In the cutthroat hospitality world, stagnation meant a slow, painful death. You have to innovate to stay on top of the game and beat back the hungry upstarts frothing at the mouth to take your crown.
Blake had no intention of getting dethroned.
That was why it was time to expand the Legends brand. He was keeping the casual, down-home business model where it made sense, but places like New York, Dubai, Miami, and Vegas? They wanted big, they wanted glitzy, they wanted out of this fucking world. And he was going to give it to them.
Now, if only he were on top of his personal life as much as his professional one.
Later that night, Blake made the mistake of asking his friends for advice.
“Dude, you’re doing this shit all wrong.” Justin cracked open his beer. “You gotta play hard to get. Make her come to you.”
Blake rolled his eyes. “Sorry, I didn’t realize we were back in middle school.”
“You make fun, but that shit works. Girls like a challenge.”
“Not this girl. Not after what I did.”
Blake already regretted bringing Farrah up in front of Justin, who was a good bartender and a cool guy but also a major pain in the ass when it came to the opposite sex. Specifically, when it came to advice pertaining to the opposite sex.
Like Blake, Justin didn’t have to work hard, if at all, to get a woman into bed. Must be the tattoos and devil-may-care attitude. Unlike Blake, he blazed a path through Manhattan’s female population with the enthusiasm of a drug addict hopped up on coke. His perception of how the whole dating thing worked was warped because he didn’t date. His love life was a flimsy string of one-night stands and casual flings.
“What did you do?” Justin’s eyes gleamed with curiosity. “Forget her birthday? Bang her best friend? Tell her what you really thought about her outfit?”
“No, dickhead. That would be you, you, and, oh, you.”
“Wrong. I’ve never forgotten a birthday because I’ve never asked.”
“Charming.” Landon entered the room with a fresh bowl of popcorn and a six-pack of beer. “You’re in the running to be Bartender of the Year.”
“Hey, you don’t need to know someone’s birthday to be a good bartender.” Justin reached for the popcorn before the bowl even touched the table. “I listen to people cry, dispense invaluable life advice, and supply them with alcohol to numb their pain. I’m a goddamned saint.”
“I’ll call the church,” Landon said wryly. He glanced at Blake. “You still moping about Farrah?”
Blake scowled. “I’m not moping.”
He, Landon, and Justin were watching the NBA playoffs in Landon’s decked-out den. The Celtics versus the Warriors. It was a nail biter, and a fun night with the guys was just what he needed after a long day at work.
Of course, it would be a lot more fun if his guy friends weren’t acting like jerks.
“Sure you’re not.” Landon chuckled. “This girl has got you more twisted than an episode of Game of Thrones. You should’ve seen his face when he saw her again for the first time,” he told Justin. “He just stood there like an idiot, gawking at her.”
Justin guffawed. “I’ll one-up you with the way he nearly tore my head off for just talking to her at The Egret a few weeks ago.”
“Fuck you both.” Blake tossed a handful of popcorn at his so-called friends. “And you weren’t ‘just talking’ to her.” He glared at Justin, his blood simmering again when he remembered the way Justin had eye-fucked Farrah at the bar. “You were trying to sleep with her.”
“True. But I try to sleep with everyone. No biggie.” Justin caught a kernel and popped it in his mouth, unfazed. “That was the same night you almost kissed, right? And you haven’t seen her since? I’m telling you, man, you gotta hit the brakes. Give her a chance to miss you.”
“It’s been two weeks.”
“I mean, you gotta be around her but not, you know, hit on her.”
“As much as I hate to agree with J on any of his often dubious advice, he has a point.” Landon kicked his feet up on his custom-made, expensive-as-shit coffee table. “You’re scaring her off.”
“I don’t hit on her that often,” Blake muttered. “The other night was a slipup.”
“Maybe not with words, but she feels it.” Justin waved his hands in the air. “Women have a sixth sense about this sort of thing and—oh, shit! The Celtics just scored. Up by two, baby!”
As Landon and Justin redirected their attention to the game and their mutual loathing of the Warriors, Blake pondered his friends’ advice.
What the hell. Might as well give it a shot. It couldn’t hurt. Right?
Chapter Thirteen
If someone had told Farrah last week that she’d willingly go on a road trip to upstate New York with Blake, just the two of them, she would’ve laughed in their face.
Yet here she was, ensconced in a rented Range Rover with her ex-boyfriend while they drove around Syracuse, looking for a place to eat lunch.
In her defense, she’d been desperate.
Farrah had gone into a tailspin when she received Blake’s text telling her the apartment had to be finished by late June because Mode de Vie was shooting a lifestyle feature on him there. It’d almost been enough to make her forget their inappropriate encounter at the lounge two-and-a-half weeks ago.
Mode de Vie. The most influential lifestyle magazine in the country. They always asked for the interior designer’s name when they shot at a subject’s home, which meant Farrah’s name would appear in its hallowed pages in a few months. That was the equivalent of an author getting their book featured in Oprah’s Book Club. One mention in the esteemed magazine could vault her from being an unknown to the brightest star in the sky…if her design was good. If not, Farrah could forget about her future in the industry.
Blake didn’t want any major remodeling done, thank God, which shaved weeks, if not months, off the process. But seven weeks was still a tight turnaround for redesigning an apartment his size.
Farrah had been a whirlwind of activity since she found out about the new deadline: calling contractors and pushing them for quotes and start dates, sourcing materials, and searching through every website and every store in the five boroughs for the perfect pieces that would transform Blake’s apartment into his dream home.
She’d succeeded, for the most part.
The only hiccup was the vintage trunk sitting in a little shop in Syracuse, four hours from New York City. Farrah had found it on the store’s website but when she called, they informed her they didn’t ship large items. She’d have to pick it up herself.
That wouldn’t have been an issue, except Farrah hadn’t driven since she moved to New York. She sure as hell wasn’t going to brave the city streets on her own. None of her friends in the city drove either, and she’d seriously considered hiring an Uber for the eight-hour roundtrip drive before Blake called her for a progress update.
She’d mentioned her dilemma; he’d offered to rent a car and drive her, and she’d accepted.
Now, here they were, with the trunk from the shop nestled snugly in the back of their car.