Page 9 of The Spare
She slapped him on the back of his head. “Maybe if you stayed out of the papers, you wouldn’t need me to clean up your PR nightmare.”
Henry tended to relieve stress in unhealthy ways. Drinking and womanizing, mostly. It was problematic for anyone, but their family's very public image made it lethal.
He rolled his eyes. “Easy to say when they have no interest in bothering you.”
“Heavy is the head that wears the crown.” She didn’t hide the resentment in her voice. Sloan grabbed a scone from the box and hopped onto the counter. Her dress rose slightly, revealing more of her thigh. My mind drifted to the idea of those long legs wrapped around my waist.
“What?” Henry asked, annoyed.
“It’s Henry the Fourth,” I answered and kept my attention squarely on the screen in front of me. A silence passed, and I looked up to see the same look of befuddlement scrawled across his face. “It’s Shakespeare, man.”
Henry rolled his eyes. “You didn’t answer my question.”
I shouldn’t—it didn’t bother me, but I didn’t want to have to sit around and think about it.
Someone, please change the subject.
As if answering my silent request, Xander’s voice echoed from the hallway. “It was a ridiculous question.” He appeared with a bright smile as he swiped his hair out of his eyes.
“Already working?” he asked me. “It's Sunday morning. Take an hour off; nobody’s gonna think you're any less perfect, I swear.” He walked past me, squeezing my shoulder before stopping at the counter next to Sloan.
For a split second, she looked up and our eyes met. She broke away instantly, peering back down at my brother.
“Are you still mad I had to leave?” Xander asked, looking up at her innocently. My little brother could charm his way out of a murder conviction. “I heard you middle-naming me earlier.”
“Get over yourself.” Sloan rolled her eyes, placed the scone next to her, firmly planted her hands on the counter, and leaned forward. “I actually had a very nice time without you.” She looked up, and her eyes pulled mine in again. She granted me a small smile.
“Uh-huh.” Xander’s mouth hung open slightly, and he looked at us skeptically.
“Do you guys realize this is the first time in over two years we are all together, just us?” Sloan asked, hopping off the counter. “I miss this. All of us.”
Nobody bothered to answer her. It was something we were all thinking—she happened to be the only one brave enough to broach the subject. Her face fell at the silence. I hated seeing the pained look she tried to hide. I hated even more that I was a large part of why it was there.
“We better get going,” she said after a long silence. Xander followed behind as she headed to the entryway. “Will you be at Thanksgiving?” She turned at the door, her body halfway through the threshold. Her voice picked up, and she looked directly at me. “You missed the last two.”
If that was meant to make me feel worse, it did.
I nodded, and her face brightened. She flashed me a smile before the door closed behind her. The room felt empty with her absence, but maybe I could get some work done. I turned back to my computer.
Agreeing to spend Thanksgiving weekend with the Amaris was like signing up for camp. There would be games, activities, and sports of some kind. All of which were mandatory. The time I would use to catch up on work would instead be filled with an overly competitive game of Taboo.
Henry sat down next to me and turned his coffee cup around in his hands for a second before finally speaking. “Are you ever going to tell me what happened?”
I let out a heavy sigh and closed the laptop. “I was working.”
“For two full years, nonstop? All over the world?”
“Henry, you of all people understand what a global company means,” I scoffed. He was the heir to the world’s largest pharmaceutical company. At one point, the same had to be done for his company.
“In between any of the cities you went to, there wasn’t a single week you could’ve made it back?”
“What are you implying?”
“It wasn’t just work. Obviously.” He rolled his eyes.
“What else do you think it was?”
“I don’t know.” He stood and paced around the counter. His voice went up an octave. “You’re a stranger to me now. I only know what’s going on with you when I read an SEC filing about it. If it weren’t for those, I wouldn’t know if you were alive.”
