Total pages in book: 136
Estimated words: 135847 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 679(@200wpm)___ 543(@250wpm)___ 453(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 135847 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 679(@200wpm)___ 543(@250wpm)___ 453(@300wpm)
I wasn’t surprised in the slightest that was how Hale would prefer to spend his days.
“Do you ever go back there?”
He shook his head. “Rarely. It’s part of Trail Blazer now and there’s a good man at the helm. His name is Frank Rossi. I don’t want to step on his toes. I’m out for good, he doesn’t need to think I’m looking over his shoulder.”
“Are you? Out for good, I mean?”
He nodded. “You run that joint, you live there. You live it with the kids. You don’t have your driver drive you to your mansion in the Pacific Palisades at night, drink martinis with actresses, then come back the next day.”
“So maybe you can segue into working more with Trail Blazer. It’s bigger. Its reach is going to be massive. That seems to fit both things that are now you.”
“That’s Judge’s baby.” He angled his head to the side, his eyes narrowing. “What’s with the interrogation?”
“It’s not an interrogation,” I replied. “I just realized that it’s been all about me so I thought it might be a nice change for it to be about you.”
“Exciting things are happening for you. And dramatic things are happening to you that you don’t want to happen, but you don’t have a choice. So it’s natural it’s been about you. My life is boring.”
Boring?
“You’re the chairman of the biggest company in the world,” I remarked.
“If people knew how mundane the day-to-day of that is, they’d be surprised.”
“Can you step away?”
His brows knit. “And let them fall back to past practices? I promise you, I could handpick someone to replace me, and they’d figure out how to corrupt him or her in about a month.”
“So it has to be you,” I said softly.
He seemed to distance himself from me, even if he didn’t move.
I understood why when he asked, “Do you have an issue with what I do?”
“I have an issue with the fact you don’t enjoy doing it.”
“Christ, you sound like Tom.”
Even if his tone was impatient, I didn’t take offense, since Tom loved him and would want to look after him, and I might not love him, but I liked him a great deal.
And I wanted to look after him.
“We can drop it,” I offered, even if not only didn’t I want to offer, I didn’t want to drop it.
But there was me, falling into a new pattern of backing off at the first indication it was getting too deep for him.
Maybe at this early juncture between us, that was the right thing to do.
It just didn’t feel like it.
“That’d be good,” he muttered, sucking back some wine then going to the oven to check the temperature.
He then went to the proving drawer and took out the bread.
I watched as he oiled it, dimpled it and salted it. He also sprinkled it with rosemary and minced garlic.
I was salivating, and it wasn’t even baking yet.
He slid the pan in the oven then went to the sink to wash his hands.
By this time, I was on a stool.
And by this time, I’d realized his mood had changed. He hadn’t instigated a different conversation topic. He wasn’t even looking at me.
So I found my mouth saying, “I’m sorry I seemed pushy. I’m just trying to get to know you.”
He put a pan he’d filled with water on the stove and looked me dead in the eye. “Right. So it’d be good you did that without it coming off as a tell-all interview. All of life isn’t an episode of Elsa’s Exchange.”
Struck by his words, I said nothing.
He salted the water like he hadn’t just been a dick to me.
I’d dated. I’d hooked up. I’d even had a couple of men who’d stuck around for a while, though that “while” didn’t last very long.
But I was realizing right then that I had no experience in how to deal with this kind of situation. Frankly, since he’d been a jerk, my first thought was, I wanted to leave.
Hale started on a salad, put the spaghetti on, indeed finished off dinner while asking about my day. Asking after Fliss. Asking if I’d touched base with my dad.
I’d answered his questions shortly, with detachment, to the point where, by the time he served up and sat beside me, we ate in silence.
It registered vaguely, how restaurant-quality delicious his food was, but in a sense, I didn’t really taste it.
He’d gone to the trouble, though, so I was going to eat it.
After that, I thought the safest bet for the both of us was me getting my stuff and leaving.
He wasn’t ready to bare all. I understood. We’d been texting banter for a year, fighting our attraction for months, and only just decided to give this a go. If I was pushing too hard too fast, okay.
But there were ways to communicate that without lowkey lashing out.