Page 69 of Mark my Words

“I know none of us have set the best example for you or your brother on what true affection looks like, but I did love your grandfather. It was a different kind of love, but he was a good companion to me for many years.” She paused, turning her head toward the house slightly up the beach, which I assumed was owned by Pietro. She seemed different around him. Maybe Nana knew more about love than I thought.

“Learn from my mistakes, Kristine,” she sighed. “When you find love, don’t let anything hold you back.”

“Is that what you’re doing?”

I was sure she would’ve been if she could blush, but she turned back toward me with an indulgent smile. “Don’t try to turn this back on me. Let that young man know how you feel about him. You never know when you’ll reflect on a missed opportunity and regret it for the rest of your life.”

Before I could bombard her with questions about what that meant, she slowly eased herself out of the chair, pulling on the gardening gloves she’d been holding in her lap and turning toward Pietro’s house. “You work on getting your head out of your ass. I’ve got a date with some hydrangeas.”

“I thought it was roses, Nana?” I teased, laughing as she waved her hand at me dismissively over her shoulder.

“Whatever, Chicklet. Quit ruining my dramatic exit.”

It seemed I wasn’t getting any sympathy for my conflicted feelings from Nana. Maybe it was time to embrace them instead of running from them. The only catch was I didn’t know if I could love someone, much less let Sam in close enough to try.

SAM

Boston

When I arrived at the office on Monday, the little colored dot next to Kristine’s name on the intraoffice messenger was still red. It wasn’t like her to remain offline for this long. If she were logged on remotely, it would still show her as online, but I hadn’t seen the little green dot next to her name since last Tuesday. I was starting to worry that she would do something stupid like drop out of the running for the promotion. I knew it was causing her stress if her interactions with me as of late were any indication, but it wasn’t like her to back down from a challenge.

She also hadn’t responded to my epically bad idea to Super Like her on Tinder while I was drunk. I knew she checked her email obsessively, so she should have gotten a notification of my drunken proclamation. If she was like me, she probably had the notifications turned off on the app, but I was anxious to see her reaction. I couldn’t take it back now, and I was sure it made me look like a desperate loser, but I was letting it ride. She couldn’t avoid me forever.

“Hey,” Adrian greeted from the doorway, hanging his bag up on a hook next to the doorframe in his office. He had an oversized travel mug in one hand and a stack of papers in the other. “Thought you might want to look these over. It’s the schedule from the last tour I managed.”

“We don’t know if Evan will agree to go yet.” I frowned as I watched apprehension roll through Adrian’s shoulders, but his smile was calculating.

“Chase has got him so pussy-whipped I bet he caves. I’m not worried about it.”

“I highly doubt she’s going to manipulate him into doing something he doesn’t want to do.”

“Wouldn’t be the first time a woman manipulated Evan,” he scoffed, sitting behind his desk and pulling open the laptop he kept in his office. Kristine had given me a hard time about my company-issued laptop, but his was like mine on steroids. Kind of like his shoulders.

“Is that what happened before he...” I’d just started at Vivid when Evan mysteriously packed up and left the city without warning. I knew he’d been tense around that time because of a book release, but it sounded like a woman was involved in his sudden need for seclusion.

“Yeah, his psycho ex was a piece of work. Total head case, super jealous. She didn’t like the idea of him traveling around the country and meeting fans without her. He’s always been a little shy, but that viper had him scared of his own shadow by the time they split up.”

It also explained a little about the absence of any romantic subplots in his novels during that time. I couldn’t imagine trying to focus on writing about two people being romantically involved if my own love life was falling apart. It was hard enough to focus on editing the scenes with Frances and Dominic toward the end of Chase and Evan’s current novel while things were unsettled with Kristine.

“Well, I hope Chase doesn’t manipulate him, but thanks for the information in case I need it.” I awkwardly lifted the folder and nodded before shoving it into my messenger bag. I’d have to look at it when I got home later. It wasn’t like I had anything else going on in my evenings anymore. Taylor and Caleb had asked me last night if we’d broken up since Kris hadn’t been at the apartment much lately, but that would have involved us dating.

This book tour was going to complicate things even further. She couldn’t hide from me if we were together every day. I knew there would be days of traveling and some downtime between events, and it wasn’t like I could confront her while we were working. But it would be easier to corner her if there wasn’t anywhere for her to escape. It seemed like a dick move to ambush her, but waiting patiently wasn’t getting me anywhere. Being the youngest child, I knew I’d been a little more spoiled than my sisters, and I wasn’t a fan of delayed gratification.

It wasn’t just about the sex anymore, although my dick had been quite disappointed in the last few weeks that my hand was the only attention he was getting. Kristine had brought something into my life I hadn’t had before. Someone who challenged me and didn’t put up with my shit. I also didn’t feel like I had to censor any part of my personality or put on the façade of a dumb jock around her. That act may have worked for Adrian, but I hated it in college when girls assumed I was just a pretty face who knew how to handle a stick—in more ways than one.

“Where’s the dragon been this week?” Adrian asked after a few minutes of typing, leaning back in his desk chair. “Don’t you two usually work together more now?”

“I’d have thought Isobel would have told you,” I tried not to smirk, but I wasn’t sure I was successful when I saw his jaw clench and his eye twitch.

“Why would she tell me? We don’t spend that much time together.” His eyes darted everywhere but my face, his jaw clenching again. Yeah right. They spent quite a bit of their time together lately, in and out of the office, but I wouldn’t burst his little bubble if he thought they were being discreet.

“She’s out of the office for a few days, using her vacation days or something. I think she’s supposed to be back today or tomorrow. I’m not sure.” It wasn’t like she’d responded to my one piss poor attempt at communication to tell me herself.

“Well, I guess you’d better enjoy the reprieve while you’ve got it. She’ll be back in here making her little snide comments soon enough. If you’re stuck with her on this book tour, you might want to invest in noise-canceling earbuds.”

“She’s not that bad. I know she can be a little—“

“Bit of a bitch,” he interrupted, and I felt my temper swell. Kristine wasn’t the easiest person to interact with sometimes, but underneath all that snark, she was a good person.

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