Page 29 of The Billionaire's Teacher

“You got interrupted at lunch.”

Oh. Right. Dad’s call, even with the advanced warning that he’d be reaching out, had thrown me. I’d forgotten I was giving Sunny a rundown on my friends back home. I glanced around and finally gave up. I moved over to the bench that ran along one side of the deck, and sat. “Cody’s great. He and Noah both work for a big Christian nonprofit. Cody ended up falling into event planning and has now realized he loves it. And that first big gala he planned ended up bringing him and Austin’s sister, Megan, together.”

“Are Cody and Austin good friends?”

I nodded. “Definitely.”

Sunny smirked.

“What’s that for?”

“Nothing.”

I considered pressing, but her expression didn’t give me much hope that I’d be able to get a straight answer out of her. I gave a mental shrug. “After Cody is Noah. He’s probably the one I’m closest to. He just got engaged to his…” I trailed off. How was I supposed to describe Jenna? She and Noah were friends. But they were exes. Kind of. And then there’d been that whole backup date thing.

“His…?”

I laughed. “I’ll go with friend, I guess. But it’s more complicated than that.”

“Love always is.”

I tipped my head to the side. “Spoken from experience?”

“Oh no. We’re not talking about me. You’re telling me all about your friends. Honestly, I’m surprised you have so many.”

“Wow.”

Sunny’s hand flew to her mouth as she laughed. “That came out so different than I meant it.”

“Uh-huh.” I crossed my arms.

“Seriously.” Her shoulders continued to shake but she did manage to keep her laughter quiet. “I’m sorry. Truly. I just meant it’s got to be hard when you’ve got so much money.”

I arched a brow. “Does it?”

She groaned. “Ugh. Dang it. Zee.”

“Should that make sense to me?”

“Probably not. No.” Sunny glanced down at the controls on the helm for a moment then back to me. “Zee basically runs our outfit. You booked with her. Probably.”

I nodded.

“So when I was talking with her about the weather and our plans changing, she happened to mention that I needed to be extra cautious because it wasn’t going to look good to shipwreck a billionaire.” She shrugged. “I’d already figured you were rich. But also, wow.”

I couldn’t quite stop the bark of laughter. “That’s about how I feel about it.”

“Sorry. It really doesn’t change anything. And I won’t bring it up again.”

“No. It’s fine. It’s not as if it’s a secret.” Or, not really. I’d love if it could be one, but that wasn’t particularly possible for all we tried to stay out of the public eye. “As for my friends, I guess you could say we’re all in it together.”

She was quiet a minute. “To be clear, you’re all billionaires?”

I nodded.

“Wow.” She cleared her throat. “Okay.”

I waited to see if she had more to add, but she stayed quiet. “Last one in the gang is Tristan. He’s a lawyer. Serious. Keeps to himself a bit more than the rest of us.”

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