Total pages in book: 142
Estimated words: 131330 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 657(@200wpm)___ 525(@250wpm)___ 438(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 131330 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 657(@200wpm)___ 525(@250wpm)___ 438(@300wpm)
Marc sits at the head of the table as usual, his wife directly to his left and Austin to his right. Aspen sits beside her, putting her directly in front of me, and as she eats, I can’t help but watch her with that same curiosity I felt earlier, sensing that change again and driving myself insane trying to figure out what it could be.
The dating suspicion is definitely plausible. Any man with a pulse would want her, but if she were with someone, Austin would have mentioned it, only because it would have driven him insane. He wouldn’t be able to keep it to himself and would have turned into a sixteen-year-old girl stalking some asshole online until he figured out what color underwear the guy’s mother prefers.
I need to figure this out, but on the other hand, why the fuck do I care so much? It’s none of my damn business if she’s dating someone, and she already has an overprotective brother to sniff out the losers. This isn’t my problem unless Austin says it’s our problem, right?
Before I can stop myself, my leg stretches out under the table, brushing against hers until her gaze snaps up, and I watch her carefully. Her eyes meet mine, and despite her brother sitting right beside me, I wink . . . and then I wait.
My gaze lingers on her full cheeks, waiting for that deep blush that always takes over every time I touch her.
I wait a second, then ten . . . twenty, and nothing!
What in the ever-loving fuck?
No blush?
Since when does Aspen Ryder not blush when I touch her, accidental or not? Hell, her cheeks should be burning with a wink like that. Something is definitely going on.
She has to have met someone, and despite how Austin and I feel about her being too damn good for any man roaming this earth, I have to somehow convince myself that this is a good thing. Maybe if she finally moves on and finds whatever it is she’s looking for, I won’t have to constantly wonder if I’m sending the wrong signals. Things could finally be easy between us.
“How’re those clubs of yours going?” Marc asks from across the table.
My gaze snaps to Marc’s, needing a minute to repeat his comment inside my head to actually figure out what the fuck he’s asking me as I try not to think about the prospect of his daughter fucking some random asshole.
“Good,” I tell him. “I was at Scandal most of the night looking over a proposal for a new club.”
“What?” Aspen breathes, her gaze snapping to mine as she gapes at me. “Another one? Didn’t we only go to Scandal’s grand opening like . . . eight months ago?”
I nod, pride swirling in my chest. My nightclubs—Pulse, Cherry, and Scandal—are my fucking babies. “Sure did.”
“Wow. That’s really impressive,” Angella says. “You must really be making a name for yourself in the industry. Before you know it, you’ll have a club in every state and your name will be hailed among drunken college kids across the country.”
A smirk pulls at my lips. “That’s the plan.”
“Really?” Aspen questions, her eyes flashing with awe. “You really want to expand across the country?”
“Yeah. At least, that’s the long-term goal. Short term, I just want to get my current clubs running to the point where I’m not needed to overlook the day-to-day bullshit. After that, I can focus on growth.”
Austin scoffs beside me, nudging his elbow into my ribs. “You sound like your father.”
“That a bad thing?”
“Nah. I just wish some of that business sense would have rubbed off on me over the years,” he says. “I could have used it this week.”
My brows furrow, needing to know what the hell he’s talking about, but Marc beats me to the punch. “What’s going on? I thought everything was going well with the new restaurant. The kitchen was going in this week, right?”
“It was,” he says, glancing at his father, disappointment heavy in his tone. “We were set to start building yesterday when the architect was going over his designs and realized he miscalculated where the gas lines run, and now the whole fucking project is at a standstill. We’ll probably need a complete redesign, which would put us back months, and until then, the restaurant will be nothing but an empty shell.”
“You can’t just move the gas lines to match up with the kitchen layout?” Aspen asks.
“Technically, yes,” Austin says. “But I know what you’re thinking, and it’s not quite that simple. There’s a lot to consider with the age of the building and just how much destruction we’d have to do in order to move them. Even though it would be a good fix that’ll keep me on track with the original design and save me from having to put in a new custom kitchen order, it could also turn into a really big pain in my ass.”