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Inside the floral shop, the saleswoman approaches me.
“Can I help you with something?” she asks.
“What kind of flowers do you get a woman when you’re apologizing for making her think you were paying her for sex?”
“Excuse me?” Her eyes are wide.
“Never mind.” I reach for a large arrangement of white and yellow flowers with sprigs of green. I don’t know what it is about them exactly, but they remind me of Sophie. Sunshine. Sweetness. An angel with a naughty side. “I’ll take these for delivery.”
“Excellent choice.” She hands me a small white card to fill out while she arranges them in a vase.
I uncap the pen, but hesitate over the blank card, my brain trying to come up with something to say.
It was good to see you today.
I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you.
When can I see you again?
The sweet taste of your pussy is seared into my brain.
I let my brain have a moment of fantasy, thinking about what it would be like to pursue Sophie. I imagine her naked body wrapped up in my bedsheets, her satisfied smile as I crawled back up the length of her body, my lips wet with her orgasm.
I ignore it all and opt for a less personal message. I read it back. It’s borderline distant, my specialty.
“I’ll have these delivered today.”
I sign my name, then hand her the card.
“Thank you,” I say before leaving the shop to return to the car.
“It’s done,” I tell Hannah as we pull away from the curb. She takes it to mean the flowers are sent, but it’s also me telling myself to stop thinking about Sophie.It’s done.
* * *
My dad, Marshall Cartwright, started Premier Real Estate Group during NYC’s building boom in the early 1980s. His desire to redevelop the city’s abandoned buildings and warehouses shaped his plan for the company. More recently, we’ve expanded into new building projects which has included a winning bid for development of the second phase of The Hudson Yards Expansion, the old Long Island Railroad storage yard.
From the early years, where it was my dad and a handful others, to now, where Premier encompasses architecture and redevelopment planning, new development, and our own boutique brokerage firm.
My body is here, but my mind is somewhere between my night in Vegas with Sophie and our run-in at lunch.
“What do you think, Hunter?” Tyrell’s question pulls me back to the conference room.
Thankfully, I know this project inside and out.
“If we don’t concede to the neighborhood association’s demands, we would need a new site plan. That’s going to set us back again and cost more money.”
It’s a huge project that has taken years to plan and even longer to develop. For years, it’s been one step forward, two steps back. My dad intended on holding off retirement until the completion of the entire project, but after countless permit delays for the second phase, he and my mom agreed it was time to hand over the reins to me.
While I want to honor my dad’s efforts by completing the project, there have been many times along the way that I’ve wanted to release the development, allow the headache to be taken on by someone else so I can focus on other ventures. Make my own mark on the company.
“Let’s agree to the concession and move forward.”
The group nods and the meeting continues. That’s how the rest of my day goes. One meeting bleeds into another. By the time I make it back to my office, it’s nearly six o’clock.
Jeannie, my assistant, is still working at her desk.
She looks up from her computer. “I’d ask how the Carmine meeting went, but it looks like it was a doozy.” Jeannie nods in the direction of my hair. She’s aware of my habit of running my hands through it when I’m intently thinking about something.
