Page 30 of Only for the Week
I clear my throat and look out of the window. “Are you and your brother close?” I haven’t met Jalen Martin yet since he wasn’t able to make it to the engagement party, but Rome has mentioned him plenty of times.
“Extremely. That’s my guy. I was always his shadow growing up, because he’s four years older than me and now his son is my little shadow.”
“That’s adorable. Does he play any of your games?”
“Oh yeah, you can’t tell his little ass he’s not a pro gamer.Proving Groundsexists solely because he challenged me to create it.”
Proving Groundswas one of Downhill Studios’most popular games last year. It’s a horror game set in a zombie apocalypse where the player must fight their way through an infested city and is only given a certain timeframe to do so. His company was already a giant in the videogame industry, but this game quickly became one of the top-rated zombie games next toThe Last of Us,theResident Evilfranchise, andLeft 4 Dead.
“Wait, you still design the games? I assumed you were too busy running the place to do that.”
“Game design is still my heart even though I don’t get to do it as much anymore. That was a special project for Kam, so I had to.”
“You’re a good uncle.”
“I try to be.” My ovaries keep trying to speak up as if I want to hear anything they have to say.Pipe the fuck down.
“I can’t believe you really designedProving Grounds.That game gave me nightmares.” I chuckle.
“Hold the fuck up. You played the game?”
“Yeah, Evie made me. She knows I don’t like horror games, but she insisted this one was fire. She wasn’t wrong. Still terrified me though.”
He laughs and rubs his hand over his beard before gripping my thigh again. “I didn’t know you and Eve were gamers.”
She keeps it under wraps, but Evie is a huge gamer. She has an entire YouTube channel dedicated to speed runs of her favorite games. I’m not on her level, and I usually spend my free time reading, but I have been known to lose myself in games from time to time. “Stick around, you might learn a thing or two about me.”
“I plan to.”
A charged silence falls over the car, steeped in unspoken claims and false promises.
One week.
That’s all we have.
“We’re here.” His claim jolts me back to the present. When I look up, I see that we’re at a dock and there’s a group of three people waving to us from a very large boat.
I turn to Rome with my jaw on the ground. “What is going on?”
“You’ve been saying that you just wanted to read by the water. I figured if we went to the pool, we’d just be interrupted and you’d be dragged into yet another activity. So,” he waves toward the yacht, “I brought the water to you.”
I look back and forth from him to the boat several times trying to make sense of his words.
“You…you rented an entire yacht…just so I could read by the water?”
He holds up the tote bag he packed for me and hands it over so I can see my Kindle and both paperbacks I packed resting comfortably inside.
“I did. You ready?”
Ready to go half on a baby with your fine ass? Shit, put me down as a possible.Damn these fucking ovaries.“Y-yeah.”
He puts his hand on my lower back to lead me up the dock and onboard where the captain introduces herself as Shirrelle, and the other two crew members introduce themselves as Paul and Luis. Luis gives us a tour of the ship from the two bedrooms and bathrooms to the very spacious sundeck and tells us the plan for docking so we can use the swimming platform if we want. Paul tells us what time to expect lunch and then they leave us in the downstairs lounge area.
“Rome, this is amazing. Thank you.” I’m blown away by this gesture. According to theForbes“Forty Under Forty” article that was done on him, Rome’s net worth is in the millions. To some, dropping at least fifteen hundred dollars on a yacht rental that could easily fit twenty to fifty people on it might seem like a drop in the bucket for him, and I’m sure it is, but the intention behind the gesture speaks volumes as to who he is and I’m listening intently.
“You’re welcome. You happy you trusted me?”
“Listen, you’ll get no questions from me going forward.”
