Page 171 of My Dark Prince
“You do.” Edward rounded to my other side. “Less tired.”
“Hmm.” I nodded, realizing for the first time that, despite my late-night shenanigans with Briar, I’d slept more in the past several weeks than I had in the past fifteen years.
When was the last time you had a nightmare?
The three of us walked along the patchy crater-sized hole as I tried to renegotiate my way out of the fucking ski park scheduled to open in the middle of our Dubai resort before Briar had my balls for ruining the planet.
John and Edward began speaking over one another, rambling about shareholders and market trajectory. But mostly, I knew they hated the fact that they’d dedicated two months of their lives to a project I wanted to scrap.
John, who was approximately two hundred years old, stabbed his cane in the ground with each step that he took. “We see where the wind is blowing, and there’s a lot of interest in Dubai for that kind of venue.”
“Yeah, I don’t really care,” I admitted, my eyes fixated on someone seated in a golf cart. “You’re not going to be here when this world implodes. You don’t mind shitting all over it.”
“You won’t, either, son.” Edward, a sixty-something, private-equity fox, chuckled. “You’re not that young.”
“You’re right.” I sagged, realizing the woman on the golf cart had white-blonde hair, not strawberry-blonde. Not that I didn’t already know Briar was currently on a baking date with Dallas. “But my children will.”
Since when do you care about your children, who don’t even exist yet?
Since the idea of them became real. God, I had it bad. I needed to get my shit together, ASAP.
“Well, with all due respect, if you won’t shit all over this planet, someone else will. It’s all about the money.” Edward snorted. “Don’t try to be a nun inside a brothel.”
We started toward the parking lot. I knew I wouldn’t appeal to their conscience on account of the fact that they had none, so I decided to put the lid on this conversation.
“It’s true that I can’t control other people’s actions.” I stopped by their Maserati and Ferrari. “But I can control my own, and I choose not to lower myself to the behavior of a greedy oil exec. So, no, there won’t be a ski resort in a place that is normally 100 degrees. End of discussion.”
“Did you clear this with your father?” John fisted a hand around his key fob. “Back in his day, he wouldn’t have turned his back on a good deal, just because he had those pesky things called feelings.”
“I’m making an executive decision,” I drawled. Dad didn’t know about it. He would, though. Soon. I couldn’t keep this from him. “And my father is no longer in the picture, so it doesn’t matter.”
Edward shook his head, like I was a lost cause. “What happened to you?”
“Love.” I grinned, depositing them into the welcome hands of their gas guzzlers. “Mine came back to me, and I’m never letting her go.”
Chapter Seventy-Four
Oliver
Briar didn’t know that I’d canceled the ski resorts in Dubai and Palm Springs. And because the “lobotomy” trulyhaddone wild things to my brain, I ditched work earlier and rushed back to tell her.
She should’ve been back from her baking date with Dallas – whatever that was – by now, hopefully waiting for me in the bedroom in nothing but her birthday suit.
The image I’d conjured – of Briar patting my head like a parent slapping a gold-star sticker on their child’s workbook – quickened my pulse. It thrummed so hard, I could feel it at my neck.
The faster I drove, the more ridiculous I found this whole ordeal. It wasn’t as if I’d spent my childhood starved of affection. Mom praised me for the mere feat of existence, which if you thought about it, was a total self-compliment. And Dad had his ways of showing his pride in me and Seb.
But I wanted it fromher.
My girl.
I wanted to hear her praise, see her smile, and bask in the glow of her approval. Fucking sue me.
The car barely screeched to a halt before I thundered out of it, straight up to our bedroom we’d shared since leaving New York. (I really did hope she’d be waiting for me naked on our bed.)
Alas, no such luck. I weaved in and out of my office, the library, and the two guestrooms upstairs. All empty.
I fished out my phone, shooting Dallas a text, knowing Briar sucked at answering – and using technology in general. She’d always been a boomer trapped in a younger body.
