Total pages in book: 103
Estimated words: 97466 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 487(@200wpm)___ 390(@250wpm)___ 325(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 97466 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 487(@200wpm)___ 390(@250wpm)___ 325(@300wpm)
I would have liked to pretend that the clear end date was the reason things were so easy, but the truth was… it was Hugh. Despite us coming from very different backgrounds and living very different lives, I’d never felt as comfortable with anyone as I did with him… unless I started to think about the future.
Because Hugh still wanted the happily ever after, and I didn’t know how to be that for him any better than I ever had. If we were in a real relationship, there would come a day when one of us would realize things simply weren’t right and that relationship would end. I couldn’t say for sure when or how it would happen—I never could—only that it would. And maybe that made it a self-fulfilling prophesy or something, but I didn’t think so. I’d dated so many good, kind, intelligent men—men who were obviously made for loving relationships since they went on to have them after me—and I’d tried to make it work with each of them. But like I’d told Hugh before, I lacked the talent to actually get there.
The fact that I had serious, scary, capital-F Feelings for Hugh, stronger than I’d ever felt for anyone—Feelings that seeped out of my pores while I slept and slid silently onto the body clutched tightly in my arms, escaped from my lungs on every exhale and were inhaled by Hugh’s generous mouth when I couldn’t pull away from his kiss, and even sometimes escaped my traitorous eyeballs and washed across Hugh’s face and chest when it was safe enough to disguise them in the warm water from a shared shower—wouldn’t change the outcome.
But they made me determined to enjoy every fucking second between now and New Year’s. To imprint Hugh on my soul forever.
“TJ said he’s okay with moving the in-person to a virtual meeting for the LA thing. It’s on your calendar,” Lesya said. “Meanwhile, your mom called and wanted me to find a time for you to go shopping with her for wedding and holiday stuff. I’m going to block off Friday afternoon unless there’s any reason I shouldn’t.”
I blinked, calling my attention back to my meeting and my assistant, who was waiting for my response with her tablet balanced on her knee.
“Oh, ah… yeah. Fine. But I told my friend Hugh I’d go with him to a holiday party that night, so tell my mother I’ll have to be done by six.”
She lifted an eyebrow. “Didn’t you just go to his party last week?”
A notification popped up on my phone. Hugh had just posted a new HEA TikTok. Without hesitation, I clicked it.
“Mhmm. Friends do that for each other,” I said, staring at Hugh’s gorgeous face on the screen before he swung the camera toward an older couple.
A minute passed. The video looped, and I watched it through a second time.
“Okay, far be it from me to suggest that you’re distracted,” Lesya began. “But you’re seriously hella distracted, Oscar. What’s going on with you? You seem… different. I dunno. Brighter, somehow.”
I found myself wanting to trace Hugh’s handsome face on my phone, so I clicked it off and guiltily set it facedown on my desk.
“Hyaluronic acid serum,” I said. I grabbed my own tablet so I could skim Chuckie’s business proposal. “I saw an interview with Jonathan Bailey about it. He said it’s like a glass of water for the face.”
She narrowed her eyes. “That’s not it. It’s almost like you’re in the honeymoon phase, but there’s been no rush phase.”
“Oh, please.” I rolled my eyes. “You know I hate when you insist on—”
“You don’t have any exciting travel planned, no big projects that are about to go live,” she went on, tapping one manicured finger on her knee and studying me like a jigsaw puzzle. “I’d say it was because you’re spending so much time with your family, but even that just seems unusual—”
A soft knock at the door interrupted her analysis, which would have been a relief, except a second later, a familiar curly-headed hottie poked his head into my office. My stomach did somersaults, which was a fairly standard reaction to seeing him these days.
Hugh looked immediately sheepish. “Oh crap, I’m interrupting, aren’t I—?”
Lesya blinked at him and then at me. Somehow, the blink she aimed my way seemed almost accusatory.
She jumped to her feet. “Mr. Linzee. Hi. Did you have an appointment? Mr. Overton didn’t tell me to expect you, or I would have—”
“It’s fine, Lesya,” I said. “I told Hugh to drop by if he had some free time.”
It seemed to take a moment for those words to kick in. “Drop by,” she repeated, as though she’d never heard of the concept… which was fair since I had a blanket policy against friends visiting me at work.
Hugh seemed to be the exception to all my rules. No surprise there.