Page 138 of The One I Hate
Charlie doesn’t say anything for a second, letting my words sink in. “You’re Magnolia Properties?”
“I am.”
“Which means you’re my landlord.”
“Yes.”
This makes her take a seat.
“How? When? Why didn’t you…”
Were those questions rhetorical? “I don’t know which one you want me to answer…”
She snaps a look of murder to me. “This isn’t time for your smartass remarks. Just fucking start talking.”
Noted.
“If you want the true beginning, Emmett and I were roommates our freshman year of college.”
“What? Oh my God…that first day I met him, I knew he looked familiar.”
I nod. “We stayed friends. Had some classes together. We reconnected last year.”
“Great story, but what does that have to do with this?”
“A lot, I promise.” I take a breath, knowing that it’s only going to get worse from here. “Emmett actually came to Mona’s months ago and made her an offer. She was going to sell to him when I convinced her to sell to me. In the course of that conversation, I also persuaded Emmett to come work for me and be my manager for Magnolia Properties.”
“I thought you were a real estate agent? Like, sold houses?”
“I am. I do. But I also have commercial properties. It was just a few, but I wanted to expand. And to do that I needed a property manager.”
“And you got them both that day.”
“I want to go on the record, before I say anything else, I bought Mona’s before I knew you were looking for a restaurant. I swear on everything I have.”
“When did you find out I was looking for a space?”
I say the next part quickly so I can brace for the blow back. “The night before you were scheduled to look at it.”
I watch the realization come over her beautiful, yet pissed off, face. “So from the beginning. Oh my God! We had slept together by then! What the fuck, Simon!”
She’s back up and pacing. “How did you find out?”
“By accident.” My tone is creeping into the pleading side, and if I had to take a guess, I’ll be full out begging by the end of this. “Emmett told me he had a showing and who you were. He didn’t recognize your name from college, so he had no idea. He also didn’t know why I told him what to do next.”
She stops and glares at me. “Which was?”
Here it goes…“Make sure you take the restaurant, no matter what.”
I expect screaming. Profanities. Maybe her throwing one of her knives at me.
What I don’t expect is calm.
Eerie calm.
Which I’m now realizing is more terrifying than Charlie yelling at me.
“No matter what?” She sits back down across from me. Our eyes are locked, and a chill runs through me when I see how much anger and hurt are in her eyes. “So my dream restaurant that I thought no way could be as cheap as it was, that happened to come with an apartment for no extra rent, that was you?”
