Jax plucks the phone out of my hand. Since not having to sum up saves me time, I let him. He glances down at the screen, his eyes skimming over the messages.
He pins me with his hard-ass glare when he looks up. “Why haven’t you fixed this? Block Leda. Make her go away. You can’t be texting her and be married to my sister. It looks like you still have a thing for her.”
He’s probably not soliciting murder, so I go with the next logical assumption. “Are you asking me to pay her off?”
Jax curses but doesn’t deny the thought of money has crossed his mind. Instead, he hands me back my phone.
“Isn’t there another way to get her out of your life?”
This is dangerous ground. “Eventually there will be legal charges, but I don’t own that timeline and I can’t guarantee they’ll stick.”
“But you think they will.”
I hesitate for just a moment. Jax is one of the few people I trust with the truth. He’s also just about the only person I’d explain myself to. “This is about her business relationships, not something personal.” Not a revenge fuck in the literal sense. “She lied to a lot of people. She took their money knowing she didn’t actually have a product—and then she spent that money, but not on R&D. Or she moved it. Whatever happened to it, it’s gone, and since she was the CEO, she’s responsible.”
Jax’s frown deepens and a slim guy in a well-tailored summer suit veers hard left and almost stumbles off the curb. “Why don’t you just say that? Everyone thinks you’re an ass who is wrong and won’t apologize.”
“The ass part is true.”
When I stop there, he does some more cursing. He’s known me for years, so you’d think he’d appreciate the whole no-apologies approach. My parents used to terrorize the neighborhood with their fights. They’d yell—or discuss at full volume—everything that had gone wrong since the last time my dad had come home, and then he’d “apologize,” my mom would call him on it and there would be more words. Nothing ever got fixed, he never stopped doing the stuff she hated, and it just made our family look like candidates for Dr. Phil’s show. I used to head over to Jax and Hana’s place whenever I heard my dad’s Dodge Charger pull into the driveway.
“So if it’s true, tell people it’s true.” Jax looks like he might want to throw his hands up in the air like a 1950s housewife and have a fit of the vapors. Whatever those are. “What does Hana think about all this?”
This one’s easy. “She knows Leda and I broke up.”
Usually I’d point out that Hana hadn’t asked for details, but she was pretty focused on our impulsive marriage. Any questions probably occurred to her later and were answered with Google.
“Are you crazy? Your ex is texting you constantly and the rest of the world believes, with some grounds, that you fucked up her business to teach her some kind of lesson. What if Hana thinks you’d do the same to her?”
“You’d kill me,” I point out. I think I sound quite reasonable.
“Yes, but she shouldn’t even have to think it.” He definitely looks like punching me has risen back to the top of his to-do list. I’d rather not be sporting a black eye when I go see Hana, so I just nod in agreement. I consider telling him I’m in the process of acquiring the mortgage on her bee farm, but it’s completely different, right? I’m not buying her note to shut her down or take the place away from her (okay, so the thought crossed my mind that it would be leverage, but Hana is nice—I won’t need to bribe her into compliance). I mostly did it to smooth things over, but it also makes a better thank-you present than flowers for helping me out. She’ll never have to worry about things like recessions or billing departments again.
“What happens next? Eventually Hana’s going to outgrow her crush on you, and then what?”
“Is this the twenty questions game? Am I supposed to drink if I don’t have an answer?”
Jax grunts something I don’t catch. “Are you staying married?”
Danger. “It would help with a work thing if we were a couple for the next few months.”
“And then?” Jax doesn’t look particularly happy, although I know he understands. Sometimes you have to do shitty things to get where you need to go—and I understand that he’ll stop me if he decides that’s what Hana needs. He’s my safety valve.
“And then I guess it’s up to Hana. I’m not calling all the shots here.”
“She doesn’t tell you that you work too much?” From his tone, I assume Hana’s been on his case, either about putting in too much time at the office or accumulating too much money. She’s idealistic, which can translate into her announcing that enough money is enough money and Jax should let someone else have a chance at the next billion dollars.
I throw him a bone. “Leda thought I put my work first. It made her mad.”
Jax just nods. “You did. We both do. Hana’s my one exception.”
He stops and then gets this weird look on his face. Possibly, his hot dog is talking back to him, but I’m not sure. Leda was right that she came second after my career. But Hana is different. A sense of rightness settles over me.
“So you have to think about what you’re going to do.” Jax stares at the sea of lunch-seeking businesspeople, but he clearly doesn’t see them. If I were a better person, I’d ask him who he does see. I’m not sure it’s my Hana. “Plan for the future and stuff.”
Generally, I see my future in terms of earning quarters. I’m only twenty-eight, which means I have some serious money-earning years left. And while I’m a risk-taker when it comes to work, I’ve already made sure that there’s plenty set aside and sewn up tight in case something unexpected happens. While I can’t envision myself failing, I’m also completely certain I never want to be broke again. This is probably the point at which Hana would tell me I’m an ass and suggest living off the land or some other granola-type approach to a wholesome life. I can feel my lips curving up in a smile.
“You need to tell her the truth. She’s going to hear stuff.”
“And she’ll believe what she believes.”
Jax heaves a pained sigh. “She had the biggest crush on you when she was a kid. She thought you were Jesus Christ walking on water, that there was nothing you couldn’t do. You have to ease her in to the actual you. Why did you really marry her? Not the crap business reasons story that makes your life sound like a movie plot, but the real reason.”
“She asked me.”
He doesn’t look surprised—Hana’s crush on me drives him nuts—but it doesn’t shut him up, either. “She couldn’t have forced you to say yes.”