Total pages in book: 129
Estimated words: 131459 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 657(@200wpm)___ 526(@250wpm)___ 438(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 131459 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 657(@200wpm)___ 526(@250wpm)___ 438(@300wpm)
This was because Hale was like Tom.
And Matt was like Hale’s father, Corey.
It wasn’t just fatherly pride when he said Matt was a genius. They’d had him tested. He simply was a genius. And Tom had always wanted something deeper with his son.
There was just an unknown barrier against it, Tom sensed for them both even before the breakup.
It was bottom line truth that Tom loved his son so much, he’d take a bullet for him.
But Hale had done what fathers wished for eventually from their sons.
As he grew into an adult, he’d adapted into a friend.
Tom didn’t have that with Matt, even if he’d tried.
Again, Matt was like Corey.
Enigmatic.
“I’m good,” he quietly answered Hale’s unspoken question. “Did you meet Mika?”
“She’s pretty. Great nose.”
Christ, only Hale would appreciate Mika’s distinctive nose enough to mention it right off the bat.
Hale…and Tom.
He gave his boy another clap, this one on the arm.
“Cute daughter,” Hale went on.
Tom’s attention intensified on Hale.
He was twenty-seven, far too old for Cadence.
But Hale wasn’t checking out an eighteen-year-old.
He was jerking his chin up at Chloe while a playful grin spread on his face.
“Tom just asked for half of my fortune to pay for your wedding. Sister, you gotta scale back,” he called to her.
“That is the first, and the last joke you’re allowed to make of my wedding,” Chloe sniffed.
“What are the colors? Blush and bashful?” he asked, even as he extended his arm to invite them to start ascending the steps to the jet.
“Are you honestly invoking Steel Magnolias?” Chloe demanded.
“I’ve not had a single girlfriend who hasn’t forced me to endure that film,” Hale returned.
“As usual, you’re dating the wrong women,” Chloe retorted, turning to the steps.
Hale looked down at Tom and joked, “I think she’s right.”
Hale was carefully, with intent, purpose, and reasoning, giving away much of his father’s fortune.
But from what Tom could tell so far, he had shit taste in women, which he used as an excuse not to be with one of them for very long.
This could be a byproduct of the fact that his mother had turned bitter after her divorce from his father, and she took zero pains to hide it, so Hale had developed a phobia to commitment in order not to make the same mistake.
Or he could be holding out for his Genny.
Or Mika.
The men waited until all the women hit the stairs.
Then, Tom first, Judge next and Hale last, they all boarded the plane.
* * *
It was in the back of the limo when he listened to it.
Two limos had met their plane, one sent by Jamie to pick up Chloe and Judge, and they dropped Nora home.
The other was there to take Hale to his father’s penthouse, a property he was considering selling because he’d never liked it.
And Hale was dropping Mika, Cadence and Tom at Mika’s.
The other three loved ones in his limo were talking, and Tom was sitting back and enjoying it.
On the plane ride, Hale had adopted his brotherly ways with Cadence. She’d been a little starstruck at first, and he’d taken pains to be approachable and that quickly grew to teasing.
But Mika and Hale hit it off straightaway.
He was sensing this was a skill of Mika’s. She was cool and confident, so much, he suspected to many she was intimidating. There was also a reserve to her that, out in public, as well as times like at the start with Bray and Pris, he noticed she erected.
But it wasn’t a shield.
It was just that, for Mika, not everyone was invited in. Only when she felt sure about you did the aloofness melt away and the warmth surge in.
But to anyone in Tom’s life, she opened up immediately.
While they were talking, he checked his phone and saw he had two voicemails and two texts that had come in during the flight.
One voicemail from the office, one from a number he didn’t know.
One text was from Sasha, asking, since he was out of town, if she could stay at his place.
He ignored that and the spike in his blood pressure it gave him.
The other text was from Matt, and it was so much better than the one he got from his youngest, it gave him a sense of emotional whiplash.
Matt’s noted that his spring break was coming up, and he wanted to know if he could come out to Arizona and stay with Tom.
Tom’s chest felt like it had caved in, he was so fucking thrilled to get that request.
He bypassed Sasha’s and sent a one-word reply to his son.
Absolutely.
None of these communications, obviously, were from Genny.
He moved on to the voicemails.
The office was first, and it wasn’t an emergency, so he went to the next voicemail.
And he took pains to appear calm as he listened.
Paloma, from a new number, sniping at him.
“You blocked me? Are you serious? You blocked me? Fuck you, Tom Pierce. Fuck you.”