Page 96 of The Mistakes I've Made
“I’m going to order us breakfast,” he said with determination.
“But…” I pressed against him, feeling him harden in response.
He groaned. “You’re evil.”
“You did call me the daughter of the devil when I first arrived, didn’t you?” I grinned.
“I don’t think I’m the one who came up with that particular name, but considering the way you move those hips, I’m not surprised.”
“Can’t we just stay in bed all day?” I begged.
He glanced at the clock next to the melted ice cream container. “Checkout is in a couple of hours.”
“What if we just stayed another day?” I suggested, my arms stretching around his neck. “Maybe two?”
“Not that I wouldn’t enjoy that, but what happened to you being behind? Don’t you need to get back?”
I rose to my feet, the loss of his body heat feeling strangely hollow. “I’m not sure I’m going to continue.”
It was like a vacuum had sucked all the air out of the room as I watched his reaction. Confusion, disappointment, disbelief.
“No,” he finally said.
“No?” I echoed. “What kind of answer is that? You can’t tell me no!”
He stood up, determination in his eyes. “Someone has to. Jesus, Lani. You can’t give up. Not now, not so easily.”
Anger took hold of me, and I retaliated. “Why? Why can’t I? It’s my dream, Taylor! I get to say when and how it ends, and believe me,” I yelled, the tears already welling up in my eyes, “that’s all it’s ever going to be. Just a dream. Because my father is never going to take me seriously, and now that he has Becky, why would he ever leave the company to me? I’ve been replaced. He has a new family, a new successor. I’m nothing!”
So much for forgetting.
But I guessed we never could really forget, could we?
We just hid the pain, squirreled away in the recesses of our mind, until one day, it came racing back to the surface, ready to play.
Too bad mine hadn’t dug a bit deeper. Hid a bit longer.
It would have been nice to live in a state of naive bliss for a while.
“Hey,” Taylor said softly, pulling me into his big, strong arms, trying to take away the pain, just as he had the night before. “We’ll figure this out.”
I shook my head in disbelief. “I don’t know how. My dad expects complete project plans on his desk in four and a half weeks. That’s barely enough time to do one design, let alone two.”
He tilted my chin up, giving me a questioning look. “Two?”
My cheeks went pink, as I realized I’d just given away my secret. But, now that I had, I wasn’t sure why I had been keeping it from him in the first place.
“I’m having Halladay work up two plans for the hotel,” I explained. “One that is a cohesive vision of the spa retreat I had planned.”
“And the other?” His brow lifted.
“And the other is a nod to the original hotel; art deco with a modern twist.”
“Are you serious?” His green eyes were alight with excitement. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Well, for one, I didn’t want you to disappear. I was afraid that if I told you, you’d consider your job done and stop hanging around so much.”
He grinned. “You couldn’t get rid of me if you tried. And two?”
