Chapter 34
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
SOPHIE
Tyler
Hey birthday girl, I miss the shit out of you. And I love you. So fucking much. I wish you were here right now so I could kiss every inch of you and show you exactly how much so fucking much is.
“And this is one of our simulation labs.” My head snaps up from my phone, Luke’s voice dragging me back to the conversation as he leads me into a big room designed to look like an elementary school STEM lab.
There are about thirty workstations, each with a computer and a 3D printer I know is the best beginner model for elementary-aged kids.
One wall contains floor-to-ceiling shelves holding 3D printing filament in every color of the rainbow, robotics kits I recognize as the ones currently being used in Vex IQ robotics competitions, tools and screws and gears and what looks like multi-colored, and disassembled parts of a 3D printed droid.
One wall is covered in 3D tiles that give the whole space a futuristic vibe, and the other two walls contain massive LED screens.
It’s basically heaven for tech-brained kids. And also for twenty-seven-year-old tech-brained women such as myself. My fingers itch to touch everything. To figure out how everything works. Which, I realize, is exactly the point.
I turn to Luke, giving him a smile. “You knew exactly what you were doing when you brought me up here.”
He gives me a knowing smile. “Guilty. You’re a geek just like me. Like all of us. I figured this might entice you to come on board. I could tell the rest of our operation didn’t exactly convince you to uproot your entire life and move it out west.”
Laughing a little because he is entirely correct, I sit at one of the workstations, running a hand over the 3D printer. “You could tell, huh?”
He takes the stool next to me. “I mean, no one actually gets excited over spreadsheets and annual reports, but you seemed particularly unimpressed. I figured I had to bring out the big guns, and for someone who heads a foundation dedicated to STEM education, this is the big guns.” He waves a hand around the lab.
Smiling, I pick up a tiny purple and green 3D printed dragon, turning it over and over in my hands. “Sorry about that. My head isn’t exactly in the game today. And I guess that isn’t something I should be admitting to my potential employer.”
He shrugs, leaning back on his stool. A good-looking guy in his early forties, Luke Davis has wavy brown hair going the tiniest bit gray at the temples, and he’s dressed in jeans, an old UCLA hoodie, and Nike high tops that have definitely seen better days.
He has dark-framed glasses on his face, and his vibes are far less famous billionaire tech founder and way more nerd who accidentally stumbled his way into enormous success.
The second we met, I was immediately comfortable with him, and it took me until this second to realize why.
It feels like I’m looking at a younger version of my dad, and that drops my walls just enough to let some truth seep in.
“I won’t be your employer. The board will be. Although, maybe they won’t, if your face is betraying your inside thoughts.”
“Shit,” I mutter, wincing a little. “I’ve always had an expressive face.
It’s mostly a curse. It’s not you, I swear.
Your whole operation is brilliant and so impressive.
Anyone would be lucky to work here. To lead the team you have obviously put together with a lot of care and intention. You’ve built something really special.”
He nods. “You get it. I knew you would.”
Propping my chin on my hands, I study him.
“Can I ask why you’re stepping down? What’s also clear to me is that you love it here.
It makes me wonder why you’re walking away.
” I ask because I’m curious and also because it will distract me from the fact that it’s my birthday and eleven hours from now, I should be sitting in the Hansley’s backyard on a striped blanket celebrating birthday night, but instead I’ll be sitting in a boring ass hotel room entirely Tyler-less and without even one single chocolate cupcake with peanut butter frosting, and that completely fucking sucks.
Luke nods, pulling his phone out of his pocket and unlocking it, clicking a few times and handing it to me.
On the screen is a picture of Luke with a beaming blonde woman tucked under his arm, each of them with a chestnut-haired toddler on their hip.
Two dogs sit in front of the family, and the picture so dramatically radiates love and happiness it makes my chest pinch, thinking of my own love and happiness I left behind yesterday.
“You have a beautiful family.”
Luke takes the phone from me and smiles at the screen before slipping it back into his pocket.
“They’re my whole damn world. My wife Emery and I met in college in Los Angeles, and we settled there.
She was getting her PhD when I was getting MasterLab off the ground, and then she got a tenure-track professorship in L.A.
, so when it was clear MasterLab needed to be in the Bay Area, I divided my time between the two cities.
“That must have been hard,” I say, thinking, for the millionth time of what it would be like to live across the country from Tyler. L.A. to San Francisco is far. San Francisco to Pittsburgh is forever.
He nods. “It really was. And it got even harder when we decided to try for kids. It took us a long time and a lot of medical intervention, and I wasn’t there.
” His face is pained. “Or, at least, I wasn’t there nearly enough.
Emery is…god, she’s amazing. The best person I know and my biggest supporter in the world.
I alternate weeks between here and L.A., but it’s not enough.
Every time I leave it kills me, and it’s gotten so much harder since the twins were born.
For two weeks out of every month, all my girls are four hundred miles away from me, and it’s way too much.
