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Holy crap, she’s like the Spanish Inquisition.
I simply shake my head and carry on away from her, feeling very small and tiny in my body. Liv the journalist thankfully doesn’t follow.
I never expected to be accosted by a journalist outside my work. I’m a nobody. I simply helped a man in his time of need. I’m no celebrity. I don’t want this.
I don’t stop moving fast until I’m safely around the corner, where I take out my phone.
And I am greeted with a fresh new email from another bank denying my loan application.
Crap.
It’s just what I need to see after a weird interaction with someone demanding my name.
It feels like the universe is playing against me.
I sigh wearily.
What a hell of a day.
9
VICTOR
“Good evening, brother.”
Spencer Penmayne opens his front door and immediately greets me before I get the chance to even open my mouth. He’s clearly been expecting me and wants to catch me by surprise.
Well, he’s certainly done that.
My brother is always on time. He always wants to get the first word in. And that is as true this evening as it ever was.
Everything is a competition between us Penmayne brothers.
“Hello, professor.”
My brother rolls his eyes at his title being spewed out of my mouth. I would never normally address him in such a way unless I was aiming to provoke.
“Don’t call me that,” he snarls at me.
“I know, I know,” I laugh. “I’m just teasing.”
“You want dinner or not, Victor? Because if you’re going to be a little bastard then I might as well force you back home.”
“Just let me in, Spencer. Stop leaving me stranded out here in the darkness and be a good host.”
All our interactions are tinged with a friendly, brotherly combativeness. It’s the fuel to our fire.
My brother steps aside, allowing me to stride inside his home. His blue eyes follow mine as I do so. His short black hair is slicked back. We rather look alike. Spencer is very reserved, but he also has a passionate side that can reveal itself in literature and the arts. He’s incredibly intelligent, as he would be as a professor and as a Penmayne, but he also has a fierce possessiveness that can border on foolishness as shown by his pursuit of Olivia Weldon – his girlfriend. He’s a man of many contradictions, just like any human. And that’s why I love him.
His place is on one of the nicest streets in Crystal River – all very leafy and refined. He’s a stone’s throw away from the main university building of the town - the place where he works as an English Literature professor. He’s one of the few Penmayne brothers who actually lives in our hometown. He’s only come back recently after stints teaching and studying in Boston and Europe. He’s a widely traveled man, but now he wants the quiet life of small town America.
I can’t help but notice Spencer is wearing a very nice dark brown suit. Tailored. Classy. I wouldn’t expect less from a fancy man like him. His shoes are fresh from Oxford. His square jawline is finely shaved. He is a man who takes pride in his sophisticated appearance. He’s very much the cliché English Lit professor.
But as for me - I’ve come in jeans and a leather jacket. Not exactly as upper class as my distinguished brother, but a hell of a lot more Hollywood. Especially when my shirt is a rare one from a designer’s collection worth about the same amount as his swanky suit.
“Hello, Victor. So good to see you. Thank you for coming.”
That’s a female voice...
