Page 26 of Hidden Nature

“Designing my place now?”

“I know how you think.” Rising, Theo went over to get the second bagel. “You’ll upgrade, and bring it up to code—and right now, it can’t be close to code. You’ll bust out that wall, and turn the bedroom next to the one you’re using into a kick-ass bathroom, a nice walk-in closet. And a deck, you’ll want that to take advantage of the view. Enlarge the kitchen, open it, bring it into the current century.”

Theo smiled over his bagel. “Big house, lots of rooms you’ll open, combine. It’ll cost you more to fix it up right than it did to buy it.”

Something Nash had calculated, considered, then accepted.

“You’re not wrong on that. I’ve got drawings in for permits.”

Nodding, Theo kept eating. “A lot of work, bro. Plus starting a business, getting that set up. You could use some help.”

“Are you volunteering to come down on weekends?”

He’d already planned to earmark one of the bedrooms for Theo’s visits. And calculated the travel time.

“No.” Theo drank more coffee, then set those golden-brown eyes on his brother’s. “I’m asking you to give me a shot.”

Because he was still thinking about the distance, the travel, it took Nash a minute. “A shot at what?”

“Partners, in the business you want to make. Teammates in restoring this house. Living here while we do the second part anyway.”

“You live in New York. You’re a lawyer.”

“Yeah, I passed the bar and I’ve got that shiny new degree.”

“And a job at a damn good firm.”

“Says the guy who had a job at a damn good firm on Wall Street up until about a month ago.”

He waited a moment, giving his brother a chance to process.

“They had a way, you know it, of putting just the right amount of pressure on us to do what they wanted. You in finance, me in the law. So we did it. I didn’t see the escape hatch until you opened it and went through.”

“Theo—”

“Don’t parent me, okay? You’ve only got a couple years on me.” Theo shoved the bagel in the air toward Nash, then pulled it back and bit in. “I don’t want to practice law in New York.”

“Well” was all that came to him.

“I don’t know if I want to live here—maybe that’s just temporary. But I’m asking for the shot. I’m good with tools, you know that. I’ve got some skills and a good eye. You’re my family. You’re what I’ve got. I’m what you’ve got.”

Truer words, Nash thought. And sighed. “They’re really pissed at me.”

“Didn’t stop you,” Theo pointed out. “It won’t stop me. I want to try doing something I want to do. Right now, this is it. Add in, I am a lawyer. Somebody starting his own business could use a good lawyer.”

He ate more bagel. “Money isn’t an issue for either of us. That’s a privilege, and we paid for it, goddamn it, Nash. We paid. Maybe I didn’t know how much I wanted out until you got out. But I do now.”

He hadn’t figured on this, and wondered now if he should have. They’d been close all their lives, linked together as they were shuttled back and forth between parents after the divorce. Watching mother and father remarry, divorce. And in their father’s case remarry again.

But all the while those parents had united in the insistence their two sons do what was expected of a Littlefield, socially, professionally.

Small wonder now that he’d broken that chain, Theo wanted to follow.

“Listen, you can stay here as long as you like. Until you figure outwhat you really want. And yeah, I can use your help with the house, so great. As for the rest, you’d need a contractor’s license, and—”

“Taking the test next month.” Theo grinned at him. “I’m not deadweight, Nash.”

“You’ve never been. I don’t know how much work we can generate, at least in the first year or so. You’re right, money isn’t a problem, but establishing a business, that’s vital. Good work, reasonable prices, reliability.”

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