Total pages in book: 102
Estimated words: 96720 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 484(@200wpm)___ 387(@250wpm)___ 322(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 96720 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 484(@200wpm)___ 387(@250wpm)___ 322(@300wpm)
“And that’s why I got the ring for you.” I nudged it across the table toward her.
She shook her head. “I appreciate you risking mother’s wrath. I do. But that’s from a life I’m not a part of anymore.”
“It’s from a family you’re still a part of,” I protested.
“And a family I’m splitting in half.” She pushed the ring back. “I wore this as a symbol of a marriage that failed. I can’t transfer it into my new start.”
“Oh, but that ugly cat statue, which can go.”
She didn’t rise to the bait. “Why not give it to Charlotte? She seems permanent.”
“She is.” Unless I gave her that ring. “But she’s not ready for this yet. We haven’t been together for that long. At least, not on the same coast. And there are other factors.”
“The trauma from the transplant fiasco.” Catherine nodded in understanding.
A strange, protective urge rose up in me. It screamed, how dare you know about Charlotte’s private pain! But it wasn’t Charlotte’s pain. It was Scott’s, too, and he had every right to share it with Catherine.
Still, I wasn’t going to take Catherine’s birthright from her. The ring was sacred. “Keep it. It’s for the daughters of the family. If it went to daughters-in-law—”
“Mother would have it,” Catherine finished for me, and we both laughed.
“Keep it for Briony, then,” I said, and gave the box another little push, pretending that I didn’t think my spooky niece was more likely to eat a man than marry him.
“I will.” Catherine took another look around the room. “I hate this place.”
“I knew it!” I jabbed the air with my finger.
“It’s all Jackon’s tastes. It’s so ugly. And he destroyed such a lovely house for this.” She pinched the bridge of her nose. “I hate that I agree with you. On anything.”
“Well, brace yourself. Scott’s taste isn’t much better,” I warned her. “Last time I was at his place, he had movie posters on the wall.”
“You had movie posters on the wall in your bedroom at home,” Catherine said, witheringly.
“In frames,” I argued. “His are raw. Thumbtacks. Right on the wall.”
She shivered dramatically and shook her hands out as if she’d touched wet food in the sink.
Not that I thought my sister had ever been within ten feet of a kitchen sink in her life.
“I’m not trying to dissuade you from your relationship,” I clarified.
“On the contrary, you’ve strengthened my resolve in one area.” Her jaw set in determination.
“Oh? What’s that?”
“I’m in charge of the decorating.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
(Charlotte)
“And I don’t care what you think about it, I’m leaving here with grandmother’s ring.”
“Ms. Holmes? Ms. Holmes?” Marshall’s fingers snapped in my face. “Charlotte? Hello? Are you there?”
“Sorry, I drifted off.” Straight into a land of terror, where my boyfriend had angrily demanded his family’s legacy engagement ring and never mentioned a word of it to me.
“Obviously,” Marshall said under his breath. “Did you get the email? About the site?”
“Ummm...” I extended the word out while I picked up my phone and unlocked the screen. “Oh, I guess I did get a notification.”
“Read it,” he advised.
I skimmed over the text on the screen. Fuck. “We didn’t get it.”
“Afraid not. I’m sorry, I know you liked that location,” Marshall said with genuine sympathy.
Planning Ascend Manhattan—I still wasn’t thrilled with the name—had turned out to be the easy part. Finding a place to put it was a challenge. The first building, which I’d been deeply in love with, would have needed a massive plumbing and HVAC overhaul that would rocket us above our budget. The second building had a great parking garage beneath it, which was probably why we’d been outbid. The very idea that we could be outbid at all annoyed me; there was so much money in Matt’s company that I couldn’t understand why the sky wasn’t the limit on this project. Obviously, I understood that there were other properties being developed, and they all had their own budgets, and then the established resorts and hotels also paid taxes and maintenance and advertising...
I wished I wasn’t so committed to not throwing around my weight as the boss’s girlfriend to get what I wanted.
“Onto the third choice, then,” I said with a sigh.
“That’s New York real estate,” Marshall said, then added with a grimace, “Well, so I’ve heard. I’ll never be able to own my apartment.”
“If I hadn’t ended up fucking a billionaire, I wouldn’t, either,” I reassured him. “Can you call Patricia and tell her to go ahead and make an offer on the ugly midtown? She’ll know which one I’m talking about.”
“No problem. Anything else?”
I chewed my bottom lip. “Yeah. Not a boss thing. Just a general question.”
“I’m intrigued.” Marshall dropped onto the armless chair on the other side of my desk.
How much did I need to explain to ask the question? Probably not the entire story of setting off in search of Matt, only to overhear him arguing with his mom about the ring. That wasn’t the heart of the issue. I distilled my fears down to their essence. “What if you knew that someone was going to ask you to make a life-altering decision, and you didn’t know how you were going to respond to that, but you also didn’t know when it would happen?”