Even worse, when she ignored every email, text, and voicemail I sent her for a month afterward. Maybe it was what I deserved. Lord knows I did it to at least a dozen women. But she was different. I was different.
Twenty-four years old, and still as beautiful as the day I first laid eyes on her, when she was working for my dad. Just cleaning up around the office, filing some paperwork. It was a local outreach he did for any student willing to apply.
She was seventeen, but I waited until her eighteenth birthday until I asked her out. Until I made my move.
I was a dick but I wasn’t a creep.
It was her last summer before college.
I was home, just graduated and there was nothing more beautiful than her. Not all the dozens of women I’d dated before or after. She was a little too young, but she was so strong-willed. So fiery. None of that was gone.
No.
It was just like the first time I saw her. I’d made a joke she didn’t like, and she glared at me with those bright blue eyes. Just like she did today. She still felt something. I knew it. I could convince her to repeat the past. I knew I could. I wanted to. Hell, this was one project worth pursuing. I wanted to relive it all.
Except the part about her breaking my heart.
No, this time, I’d get exactly the ending I wanted. I wasn’t going to let her slip away from me a second time.
Chapter Two
“Branch,” I said the word through clenched teeth.
He was never here when I needed him. And I needed him the last year.
Shit was getting heavy with the business, it was growing like nothing I’d seen since I’d taken over, but he was off running around with his women.
First it was St. Lucas, then it was Martinique, and then the last two months at his retreat in Key West. Sure, he clocked in from his vacation homes doing some work from his computer, here and there but mostly he was enjoying the retirement he was supposed to be easing into.
What he wasn’t doing was giving me insights in how to run this aspect of the business. Not that it was the worst thing in the world. I had to admit, it was easier without him here, hounding over me.
“Son.” Branch Graves had several folders spread out across my desk. Of course he would be sitting in my office, in my desk. Never fails. "I see you’ve been doing your best to cock everything up and destroy my legacy."
He was always one for melodrama.
“What in the hell are you talking about? The business is doing well. Solid. And I don’t have to try and pull any of your stunts. I call that a definite win. You can go back to Key West now, to your woman and your yachting around.” I wasn't going to take his crap, not when he wasn't here calling the shots. He wasn’t helping when I needed it.
He just threw me in the deep end with the expectation that I could swim.
Everything to him was life or death when he was here. It was like he didn't understand the ins and outs of the business.
Except he did, and he used this as a manipulation tactic to try my patience and get exactly what he wanted.
He was a shrewd business man, I had to give him that much.
“You know for this to work you’ve got to get your hands dirty, shit like this isn’t going to work. Your profits are steady, sure, but you aren’t actually growing at the rate I’d expect. And you’re buying up land at twice the price-” I cut him off.
“You’re retired.” I was starting to lose my patience.
“Semi-retired.” My father leaned onto the desk. “You have permits you need to acquire for your farms. Judge McKean called me yesterday. Said he hadn’t heard from you.”
I fought the urge to throw all the shit off my desk and kick his ass out. The last thing the employees needed to see was the two of us going at one another.
That hadn’t happened for a long time.
“I won’t bribe him for my water rights.” I wasn’t going to do what he told me. It wasn’t the right thing. I’d never been one to do business that way, and he knew it.
Things were going just fine until he stuck his nose into my affairs. I was supposed to be running this place. He had a million other things to run, hell he had several business ventures brewing right now. He was too busy for this. Semi-retired and still empire building.
Only my father.
It didn't matter that he had too many obligations. None of it stopped him from coming in here and micromanaging every aspect of the day to day operations when he decided I wasn’t following in his footsteps, or some other garbage.
“Then you won’t get them. At least not without making major repairs to the land.” My father’s square jaw clenched. “It’s a more expensive route to go, Wyatt. This would save us time and money.”