” He blows out a breath. “I miss them. I miss them so damn much, and I don’t want to have to say goodbye to them anymore.
” He shrugs, his lips curving up in a smile as he looks around the lab.
“I love it here. I love this company, and I’m so proud of what I built, but it’s time for me to go home.
To be the dad I want to be, and to get to go to sleep every night next to my girl.
I’ve done the work here, but it’s time for me to put it down now.
To let someone else take over.” He studies me carefully.
“I’m getting the feeling that someone might not be you. ”
I replay his words over and over in my head, feeling the weight of them pressing down on my shoulders. “It’s complicated.”
Luke laughs, propping one leg up on his opposite knee and taking a sip of the probiotic drink with the unpronounceable name he’s been carrying around with him all day.
“It’s always complicated. Except when it’s the easiest thing in the world.
What’s his name? Her name? Sorry, I shouldn’t have assumed. ”
I blow out a breath and lean back, crossing my legs and once again admiring the perfect pink pants that go with the perfect pink suit that couldn’t be more out of place in a startup full of jeans and T-shirts, but I love it anyway.
I take myself wherever I go. “Tyler Hansley,” I say, wincing inwardly when Luke’s eyebrows wing up.
I spend so much of my life in a bubble that contains all manner of famous people I mostly forget are famous that I forget saying Tyler’s name tends to garner a very specific reaction from most others.
“Like, starting quarterback of the Pittsburgh Renegades Tyler Hansley?”
I nod. “The very same one. Although, to me he’s mostly just lifelong best friend Tyler Hansley who has recently become way more than friend. Our moms have been best friends since their law school days,” I explain at his questioning look. “Tyler and I literally grew up together.”
Luke grins. “Childhood best friends to lovers. I dig it.”
I snort out a laugh. “Tyler and I are basically a trope factory. I’ve been in love with him for years, but it took him until a couple months ago to catch up.
And now the idea of moving across the country?
” I shake my head. “I don’t love it, and he can’t come with me what with the whole, him being the Renegades’ franchise quarterback with a contract and a legacy and all that stuff. ”
“Well, as someone who is currently giving up a multi-billion-dollar company because I can’t bear to be away from my wife anymore, I’m not sure I’m the best person to offer objective advice.”
I huff out a laugh. “Advice is the last thing I need. What I need is someone to tell me exactly what to do and give me step-by-step instructions. I’m chaos under the best of circumstances, and my decision-making skills leave something to be desired.
Although that’s probably not something I should tell you when I’m trying to impress you. ”
Luke gives me a warm smile. “Sophie, you’ve been impressing me since you graduated college and took the executive director position at your foundation.
This isn’t an interview so much as it is a Please let us impress you so you want to come work here.
I want you to take over my company, but I also love love, and as one person deeply in love, I can recognize another, so I’ll just say this.
You’re choosing between right and right.
If you move out here and take over, I have no doubt you’ll be successful and take this company to the next level, and a million levels after that.
But if you decide to stay in Pittsburgh and keep running the foundation, you’re going to do incredible things there too.
You’re smart and intuitive, and no matter where you land, you have a long and brilliant career ahead of you. ”
“That’s a whole lot of faith to have in someone you barely even know.”
Luke shrugs. “I didn’t get where I am by being a bad judge of character.”
He says it so matter-of-factly I have to laugh.
“Are you sure you aren’t my long-lost brother or something?
You remind me so much of my dad, it’s spooky.
It’s the whole, captain of industry but in the really nice, kind way, entirely unaffected by all your wealth and success when so many other people in your position are total assholes about it.
Not to mention the fact that my dad also gave up his company to go be with my mom. ”
“No way,” Luke says with a grin. “That actually happened?”
“Sure did. They fell in love in college and broke up senior year. Ten years later, he sold his company and moved to Pittsburgh to beg her to take him back.”
“I met your dad once when I was first starting the company. I was no one, but he was so nice and talked to me for a solid thirty minutes when there were a million way more important people vying for his attention. He’s good people.”
“The best,” I agree. “My parents are another reason why moving here would be rough. And my best friends who are basically my sisters. And my favorite city in the world.”
And Tyler’s house.
His grilled cheese.
Rom-com movie night.
Perfectly icy Dr Pepper.
His hugs.
The way he holds onto me all night long and never lets go.
The way he knows me. Gets me. Loves me exactly as I am.
“Sorry,” I say, shaking my head. “I didn’t mean to turn this little get together into a therapy session.”
Luke chuckles. “It’s probably mostly my fault. I’m excited to go home. I miss my girls.”
“They’re lucky to have you.”
He smiles a little. “I’m the lucky one. And I think you are, too. Which means you’ve got a tough decision to make.”
I give him a hopeful smile. “You sure you don’t want to make it for me?”
“Wish I could, Sophie, but this one’s all you. Remember, right and right.”
Right and right.
As Luke’s words tumble around my head, I can’t help but think I already know which right is right for me. And I smile, thinking I’m ready to get the rest of my life started.
Right fucking now.