23
DANE
I sat outsideon the terrace, my laptop open in front of me, and hesitated over my phone before sending the text to Avery.
First of all, she didn’t know I had her number. Second of all, the request for a meeting would be last minute. Lastly — and most importantly — I didn’t want to be the one to make the first move.
It was dumb. We weren’t dating, and it didn’t matter what Avery Hart thought of me.
She’d be gone soon anyway.
But I couldn’t help it. She had me in knots, her presence in the house disrupting the carefully calibrated dynamic that had seemed intentionally orchestrated by Evelyn before she died.
Beck, Noah, and I got along fine. We worked well together, didn’t socialize much, kept to ourselves.
No conflict. No drama. Just the way I liked it.
Avery was like a stick of dynamite in the middle of our predictable, serene lives.
An apple-scented, pink-wrapped, absurdly adorable stick of dynamite.
And I knew what Beck and Noah were up to, knew they both wanted her, that they were working on their own ways to get her in bed. I didn’t blame them, but fuck if I was going to let them know I was jealous.
They had an easy way with her I couldn’t replicate. My upbringing hadn’t been conducive to personal relations. Actually that was putting it nicely. I’d learned the hard way not to trust anyone, had learned that life was easier when I relied only on myself.
It had worked. My existence was calm.
Safe.
I did my work, frequented a handful of familiar businesses in town, and saw a handful of girls on the regular when I needed to fuck.
Losing sleep over Avery was the last thing I needed.
And yet that was exactly what was happening. I’d white-knuckled the last three nights, distracting myself with work until I finally felt tired enough to sleep, then lying in bed in a cold sweat, like a junkie trying not to text his dealer, except in this case my dealer was the brunette in the bedroom across from mine.
I scheduled a security company to install cameras and alarms while I waited for Avery to text me back. Evelyn had the final say on security when she’d been alive, but I knew if she was here now, she’d want us to do whatever was necessary to keep Avery safe, and the truth was, I wanted to keep Avery safe too.
I told myself it was part of my responsibility to Evelyn, one of the ways I could thank her for the life she’d offered me when she’d hired me to be her house manager, but deep down I knew it had more to do with Avery’s brown eyes and soft curves than any duty to Evelyn.
I still hadn’t heard from her when I finished scheduling the alarm installation, and I checked my phone, feeling like a desperate teenager, which just pissed me off even more.
Where was she?
And then, right when I was starting to think I should go looking for her, make sure she was okay, I heard the front door open.
I knew it was her even before she entered the kitchen. Beck and Noah had heavier footsteps, plus Noah almost always entered the house through the kitchen since it was closest to the gardens.
These footsteps were light and quick, and I was unsurprised when she stepped outside a few seconds later, although Iwassomehow still surprised by how beautiful she was, by the way my heart skipped a little when I looked at her.
“What is this?” Her cheeks were flushed, brown eyes flashing as she held up her phone.
I tried to sound bored even though looking at her made me anything but. “Can you be more specific?”
She looked at the phone in her hand and cleared her throat. “‘Meet me on the terrace. Now.’”
“It’s an invitation to look at the books, get your arms around some of the house stuff.”
“An invitation?” She looked at me like I was deranged. “An invitation is a request.Would you like to meet on the terrace in an hour to talk about the house?”