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He was one of the few people in this world whom I trusted with my life, my business decisions, and to tell me the truth when most other people would tell me what they thought I wanted to hear.
“She’d be fucking good for you,” he said when I ignored him and walked over to the throwing lane.
“And you know that from spending the past forty-five minutes with her?”
“Brother, I would have fucking known that from spending five minutes with her,” he insisted, causing me to pause and actually turn to face him.
I wasn’t sure I wanted to know the answer, but I would ask it anyway. “And why is that?”
“Because you feel like you need to protect her,” he said, short of adding a ‘duh’ to it for effect. “When she was finished telling whatever story she filled you in on before I walked over, you looked like you were about to kill anyone who came anywhere near her.”
I was.
Her pathetic mother included.
“I just feel like she’s been done fucking dirty,” I explained, turning back to face the target with my axe. “After everything she’s been through, she deserves better.”
Two days.
That’s all it had been since I picked up Valen on the side of the road and helped her shove her oversized wedding dress into the back seat of my car. Just two damn days, and here I was, ready to stand up and let the world know that this woman is worth so much fucking more than what the world had handed her.
I knew how ridiculous that probably sounded to anyone else.
But to me, it simply made sense.
“Don’t tell me you two ladies have been busy gossiping and not throwing?” I glanced back as Valen slid onto a stool at the bar table with Bronson, looking extremely pleased with that insult.
“Actually, I was just about to let Reed know about a little problem we have for an event next weekend,” Bronson said, suddenly reminding me that there was another reason he had come down here, not just to be the nosey bastard he was.
I made quick work of tossing my axe, my aim a little off-center, before collecting it and returning to the table. “What’s happened? I thought everything was organized?”
Bronson nodded. “It was… until the venue had a burst water pipe and flooded yesterday.”
Valen’s mouth dropped open. “Oh wow. Is two weeks enough to clean it up before you guys need to use it?”
“Nope,” I answered, knowing already that was the problem. Bronson and I had recently purchased a small block out west in Allston. It was an up-and-coming area, and while we’d had some pushback from a few locals who didn’t see the benefit of the change, the student population in the area had a high turnaround. The local universities were ecstatic about the idea of us building more small flats and apartments, as well as a handful of business spaces to accommodate more jobs and opportunities.
The construction had begun a month or so ago, thanks to the investments both Bronson and I had injected, and we were at the next stage where we were planning an event to show off the building plans and models for potential buyers, which would be needed for us to continue construction and turn a profit.
We needed to show them exactly what we had and why they needed to jump on board.
“We’re gonna have to find somewhere else, like yesterday.”
“And catering,” Bronson added. “They were doing that too.”
“Don’t you guys have, like, event organizers or people who deal with these kinds of issues?” Valen questioned, leaning into the table. “You can’t just ask them?”
“We do, but I like to have a plan,” Bronson answered.
“What he means is that he can sometimes be a micromanager,” I explained, earning me a hard glare from my buddy. I learned a long time ago to try not to control every aspect of things. But this was Bronson’s first major step into my world, and if it was a place he was going to be a part of in the future when expanding the Rhodes brand, he needed to ensure his first wade into the water didn’t have him washed away.
“What is the event for?” Valen asked.
I went through the explanation, telling her about the area, the apartments, and the spaces we intended to add to an already busy and bustling area.
“Okay, so why can’t you have it at the place you’re building?”
I shook my head. “There’s barely a first floor with four walls. The rest is steel beams and rebar.”
