Page 4 of The Best Worst Mistake (Off-Limits #2)

Dax, one week ago

Silas is standing by the wall of windows in my office. A dart is pinched between his forefinger and thumb, brows raised in disbelief like he can’t believe I’d have the audacity to say no to him.

His point has already been accentuated by the last dart he let fly into the target on my wall, which narrowly missed the bullseye, landing just outside the center.

“You have to go, bro,” Silas insists.

Maybe I would be out of my mind to blatantly refuse him.

I pour myself a splash of bourbon from the bar cart I gifted to myself the day my mother, a.k.a.

my boss, moved me into this corner office of her L.A.

branch. It may seem like a weird gift to oneself when given a gilded prison cell by a parent, but I knew I’d be spending a lot of time here and I wanted to make it more bearable.

Particularly when Silas was in town, like he is now.

“What do you think of that stuff, by the way?” he asks, relaxing his brows just long enough to angle the tip of his dart toward the fresh glass of Kavalan in my hand.

Silas’ assistant had a case of his favorite bottles sent over before his arrival from Boston last week — Michter’s 20 Year, Kavalan Solist Vinho, Old Rip Van Winkle — all at least a few thousand dollars, with the exception of Old Rip.

That one cost roughly the same as my first annual salary out of law school.

I hadn’t had the heart to try it yet. Seemed wrong to open the bottle without him.

“I prefer Maker’s Mark,” I say, ribbing him a bit before taking a sip.

Shit . Even I can’t keep a straight face after tasting that.

“Damn.” It comes out more like a sigh and I hold the glass up to my eyes, inspecting the tumbler like it contains actual gold and not just absurdly expensive alcohol. I tip it up toward Silas, showing my approval, watching the way his face morphs into a triumphant grin.

“Don’t even bother trying to play me,” he says, turning back to the dart board across the room. He narrows his eyes before letting the next one fly, hitting the outer ring of the center. Competitive, even when playing against only himself. “That shit is the best you’ve ever had and you know it.”

I pour a good amount into another glass for him, knowing he won’t object, and he clinks it against my own. I hope it’s enough of a distraction that he stops peppering me about going to New York for him.

“Now, back to what I was saying,” he says. No luck, of course . “What’s your issue with New York?”

“I don’t have a problem with New York,” I tell him, tightly. “Lovely time of year to visit. The trees in Central Park are stunning in October, I hear.”

“Then explain to me why you’re trying to dodge a trip out with the juniors for this negotiation. You represent me, bro. Not them.”

“The firm represents you, Si,” I remind him, “and the junior partners are perfectly capable of handling this one without me.”

“See, when I think of the firm , I think of you. You are the firm here,” he says.

“My mother is the firm,” I correct him, referring to the founder and managing partner of the entire Harper and Associates legal operation, which comprises a vast number of offices scattered across the country from here to New York.

“Ah, Mrs. H,” he says, smiling, pausing ever so slightly before throwing another dart across the room. This one lands just above the last. “I remember when she dropped you off at the dorm for the first time. Even back then I was right to be terrified of her.”

I take another burning sip from my glass, thinking back to the day my mother and father dropped me off at Fox Glenn boarding school.

I was thirteen.

My parents took my body-sized duffel bag into the dorm room, as I watched Grant and Silas, the occupants of the neighboring room, peek their heads around the corner, studying me in the same way you’d study a new pet or a kid that you may want to befriend, or torture, depending on the situation at hand.

I stared back at them in that awkward way only young kids can get away with.

Lord, I miss being able to size someone up like that.

A lot of issues might be cleared up as adults if we could just size one another up outright and without pretense before getting deep in the mix of things.

At first glance, Silas and Grant reminded me of a pair of mismatched socks.

The same manner of species in every sort of way, but somehow different .

Both born and bred to be there — two thirteen-year-old boys who looked just as excited as I felt for an extended adventure away from home.

Anxious for that defining moment when all the parents would swipe at their eyes and drive off, leaving us boys on our own for the first time.

