Page 99 of Love By Design

I had texted him and Finn over the weekend, and I’d checked in again with Smith after he’d left, but if my own feelings were any indication of the matter, all four of us would be feeling the aftermath of this revelation for quite some time.

“He says he’s fine, but he took a glass of wine to bed with him on Friday,” I said. I didn’t tell Hunter how he’d asked me to sit with him until he was asleep. Those moments had been ours…always. “I’m going to search him out tomorrow to make sure.”

“I talked to Smith yesterday, by the way,” Hunter confessed. He’d eaten through half his sandwich already.

“And?” I arched a brow.

He shrugged, but it was obvious there was something else he wanted to say.

“How areyouwith all of this, Marshall?” he asked.

I glanced down at my lap and smoothed the white linen napkin over the top of my thighs. There were crumbs, a smear of mayonnaise, my trembling fingers.

“I’m fine,” I said, whether it was the truth or a lie was uncertain.

“Fine because you’re distracted by Stanley’s son?”

The silence between us was deafening, and I leveled a sharp look across the table. “His name is Silas,” I corrected.

Hunter flashed a brief smile. “Him and Smith graduated the same year, yes?”

They were the same age, yes, but I only knew the year Silas had graduated because it had been in the bioLA Design Digesthad attached to his article, which I’d practically committed to memory.

“What’s your point?” I asked, instead of confirming or denying.

“Just making an observation.”

“Your honor, I object.”

Hunter snorted. “On what grounds?”

“On the grounds you’re being an annoying gnat.” I ate the last bite of the first half of my sandwich with my brother’s amused laugh in my ears.

We lapsed into another silence while we finished our meals, and Hunter didn’t bring Andrew up again until our plates were cleared and the check was on the table.

“He does want to meet,” he said again, as if I’d forgotten.

“When?”

“Up to us.”

“Then we’ll talk about it on Friday.” I paused. “Do you want to meet him? This is all taking his wants into account, but not ours. Just because Andrew, who is too good for our name and our money, wants to meet us, doesn’t mean we have to.”

“Finn likened us to sideshow acts when I told him.”

It was an astute observation, and I knew that was how the whole thing would land with Smith as well.

“We’ll discuss it Friday,” I said again.

Hunter nodded, then reached into his pocket and pulledout enough cash to cover the whole bill. “Lunch is on me,” he said.

“I won’t argue.”

We finished our drinks and walked together back to my office so Hunter could collect his bag and head back to court or work or wherever it was he disappeared to during business hours. Before he left, though, he stopped me with a gentle touch against my forearm and a very serious expression on his face that had him looking so much like our father I wanted to throw up a little bit.

“What?” I asked after he’d taken too long to say anything of note.

“Be careful with Silas,” he said softly.