Brother's Best Friend_An Older Man Younger Woman Romance Read online

  “Where’s Leah this morning?” I try and ask casually.

  “Oh you didn’t hear?”

  “Hear what?” I ask. I swallow my half chewed bite and although I’ve just started eating I suddenly feel full. Something’s not right.

  “She landed a job at an ad agency. She starts bright and early on Monday morning so she already flew out this morning.”

  “Flew out where?” Are we talking Philadelphia, Miami, or somewhere on the East Coast here? I’m not liking the sound of this.

  “The city of angels.”

  “Los Angeles?”

  “The one and only,” her dad says.

  I freeze up. My entire body goes ice cold.

  “Xavier, are you okay?” her mom asks. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

  “No, I’m fine. I just remembered I have a job today and I have to take off myself. Will you please excuse me?”

  “Sure.”

  I thank them and make my way back up to my room.

  Yeah, I saw a ghost all right. I saw a vision of the most beautiful woman in the history of the universe and what we could be together and now it’s gone.

  Now you see her. Now you don’t.

  There’s no way this is happening. No way!

  I will not lose her.

  When I enter my room my phone is already ringing.

  I run for it and catch it on the last ring.

  “Hello?” I say frantically. I was in such a hurry to get the call before I missed it I didn’t get a chance to look at the caller ID. But it’s got to be her.

  “Xavier. There you are. I’ve been trying to get ahold of you.”

  “Hey Doug,” I say to my booking agent.

  “You just got booked for Cape Town, my man! Your plane leaves in five hours out of JFK. There will be a driver there to pick you up. I’ll text you the info.”

  “I can’t make it,” I say immediately.

  “What are you talking about? Let me finish. This is an African-wide TV spot that could easily go international. They’re making you the face. This is it, buddy. You’ve had some big jobs before and some big paydays but this one takes the cake. This is the one most people dream of but never get. This is what we’ve been working for. This is everything.”

  This is nothing. Nothing without her.

  “I’m sorry, Doug, but can you put this one on hold? Maybe find someone else?”

  “Xavier, are you okay? They requested you specifically. There is nobody else. You got it. No castings. No auditions. You’re the man. And if you cancel I know the agency head will…how do I say this nicely…drop you. She will be absolutely irate if you don’t go. She’s been trying to get one of our models booked with them for ages.”

  I don’t say anything.

  “Xavier? Are you there?”

  “Yeah.” Damn, the last place I want to be right now is away from her. It’s bad enough that she’s half way across the country. Now I have to go to an entirely different continent? “I’ll be there,” manages to somehow come out of my mouth.

  “Come on, man. Get excited. You’re bumming me out over here.”

  “Thanks for the booking,” I say. “Gotta run.”

  I drop the call and collapse onto the bed.

  What in the world is happening this morning? I had my future right in my hands and now everything is collapsing around me even quicker than I thought I had a grasp on it.

  Hours ago I was as close to my soulmate as I’d ever been in my life, and now that’s been ripped away.

  This cannot be happening.

  And I’m not going to let it. Yeah, I’ll fill my professional responsibility and honor my contracts but I’m going to find Leah and get to the bottom of this.

  And by the bottom of this I mean make her mine. Again.

  But this time forever.

  CHAPTER 6

  Leah

  One month later

  It’s been a month since I started a dream job in my dream career path. I’ve got the ocean, the mountains, and perfect weather over three hundred days a year.

  I should be beyond happy, but I’m a complete wreck.

  All I can think about is him. And to make matters worse my boss gave me a company phone and expects me to be available twenty-four hours a day eight days a week. Yes, she really tried to explain some sort of weird math to me where I can “optimize my productivity” and work eight days a week. I thought she was joking at first. Then I thought she was talking about me outsourcing some of my work. In the end I was totally confused, but I got the main idea. Work as hard as possible and then work harder.

  And that leaves no time for anything social. I didn’t expect my first year or two to be a walk in the park, but I was hoping I could get in touch with Xavier at least.

  Half of the nights of the week I sleep at the office. It’s just so much easier. I’m downtown with clients and it saves the time having to run to my apartment and back. It’s not even uncommon. They have women’s and men’s showers and locker rooms here. They hire the best and brightest, their words not mine, and then just play the war of attrition. Only the “strong” survive.

  And right now I’m completely spent.

