Chapter Twenty-Three Hunter
Chapter Twenty-Three
Hunter
On Saturday night, I offer to go and get Lucy from Brooklyn, but she insists on meeting me at a bar in SoHo.
I would have been happy to stay in, order pizza, and watch Netflix, but I don’t want her to think I’m only interested in sex.
Not that I’m not interested in sex—I most definitely am.
Specifically, sex with Lucy. But I like hanging out with her too.
She’s fun. And sweet and thoughtful. She makes me laugh. She makes me think.
I stalk over to where she’s sitting on a barstool, and her smile widens the nearer I get.
When I reach her, I do the only thing I can: I cup her face and press a kiss to her lips.
God, I wish it were just the two of us here and the rest of the people in this bar would just disappear.
I only want to be with her. Here, in public, it feels like I have to share her a little.
“Hey,” she says on a little sigh as I pull back.
“You look gorgeous.”
“Hunter,” she says like I’m crazy, “I was studying. I lost track of time. I’ve been wearing this all day. I let my hair down and that’s it.”
“I don’t think you’ve ever looked so beautiful.”
She smiles, but it’s not a confident smile.
She smiles like she can’t quite believe what I’m saying is true, and the thought tugs at my chest. I really don’t understand why she’s so down on herself.
I know she looks up to Katherine, but she and Katherine are just different.
Katherine’s a teacher who lives in suburban Boston.
Lucy is a paralegal in New York City. They lead opposite lives that are impossible to compare, but Lucy still thinks she’s not matching up to Katherine.
“This place is wild,” she says, changing the subject.
“Yeah. I’ve been to speakeasy places where the waitstaff wear costumes, but not a . . . what? Victorian place?” I glance up. “Why is there a wolf on the ceiling?” I slide onto the stool next to her.
“I was wondering the same thing,” she says matter-of-factly. “I’ve come to the conclusion that it must be a hound.”
I narrow my eyes, wondering if I’ve lost time somewhere, which might explain my confusion. “A hound?”
“As in Baskerville. The place is called Baker Street, right? It’s a Sherlock Holmes–themed bar.
At least, I think it is. The cocktails seem themed after Sherlock Holmes books.
Or something. My dad had the books and used to read them on a Sunday after lunch.
” She grabs a menu from where it’s standing upright on the bar.
“Five Orange Pips. That was a story, right?”
“I defer to you on all things Holmesian.”
She puts the menu down and grins at me. “Is it weird that I know this stuff?”
I shake my head. “I like you telling me things. It’s . . . sexy.”
Her eyes widen. “Really?”
I shrug. “Yeah. You’re a badass. You don’t take shit from anyone. You protect the people you love. You know things about Victorian literature. It’s all very sexy.”
She leans forward on her barstool. Her T-shirt tightens, showing the outline of her breasts. It’s just a simple white T-shirt, but from where I’m sitting, her outfit is bordering on obscene. “I think you’re sexy too.”
My body starts to vibrate. I skirt my hand over her waist and down her thigh. I just want to be closer to her. No matter how close I get, I want to be closer still.
She links her fingers through mine, and we order a cocktail each. “I’m definitely getting the Sussex Vampire,” she says.
“Sounds bloody. I’ll take His Last Bow.”
“You want to take a picture to send to Katherine?” I ask when our cocktails arrive.
Our eyes snag, and after a beat she shakes her head. “I don’t think so. Let’s just . . . not.”
I take a sip of my drink to stop myself from smiling. We’re way past pretending, and we both know it.
“Are you going to grow fangs?” I ask as she sips her red drink that’s come in a martini glass topped with white foam.
“Oh, wouldn’t that be something?” She waggles her eyebrows mischievously. “Would you want me to bite you?”
I trail my gaze down her body. I want to bite her all over. “Not my thing,” I say. “But I think you know that. You know all my things.”
“Do I?” she asks. “I’m sure there’s loads about you I don’t know.”
I pull in a breath. “It doesn’t feel like that.
” In fact, it feels like the complete opposite.
It’s like she knows everything without me having to tell her.
It feels like I’ve known Lucy much longer than I have—that we’re in a decade-old relationship or something.
Maybe it’s because we started off hating each other and didn’t waste time trying to show carefully curated versions of ourselves to each other.
Maybe it’s because the people closest to us love each other.
Maybe it’s because it feels like she sees me. Really sees me.
“You don’t talk a lot about your parents. Are you close?”
I shrug. “We were,” I say.
“And your dad liked to fish?”
“Yeah. Still goes out.”
“But you don’t like it? Did you used to like it when you were a kid? You seemed to be pretty good at it, at least according to Ed and the guys.”
I chuckle, but it has a cynical tinge. “Lots of things change as you get older. How you see the world can completely turn upside down.”
“Can it?” she asks.
“Yeah, like most boys, I idolized my dad. He loved to fish, so I loved to fish. He used to like to grow vegetables, so I tried to grow the biggest carrots and the most potatoes.” My best memories of growing up all revolve around spending time with my dad.
“He was my hero. I wanted to be just like him.”
“So when did he stop being your hero?” she asks.
I don’t ever talk about Bain Insurance. I told Ed before we went into business together, but that’s it. But something about Lucy makes me want to tell her. I want her to know everything about me. I don’t want to hold anything back. “Did I tell you I took over his business?”
