Page 66 of Love In The Spotlight

Nelson snorted. “No one believes that.”

“Are you saying I’m a wuss?” Jamie asked.

She held back the laugh when Nelson’s face got red at the thought he might have insulted the guy he was technically working for.

“No,” Nelson said. “Just that the women in our family tend to rule everything.”

She turned and saw Jamie look at her questioningly.

“Is that true?”

“No one goes against our mother,” she said. “She’s a saint raising us all on her own. So yes to that. I’m not as much like her as everyone thinks. I mean, as my mother has pointed out, she had a lot of kids she was caring for by the time she was my age.”

“And Talia is just annoying,” Nelson said. “But she thinks she rules things since she always gets her way.”

“I’m not so sure Talia gets her way any more than you get yours, Nelson. You both have no clue what it’s like. The life you grew up in isn’t like what the rest of us had.”

“You’re never going to let me forget it either,” Nelson said. “But at least you’ve got more memories of Dad than we do.”

She sighed. That was the first he’d ever said that and she was surprised it was said in front of Jamie.

But she did know that was a fact too. Talia had little to no memory of their father and Nelson was only two years older.

“That’s true,” she said. “But it shouldn’t be a crutch you use.”

She could see her brother wanted to argue with her, but Jamie said, “I know you’re busy, Laken, should we get started?”

“We should,” she said. “I’ve got meetings back to back starting at one. I’ve got two hours for this and we can order lunch; otherwise, I won’t eat.”

“Let’s get lunch set now,” Jamie said. “No reason for you to miss a meal.”

“That’s the parent in you,” she said. “I like it.”

She walked over to her desk and pulled off the specials she’d printed earlier that came via email.

She knew what she was having, got Nelson’s and Jamie’s orders and emailed them in to be delivered and then they got down to business.

“I’m ready to start running job ads,” Nelson said. “We need to get people hired to oversee the setup in the plant once the construction is done. I’m popping in there and checking on things, but I’ve been out of town too.”

“Nelson is still finishing up on a few other projects before he transitions here fully. He’s also put out because he’s living in and out of hotels.”

“Could be because my siblings won’t let me stay with them,” Nelson said.

“You and West would kill each other and you know it. Plus Abby is there now at times when she’s not in the Hamptons.”

Abby was getting set up to work for her and came into the building twice a week with West, and the other three days right now she was working out of the city with West flying there for long weekends to work too.

“And Braylon is with Lily so that is out,” Nelson said.

“You’re not staying with me,” she said. Nelson had asked before because she was on the road so much. In the past, if he was just here a day or so visiting, she’d say yes. But he was here too much and she needed her space. “You’re a slob. I’m not Mom and picking up after you.”

“No one has to pick up after me,” Nelson said. “You just can’t stand things not to be exactly the way you like them.”

“As I shouldn’t have to deal with in my own house,” she said. She turned to Jamie. “Nelson’s biggest problem is he wants to live in the places we do without the work to get there. Just like everything else. He forgets we didn’t live in those places when we first started out and he isn’t going to either.”

She turned to look at Nelson who had a frown on his face. They’d joked with West to bring Nelson here and pay him a project manager salary and see how far it went.

West half did it. Putting Nelson in the position he was in was giving him a shit ton more salary than most his age, but Nelson was too used to the finer things in life.

---