The Trouble With Forever: An Age-Gap Romantic Comedy (The Trouble With Series Book 3)

1. Elias

Elias was pissed.

Okay, not pissed.

Yes, pissed.

He was fed up to the gills with everything.

The world.

The universe.

And whatever was bigger than the universe.

Taking a step back from the sculpture he was working on, he tossed his welding helmet. He was tempted to throw the MIG torch as well, but he couldn’t afford the eight grand it would cost if he broke it.

Okay, so maybe he could afford it, but he wasn’t the type to waste money. He may have been born into a wealthy family, but that didn’t mean he was blind to the value of it. He’d spent a few years distancing himself from the family and their money. Yes, he had a trust fund. No, he hadn’t touched the bloody thing. It felt too much like dirty money—especially now.

Despite it being over two years since his family had been front page news—and not for anything good—he still strived to keep his name disconnected from theirs. It had been the only thing that saved his career. Things had been going well… until now. He had an exhibition scheduled to open in a week, and he still hadn’t finished the show piece. The centre sculpture. The star of the show. The one thing that would tie the entire exhibition together into a cohesive story.

Did he even know what that story was anymore?

When he started, he thought he did. But now…

He looked at the sculpture. She was an angel. She was nine feet tall. She was made entirely of scrap metal. She wore a doctor’s coat and had a stethoscope around her neck.

And she looked like shit.

How many bloody hours had he spent on her? He couldn’t even count.

How many times had he dismantled her? At least four.

Now, with a week until the exhibition, he couldn’t afford to pull her apart and start over, but he also couldn’t seem to make her look like the image he had in his mind.

It was the face. The face was all wrong.

It had been more than a couple of years since he’d seen her, so it was understandable that the details were fuzzy. But he was an artist with an artist’s eye. He should remember.

He should have drawn a sketch immediately after meeting her, but his hand had been banged up, and he couldn’t even hold a pencil. Not to mention his nose had been broken and he’d been feeling pretty sore and sorry for himself. And the morphine. That morphine whistle had done a number on his brain.

His phone buzzed, so he put down the torch and pulled off his gloves. It was a message in the group chat.

Levi:

Dinner. Tonight. Theo’s place.

Theo:

Hey! Who invited you?

Sarah:

I did.

Alexis:

I made dessert.

Sarah:

Oh… um… maybe don’t bring it?

Alexis:

Hey!

Levi:

No, it’s good. I tried it and I’m alive.

Alexis:

HEY!

Theo:

Fine *eye roll emoji*

Levi:

Theo and Sarah can organise dinner. Elias you bring the wine.

Elias:

Fuck off. I’m busy.

Alexis:

Come on Elias! We haven’t seen you for weeks.

Sarah:

We’re playing Pictionary. You can be on my team.

Theo:

Hey!

Sarah:

Baby, you’re gorgeous but you can’t draw for shit.

Alexis:

He’s my brother-in-law. He gets to be on my team.

Levi:

He’s not your brother-in-law yet, and I’m not bad at drawing.

Alexis:

Oh honey, you keep telling yourself that.

Elias:

I’m too busy. In case you’ve forgotten, I have an exhibition next week.

Alexis:

We know. That’s why we think you need a break.

Theo:

Just for the record, this wasn’t my idea.

Levi:

Alexis made me do it.

Sarah:

Come on Elias. It’s just one night. Give yourself a couple of hours off. We promise not to bother you again until the exhibition opens.

Theo:

Come on, man. Sarah and I got back into the country a week ago and we haven’t even seen you yet.

Levi:

If you’re not there we’ll come to you. We know where your workshop is and we’re not afraid to gatecrash.

Elias:

Fine. FINE! I’ll be there.

Elias ignored the rest of the group message and tossed his phone onto the worktable. He scrubbed his hands through his hair and grimaced at the greasy feeling and bits of metal grit on his scalp. How long had it been since he washed it? How long since he’d had a shower? He’d showered yesterday, right?

Whatever.

He didn’t want to go and be amongst the ‘happy’ people. He would be the third—fifth—wheel again. He hated it. It wasn’t that he hated his brother and friend finding their forever loves, it was that seeing them made him jealous. He didn’t want to be jealous, but he couldn’t help it.

Elias was lonely.

Since the blow-up with his family, Elias had gone underground to some extent. He didn’t go to clubs anymore, and he hadn’t dated in forever. It was unlikely that anyone would see him and immediately think he was related to ‘those Beckingsale doctors’, but he hadn’t wanted to take the chance. His career had just started taking off, and he needed to protect it from any bad press. That meant not being associated with the criminal activities of his family.

So, yeah. He was lonely. And then she started appearing in his dreams, making him feel even lonelier.

He turned to look at the sculpture again. It was nearly there. It was just the face. If he only had a photo of her…

Elias picked up his phone and opened the browser, tapping on the search icon and typing in her name. He would never forget her name.

A few images popped up, but they weren’t her. He tried putting ‘doctor’ in front of her name, and BAM! There she was staring back at him with that knowing smirk.

Why hadn’t he thought of doing this before?

He knew why.

He’d been very tempted to cyber-stalk her—not in a creepy way, just in the regular way that everyone did these days. But he hadn’t. With all the shit brewing with his family at the time, he’d wanted to keep a low profile. She was a doctor, and he was from a family of doctors who had done bad things—all except Levi, who had been the one to blow the whistle on them. The doctor community was small, or so Levi kept telling him. The last thing he wanted was to get involved with a doctor when he’d worked hard to get himself away from them.

But then she’d started appearing in his dreams. Good dreams. Really, really good dreams that were a little bad but still oh-so good. They kept him warm at night during what had felt like a nuclear winter.

She had been the inspiration for his exhibition. ‘Unsung Heroes’ was the title. He’d sculpted people from all different walks of life. Firefighters, police, paramedics, teachers, and doctors… or at least doctor, singular. His main piece. The one he looked at now.

Her halo was crooked—he’d done that on purpose. It reminded him of the sass she gave him. Her wings were made from individual leaves of metal he’d hammered to paper thin sheets from wrecked cars. Now that he had a picture of her, maybe he could finally finish the piece.

The goal wasn’t to make her recognisable to the world. It was more an expressive representation. Regardless of who other people saw when they looked at her, Elias would know. He might not be able to see her again in real life, but she would live forever in his art. This piece wouldn’t be for sale.

Okay, everything was for sale for a price, but it would take a pretty hefty offer for him to consider it. Besides, who had space for a nine-foot angel?

Elias looked at the photo on his phone again and then took a screenshot of it, saving it to his photo library. That wasn’t being a stalker. It was inspiration. He took photos all the time for inspiration… it wasn’t like he was going to use it for nefarious purposes.

It was the eyes, he decided. The eyes in the sculpture were wrong.

He tromped across his workshop to the massive wall of wooden drawers. They were those small drawers that used to be in libraries when they had card files… before computers took over the world. He searched through a couple before he found what he was looking for. Sapphires. Two of them. Yeah, he knew he shouldn’t keep precious gems in his drawers, but seriously, who would think there was anything of any value in them? It was the perfect hiding place.

Feeling a hell of a lot better about the sculpture, he strode back over and held up the sapphires. They would work. He just had to create the right setting for them. Silver. Yes. Definitely silver.

He hummed as he sat at his work bench and pulled out the tools he needed. Finally.

Finally he might be able to finish this bloody thing.