Page 7 of More Than Words

“Yeah, I get it, Ad. But sometimes, I feel like it’s not fair that I’m still here and she’s not. Your Ma is stuck with the three of us, and on my bad days, she doesn’t even have me.”

“Well, you’re stuck with us for the time being, old man, so quit your bitchin’.”

“If you’d quit acting like a prick, maybe she’d have another woman around.”

Fuck. Getting my balls busted by the elderly now.

“She has Pen around. I don’t think Ma cares if I settle down.”

“Hmm,” he hummed as he turned to face me. “You know that she always told me she wanted a house full of grandkids. If my Liam wasn’t gone all the time, before he… There probably would have been a herd of you hell-raising delinquents.” Pops still had trouble mentioning my dad, almost thirty-five years later. I couldn’t imagine the pain of losing a child.

“Then maybe she needs to ask Hutch for another one.”

“Or maybe you stop running from your problems and settle down already. Maybe I’d like to see one of your kids come into this world and put you in your place like Pen has done with your brother. And we both know your brother is too busy fuckin’ around to get tied down again.”

My twelve-year-old niece was a little ball-buster but was only around on the weekends. Still, I knew she had a special bond with Pops. It wasn’t that I didn’t want kids. I was a workaholic who had little time to meet women and, being dubbed the office Dickhead left little room in the office dating pool. Not that I hadn’t thought about a certain feisty blonde a lot over the last five years since we started working in the same office. She was in the same boat as me—worked crazy hours, traveled frequently, didn’t have a family, and didn’t date—at least not that I knew about.

“Just somethin’ tah think about. When yah grow a pair, yah let me know.”

He didn’t wait for me to leave the car, opening the door himself and stepping onto the sidewalk. The rain had settled into a gentle sprinkle, and I stared through the streaky raindrops on the window while he pulled himself up the front steps using the handrail. My brother swung the door open before he got to the top, his middle finger extended in my direction briefly before he helped Pops in the front door and pushed it closed.

I knew I should stick around and make sure everything was good, but I needed to catch up on a lot of work if I would be out of the office for a week. Part of me dreaded keeping up the act with Isobel the entire trip, but the other part wondered how she’d react if I didn’t bother anymore.

ADRIAN

Boston

“Are you fucking kidding me?”

I stopped mid-stride, my eyes widening at the outburst coming from the partially open office door at the end of the hallway. I’d intended to stop by Isobel’s office and confirm the itinerary for our travel plans, but I wasn’t sure if I should just come back.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck me. God fucking dammit.”

My lips pinched together as I listened to her little mini tirade. I could hear things being slammed around on her desk, and I imagined the little pouty look she got on her face when she was irritated—which was admittedly a lot when I was in her presence.

If her intern was in there, I didn’t want to step on the hornet’s nest, but as I crept forward and peeked around the edge of the frame, I saw the table across from her desk where her guard dog often worked was empty.

Maybe I could avoid a conflict this morning and return to my office to ensure my files were all marked for my copy-editing intern, Sam. He was typically on top of things with little interference, but I had this compulsive habit of micromanaging.

It was probably an older twin thing, but I was the planner, and Hutch was the one who often blew those plans to smithereens. I knew Sam thought it was weird that my files were all meticulously organized, but the only way I survived school was to ensure I had every aspect obsessively covered. It was easy to let things backslide, but that made my skin crawl. We all had our tics, and an almost compulsive need to organize things was mine.

“What the actual fuck?” Isobel sighed loudly, and I watched her throw her phone onto her desk with a dull thump. Her forehead fell to the messy pile of papers in the middle of her desk, rising and falling a few times before she sighed again and sat back in her chair, facing the ceiling with her eyes closed.

I watched her face soften as she took a few deep breaths; the tension draining from her shoulders.

“What do you want?” she asked with an exasperated exhale. “And quit staring at my cleavage.”

Biting back my response was hard, but I managed, because I was not taking the bait and getting myself in trouble. I’d been more fixated on the soft motions of her throat as she breathed than the few buttons she had unfastened on her blouse.

“Just wanted to ensure we’re on the same page for tomorrow. Do you need me to go pick up the rental? I don’t mind. I’ve got some time open this afternoon.”

“Fuck,” she sighed, sitting forward and scooting her chair closer to her desk to pick up her phone. “About that. There won’t be one. Travel just sent over an email. They weren’t able to get a car. Something about the reservations not being put in for the correct dates. We’d need to come back Tuesday, and with the closing reception not being until Thursday night, there’s no way to make it work.”

“What are they proposing as an alternative?”

“They were going to try to get some plane tickets figured out, but then we’d be stuck in the airport all day and still have to mess around with getting a rental on the other end. So basically, we’d lose most of tomorrow when we could drive there in four or five hours. Corporate travel is so stupid sometimes.”

“If you’re up for it, I can drive. I mean, I’ve got a car. Or we can take yours, or…”

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