Benton capable of.
She opened her mouth to once again feint what he had guessed correctly. To once again try to convince him that she didn’t have a wild party girl trapped inside her, one she’d been ruthlessly suppressing for the past five years.
But she was saved from doing so by the sound of a vibrating ring. It was Max’s smartphone, going off on the little table beside the couch.
He picked it up and smirked. “It’s my brother,” he told her before answering the phone with a fake-chummy, “Cole, bro. What’s up?”
Cole answered and Max’s smirk grew even more pronounced. “Well, you know me, bro.
Impetuous
is my middle name. Sorry you had to hear about it on the news, but Pru’s a great girl. You know that. I’m just happy she agreed to marry me, so of course I wanted to lock that down sooner rather than later.”
Max nodded, looking bored, as he remained silent. “Okay, duly noted. You and Sunny want to be invited the next time Pru and I get married. We’ll keep that in mind. Meanwhile, should I pick up my trust-fund check from your office or do you just want to transfer the funds straight into my account?”
Cole answered again, and this time the smirk fell off Max’s face. In fact the more Cole talked, the more furious Max looked.
But in the end, all Max said was, “Fine. See you later.”
Then he hung up, his jaw ticking.
“What did he say?” Pru asked, her curiosity temporarily superseding her need to run from the room. “Is he refusing to give you the money again, even though you met his terms?”
“No,” Max answered, his voice tight. “He says he’ll sign off, but he has one more condition. He wants me to come meet him to fill out the paperwork.”
“That’s not a bad condition,” Pru told him. “You can do that. Isn’t his office right upstairs on the thirty-fifth floor?”
Max rubbed a hand over his face, suddenly seeming weary beyond his years. “Yes it is. But he’s not there today. He’s in Utah, on the company’s annual executive retreat near the Grand Staircase.”
Pru would have argued that this wasn’t so bad either. The Grand Staircase was only a few hours’ drive away. If Max left now, he could get there before lunch maybe.
But then Max let the other shoe drop. “He wants me to come meet him in Utah. And he wants me to bring you.”
Chapter 8
P ru hadn’t loved the idea of being married to Max, and she was even less enthusiastic about having to pretend to be in love with him directly to his brother’s face.
Max knew this because she’d made him wait outside in his Ferrari sports car when he dropped her off at her apartment to get a shower and put on something to wear for the short trip to the Sinclair Lodge, a retreat a few miles from Utah’s Grand Staircase–Escalante National Monument. The shower and change of clothes didn’t seem to help her mood. She barely said a word in the car ride up to Utah, not even when he baited her with questions about Wedding Night Pru.
She maintained her hostile silence, breaking it only to greet the Sinclair Lodge’s manager, who handed Max a set of old-fashioned metal keys and guided them to their room on the second floor. The manager walked beside Pru up the stairs, telling her about the lodge’s history. How it had started out as a private residence for the Sinclairs, a prominent Pittsburgh steel family, but had later been converted into a corporate retreat by Andrew Sinclair, the youngest Sinclair brother, who had decided to leave behind the steel business and start his own line of specialized hotels. Ski resorts, dude ranches and retreats such as this one, which were rented out only to large groups for reunions, corporate retreats, etc.
Max only half listened to the manager’s explanation. Instead he remembered how he’d partied a few times with Nathan Sinclair, the older, much less upstanding of the Sinclair brothers, back before he’d decided to take over Sinclair Steel and become boring. Like
She opened her mouth to once again feint what he had guessed correctly. To once again try to convince him that she didn’t have a wild party girl trapped inside her, one she’d been ruthlessly suppressing for the past five years.
But she was saved from doing so by the sound of a vibrating ring. It was Max’s smartphone, going off on the little table beside the couch.
He picked it up and smirked. “It’s my brother,” he told her before answering the phone with a fake-chummy, “Cole, bro. What’s up?”
Cole answered and Max’s smirk grew even more pronounced. “Well, you know me, bro.
Impetuous
is my middle name. Sorry you had to hear about it on the news, but Pru’s a great girl. You know that. I’m just happy she agreed to marry me, so of course I wanted to lock that down sooner rather than later.”
Max nodded, looking bored, as he remained silent. “Okay, duly noted. You and Sunny want to be invited the next time Pru and I get married. We’ll keep that in mind. Meanwhile, should I pick up my trust-fund check from your office or do you just want to transfer the funds straight into my account?”
Cole answered again, and this time the smirk fell off Max’s face. In fact the more Cole talked, the more furious Max looked.
But in the end, all Max said was, “Fine. See you later.”
Then he hung up, his jaw ticking.
“What did he say?” Pru asked, her curiosity temporarily superseding her need to run from the room. “Is he refusing to give you the money again, even though you met his terms?”
“No,” Max answered, his voice tight. “He says he’ll sign off, but he has one more condition. He wants me to come meet him to fill out the paperwork.”
“That’s not a bad condition,” Pru told him. “You can do that. Isn’t his office right upstairs on the thirty-fifth floor?”
Max rubbed a hand over his face, suddenly seeming weary beyond his years. “Yes it is. But he’s not there today. He’s in Utah, on the company’s annual executive retreat near the Grand Staircase.”
Pru would have argued that this wasn’t so bad either. The Grand Staircase was only a few hours’ drive away. If Max left now, he could get there before lunch maybe.
But then Max let the other shoe drop. “He wants me to come meet him in Utah. And he wants me to bring you.”
Chapter 8
P ru hadn’t loved the idea of being married to Max, and she was even less enthusiastic about having to pretend to be in love with him directly to his brother’s face.
Max knew this because she’d made him wait outside in his Ferrari sports car when he dropped her off at her apartment to get a shower and put on something to wear for the short trip to the Sinclair Lodge, a retreat a few miles from Utah’s Grand Staircase–Escalante National Monument. The shower and change of clothes didn’t seem to help her mood. She barely said a word in the car ride up to Utah, not even when he baited her with questions about Wedding Night Pru.
She maintained her hostile silence, breaking it only to greet the Sinclair Lodge’s manager, who handed Max a set of old-fashioned metal keys and guided them to their room on the second floor. The manager walked beside Pru up the stairs, telling her about the lodge’s history. How it had started out as a private residence for the Sinclairs, a prominent Pittsburgh steel family, but had later been converted into a corporate retreat by Andrew Sinclair, the youngest Sinclair brother, who had decided to leave behind the steel business and start his own line of specialized hotels. Ski resorts, dude ranches and retreats such as this one, which were rented out only to large groups for reunions, corporate retreats, etc.
Max only half listened to the manager’s explanation. Instead he remembered how he’d partied a few times with Nathan Sinclair, the older, much less upstanding of the Sinclair brothers, back before he’d decided to take over Sinclair Steel and become boring. Like
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