“I sold three more paintings at the closing show, so I ended up with some extra money I wasn’t expecting.” She tilts her head at me and smiles. “And I wanted to do this for you. I wanted to get you something we don’t need, but that might make you happy.”
I sling an arm around Anya’s shoulders and draw her closer, pressing a kiss to her forehead. “You know what else would make me happy?”
She leans back and scans my face, then rolls her eyes. “Oh my God, this is the beginning of the end, isn’t it? Because I assumed the answer to that question was sex. But you want to mow the lawn right now, don’t you?” I nod and she sighs, ducking out of my embrace to head back into the house. “I’ll bring you a beer when you’re done.”
An hour later, I’m on the front porch, sitting on the stoop and watching the world go by. Anya emerges from the house, hands me a beer and takes a seat next to me. We sip in silence, sitting next to each other with the sides of our legs pressed close and our shoulders nudging together. A gentle but powerful sense of being right where I belong settles inside of me, rooting itself down into my bones and easing its way into the parts of me I thought would always feel a little broken. And with that easy contentment comes something even sweeter.
Love.
The kind of love that’s tougher and stronger than what I once believed in. A love that’s forever—not because it’s easy, but because it’s worth it.
I raise my bottle to the person who taught me what that kind of love is all about. Anya raises a brow, holds her beer up, and smiles.
“To us,” I say with a grin. “And to finding our way home to what matters. Together.”
Thank You!
Thank you so much for reading What Matters More! I hope you enjoyed JT and Anya’s story.
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Also, I hope you’ll consider leaving a review wherever you purchased your copy. Reviews not only help readers find the books they love, they also support the authors who want to write those books, so I’m truly grateful when you take the time to share your thoughts with others.
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Be sure to visit my website for playlists, bonus extras, and updates on future projects.
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xoxo,
LB
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PS: Want a peek into my new Reluctant Hearts series? Read on for the first three chapters of After This—an enemies-to-lovers romance featuring a charming playboy executive who finds himself at odds with a smart and sexy woman who isn’t the least bit interested in being charmed…
1
Alec
Four words are all it takes to send my morning into a tailspin, almost before it starts.
My office. Ten minutes.
A straightforward text like this one shouldn’t leave a grown man wondering how quickly he can escape a ten-story building while somehow going unnoticed by everyone inside when he does. In fact, very few things in life should affect a thirty-two-year-old man this way, and certainly not a text. Especially when that text is nothing but a to-the-point request about where I need to be and when. Because taken objectively, those words are utterly harmless.
Perhaps.
Unfortunately, I know that a text like this one from my boss—within minutes of arriving at the office—is likely something I’m not going to want to hear. At least not before I’ve consumed enough caffeine to keep up with whatever Alessandra Rossi-Mason is about to throw my way.
Because even though she’s only five foot two, her aura outsizes her physical being a few times over. And good luck trying to outwork her, because despite sleeping just three hours a night, the woman is always ten steps ahead of everyone else in the room. She’s tough, tenacious, and an all-around corporate badass.
She’s also my mom.
That last bit probably explains the low-grade panic I’m experiencing. I don’t care how old I get, being summoned by my mom always has the power to make me feel like I’m eight years old again, caught red-handed eating the cookies I wasn’t supposed to touch. But my mom’s brand of supervising—as both a parent and a boss—is built on healthy doses of love and respect. So no matter what awaits me in her office, I know it won’t involve spite or intimidation.
Now, even if my mom’s love will always trump her badass-ness when it comes to her kids, that doesn’t mean I’m stupid. There’s no way I’m going to walk into her office empty-handed and risk her picking up on how unprepared I feel. My cute grins don’t quite work the way they did when I was a kid, so I’ll need something else to serve as a distraction.
I slide back the cuff of my dress shirt and glance at my watch. Nine o’clock. Also known as the perfect time for a macchiato, prepared traditionally as my Italian mother prefers it. According to her, anything that’s served in a paper cup and topped with a drizzle of caramel should not be considered a macchiato. Avoiding coffee shops where that’s the norm is just one reason she paid five figures to have an espresso machine imported from Milan, where she grew up.
After a quick stop at the espresso machine, I head down the hall toward my parents’ office suite, which comprises the top floor of our family business’s headquarters. I share this floor with them and my sister Marissa while the rest of the building houses the myriad of employees who help make Mason Enterprises one of Houston’s top fifty companies.
Although we do business in forty states, we’re headquartered in Texas because my dad is a good ol’ boy who made it big and he refuses to live anywhere but the place that made him a success, both in business and in life. Over the past forty years, Mason Enterprises has become a powerhouse in not one but two competitive industries. Mom heads up the real estate side, where our focus is on upscale retail developments. Dad handles the oil and gas side, overseeing thousands of drill sites across the country. In short, there’s a strong chance that you have Mason Enterprises to thank for that fancy new strip mall with the big-box store that just opened up by your house, along with everything it takes to heat, cool, and power the store itself.
So you’re welcome… or I’m sorry. Take your pick really. The truth is, we work in contentious industries, and if you ask a hundred people how they feel about a company like Mason Enterprises, you’ll probably get a hundred different answers, ranging from “I love having ten Starbucks stores within a one-mile radius of my house” to “Someone should feed you to the polar bears you’re killing each day with your glacier-melting assault on Mother Earth.” We can be controversial to say the least. Honestly, there are days when I’m not even sure which side of the argument I’m on.
The double doors leading into my parents’ office are propped open as they always are. I stroll in and find Mom slowly pacing the length of her desk, a cell phone pressed to her ear, murmuring the occasional affirmative sound to whoever is on the other end of the line. She’s dressed in a simple red sheath dress paired with stilettos that add a good four inches to her height. Her only accessories are her wedding ring and a pair of princess-cut diamond solitaire earrings. Her jet-black hair is styled into a sharp chin-length bob that matches the rest of her refined, minimalist style.