It’s all about the money.
No woman had really seen Owen’s value before he’d come into a fortune.
Well, no female had . . . except me.
CHAPTER 3
OWEN
“Is Layla there yet? I’m stuck in traffic. I’m going to be late. I should have just let them deliver the damn cake.” Andie sounded uncharacteristically frustrated. She hadn’t even said hello when I’d answered my cell phone.
“Well, hello to you, too,” I said with a smirk as I plopped my ass into a recliner in my living room. “Calm down, Andie. This is supposed to be a casual, fun party. And no, Layla isn’t here yet, but I did manage to get through medical school and my residency all by myself. I think I can handle this reception if she doesn’t show up early.”
“Easy for you to say,” she grumbled. “Most of the people attending are already your family.”
“Your family, too, now,” I reminded her. “And it’s not like I really know my half brothers and cousins from the East Coast, either.”
Although most of my siblings were well acquainted with the Maine Sinclairs now, I’d never been around to see them on their frequent visits to Citrus Beach. I’d spoken to Evan quite a bit on the phone, since he’d been the one dispersing the funds that had changed all of our lives. But other than that, I’d only connected with my newfound family from Maine a couple of times in person. We might share DNA, but they were pretty much still strangers to me.
“But they’re still your blood. What if they don’t like me, Owen?”
I frowned. Andie wasn’t a woman with huge insecurities, so it was a little disconcerting to hear how worked up she was over this whole wedding-reception thing. “Absolutely nothing will happen, Andie. Noah will still love you, and he won’t give a damn what anybody else thinks, family or not.”
Jesus! Didn’t she know that Noah would happily throttle any person who said a bad word about his new wife?
She released a large breath. “You’re right. I’m being ridiculous. I guess I’ve gotten myself all worked up from sitting in traffic. God, I hate San Diego traffic. Where in the hell are all these people going on a Saturday?”
I hesitated to remind her that it was still summer, and most people were out and about in nice weather. “Why didn’t you just do something local?”
She sighed. “Noah and I went to a bakery here, and we fell in love with their fresh lemon-berry cake. It’s a vanilla-bean cake infused with almond syrup and filled with zesty lemon curd and white-chocolate mousse. Then it’s topped with seasonal berries. We both loved it. I wanted to surprise Noah by getting him this cake for our reception.”
I grinned. My best friend had gone from a carefree food critic to a woman who was head over heels in love. I still wasn’t used to her being so happily married. Yeah, I was accustomed to her waxing poetic about food, but she’d never given a damn about whether that food made someone else happy or not. “Sounds pretty damn good to me, too. Is there anything you won’t do to make your husband happy?”
“Nothing,” she said adamantly. “Noah deserves a little pampering after everything he’s done for me.”
Truthfully, I thought the two of them were perfect for each other, since Noah busted his ass to make sure his wife was deliriously happy, too. “Take your time, Andie. I have everything under control. The caterers have already been here to drop off food, and they’ll be back to run the barbecuing. There isn’t a ton of stuff to do.”
I’d discovered that one of the benefits of being a billionaire was that I could pay somebody else to do all of the things I used to have to do myself. I couldn’t say that I was completely adapted to having the kind of funds I’d inherited, but after being dirt poor my entire life, it wasn’t exactly a hardship to roll with it.
I’d worked with an interior decorator to help me get my new waterfront home together. Granted, my brother Aiden had needed to remind me that I could afford to hire one, but I was completely on board once I realized how inept I was at doing anything remotely artistic.
Andie snorted. “Of course there are things to do, but maybe I didn’t need to tell Layla to get there so early. She should be there in a few minutes, and I’m still sitting in traffic.”
“It’s okay,” I assured Andie. “I think Layla and I need to talk. This might be the only way I can meet up with her outside of work. I offered to take her to dinner a couple of times, but she turned me down flat.”
“You two still aren’t getting along?” Andie questioned. “I don’t understand. The three of us used to be such good friends in high school. I know you and Layla didn’t really keep in touch, but I feel like I picked up my friendship with her like we’d never really been across the country from each other.”
“I don’t get it, either,” I confessed. “She and I couldn’t stay in touch because she wasn’t talking to me when I left for college. I don’t know what I did to piss her off so damn badly.”
“I don’t know, either. I’ve tried to ask her, in a subtle kind of way, but she’s not biting. She doesn’t want to talk about you, so I haven’t pushed. Is this hurting your professional careers?”
“Not really,” I told Andie. “We both do our jobs, and it’s obvious to me that Layla cares a lot about her patients. It just bothers me . . . personally.”
Best friend or not, I wasn’t about to tell Andie that my dick didn’t care if Layla hated me. It got hard every single time the woman was within my sight.
“Do you want to be friends with her again, Owen?” Andie asked hesitantly.
Well, not exactly. How in the hell was I supposed to explain that what I had with Layla in high school wasn’t going to work for me anymore?
Hell, it hadn’t even really worked in high school, either.
Yeah, we’d been really good friends, but during our senior year, my feelings had changed. My abundant teenage hormones had suddenly noticed her, and nothing had been the same after that.
I’d just never done anything about that crush. I hadn’t wanted to lose Layla completely by telling her about it, so I’d kept my mouth shut.
Now, as an adult male, my dick was a million times more insistent about making my relationship with her more . . . carnal.
“Yeah. I guess I do,” I said noncommittally. Andie was like a sister to me, so talking to her about the way I lusted after Layla just seemed . . . wrong.
“It would be great if you two could spend some time together outside of work,” Andie said enthusiastically. “Most of our other old friends have scattered, and you really should get out more. You’ve earned your leisure time, but you don’t seem happy that you actually have some of it now that your residency is over.”
“I have no idea how to spend my free time,” I scoffed. “I don’t know what to do with myself. My siblings are all married, so it’s not like I can just go hang out with them like they’re single.”
Truthfully, my new life was a little like stepping into an episode of The Twilight Zone. I’d spent an entire decade doing nothing except working and studying medicine. The rest of the world had moved on while I’d been studying to be a doctor, and now that I was ready to join it, everything had changed.