Total pages in book: 12
Estimated words: 11290 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 56(@200wpm)___ 45(@250wpm)___ 38(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 11290 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 56(@200wpm)___ 45(@250wpm)___ 38(@300wpm)
I nodded slowly and threw up a grin. I didn’t care. None of this mattered. See me here not caring. I will never care. I am the king of not taking things seriously.
“Yeah, good. I understand. No problem. Enjoy your… trip.” I gave him a jaunty salute like an absolute nutter and returned to my suite, where I could sit and stare into the side of the same dirty white train car.
Sometime later, the dirty white train began to move. It took me long minutes before I realized it was actually our train moving out of the station, not the other one.
It didn’t matter. I would simply stay here and feel sorry for myself in this tiny train suite until we arrived in Pretoria in two days. Then I would fly back home to London. To my work. To my social obligations. To the days and nights stretched long and lonely ahead of me…
Utterly Jon-less and gray.
The sulk lasted several hours. I missed the special high tea to celebrate our departure, but I couldn’t have cared less. It wasn’t until the butler arrived to inform me about the formal dinner service that I realized I would need to actually eat if I wanted to have enough energy to continue my righteous indignation.
Besides, I’d moved from self-pity to anger strongly enough to change my mind about staying out of Jon’s way. Why should I? I had as much right to enjoy my safari train vacation as the next arsehole.
I rallied by hopping in the tiny shower and banging my elbows and knees through a thorough wash before getting dressed in my trousers and shirt.
As soon as I realized what kind of shirt I’d packed, I nearly declared defeat.
French cuffs.
The kind that required cufflinks, eight hands, and a superhero level of patience I didn’t have.
The kind that required… Jon.
4
JON
I couldn’t decide if Iggy was trying to make a point to annoy me or if it simply came naturally for him.
The banging and knocking between our suites were becoming comical. The man was over six feet of slim, strong muscle, so I had no trouble picturing him in the cramped quarters of a train car lavatory. But when I heard him bark out one of his favorite curse words and knock something over, I had to roll my eyes at the dramatics.
“Not my problem anymore,” I murmured to myself.
“Sorry, sir?” the butler asked from the half-open doorway to my suite where he’d come to offer me assistance dressing.
The irony of this wasn’t lost on me. I was getting a taste of Iggy’s life.
I hadn’t expected it to be so heartbreakingly lonely.
“Nothing. I was simply noticing my neighbor was awfully frustrated about something. It seems not everyone can relax on holiday.”
He gave me a polite nod, but I could see the tiny curl of a smile. “Between you and me, sir, I believe he’s attempting cufflinks for the first time. I told him I’d be in directly once I help you.”
I stifled a laugh. There was no way Iggy would let a stranger touch him. Not only was his pride way too great to accept help under the best of conditions, but he’d also experienced an attempted kidnapping at age ten that had given him an aversion to being touched or cornered by people he didn’t know.
There had been many times he’d called me in tears to come rescue him from uncomfortable situations. Thankfully, his aversion to touch had never included me.
“Good luck with that,” I murmured with a smile.
But as the butler left, my gut began to churn with guilt. If Iggy needed help and he wouldn’t accept it from the butler assigned to our carriage, maybe I…
No. I no longer worked for him. It wasn’t my job to help him with cufflinks.
But as a friend…
I bit my lip. I needed to remember that Ignatius Corbridge and I weren’t really friends. We’d been employer and employee for years. Yes, we’d been close. Intimate, even. But he’d pulled away. Shut me out. It wasn’t my place to offer to help him with—
“Oh, for fuck’s sake, it’s just cufflinks,” I spat into my empty suite. I moved quickly down the hall to Iggy’s open door just as the butler escaped with an apology.
We exchanged awkward, polite smiles before I slipped inside.
“I said no, thank you,” Iggy said between clenched teeth, looking down at his mangled cuffs.
“Alright then,” I said primly, turning to leave. “I guess you don’t need my help.”
“Wait!” I heard a footstep before he stopped himself from coming after me. “Jon. Wait. Please… would you mind? You know how I am with these blasted things.”
I moved closer and reached out a hand for the sterling silver cufflinks. When I saw they were my favorite pair, intricately detailed octopi with a tentacle for a stud, memory assaulted me.