Total pages in book: 146
Estimated words: 141951 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 710(@200wpm)___ 568(@250wpm)___ 473(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 141951 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 710(@200wpm)___ 568(@250wpm)___ 473(@300wpm)
“Would you stop saying that?”
Jacob’s jaw snapped audibly shut.
A part of Lucas hated that Jacob might be right—it got under his skin to have people constantly compare him to his father. More than anyone else in the world, Jacob knew it, too. Lucas considered bringing the conversation back to what currently concerned him about his brother, but he stopped himself. His defence against Jacob’s comments didn’t have to be to look for something equally bad or worse in his brother to point out.
That was the type of shit their dad would do.
Really, Lucas didn’t mean to be so harsh. “Sorry,” he muttered fast, “but you can’t holler and swear down the hall when people are trying to work here, Jacob. People are working—they’re making calls and doing meetings.”
He gestured at the triangle base for his phone in the middle of the desk. “I was on a damn call!”
His brother had the nerve to look sheepish. “My bad?”
The problem with having a brother who didn’t have a lot of responsibilities or expectations was that he also had yet to grow up. In a lot of ways. Lucas had a bad habit of excusing Jacob’s shortcomings because of his biases. He knew the reasons why Jacob was the way he was—flighty and indifferent, and so he tried to give Jacob grace.
Sometimes, to his detriment.
Giving his brother grace didn’t change the fact that they had already had quite a few hard years together. By Jacob’s own actions, too.
Jacob had yet to find something he cared about except for his dog, a Mastiff rescue named Purdy that had passed from age-related illness a few months ago, his truck, and the quad on the back. Even the three-year degree in business had been stretched out for another two because his brother found too many other things to do except go to school. Before changing his direction in the last year to something else entirely. A bachelor’s in exercise science.
Truly, that was a better fit for Jacob.
“It was just the head office for the call center in Freddy, but still,” Lucas tacked on a little sharper at the end, “just think when you walk in here, all right? It’s not a place to party.”
Jacob grinned in the direction of the windows overlooking the factory line below. “Actually, there’s enough liquor in this building for the whole city to have a party.”
“That’ll never happen, and aren’t you the one who says sober means sober?”
“Fun sucker,” Jacob bitched under his breath.
Lucas wished that was his problem. “Tired, is more like it, man.”
He flattened his palms over his face, scrubbing hard to get a bit of blood flowing. Trips to Freddy every other week for a day here and there to be on hand for the recent management changes implemented at the head office for the call center left Lucas exhausted. He took the company helicopter back and forth because he wasn’t built for long car drives on dark highways that seemed to stretch on endlessly.
He also wasn’t sleeping in his bed as much as he would like. The bigger issue in his life. The real one.
“You need to relax a bit,” Jacob said, his brows rising high like they did whenever he had a bright idea. “Oh, like go out with me this weekend—and by go out, I mean meet me at the gym where we can put on helmets and gloves and beat the hell out of each other.”
Lucas chuckled, former memories of doing just that with Jacob over the past few years filling his mind. Those moments between the two almost always led into deep conversations about their lives and circumstances; or to confessions they might not have shared with anyone else.
“We never do that anymore, you know?” Jacob asked quieter.
“This weekend isn’t great for me.” Lucas blinked through his fingers. “I have the mayor’s dinner and ball this weekend. You wanna go to that?”
A charity event thrown every winter.
A cringe pulled at Jacob’s face. “Nobody wants to go to that, bro.”
“Dad does. He’s making me go, too.”
And would likely ignore his oldest son all night, as well.
Lucas couldn’t wait.
He got two and a half weeks of silence from him father, and had been stupidly hoping for longer. He should have known better.
Ronald continued to find interesting ways to punish his adult sons despite the men making every effort to give him distance and silence. Work and handling his father’s responsibilities—without the actual title on his desk that he deserved—for the brewery made that harder for Lucas, obviously. Things had gotten more tense over the last twelve or so months.
He honestly believed that was because his father had started to face his harsh, stark reality. The loneliness awaiting him in his coming years. All the effort he put into making everyone else around him miserable had finally started catching up to the bastard.