Total pages in book: 96
Estimated words: 93578 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 468(@200wpm)___ 374(@250wpm)___ 312(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 93578 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 468(@200wpm)___ 374(@250wpm)___ 312(@300wpm)
(And frankly, even if someone had cracked our code, what we mostly passed back and forth were quotes from Star Trek.)
My family was always convinced we were secretly in love and teased me endlessly, but our relationship was one hundred percent platonic. Honestly, I’d been shocked when he asked me to go to the senior prom—to this day, I have a hunch his mother bribed him with a fancy telescope or something—but we ended up having a good time, and he looked so cute in his suit and tie. We even danced once, and when the song was over, he said, “That wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be.” I think we shook hands at the end of the night.
There was that one night in the library when I thought he might kiss me—and I’d wanted him to—but true to form, I’d blurted something stupid and the moment passed us by.
After high school, Hutton had gone to M.I.T. to study math and physics, and later he made a billion-dollar fortune thanks to some algorithm he’d created. In fact, he was the youngest self-made American billionaire ever. He lived in California for years, but he was in town for the summer, staying in a gorgeous cabin about twenty minutes from town.
“I’d call him up right now,” Millie said.
“He hates the phone.”
“Why?”
“Because it involves talking to people. He likes numbers more than words.”
Millie laughed. “Guess that’s why he’s a billionaire and we’re us. Somebody asked me the other day what he does—everyone is talking about him—and I didn’t even know what to say.”
“My answer is always, ‘He co-founded a cryptocurrency exchange called HFX.’ But don’t ask me to explain it.” I sipped my coffee. “Whenever he tries to tell me what it is, I get lost.”
“How can that be? You’re a math whiz too, Miss I Skipped First Grade. We all know you were doing complex algebraic equations when the rest of us were learning B says buh.”
I laughed, leaning back against the counter. “The kind of math Hutton does is way beyond algebra. You don’t get to be a billionaire solving for x.”
“Speaking of which, you’d think a billionaire would want to spend his summer vacation somewhere more ritzy than northern Michigan,” Millie said.
“Well, his family is here, and Hutton’s not really the ritzy type—although I assure you, the place he’s staying in is not your typical cabin in the woods,” I said with a laugh. “It’s got like four bedrooms, three decks, a gourmet kitchen, one of those indoor/outdoor fireplaces, cathedral ceilings, huge windows. When you look out, all you see are trees.”
“Nice.” Her tone grew playful. “Sounds like you’re there a lot.”
“We hang out a few times a week,” I said, trying to keep my tone neutral. Things between Hutton and me were still completely platonic, but there was something different about our chemistry this summer. Something simmering beneath the surface. Sometimes I thought about just going for it—kissing him to see what would happen.
But I always lost my nerve.
Hutton could have any woman in the world. I’d seen photos of him with actresses, supermodels, heiresses. Gorgeous, famous women I could never compete with. Why embarrass myself by trying?
“A few times a week, huh?” she teased. “That sounds like dating.”
“No dating, we just hang.” I rinsed out my coffee cup and put it in the dishwasher. “He doesn’t love going out in public, which was the case even before he was a celebrity, but now it’s even worse. People just stare with no shame. Women flirt outrageously. Guys ask for stock tips.”
“Really?”
“Yes.” I laughed as I went up the stairs. “He runs in the park super early to avoid having to deal with people, but there’s this group of old ladies who gather in the park to do their Prancercise, who call themselves the Prancin’ Grannies, and they adore him. They prance right up to tell him all about their single granddaughters.”
Millie snorted. “Stop it.”
“His own mom is even worse.”
“Does she still have the shop downtown? The one that sells all the crystals and candles?”
“Yep. Mystic on Main. She’s constantly trying to set him up on dates with her customers.” I entered my room and flopped back onto my bed. The glow-in-the-dark stars I’d pasted on the ceiling were still there, as if my parents had known I’d be back. “Like she’ll call him and say she has a computer problem at the shop, or she can’t reach something on a high shelf, and when he shows up to help, there isn’t really a problem, but there’s a woman she wants to introduce him to. He gets so mad.”
Millie laughed. “Does he ever talk about Zlatka?”
I ignored the little bolt of jealousy that always shot through me when I thought about Hutton and Zlatka, a stunning Lithuanian supermodel and the latest Bond girl. They’d dated for a few months this past spring, and the media had eaten it up. “No.”