Total pages in book: 68
Estimated words: 64354 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 322(@200wpm)___ 257(@250wpm)___ 215(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 64354 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 322(@200wpm)___ 257(@250wpm)___ 215(@300wpm)
“More than ready.” He smiled at me when I kissed his forehead, and we left the flat hand in hand.
When we arrived at his place, Arie held the door open for me and said, “Welcome home.” That felt good.
I stashed my stuff in the bedroom and went to the kitchen to make us some tea. When it was ready, we curled up together on the couch, and I asked, “When are you going back to work?”
“Bright and early tomorrow morning.”
“You must be exhausted, though. Isn’t there someone else that can open the diner?”
“No. Javier and Cami both need some time off after covering for me for three and a half weeks.” He took a sip of tea and said, “I need to crunch the numbers and see if I can hire another employee, so I don’t have to keep working all those early morning shifts. Actually, I want to cut back my hours across the board. But until I can make that happen, it’s on me.”
“That’s the perfect lead-in to something I’ve been wanting to discuss with you,” I said. “I’d like to buy out your son-in-law—with interest, of course—and become an investor in the diner. What do you think?”
“Oh wow! Really?”
“It would be a win for everyone. I want to invest above Devon’s original contribution, so you’ll have plenty of funds available to hire more staff and cut back your hours. And you mentioned that Devon had sunk a huge chunk of his trust fund into the diner, so this would free up his cash. Then he and Kit could buy a house, or do whatever they wanted.”
“That would be amazing, but what do you get out of it?”
“I get to take care of the man I love, and become part of the history of that wonderful diner.”
He threw his arms around me, his voice full of emotion as he whispered, “Thank you, Tory.”
“Is that a yes?”
“Definitely.”
There was one more thing I wanted to do for Arie. Over the last few weeks, I’d been trying to think of a gift that would show him what he meant to me. I’d asked myself what he really wanted, and I’d finally come up with an answer. Now I had to figure out how to make it happen.
16
Salvatore
A lot happened over the next two months.
About five weeks after we returned from the UK, the news of billionaire Philip Ashcroft’s death made headlines. Apparently he’d had a heart attack and drowned in a hot tub aboard his mega yacht in the Mediterranean. When I told Arie the news, he asked, “Do you think Dante had something to do with that?”
“Probably not, but now we know for sure that we’ll never have to worry about Ashcroft again.”
Although I’d been reasonably certain Ashcroft would leave us alone, knowing it was definitely over brought us a sense of closure. But even before that news report, Arie and I had gotten on with our lives, the time we spent in the UK becoming little more than a faint shadow in our rearview mirror.
After I moved in, Arie insisted that I do whatever I wanted to the apartment to make it feel like it was our place, instead of his. With the landlord’s permission, I ended up painting the walls a pretty shade of light blue, which was Arie’s favorite color. Next, I gave the kitchen cabinets a crisp new coat of white paint and replaced all the old, dented mini blinds throughout the apartment with drapes.
I also replaced Arie’s older, smaller bed with a king-size one, complete with new pillows and linens. I wanted him to feel like his home was a refuge, a place he could truly relax at the end of the day. He was particularly excited about that change and said it felt like he was sleeping in a luxury hotel.
When Kit and Devon came for a visit, Kit insisted on emptying out his childhood bedroom and taking everything back to San Francisco with him. I never would have asked him to do that, and neither would his dad. But he told us, “You two need the space. Besides, Devon and I would prefer staying in a hotel when we come to visit. Not only are these walls paper thin, but we’re totally over trying to sleep in my tiny twin bed.”
During that same visit, I told Kit and Devon the whole truth about my past. I explained it the way I should have when I first met Arie, and they didn’t hold it against me.
Then Arie told them why we’d spent over three weeks in the UK. He underplayed the sense of danger and left out the fact that guns were involved, because he didn’t want to scare them. Understandably, Kit and Devon were concerned, but they believed us when we told them nothing like that would happen again.