Page 65 of Her Brother's Billionaire Best Friend

“Well, I have a garden.”

I watched Laura’s face as she gave me a wary glance, then nodded. I felt relief as we got into my car and the engine of the Jeep purred to life. I didn’t want Laura to feel pressured to come home with me, especially given the encounter we’d just had with Tracey. The way I figured it, a quiet drink in my backyard by the pool would help take her mind off things.

But Laura’s mind was emphatically on the meeting with her mom as we drove up and out of the Valley, where Lakeview stood twinkling at the top of the Falls.

“How could she speak that way to me? What gives her the right? And the way she talked about Kyle…”

Laura shook her head as she relaxed into the passenger seat. “Am I a bad Mom?” she said despairingly.

I reached across and squeezed her hand as it rested in her lap. “No, Laura, I…I don’t know a lot about you. But the one thing I do know is that you’re a great Mom.”

“You think?” her eyes lit up a little bit.

“Yeah. I do. You always put Kyle first. And I’ve never heard you talk to him the way she spoke to you just now. It’s like…” I strained to find an explanation for the way Tracey had just spoken to Laura. “It’s like she blamed you for what happened.”

“I guess I still blame myself.”

“But there’s no reason for you to. What happened to your dad, it…wasn’t your fault. No one could have predicted a thing like that.”

“But she’s right,” sighed Laura. “I wasn’t there. And David needed me—my family needed me. What does it say about me that when I heard my dad had died my first thought was…”

“Was what?”

At the gates to Lakeview, I opened the window and punched in the code. The electronic lock snapped open, and the gates swung wide as I brought the car up the driveway.

“Was how Kyle had never met him?”

“That’s a normal way to react. It’s only natural that you think about the people close to you in a crisis.”

Laura sighed. I parked the car in my garage and we got out. We went around the house, up a path and a set of stone steps to the back garden. At the top of the bank, I could see the shed where I kept the chopper. But this time, we turned left, round to the back of the house.

This was a secluded part of the house where I went to relax. You couldn’t see it from the main road, and the high hedges around the garden kept the prying eyes of local busybodies from seeing too far in. The swimming pool was open and still uncovered, blue light coming up from the bottom. I led Laura to a hand-carved wooden table with a few chairs around.

I offered her a blanket but she refused. “It’s still warm,” said Laura.

“I know. Hope it carries on for a while.”

“I’ve never been round here,” said Laura.

“I mostly use it for swimming in the summer,” I explained. “Aside from that, I occasionally have guests out here.”

“And when you’re not exercising? Or hosting parties?” said Laura slyly.

I shrugged. “The downside of my job,” I grunted. “Once you can afford it, you barely have time to use it.”

“Well, thanks for making time for me,” Laura flashed a faint smile.

“It’s no trouble. Can I get you something to drink?”

“I’ll take a beer.”

I nodded. “Beer it is.”

I went inside and got two glasses and two bottles of a fine pale ale I’d had imported from the Netherlands. I sat down.

“You forgot to bring a bottle opener,” she giggled.

“I don’t have one,” I said.