Total pages in book: 119
Estimated words: 112762 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 564(@200wpm)___ 451(@250wpm)___ 376(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 112762 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 564(@200wpm)___ 451(@250wpm)___ 376(@300wpm)
“Then maybe we need to find you someone new to crush on.”
“Dating?” I sighed. “When will I have time to date?”
“You’ll make time.” Monroe proceeded to pull out her laptop and do a quick search. “There,” she announced after a few minutes. “There’s a speed-dating event in Inverness in two weeks. We could babysit Callie.”
“And if your own little bump has arrived by then?”
Monroe flushed with excitement. “Then Regan can babysit Callie.”
I laughed at her offering poor Regan’s time, like she didn’t do a lot for me already. “I’ll think about it.”
I don’t know if I really meant it at that point.
On the Monday after the run-in with Walker and Chloe, there was no sign of Walker watching out for me. No sign of him at all on the estate. I finally gave in and asked Monroe about him, and she told me he was on vacation. She didn’t know where he was, but he’d left Ardnoch on Saturday, and according to Brodan, he would be gone for two weeks. She also told me, with not a small amount of curiosity in her voice, that Brodan said Walker took the same two weeks off every year.
I wondered why but realized I’d probably never know. He hadn’t told me he’d be gone from the estate. He didn’t know that his leaving made me feel less safe. He didn’t know because he didn’t want to know. In fact, I suspected it would agitate him to know he made me feel safe.
He didn’t want to be that person for me.
We weren’t friends, me and Walker.
We weren’t anything.
Eight
WALKER
It was the end of the first week of September, and a heat wave had hit the country. Portobello Beach was fairly busy for the middle of a working day. I sat on the concrete wall of the promenade, feet dangling above the sand, staring out at the sky-blue water.
The cool breeze sweeping off the North Sea masked the heat from the sun.
People walked behind me, in front of me. Some ran. Some hurried after dogs. Others sat on the sand, enjoying the last of the summer sun before autumn hit.
There was no sign of turmoil here. Laughter lit the air, loud chatter muffled by the squall of seagulls above, the aroma of fish and chips prevalent and familiar.
My hometown shouldn’t have been a place that hurt.
But, fuck, sitting there, I might as well have had a knife sticking out of my chest.
Every year, I took the same two weeks off work. Disappeared. I always went somewhere different. Somewhere I could hide. Somewhere safe I could be distracted. My head was not in the game, and in a job like mine, that could be a danger to someone else. So I took off on this anniversary every year.
But Rich had asked me to come here.
“Are you taking time off work at the beginning of September? Like always?” Rich asked.
“Of course.”
“This year I want you to go home, Walker.”
His suggestion made me instantly defensive. “I didn’t realize emotional torture was part of your process.”
Rich’s answering smile was patient. “You need to face the past if you’re ever going to move forward. Avoiding it does you no good. I think this is a gentle first step toward processing what happened there. You don’t have to see anyone. I just want you to explore Portobello. Spend some time there. If it’s too much, you can leave.”
And because I hadn’t started seeing Rich just to ignore his advice, I’d done as he’d suggested.
But I was starting to wonder if my therapist was a fucking sadist.
Here … she was everywhere. And they were here. It was a wonder we hadn’t crossed paths. Good thing I was leaving tomorrow to spend my last week off catching up with some lads from my military unit. This year we’d decided to meet up in Perthshire to camp and fish and get drunk. It’s what I needed. It would hurt less than this shite.
A burst of giggles to my left drew my gaze, and I saw a child with blond hair and blue eyes walking with her mum, swinging her arm as she held tight to her hand. The mum was blond, young. The sight of them miraculously drew my thoughts of her to Callie and Sloane.
Before I’d left, I’d had a Zoom call with the Ardnoch Estate board members along with North Hunter. We told them what we’d witnessed. I was on my way down south when Aria called to let me know Hoffman was out. Membership stripped. Unsurprisingly. Lachlan had people looking into rumors about Hoffman’s behavior, trying to find someone to come forward. I was doing the same, using what contacts I’d made while working as private security for the rich and famous.
North Hunter had reiterated his offer, but I’d turned him down. I liked Ardnoch.