She shakes her head but doesn’t say anything.
“I went to college to study finance so I could take over his life insurance business. Like I said, I wanted to be just like him. When I left college, I worked in the business for four years before he retired and left me in charge.”
“Wow,” she says. “You were young when you took over. Was it a big business?”
I nod. “Yeah. It was a lot of responsibility. But I was ready for it. I’d studied for a long time. I made sure that I’d worked in every aspect of the business before I took it over. I thought I was prepared.”
I glance up at her. Her expression of concern hits me in the chest.
“And I would have been.” I take a breath. “But the business was in debt. It wasn’t making any money—our costs were too high. Rent, payroll. Everything, really. We were weeks away from bankruptcy when I finally understood the mess my dad had handed me.”
“Hunter,” she says and squeezes my hand.
“I tried my best to save it. I really did.” I look into her eyes, trying to gauge whether she believes me.
I worked so hard—negotiating with the landlord, trying to cut costs, letting people go.
It was a brutal time. “Maybe I should have spent more time growing the business. If I’d been better at business development, maybe things would have gone another way.
Some people only want to deal with people with more gray hairs.
If my dad had still been in charge, then . . .”
“Hunter,” Lucy says again, firmer this time, “I know you. I know you worked harder than anyone to save that business. You wanted it to work.”
“I really did.” I pull in a breath.
“If you start off with high costs and a mountain of debt, you’re fighting a losing battle. What did your dad say?”
I pick up my drink. I only meant to take a sip, but I down the rest of it, trying to push away the feeling of failure that swirls in my gut every time I think back to that time.
“My dad didn’t say anything.”
“What do you mean? He didn’t warn you about the debt?”
“No, I mean he didn’t say anything. Nothing about the financial position of the business at all.
As far as I was concerned, when I took over, it was a family business we’d all done well from.
I planned to go in and grow it. Offer different products.
Focus on high-net-worth individuals. But I couldn’t do anything.
I was fixing leaks as soon as I got there.
Just trying to stop the business from sinking was a full-time job. ”
“And after it sank, what did he say?”
I knew the question was coming, but it doesn’t stop it hurting when she asks it.
Because admitting that my father didn’t take responsibility feels like .
. . It feels like I lost a father that day.
He stopped being the man who’d stand in front of a bus for me.
Stopped being the man I could go to for help and advice.
Stopped being a man I could trust. “He told me I shouldn’t feel bad and that I should learn from my mistakes. ”
“Oh, Hunter.” She doesn’t say more, and I don’t need her to. She doesn’t make excuses for him or say that it must have been a misunderstanding—rationalizations I’ve tried to make over the years.
“He abandoned you when you needed him most,” she says simply.
She slides off her stool and presses her palm on my cheek.
It’s so comforting. So warm. So completely what I need.
Yes, I was an adult when I took over Bain Insurance, but I needed my dad to step up in that moment.
Even if he hadn’t told me the state of things in advance .
. . Maybe he was embarrassed or thought I could fix things.
But when everything eventually collapsed, I needed him to tell me it wasn’t me who had failed.
I needed him to let go of his ego, his pride—whatever it was that stopped him being a father in that moment—and to step up as my dad. To take responsibility.
“I think you’re the bravest man I know,” she says.
“Don’t say that. It’s not true.”
“It is true. Your dad blamed his lack of business acumen on you and cut you loose. And you took it, shouldered it all. Then you started again. That takes courage.”
Her words are like lines on a ship, fixing me to her shore. Keeping me close. Safe.
“No, that was Ed. If it hadn’t been for him, I never would have started Portis. I would be working in a bank somewhere.”
She looks at me as if she can’t quite believe what I just said.
“You picked yourself up and went and got yourself a job. I would have been in a ditch with a bottle of wine. Ed didn’t do you a favor by asking you to go into business with him.
Ed is a great guy, but he’s no dummy. There’s no way he’d have suggested going into business with some worthless dropout who sinks businesses.
He knew you were smart, self-motivated, and trustworthy. ”
“I know, but he took a chance on me,” I say.
“Of course he did. But he didn’t do it out of pity or charity.
He did it because he knew you’d be a good fit for each other.
And you know what? You deserve credit for saying yes.
Because if what happened to you had happened to me, I don’t think I would have trusted anyone enough to make me a Big Mac and fries, let alone run a business with me. Kudos for taking a chance.”
Her words echo inside me, filling up all my empty spaces.
She sees things through fresh eyes. I’ve always thought of Ed as someone who saved me.
But Lucy is right. I’ve learned a lot about Ed since going into business with him.
He’s not a guy who makes business decisions from a place of emotion.
I think he did believe in me. Maybe he knew I’d shoulder the burden when he decided to take a step back.
“I like the way you see the world,” I say.
“Oh, I don’t know. I was ready to write you off the first time I ever saw you. I can jump to conclusions.”
Despite all the emotion running through my body, I manage to laugh. “You were protecting your sister’s happiness. You’re very good at doing that.”
She smiles. “Thank you.” She slides her hands up my thighs, and the air between us goes electric. “You know what else I’m good at?”
If we weren’t in a bar full of people, I’d spin her around, yank down her jeans, and be balls deep into her before she had a chance to tell me.
“Let’s get out of here,” I say, pulling out my wallet.
“Great idea.”