Page 38 of The Billionaire Offer
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “It’s not like I’m one of those people who have a proper, paralyzing fear of heights. I’ve just never liked it much. I loved the hot-air balloon, though, so it could just be that I came to the realization that I don’t have to keep thinking that I’m afraid of something that I’m not really so afraid of anymore.”
“That’s great for you, but somehow, I don’t think that’s all there is to it.”
I sighed but then squeezed my eyes shut and cut the bullshit. “Okay, so I might be falling back in love with him. No, not might. I definitely am. That’s why I was so tempted to tell him that I don’t want the money anymore. I want to be with him again, and the payment aspect is just this stupid thing standing between us.”
“It’s a colossally bad idea to turn down the money,” she reasoned. “I saw the way you guys look at each other, like there’s no one else in the room, but I imagine it was like that before, too. Then life happened and you grew apart, and you’ve always told me how, despite how much you loved it, it was the right thing for both of you to break up when you did. What if that happens again?”
“What do you mean?”
“Your relationship fizzled out over time once, and if it does again after you turned down the money, you’ll be right back where you started. Broke and chasing a dream that’s only getting further and further away. Stay the course, honey. That’s what I would’ve done, anyway. You can have the money and his love, but if the love should fade, at least you’ll have the money to do what you’ve always wanted to do for yourself.”
“You’ve got a good point,” I said, meaning it but also wondering if it wasn’t time to follow my heart when it came to Bart.
Leah was extremely career driven, just like I’d been for the last few years. It was wonderful to work with someone like her, but it also made her very rigid about pursuing anything that wasn’t strictly related to furthering ourselves professionally.
While I really did agree with the points she’d made, I also had to place them into the context of my own life. When I did, I wasn’t so sure it was as cut and dry as she’d made it out to be. Either way, I was glad it had turned out that I’d gotten to talk to her before I spoke to Bart.
The time would come when we did speak, but before we did, I had to make sure I had all my ducks in a row. At the moment, they weren’t quite there yet. My ducks were still off at a rave somewhere, and although it felt like they were starting to think about coming home to stand in that row, maybe being cock-blocked by my brother really had been a good thing tonight.
But I’m still paying him back for it when the time comes. Just you wait, Shawn. Just you wait.
CHAPTER25
BART
When I picked up Serenity the next day, I was admittedly a little more tired and hungover than I’d planned on being. It wasn’t so bad that I felt like I was dying or anything, but I’d felt better.
As soon as she opened her door for me, she gave me one look and burst out laughing. “Poor baby. What time did you get to bed?”
I lifted my wrist and glanced down at my watch. “Uh, about four hours ago. You don’t have anything to worry about, though. I’m still up for this. Definitely. I might just need to stop for the biggest coffee we can get our hands on.”
“Well, I’m always up for the biggest coffee we can get our hands on,” she said, walking back inside to grab her purse before coming out again and turning to lock up.
As she did, I finally noticed that she was wearing a pair of pale pink sweats that hung low on her hips and a black sweater with a neon pink unicorn horn on it. She looked fucking hot, even if the pink was uncharacteristic for her.
Then again, I always thought she looked fucking great and I was always more likely to get randomly turned on when I was hungover, so there was that. Still, I was very tempted to say fuck it to skydiving and dive into her instead.
Too bad that option’s not on the table.
Internally berating myself over the fact that I couldn’t stop staring at her ass in those pants and wondering how easy it would be to get them off, I followed her to the elevator and made a concerted effort once we were in my car to focus on finding the coffee I needed. “Is there any place around here that sells, like, a gallon-sized cup?”
She laughed. “It’s that bad, huh?”
I nodded. “I probably shouldn’t have had the last five shots of tequila, but it was the good stuff, so it seemed like a waste not to drink it after Shawn had already filled the glasses.”
“I’m sure he did.” She pursed her lips. “Does he know we’re doing this today?”
Glancing at her before turning my attention back to the road, I frowned but nodded. “Why?”
“No reason.” She shifted in her seat to face the window but directed to me a place nearby that she said had the biggest cups of coffee she could think of. “Not gallon sized, but close enough.”
After we stopped to pick them up, we were both wide awake thanks to the espressos we had while waiting for our order. Feeling more alive, I figured that we might get into the kiss now that we had the time.
The skydiving location was about an hour away, so we could finally talk—except Serenity was quiet. When I eventually realized it wasn’t just because she was savoring her coffee, I pushed my sunglasses to the top of my head and glanced at her again in the mirror.
“Is everything okay?” I asked. “Are you nervous about today, or is there something else going on I should know about?”
“Everything is fine,” she said, shrugging and still not looking at me. “I am a bit nervous, though. I never thought I would be going skydiving. In fact, like Leah said, I’ve been turning her down for years.”
