Total pages in book: 127
Estimated words: 127368 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 637(@200wpm)___ 509(@250wpm)___ 425(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 127368 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 637(@200wpm)___ 509(@250wpm)___ 425(@300wpm)
He took another drag, blew out the smoke, then looked back to me.
“It turned to shit after that. She withdrew, even from us in some ways. And he seemed to make it his mission to show us what a ‘real man’ was and drilled that into us both.”
“And what’s his version of a real man?”
“One who does what the fuck he wants, when he wants to do it, and no one has the right to tell him any different.”
“Are you going to kick them out of the house?”
His brows shot up. “Hell no. It’s their home.”
“Does your dad think you will?”
He sighed.
Deeply.
“His allowance will be defined by me. That doesn’t exactly say, ‘Do what you want when you want.’ I’m not going to make them live like paupers among splendor, but part of me understands a man’s son controlling his finances would be humiliating. Which is why he should have found some way to make his own money.”
“Like you did,” I noted.
He nodded. “Even when my son, if I have one, turns thirty-eight, I won’t need to rely on him. Far from it. As it should be. My grandfather saw the writing on the wall. He knew the covenants. He was an architect. When his time was up, he moved my grandmother to a beautiful home he designed himself over on the coast, continued his work at his firm, and I don’t think he took another penny from the estate. Same, in a sense, with my great-grandfather. He ended his career as an admiral in the Royal Navy when he was in his sixties, and he retired in Cornwall.”
“Impressive. You come from good stock.”
His eyes twinkled.
It was fabulous.
Yeesh.
He seemed too good to be true.
However, the twinkle died. “Granddad was disappointed in my father. I have two uncles and an aunt. One is a solicitor. One is a retired pilot in the RAF. My aunt’s still a practicing psychologist. But Dad always lived off the estate. The only one of the four. In fact, my uncles and aunt all moved out for college and never came back. Dad went to Oxford. All the Alcotts do. But he didn’t do anything with the degree he earned.”
“Did you go to Oxford?”
He nodded. “And Eton. Same with Danny.”
“And again, I’m impressed.”
This time, he shook his head. “Don’t be. The Alcotts have endowed both. We had guaranteed places.”
“I bet you were a good student.”
“You’d bet wrong. I spent more time taking my mates’ money and investing it in the stock market, and losing most of it, than I did studying while I was at Oxford. It was a game to me, but I was fascinated with it.”
“That losing streak obviously ended.”
One side of his mouth went up. “It did.”
“Hm.” I took the last sip of my Amaretto.
When I did, Ian took my glass.
He reached to the table to set it down, crush out his cigarette, set his glass aside.
Then he came back to me.
“Come here,” he ordered gently.
I looked at his face and my chest got tight.
Because it wasn’t first kiss time.
It was something else.
“Ian—”
“Please, come here, sweetheart.”
I’d been holding it together. All that was me told me I needed to keep holding it together.
But when Ian lost patience and pulled me into his arms, I gave up the fight.
Shoving my face in his sweater, my shoulders racked as the sob came.
Ian gathered my hair in his hand and held it at the nape of my neck as he held me, and I cried for what Lou was going through.
“D-dad would lose his shit,” I stammered. “He wasn’t the greatest husband. B-but he loved her the way he could. H-he’d hate he wasn’t here to be there for her.”
“I’m sure,” he murmured.
“It’s not an ‘easy procedure,’” I mumbled into his chest, referring to how Lou described her upcoming surgery.
“I expect not.”
“She just doesn’t want me to worry.”
“No, she doesn’t.”
I tipped my head back and looked at him with watery eyes. “I’m worried as fuck.”
He shoved my face back into his chest. “I know.”
I cried more, he held me through it.
Eventually, I got my shit tight, turned my face, and rested my cheek against his chest, but otherwise didn’t move.
Ian’s thumb stroked the side of my neck.
“Thank you for being so cool,” I said.
“You’re most welcome.”
“We’re not going to kiss tonight, are we?”
“I taste of cigarettes and your friend has a brain tumor, so no. I don’t think our timing is right.”
“Ugh,” I grumbled.
He stopped stroking my neck so he could squeeze me with both arms.
I was still grumbling, even if the words were, “It’s annoying, but I’m glad you want to make it special.”
“Mm.”
“I need to go check if the girls have got all of Lou’s things packed, and then I want to call Lou’s mum. She’s probably beside herself and it’s a long trip. She won’t be here for at least another hour, and I want her to know Lou’s okay.”