Chapter 22
Dane
This time, we’re taking the bigger jet.
Cole and I are already seated, and he’s staring at something on his tablet, while I anxiously stare at the door.
It’s time for our annual retreat.
Cole, Nico, and I have been doing this since we first started working together.
Every year, we go off to an island with no technology and no interruptions.
A chance to decompress and toss around ideas.
Most of our ventures were conceived on the island, then nurtured to life when we returned to reality.
But this time will be different.
The three of us share a cottage for synergy and idea generation, but there’s one other cottage on the island. Just outside of ours, down a dirt path, is the assistant’s cottage. It’s typically occupied by a young man who makes himself scarce unless we need him.
This time, it’s Lucy who will be sleeping there.
I already called ahead to ensure the cottages were in good working order, and everything is ready. Typically, it would be the assistant’s job, but I also submitted a work order to have the assistant’s cottage completely updated.
It’s not like it was a shack before, but I want her to be comfortable.
More than that, I want her to be impressed.
For the past two weeks, since we were together in Amsterdam, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about her. When I’m not meeting with manufacturers, conducting board meetings, or doing financial forecasting, I’m thinking about Lucy.
We haven’t had a chance to be together since Amsterdam.
Last weekend, I thought about inviting her to my place, but Nico dragged me along to a two-day golf tournament he insisted I needed to attend “for the company’s sake.”
It was a waste of time, as is typical when he ropes me into things like that.
So the work week returned, and now we’re setting off for the retreat. I’ve scarcely been able to really talk to Lucy without either Cole or Nico interrupting.
I’m itching to see her alone.
But sneaking into her cottage isn’t a good idea. Either of the guys could see me going out there. Cole likely wouldn’t care beyond the risks to the company, but Nico would never let me hear the end of it.
And, besides, I can’t shake the feeling that there’s something more going on with Nico—that he knows what happened between Lucy and me. Of course, he would figure it out. Somehow, the man manages to be lazy and perceptive at the same time.
Now, I sit up straighter when someone appears, walking through the door of the jet.
“Wow,” Nico muses, cocking his head and taking a sip of an iced coffee. “You missed me that much, bud?”
I skip my usual smartass remark and just go back to what I was doing—staring at the financial report in front of me and repeatedly glancing up at the door.
With a self-satisfied grin, Nico sweeps in, the smell of his sea salt and musk cologne trailing after him, and drops into the chair across from me, crossing one leg over the other and leaning back.
“Wheels up?” he asks, poking at me verbally, like usual.
To both of our surprise, Cole says, without looking up, “Lucy isn’t here yet.”
Up to this point, I wasn’t sure he’d really acknowledged our new assistant, so it’s surprising that he’s noticed she’s not here.
More than that, it’s a shock that he knows her name.
One assistant—an MIT graduate and Davenport fan-boy if there ever was one—made sure to bring Cole his lunch every day with the hopes that he’d be invited to eat with him. Three months after he quit, Cole called the new assistant by his name, confusing the new guy and causing Nico to crack up.
Nico gives me a pointed look, grinning even wider, and I scowl at him. He’s like a brother to me—which means that most of the time, I want to strangle him.
“Oh, my bad,” Nico hums knowingly, busying himself with his coffee and something on his phone.
I’m about to return to my own faux work when my phone starts vibrating in my pocket. My stomach sinks instantly. I know who it is without looking.
Nico, ever observant, shifts in his seat, shooting me a supportive look as I answer the call and move to the back of the plane, where we normally take calls. The bathroom is relatively soundproofed, as is the small room with two beds across the hall from it.
“Dane Rourke.”
“Dane.” My father’s voice is hard, and I can’t tell if he’s fully lucid or not. “Neville Anderson—you remember him, he’s in investing—is looking for a consultant. I gave him your name. How soon can you be in Tennessee?”
Sighing, I pinch the bridge of my nose and let the breath out slowly. “I’m not coming to Tennessee, I—”
“Nonsense. This is a friend of mine. Of the family. You’ll come.”
For a second, I teeter. It’s a sensation I’m not used to, not knowing what to do. I take a breath and without meaning to, I think of Lucy, lying next to me, her hair fanned out over her bare shoulders.
Gorgeous. Effortless, in a way that I’ll never be. Everything I do takes great work, precise judgment. It felt good to just exist with her, to have her see me in a way that nobody but Cole and Nico do.
Your life should be yours, too.
“I’m not coming to Tennessee,” I say firmly, cutting him off when he tries to speak over me. “We’re taking off now for the retreat. I’ll come and visit you when we get back, and if your friend wants a video conference, I can spare him thirty minutes… no more than that.”
For a second, I think my dad might have hung up. My stomach roils like I’m a teenager again, desperately seeking his approval.
But I’m not a teenager. I’m fifty-two, and my father is nearing eighty. There’s no reason he should hold so much sway over me.
I wouldn’t let a single other person on this planet have so much power.
That’s not true, my mind counters, supplying me with the image of Lucy in bed again, and I push it away.
There are many reasons why that’s a dangerous way to think—she’s not staying in the city, it’s a breach of company conduct, ethically ambiguous, and opens us up to lawsuits, and more than all that, I know she’s not mine to keep.
Letting myself think it, for even a second, is just going to lead to pain.
“Alright.” My father’s acquiescence shocks me out of my thoughts, and the sensation of him not trying to steamroll me is so new that I have to take a second to grapple with it.
“Alright,” I manage back. There’s a sound from the front of the plane, and I instantly wonder if it’s Lucy, if anyone has bothered to help her with her bag. “We’re wheels up soon. I’ll talk to you after we get back from the island.” I pause, consider it, then say, roughly, “Be well, Dad.”
It’s the closest I can get to saying what most sons would say to their fathers.
“You too, Dane.”
And with that, I end the call, throw open the door, and head back to my seat.