Page 216 of Broken Brothers

“I think it’s more accurate to say I’m better defining what it means to be a Hunt,” I said. Like how it means to look out for each other, take care of each other as much as needed, and help out as needed.

“Well, good for you,” she said. “You seem like you’ve really done well for yourself.”

I definitely picked up a flirtatious vibe. I was doing my best right now to resist, but that little kid who had gotten dumped because of being adopted was begging for the validation of being taken back. It was a very good thing that she was heading back to wherever in a couple of days, because if she was living here in New York City…

“Well, let’s not make this all about me,” I said with a chuckle. “You’ve been all over the place too! You’re in a graduate program at Oxford, right?”

“Hah, well…”

Uh oh. Where is this going…

“It’s been an interesting couple of years,” she said. “When I got into Oxford, it should have felt like the happiest day of my life, or at least the most accomplished. Here I was going to one of the greatest universities in the world, one of the most well-known… and I just sort of felt like I was tightening the chain on myself to be something that I actually wasn’t. My father was overjoyed, of course. My father said that I was doing proud the Hill name. But I just disagreed. Nevertheless, I went.”

So she’s miserable? Maybe it’ll be easier to push away someone like that. Maybe I’ll actually be able to focus on Layla and not have to worry about this encounter.

“And so for the last year and a half, it’s been… OK, I guess,” she said. “I’ve got job offers from everywhere. People want an Oxford graduate. But I don’t think I’m going to take any of them.”

“I’m sorry?” I said, stunned.

I knew that I had taken my own path, but I at least had kept within the career path of finance and investing. Where Sarah was going with this…

“I had a long talk with my father about a month ago,” she said. “It was not pleasant. My father still hasn’t spoken to me since, actually. I just told him I was tired of the work and going into a field I had no interest in; he told me that if I stopped, I’d be doing a disservice to the Hill name. I told him that I was tired of servicing the Hill name and that I wanted to make myself happy. He called me selfish, the fight got worse, and I hung up by saying that I would probably drop out of Oxford.”

“Holy shit,” I exclaimed. “Sorry, I just… you were always the good student. You should definitely do what makes you happy, don’t get me wrong; I just never would have expected that.”

“And to be clear, I haven’t yet,” she said with a gentle smile. “But my father has always put a lot of pressure on me, and at some point, everyone cracks under pressure or slides out from it. I’m doing my best to slide out of it before it cracks me.”

It was at that moment, hearing Sarah say that, that I began to see the first signs of what she was talking about. Crow’s feet that were a little more evident than before. Forehead wrinkles. Eyes that didn’t seem to open quite as much as they had before. She was still beautiful, model-esque beautiful, but now that I was looking more closely, I could see the signs of her having experienced a little bit of burn out.

“Damn, sorry to hear that,” I said.

“Nah, don’t worry about it,” she said. “I’m starting to embrace my future goals and take the steps to realize those. It’s actually partially why I’m here.”

“Hmm?” I said. “And why is that?”

“Well,” she said, a nervous smile coming over her face. “Don’t laugh at this. But I’m thinking of becoming an actress here in Manhattan.”

“Sarah!” I said with a huge smile.

But that reaction was to mask a very different feeling—extreme nervousness. That thought that I’d had about dealing with Sarah if she lived here? That suddenly seemed very real.

“That’s amazing,” I said. “How sure are you about launching forward on this?”

“Pretty sure,” she said, causing me to smile more and feel more nervous inside. “I want to take my time to make sure it’s the right choice. I’ll probably finish out Oxford, to be honest, and see what kind of jobs I can get. Maybe I’ll get something here in New York City that’ll allow me time to act in the evening and on weekends. But the goal is to push for that.”

“Wow.”

We spent the next hour trading on much lighter subjects. We reminisced over our middle and high school days, discussing mutual friends and people of interest. I told her about how Morgan was about to take over as CEO of Hunt Industries—the kind of half-truth that didn’t say everything but was, in itself, a true statement.

As the hour wrapped up, I realized that I wasn’t going to be able to pull myself away so easily. I was really enjoying my time with Sarah, and even if this led nowhere, she was a radiant person I wanted to spend more time with. It was a risk, but it was Sarah.

No, it wasn’t just Sarah. It was the person I’d hoped would walk back into my life for over a decade now. It was the person I’d hoped I’d get a second chance at. It was the person that I considered one of the, if not the, most beautiful and kind women I’d ever dated.

Even as my rational brain shouted at me to go somewhere else and to detach from Sarah… the preteen Chance was winning the battle right now.

“So what have you got going on the rest of today?” she said with a smile, leaning forward, her chin on her hand.

“Nothing, really,” I said. “I’ve got things to do tomorrow, but today is pretty wide open.”