Total pages in book: 96
Estimated words: 89666 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 448(@200wpm)___ 359(@250wpm)___ 299(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 89666 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 448(@200wpm)___ 359(@250wpm)___ 299(@300wpm)
I stared at Declan, utterly speechless, my brain reduced to white noise. “How the hell do you know that? You know nothing about relationships. You couldn’t date your way out of a paper bag.”
“I learned it from you. You’re the one who said everyone wants to be taken care of. Even grumpy assholes like Pierce. And Byron isn’t half as grumpy as Pierce can be.”
He was right. Very, very right.
When Byron had canceled our dinner date, I should have followed him home and offered to take care of him. At the very least, grabbed a fucking bucket of fried chicken and offered to cuddle him until he felt better.
I needed to fix this.
As I jumped to my feet, I snagged my phone, wallet, and keys. “Whatever brought you here, send it in an email or tell Kaylan to make you my first meeting of the day. I need to go talk to Byron now.”
“Fine. Just try to be less of an idiot.”
Yes, that was the goal.
14
BYRON GRAHAM
Fucking jackass.
I sat on the floor of my apartment, my back against the mini fridge, glaring at the floor. Upon returning home, I’d changed out of my suit, thrown on my most comfortable clothes, and dropped to the ground, not knowing what to do with myself next. I was a fucking jackass.
What a horrible day!
But that was to be expected after a shit weekend. The visit with Ronnie hadn’t been bad, but it had hit home that I needed to figure out something for his situation. I was reluctant to pull him out of Holy Mother because I didn’t want to cause him any kind of distress, but it was what he needed. Giving Hope Long-Term Care Facility could provide him with the kind of care and attention he needed to live his best life possible.
After a lackluster visit with my mother on Saturday, I’d passed that night and all day Sunday working through all the information Sebastian’s people had gathered regarding government grants and other kinds of financial support.
Of course, I’d already banked three years of care thanks to Sebastian, and we’d had another date scheduled for tonight, which would have given me four years, but I couldn’t go through with it. Not tonight. My head was a mess, and my heart ached. How could I go out on a date with Sebastian when I couldn’t give him the full attention that he deserved?
Some wicked part of my brain argued that I should have sucked it up and done it for Ronnie.
No. That was wrong. I wasn’t using Sebastian for his money, and I wasn’t selling myself for my brother. We hadn’t hit that level of desperation yet.
But I’d started crunching numbers over the weekend, assuming that Sebastian did only give me enough money for three years. I’d made notes on how I could use it for my brother, stretching every fucking penny until they nearly snapped like a rubber band. Then I made notes on the ways I could spend my money that I wasn’t using on Ronnie to help my mother. I looked into nurses who would visit her house a few times a week, rehab programs, and assisted living facilities.
The sad part was that no matter how I worked it, my dollars didn’t stretch quite far enough. There was never any wiggle room for an emergency, such as my car breaking down or needing to buy a new laptop. God help me if something happened that required me to go into the hospital.
The truth was that as well as Sebastian paid me to be his assistant, I couldn’t stay in that position. I needed to make more money. Which made sense because I hadn’t gotten a master’s degree to be an executive assistant. I dreamed of managing my own department, and eventually, my own company.
Leaving Courtland Enterprises would be a good thing, because I wouldn’t have to worry about breaking the rules by dating Sebastian. If I could find a good job as a middle manager at another firm, I’d make more money and be able to date the very sexy Sebastian Courtland publicly.
I would miss him, though. Our days together at Courtland Enterprises were some of the greatest of my life.
But just as I’d been turning my brain to focus on the next stage of my career, Sebastian had dropped the bomb on my head that my proposal to help save the company wasn’t any good. Clearly, I was fooling myself. There was no way I could sell myself as a manager for any company. My ideas weren’t good enough. I didn’t have enough experience managing anyone. Yes, I’d hired, trained, and managed Kaylan, but we were a department of fucking two. Big deal.
Between my financial frustrations and my failure with the proposal, I felt like I was swimming in an endless black sea. Right now, I was paddling desperately simply to keep my head above water, but I wasn’t making any headway. There was no getting ahead. If I were lucky, I’d be able to improve my brother’s and my mother’s lots in life, but it depended on me never making a mistake, never having something bad happen.