Page 120 of Titus

I set my coffee cup down and leaned back in my chair. “I’m not listening to this shit from you.”

“What?” she smiled. “I haven’t said a word about your two dates.”

“They were just simple outings,” I reminded her. “It was fun, and now he’s overseas for work.”

“And when he gets back?”

“He’ll probably be gone for the entire summer. Those events seem to pile up over there, keeping those elites going nonstop until the season ends.”

“And when he gets back?” she repeated.

“And when he gets back, he’ll most likely have forgotten all about our dates.” I took a bite of my pastry. “Besides, who cares if I wanted to date him?”

“I care,” she simply said.

“Well, I am an adult, and I don’t need anyone warning me off Titus Hawk. I’m not a fool, and I probably know more about that man’s playboy lifestyle than you do.”

“I’m just being a concerned friend.”

“You don’t need to be, Sienna,” I said. “My God, it’s me—of all the people in this world—that you’re treating like a foolish girl.”

“You’re right,” she said in resignation. “Just be careful.”

“I always am,” I smiled. “Now, if we want to talk about wealthy men I should be concerned about, why not bring up Christian Jameston?”

She exhaled. “Fucking creep. Are you going to break the lease and move out?”

“I was planning to do just that until Lowell Jameston approached me in my office and offered his deepest apologies. He assured me that Christian would leave me alone and, if not, that I was to go directly to him so he could handle it personally.”

Her lips twisted, “Interesting.”

“What? I am okay staying so long as the man keeps his word.”

“Not just that,” she responded. “Those men are somewhat of a mystery to me. They’re not very well known out here.”

“Well, my only concern about them is that if they go under, I will have to look for a place to relocate my business,” I chuckled.

A small group of women interrupted our conversation as they stepped onto the terrace, their huge designer purses slung over their shoulders and their Louboutin heels clicking with each step.

“My God, would you look at that. What a view,” one said. “I’m uploading this to my Instagram.”

“The owner is Titus Hawk. He lives somewhere around here,” another said.

Just as Sienna rolled her eyes at the name Titus Hawk, I turned to see what had captured the women’s attention.

“Jesus Christ,” I whispered. “He really did relocate the damn thing here.” I smiled when I saw the massive superyacht two miles off shore, dominating nearly the entire coastline.

It was beautiful, and damn it, I had to admit I missed the man. I wanted to make fun of this whole thing and of him right now, but I couldn’t. Sadly, my sorry ass woke up to another day of not hearing from him.

I tried not to let that get to me. I told myself this was exactly what to expect from a man like him. But somewhere between Malibu, Europe, and those quiet text messages… I started looking forward to hearing from him.

Which was terrifying, considering that scenes like this only reminded me how different our worlds were.

“You haven’t seen this shit on the news?” Sienna asked me.

“No,” I answered. “I’ve only been on the thing when I was salvaging his party in Monaco.”

“Not that,” she said. “The fact it was coming into Newport this morning.”