  Spent to the point I’m feeling sick most mornings until I can get a few cups of coffee into me and some sort of sugar rush from the vending machine. At this rate my body is going to be wrecked within the first year.

  But the only “wrecking” of my body that I want is that which can only be provided by one man.

  The man who held me up in his arms like I was weightless. The way he made me feel so small and feminine. And the way he gave me my first time.

  Everything was so perfect. Too perfect in fact. I wanted to leave him a note. I wanted to wake him up.

  And most importantly I wanted what we had that one night to continue.

  But something deep inside me just knew it couldn’t. We live on complete different sides of the country. That and he travels all around the world most of the year.

  How would that relationship work? We meet up a few times a year for absolutely blissful, romantic weekends only to say to each other, “We really have to do this more often,” as we leave each other at the airport each time knowing what we have will eventually meet a tragic ending?

  It’s just not sustainable.

  But the part that is the most frustrating and most angering is what my brother did. How he intentionally kept us apart. How would he even know we’d have an interest in each other?

  And if he hadn’t my life would have been much different. I wouldn’t have run away for school. I would have stayed in New York and allowed Xavier to pursue me, not that there would have been much pursuing needed.

  I was hooked immediately.

  “Leah, do you have that sales deck for the 1:30 p.m. conference call with Beverly Studios?”

  I look up from my desk realizing I’m daydreaming again.

  “Yes, Mrs. Jackson. It’s on the cloud server.”

  “Excellent. With that done can you get the reality media pitch wrapped up by lunch?”

  “On it now.”

  She pivots on her heal with military precision and is gone.

  I look at the clock. I’ve got just over two hours to put together a pitch I barely know anything about.

  And the worst part is I’m sure that the minute that document hits the server she’ll be right back over at my desk with something else to work on. And she always makes sure to leave me with a final project when she heads home at 9:00 p.m. And at least three days a week I get an incoming text around 6:00 a.m. with something that’s due by 8:00 a.m. or 9:00 a.m.

  Completely unsustainable. I mean, maybe I could pull it off if I just had a little emotional support here. Someone who could tell me that everything was going to be okay. Someone who could tell me that I’m doing a great job and that in two years I’ll get a promotion and I’ll be able to free up my weekends and start to get my life back.

  A life I could only want with one person. The
same person who could be my rock.

  The man who I spent one magical night with and will never do so again.

  Xavier.

  CHAPTER 7

  Xavier

  One month later

  I reach the top of Lion’s Head in Cape Town, South Africa and take in one of the world’s truly most spectacular views. I look out over the area where the South Atlantic Ocean and Indian Oceans meet.

  I’ve got Camp’s Bay to my left and Robben Island to my right. I marvel at the courage of Nelson Mandela. I can’t believe the man was imprisoned for twenty-seven years and didn’t let it come close to breaking his spirit. What an amazing person and legend.

  And as much as he serves as an inspiration and makes my own problems seem trivial by comparison I just can’t stop thinking about them.

  I begin the path down Lion’s Head back into the “City Bowl” as they call it.

  All I can think about is how much better this would be to share it with someone. And not just anyone. There could be only one.

  Leah.

  I snap a quick selfie and send it off to her just hoping maybe I’ll get a response this time.

  It would be a first and keep my hopes up, not that I have any intention of stopping my pursuit to get in touch with her.

  I won’t. I can’t. I’m literally possessed.

  I tell myself she just started a new job and she’s probably super busy right now.

  I’ve been texting the number her parents gave me, but who knows…maybe she changed it.

  Maybe she wants a fresh start. Maybe she doesn’t want what I want.

  But I know she does. That’s the thing.

  Half way down and I hear the sound of an incoming call. Maybe it’s her. Please be her.

  My hand darts into my backpack looking for my phone.

  My booking agent. I answer it and immediately reply as I have been since I arrived.

  “Any jobs in L.A. for me?”

  “Xavier, you don’t have that L.A. look. They’re doing the heroine chic thing again, which I find disgusting by the way. They’re not into the All-American boy with muscles, a great smile and global marketability…but guess who is?”

  I really don’t care. I’d drop the weight just to get a job there. Just so I could get closer to her. I’d show up at her office just to see her and talk to her. It sounds borderline stalkerish, and I wouldn’t do it in front of her co-workers, but I just have to see her again or I’m going to lose my mind.

  “No clue.”

