still had time to find someone else, fall in love, get married, and give Lily siblings, but that hope didn’t keep me warm at night. Or give my vibrator a much needed rest.
Our neighborhood gave way to the city, which then gave way to the sleepy mountain town, which then gave away to the sprawling mountain resort, almost too luxurious for words.
“Almost there,” Krista said as we drove through a wrought iron gate.
The homes—or more accurately mansions— grew more and more impressive as we drove. Of course we pulled to a stop at the biggest, most impressive home of all. It was tall with balconies jutting off in all directions, probably giving impressive views of the mountains. It looked like a log cabin, though the biggest one I’d ever seen, with it’s rich browns and tans. So many chimneys pointed up from the roof I wondered if each room had a fire place. The ski condo was simply nothing short of impressive.
