The Virgin Society Collection

27. Four Days and Fourteen Hours

27

FOUR DAYS AND FOURTEEN HOURS

Nick

It’s Wednesday, and I’m stepping into the elevator in my office building, checking the time on my watch.

It’s one-thirty, which means it’s been four days and fourteen hours since I left Layla.

I’ve been non-stop since eleven-thirty on Friday night. Like I had any other choice. You have to fight fire with fire. Obsession with obsession. So I poured myself into work all weekend, coffee and me powering through my days and into the night, stopping for little except dinner with my parents and Finn on Sunday evening. Dad gave Finn more tough love about Marilyn. Finn grumbled more, then Mom told Dad to let Finn figure it out in his own time. Finn asked me later if that meant Mom thought Marilyn was bad for him.

We all do , I’d wanted to say. Instead, I’d said, Everyone just wants you to be happy and you haven’t been.

Since then, my week has been wall to wall, and that’s both good for business and for sanity. I just finished a lunch meeting with the founder of an encryption app that has my brain buzzing. I’m itching to crack open my wallet and fund the startup now. But due diligence matters.

And due diligence damn well better keep me busy for the rest of the day.

When I get off the elevator on my floor, I’m in the zone, ready to power through my afternoon. First, though, I head down the hall and pop into David’s cube to say hello. I try not to visit him too much at work. Don’t want to look like I’m giving him special treatment, but I do want to make sure he’s fitting in and learning. His small cube looks like his already. There’s a framed picture of Cynthia and him on the desk, from the hiking expedition over the summer. Then a stress ball to squeeze, and a wall calendar from an animal shelter.

“How’s everything going, David?”

He looks up from his laptop with a droll expression. “Well, considering your social media was white bread until I arrived, it’s better.”

Whoa. “Someone is cocky,” I say, jerking my gaze back. Then I furrow my brow. “Also, what’s white bread?”

“Boring, Dad. Boring,” he says.

“Then make it…un-boring.”

“That’s my goal,” he says, then shoos me away. “Don’t want anyone to see the boss hanging around too long.”

“Message received,” I say, then rap my knuckles on the padded half wall in a goodbye. “See you tonight at Dragonfly.”

A smile tilts his lips as he says, “See you then.”

There. I’ll be busy tonight too. My schedule is so damn full.

I leave, heading toward my office where Kyle greets me from his desk just outside. “Hello, Mr. Adams,” he says. “Did you have a good lunch meeting?”

“Fantastic, Kyle,” I say, since I’m staying in the work zone. “And now I need to bury myself in research.”

Bring it on, research. Rain down from the sky in a deluge.

“Great. Don’t forget we have the HR session though at three.”

That slipped my mind. Maybe I’ve been too focused. “Remind me?”

A shock of sandy-brown hair falls on his forehead, and he pushes it back. “The HR consultant you and your brother hired as part of the merger is hosting a series of sessions on creating a culture of respect in the workplace. The first session is today.”

I snap my fingers, remembering. That’s important, even though I’ll have to leave my cave for it. “Right. Right. I’ll be there.”

“Oh, and I confirmed your reservation for three at Dragonfly tonight. The address is in your calendar.”

“Excellent,” I say, and I thank him and head into my office.

But before I can dive into work, Finn raps on the door, then strides in. “Find any good tech to invest in, or can I plan on beating you with the firm’s next big funding?”

“Like I’d tell you before I reeled them in.” This competition with my brother is half the fun of being in business together.

Finn scoffs. “Like I’d tell you about any good content plays before I snagged them.”

There’s a freedom and a shorthand in working with Finn at last. You don’t play in my sandbox. I don’t play in yours . But together we make it rain. And it rains on our terms—the terms of two brothers from the wrong side of the tracks who made it big.

All on our own.

He glances at my palm which I’ve wiped clean of evidence of my Layla obsession. “Guess the woman isn’t driving you wild anymore,” he observes.

I wish.

