Page 19 of Boy Issues

Chapter Seven

“Where the hell do you think you’re going? You’ve barely been in the office for an hour!”

Donovan’s brother trailed him as he made his way to the elevator. He’d only come into the office at all to sign some paperwork and speak with the very client who’d liked his designs so he could artfully explain why they couldn’t be used. The irony is that he’d won an award for those sketches. Yet, that meant nothing to his family.

He was a CEO. Nothing more. God forbid his brother be outdone. Couldn’t have that. Donovan had never understood why there wasn’t room for him at the design table as well.

Donovan mashed the call button as if that would somehow speed up the elevator. He was about ten seconds away from tearing down the twenty flights worth of stairs.

“Did you hear what I said, Donovan?”

Donovan whirled around to face his mealy-mouthed brother. “The entire Wilshire District heard what you said. What’s the matter? Afraid you might have to communicate intelligibly with a client if I’m not here?”

Lawrence moved into Donovan’s space and growled, “I swear to the living Christ, if mom hadn’t manipulated father by insisting you run this company, you wouldn’t be anywhere near this firm. You’re a fucking embarrassment.”

Donovan fought the rise of emotion clogging his throat at the mention of their mother. She was the only member of his family who’d ever cared about him, who’d made him feel loved. Not even his grandparents gave a shit about whether he was around or not. He could jump in the ocean, then after they’d finished holding the champagne celebration, they’d forget he’d ever existed.

“I’m failing to see how mother could’ve manipulated him from beyond the grave.”

Lawrence sneered. “You know damn well he worshipped her, would do anything she asked. Even if she never said it to his face, it was her last wish. The old fool wouldn’t have gone against that if his life had depended on it.”

Donovan’s eyes flicked up and he gazed past his oblivious brother. Their father was approaching them with a frown, and Donovan braced himself for Office Blow-up, Part Two.

“Ah, father.” Donovan broke into a wide smile. “You’re just in time. Lawrence was sharing his thoughts regarding the astuteness your decisions regarding the firm’s hierarchy.”

Lawrence huffed, “Shut up, will you? Just shut up.”

Donovan wagged a finger at him. “There you go using your big boy words again. Don’t hurt yourself.”

“Why don’t you both shut up!” Their father’s voice boomed. “What the hell is going on here? Does it ever let up with you two?” He lowered his voice to a growl. “You’re both damn lucky there aren’t any clients in here right now.” He regarded Lawrence. “It’s bad enough I have to put up with his antics, now you’re behaving like an ass too?”

Donovan pretended as if his father’s words weren’t a punch to the gut. He grunted to himself. Why he wasn’t used to being the family joke by now, he couldn’t imagine. What he should do is walk away, but instead of it being for the afternoon, it would be forever.

Too bad about the gazillions of dollars I’d lose if I did that.

Donovan sighed. He’d be their prisoner forever. At least he had booze, tail and race cars to get him through so he wouldn’t go batshit crazy. He scrubbed his face with both hands, his thoughts immediately landing on Silver.

One year. The two-word phrase had become an unwelcome mantra.

“What are you sighing about?” His father regarded him with an even deeper frown than he’d marched up with. “And where are you going? It’s not even lunch yet.”

Donovan really needed to fine tune his stealth skills. “I have a dreadful headache which has only been magnified in the past few minutes.” He gazed pointedly at Lawrence. “Everything’s been handled this morning already. Emails, contracts and so on. I planned to take the afternoon off.”

In truth, his work responsibilities weren’t nearly as pronounced as they could be if he were less efficient. He could get through most of his daily tasks with little effort. It was only when they had multiple projects going at one time that he had to pull all-nighters. However, that hadn’t been much of an issue in recent years. Their dated designs had begun to tarnish their reputation as the go-to firm and the word had gotten around. He couldn’t remember the last time they’d been featured in Architectural Digest, and they used to be a regular feature in the prestigious publication.

His father had been considering him with narrowed eyes. “Fine. As long as everything’s handled, then get out of here.” He snorted. “Maybe we can have some peace around here if you two idiots aren’t going at each other all day.”

Lawrence gasped as their father strode away, trailing after him like a puppy. “What did I do? It was all his fault, Father. You know how he is.”

His father’s response was lost in the wake of their departure, which was just as well. Donovan was over it.

After a few more annoying minutes, Donovan found himself in the blessed safety of the elevator. Soon, he’d be in his new Porsche and on his way to Willow Springs where he could have an afternoon’s worth of tire-burning laps. He was damn lucky there was an opening that afternoon. He sometimes had to book the track weeks in advance.

Then, he’d go to the beach house instead of the condo and get sloshed off his ass. At some point, before he got too obliterated, he’d call around to see if anyone wanted to come over and blow him. That was usually easy enough to accomplish when he was in Malibu. Who didn’t want to get wasted and have sex with an ocean view?

By the time he’d driven ninety minutes north of the city, he’d abandoned all hope of forever eradicating Silver from his mind.

What is it about that guy?

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