  “Dude! Cheer up. Remember the reason you came down? How I told you this could be the golden ticket? Well it happened. I’m looking at the offer right here. And let’s just say the number is huge and it includes royalties. It tested through the roof across all of Africa. All demographics loved it. They ran it in some big markets in the U.S., U.K., Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Germany, France…it was a hit everywhere. Ev-ery-where!”

  “So I might have a chance to go to L.A.?”

  “Man you are really hung up on that place. What is it about that place?”

  “I…I just need to be there,” I say. It’s nobody’s business but mine what my reasons are. In a world of instant hook-up culture I’ve got the one thing that’s real. A real connection between two people. And most importantly it’s the only person I’ve ever wanted.

  Cape Town has been called heaven on earth, and it’s easy to see why. But without her it just can’t ever be. No matter how majestic Table Mountain is, regardless of the Malay-fusion or other amazing foods in town, or the surfing and outdoor activities that are offered it just can’t be to me what it is to everyone else. Not if I can’t share it with her.

  “Swing by the office. All you have to do is sign the paperwork and it’s done.”

  Then it hits me.

  “What kind of number did they offer?”

  “Eight hundred thousand U.S. dollars plus the royalties.”

  “And it was submitted through the ad agency, right?”

  “Of course.”

  “Can you go back to them and ask them for five hundred thousand, but…and this is the most important part…one full-time ad agency position paying a quarter a million a year, guaranteed for two years?”

  “Are you out of your mind?”

  “And I don’t need the royalties. I just want that ad agency position, fully guaranteed. The money in an escrow account. They can pay me two fifty two if they really want.”

  “Xavier. What kind of drugs are you on?”

  “When have you ever known me to take any drug?”

  “Never.”

  “Exactly. And that’s how it is and how it always will be.”

  “So what’s gotten into you.”

  “Life. Life’s gotten into me. And the true definition of success. One I’ve only recently come to fully discover.”

  “The boss isn’t going to like this.”

  “Just ask, ok? It doesn’t hurt to ask. And it saves the client money, or you can put it to the agency’s bottom line. I really don’t care. Just whatever it takes to get that ad agency slot opened up.”

  I hear a sigh on the other end. “All right. Let me see what I can do.”

  “Oh! And one other thing.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

  “How long is the offer good for.”

  I hear some papers shuffle. “Seventy-two hours it says.”

  “And it just came in?”

  “I called you right away.”

  “So we’ve got seventy-one hours and fifty-five minutes?”

  “What we’ve got is a crisis! We need you to come to your senses and get down here and sign this darn thing.”

  “Oh, I’ve come to my senses all right. I’ve got just enough time. I’ll have to call you back.”

  I hang up the phone and sprint down the hill passing other hikers and tourist who are looking at me like I’m crazy.

  And I am crazy. Completely crazy. Crazy for her.

  And it’s now or never.

  CHAPTER 8

  Leah

  One day later

  Twenty minutes ago I pulled my head off my forearm which was horizontal across my desk. Another all-nighter and another shower at the office and a change of clothes from my locker. I’m falling apart.

  I expect I’ve got about forty minutes before that first email comes in. I’ve got to do some online research and figure out what’s wrong with me. I absorb every bit of information I can hastily making notes on my phone.

  I don’t know if this is just stress or if it’s something more. Either way I’ve got to get to the bottom of this.

  And then just like clockwork my phone beeps at 6:00 a.m. with a to do list to start the day.

  I quickly schedule a doctor’s visit for my lunch break. Luckily there’s a clinic in the building next to ours and they have a twenty-four hour chat available on their website. I let the woman on the other end of the chat know I’ll be pressed for time. She says she’ll have blood work tests ready to go. I’m hoping to be in and out in twenty minutes. She promises to send over the questionnaire, release, and other paperwork so I can print them and complete them before I arrive.

  Another day and I’m already behind before it’s even started. Only two more years of this and I’ll be eligible for promotion. But can I make it that far?

  Part of me wants to break down. If I just had Xavier in my life. If my brother hadn’t told us both those lies. Life could be a lot different.

  But I won’t be a victim. There are people who have it a lot worse off than I do in this world.

  I take in a deep breath and get to work.

  If I can just stay focused maybe I can keep my mind off my problems…and him.

  But I’m not holding my breath.

  CHAPTER 9

  Xavier

  The Uber pulls away from the curb at LAX and we speed away towards downtown L.A.

  I’m grasping at straws here, but I feel like I’ve got a shot. Maybe the best shot I have at tr
acking her down.