“I’m all good,” I say. It’s the furthest thing from accurate. But I’ll have to make it true, or I might go crazy. Especially when I head to the session at three. This discussion of inappropriate workplace language is making me think of other inappropriate things.

David warned me that Cynthia might be a little shy, and she was at first, but an hour into dinner, she seems to be holding her own.

We finish our dishes debating how to bowl your best game. “Look,” I say. “Here’s my official take: it’s all about the swing…” I pause, lift my bottle of beer, then add, “But honestly, it’s down to the beer.”

Cynthia laughs. “Beer does make you bowl better.”

“Fact,” David chimes, then sets down his chopsticks. “We should all go bowling sometime. There’s an alley in Brooklyn near my new place.”

“I’d like that,” I tell him. “But I have to warn you—I’d beat you all. Get ready for a phenomenal level of destruction.” I am smug but honest.

David whistles, then claps Cynthia’s shoulder. “Dude. Are you taking on my girl? She’s the queen of bowling.”

“You and her,” I say. “ Dude .”

“Hey, everyone’s dude to me.”

“I’ve noticed, and yes, I will take you both on.” Then I turn to include David’s date. “As long as that works for Cynthia.”

“I’m game,” the brunette says with a smile. “How are you so good at bowling, Mr. Adams?”

I’ve asked her to call me Nick, but she seems more comfortable with the formality, so I don’t insist again. As for her question, I could tell her my dad played. That he taught Finn and me from an early age. That it was part of our world. But there’s a simpler answer. “Because bowling’s awesome,” I say, then finish my beer.

When the meal ends, I call a cab to take the two of them to Brooklyn, since Cynthia is staying in the city tonight.

At the curb, she extends a hand. “Thanks again for dinner, Mr. Adams. I’m so glad we could meet before the auction.”

The reminder of the auction jolts my brain back to Layla.

I try not to think about seeing her there, dressed up in something stunning. Because she’s always stunning. She’ll be hosting the event with David. We’ll be in the same room for hours, while I have to keep my cool.

I try, but I fail, since I’m thinking of her jasmine scent, her lush hair, her soft skin.

What is she doing tonight? Is she having a hard time not reaching out to me too? Is she forcing herself to make ten million makeup videos to stay busy?

Focus, man. Fucking focus .

I concentrate on David and Cynthia. “It was good to meet you too.” I shake her offered hand, telling them goodnight as the cab idles.

David scoots inside the yellow car and snuggles up against his woman as they drive off into the New York night.

Lucky guy. But hey, that’s the benefits of falling for a woman you can have.

And now I’m jealous of my son.

I head home and go straight to the gym to burn off my inappropriate feelings with exercise.

The next day, I’m up at dawn. I hit the pool for a swim then march into work before anyone else. I am nose to the grindstone all day long, and all these fantastic metrics, like ROI potential, and market share, and scalability, have my mind exactly where it should be.

At the end of the day, though, David knocks on my door, too fast, too frantic. His hair’s a mess. He tugs on his tie. “I don’t know how to get all this done before the weekend,” he says, then as he heads straight for the couch, he rattles off a list of final details he needs to take care of—a shelter visit for more pics, a phone call with the hotel, ferrying some auction items out to the Hamptons tomorrow since he has the day off. “And I promised Layla I’d go with her tonight to pick up the final things around the city. And I don’t want her to have to do it alone.”

He flops onto the couch, flat on his back, like he’s at a shrink’s. “I don’t know what to do.”

My heart aches when he’s like this—nearly immobile from the weight of it all. And I haven’t seen him this stressed since the night we started planning the auction at my place. I take the wheel now like I did then. “I’ll go with her.”

He breathes a huge sigh of relief. “Really? You don’t mind?”

It’s amazing how much I don’t mind. “It’s no problem.”

“Great. I’ll text her,” he says, then taps away on his phone. When he looks up, he says, “She’ll pick you up at your place at six.”

I don’t want her to drive around the city alone either. A new count begins—sixty minutes till I see her.

There goes my six-day chip.

I head home quickly and shower.