Away from home for weeks — no, months — at a time with only each other to depend on.

My mother, the honorable Mrs. H, had been right to warn me of Si before leaving, while my father merely grinned at the three of us, looking like he must have been remembering what it was like to be a young boy left on his own for the very first time.

Wide-eyed and confident beyond his years, even then, Silas had the look of a kid who charmed the mothers with all the right answers before trying to seduce them once the fathers had left the room.

My mother had known with just one look what it took me a whole semester to figure out.

That these kids were trouble — the best kind of trouble a boy can have, really.

The classic kind of boyhood trouble that movies like The Sandlot or The Goonies were made of.

The type that makes for lifelong friendships and stories retold in wedding toasts for years to come.

I hadn’t known it then, but those boys — along with my own roommate Ryeson, who would show up a few hours later — would define my childhood, and eventually who I was, long after those more innocent days had ended.

Like all good boarding-school boys, I only heeded my mother’s warnings until she was out of the building, and waved dutifully from the window as she and my father drove slowly down the gravel drive.

They were barely out of the towering, iron-clad gates of the school before I walked out of my own room, rounded the corner, and went straight into theirs.

We all had a place within that group for the next five years — Grant, Silas, Ryeson, and me.

Between the four of us, I was the balancing act.

The one who was level-headed and charming enough to keep us all enrolled.

Like Grant, I was smart as a whip but had the wit to back it up.

And thankfully, by that point, I was also cultured enough to know that having street cred with the right administrators was imperative in order to have the freedom to rebel outside the classroom without worrying too much about whether or not I’d be allowed to come back again the following year.

Kids like Grant could recite the handbook while kids like Silas knew it only well enough to know how to break the rules listed inside.

And while Ryeson was adept at ignoring the rulebook altogether, I could decipher it.

Study it just enough to find the loopholes.

Note where the language was just vague enough so that when I was arguing on all of our behalf before the headmaster, I could do so like my mother might.

Like Mrs. H.

“Not enough interest in tech,” I’d overheard my father saying one evening in a hushed tone when I was barely eight years old. “He’s going to have to follow in your footsteps, Norah, not mine. His future’s at the firm, not in my business.”

And that was that. My path had been decided. Starting the next day, my mother began grooming me for a future life at her firm. Showing me how to debate each point I made at home, as if I were already stating my case in front of a judge. She taught me — not how to argue — but how to win .

And yet, from the age of thirteen, the only person I could never win against was the guy throwing darts against my office wall today.

Silas drops onto the leather couch. All this talk about New York has made my memories of Abby resurface, even after I’ve spent years stuffing them down where they belonged. Out of sight, and out of mind.

“What, you’re suddenly afraid of flying?” he asks.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” I tell him, brushing off the whole line of questioning.

“Do I need to get Ryeson on the phone to give you a little pep talk now that Grant’s—?

” He’s pulled his phone out, like he actually might call Rye.

Then his face falls, staring past the phone to the floor.

Out of all of us, losing Grant last month hit Silas the hardest. They were always closer than the rest of us, more like brothers than friends, and he gave everything he could trying to save him there at the end.

Considering how much Si has gone off the rails recently, I can tell that Grant’s death is nearly killing him, too.

More than he’s willing to admit. First his father — who left his entire empire to Si after his sudden passing two years ago — and then losing his best friend Grant in the last month.

The strongest among us would tailspin in both those scenarios, but the pile of money Silas has at his disposal has always made his tailspins particularly epic.

Plus, the media has repeatedly reported on his antics to a nauseating degree, since the headline clicks alone are likely making them millions.

I watch him blink, face still frozen, looking toward the floor. It’s impossible to ignore the sudden change in his demeanor.

“Si, have you talked to Jules since the . . .” I start to ask, gently, but can’t finish. Jules, Grant’s fiancée, has been furious at Silas since his father died and the young business heir’s shenanigans, with Grant by his side, began to fuel ever-increasing interest from the media.

His eyes ignite, but he ignores the question.