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)
That he wanted to at all, really.
Hanson, to his benefit, cleared his throat next to his wife, drawing attention to himself for a moment. The clean lines of his suit and slicked back hair, somewhat helping to hide the balding patch on the top of his head, was a far cry from the frizzy, messy pile of his mother’s dyed red curls, but at least he kept her dressed up nice.
To be honest, Lucas noticed over time that his mother preferred men—especially after the separation, and later, the divorce from Ronald—who liked a project. So to speak. Men who gravitated to broken women they thought could be fixed. By their hand, of course.
Clearly, that was not working out for Hanson, the retired realtor mogul with his penthouse in Florida, and Penelope, who’d called her son drunk to brag about the size of her engagement ring and how she’d thrown the one from his father into the bay.
Sentimental, who?
Nobody here.
The husband of the current decade—if he lasted that long, who could say? —tried to defuse what he saw as a brewing situation between Lucas and Penelope by saying, “Okay, okay—aren’t we all here to have something to eat and talk about Jacob on this beautiful morning?”
Lucas didn’t flinch. “It’s minus twenty outside, nothing is very beautiful today.”
Except a woman two hours away, out of his reach.
He didn’t add that part out loud.
The fact his earlier phone call with Delaney had left him relaxed and blissed was the only reason he decided to even show up at this excuse for a brunch. Dopamine could be a fucked up thing. That, and because Hanson had taken the time to personally reach out to Lucas over the last week—when he couldn’t be reached—to make the request for his mother. Not that he’d included his involvement in the brunch—a tidbit Lucas was sore about.
Two years of spotty contact with his mother—mostly by his choice because Penelope had a way of making things worse than they already were—made him feel like he at least owed her this today. Couldn’t he put on a suit, show up at a restaurant he wouldn’t otherwise eat at because of the cost-to-food ratio alone, and grit his teeth through an hour of her non-apologies and victimhood?
Her youngest son had died.
Lucas imagined that did hurt.
So, here he was.
Trying.
Even if she drowned all of her grief out, like everything else in her life, with too much liquor and a handful of sleeping pills at night.
Hanson shifted in his chair, his gaze darting away from Lucas awkwardly while he slung an arm over Penelope’s shoulders to coax a tepid smile out of her. “Yes, well, we don’t have to make it more painful than it already is to be here, right?”
Oh, didn’t they?
Jesus, Lucas hadn’t even asked for this brunch.
Where was the goddamn food, anyway?
“Are we eating?” Lucas asked. “I’m starved.”
Penelope, glass-eyed and loose in her movements in the chair covered with a silk slip that matched the rest of the private dining room, looked to her husband for a way to proceed.
“The waiter will be here shortly,” Hanson explained.
Lucas rubbed at the spot of pain beginning to form beneath his temple with two fingers. “Oh, wonderful.”
“We’re flying to Florida tomorrow,” Penelope blurted out suddenly.
He blinked at the news. “What?”
“You know how snowbirds are,” Hanson added, trying to add his two cents into a conversation where Lucas didn’t particularly want the man involved. “We thought we could make it through a winter back here, but it’s been a hard one.”
Had it?
Lucas laughed, and it came off so bitter.
He couldn’t even hide it.
“Jacob’s memorial is Wednesday,” he said to a table that he was sure had no intention of listening or hearing him.
Penelope proved that by muttering, “I was told Ronald made it clear there would be no services for Jacob, so I didn’t think it would be a problem.”
“You didn’t think it would be a—” Lucas clamped his mouth shut, and pinched the bridge of his nose to give him the focus he needed to help subside the flood of disbelief and anger. “He was your youngest son.”
“Ronald said—”
“Ronald’s a fucking idiot,” Lucas interjected hotly, dropping his hand where it slapped against the table, jostling the setting.
Even his mother jumped across the way.
Hanson, to his benefit, only stared at Lucas with pity.
He hated that even more.
“There is a memorial on Wednesday,” Lucas said, deciding to get out what was most important before he let the anger consume him entirely. Inevitable when it came to his mother—much like his father. How could the people who had created him be the same ones that caused him constant, unwavering struggle?
Year after year.
All the decades of his life so far.
At what point did Lucas get to cut the cord and say enough was enough.
Right about now, honestly.
“The memorial is on Wednesday,” he repeated, “and I know every person on my contact list got the email, voice message, and a text from my secretary letting them know as much. Including the two of you, so—”