Tahiti, Maui, Turks. Will scanned the Wellington Thorne database for honeymoon destinationsâand there were plentyâbut he couldnât decide. None of them screamed âHannah,â and all of them had been on his list of proposal vacations for Madison. Maybe Europe. Hannah had gone before. Perhaps there was somewhere she wanted to see again. There was only one way to find out. He dialed her number on his office phone.
She picked up on the fourth ring. âHello?â
âHello, my darling fiancĂ©e,â he said, cluing her in. He hadnât considered that she wouldnât recognize his office number. âDo you have a second?â
âNot really, but whatâs up?â She sounded distant. Wherever she was, it was crowded and loud. He imagined her sitting in a restaurant in SoHo, waiting for some musician only heard on Alt Nation. Â
âWhere would you like to honeymoon?â
She laughed but quieted when he didnât join in. âOh, youâre serious.â
Muffled background static came across the line, followed by garbled speech, but it sounded more professional than secretive. Maybe his imagination was spot-on.
âListen, I gotta goâimpatient singer and all. But beaches are always nice,â she said at lightning speed before hanging up.
A beach. Well, that narrowed it down and put him right back where he started. Turks, Maui, Tahiti. He pulled up the list of luxury hotels againâHilton Head or Antigua? He opened the weather app on his phone. There didnât appear to be any hurricane warnings for the next week as of yet. Antigua. It was quiet and one of their nicest resorts. Hannah would love it. Assuming she had a passport still. He wrote himself a note to ask before he bought the tickets.
The unmistakable clearing of his older brotherâs throat caught Willâs attention. Jon stood in the doorway in a perfectly pressed suit. It fit better than any suit heâd ever worn before. The Madison effect. It had happened to Will too.
âEverything okay?â Jon asked, stepping into the office. He stood with his hands in his pants pockets, looking heartily uncomfortable. Will almost enjoyed it, but Jon never stopped in without reason anymore.
âYes,â he said more tersely than intended.
âWell, good. Why the sudden vacation?â Jon took a seat.
Fuck. They were tracking his vacation requests. The request had been sudden, but it shouldnât have been cause for alarm. Will had more than enough time built up, and heâd been working his ass off for the last six weeks. âDad sent you?â
âDo you think itâs a good idea to be taking vacation right now? After everything?â Jonâs voice was strained, but his expression remained stoic.
You mean after everything that you caused? He wanted to say it perhaps more than anything heâd ever wanted to say before, but that would be going backward. All the angry words had been said. There was no reason to rehash them, or so his father reminded him at every opportunity. But there was so much left to say that sometimes it made Will sick. His marriage to Hannah was a new path, one in which his father didnât see him as a proverbial screwup who couldnât even keep his girlfriend from sleeping with his brother. Yeah, that had been a Jonathan line for the books, as if his father hadnât set the bar impossibly high from birth.
âItâs just a vacation. Iâm not having a breakdown or doing anything that will embarrass Dad or the company.â He held up two fingers. âScoutâs honor.â
âThat would mean more if you were actually a Boy Scout.â Jon laughed and unbuttoned his jacket, a sure sign that this conversation wasnât over. âLunch then? Iâd love to talkââ
âActually,â Will said, turning off his monitor and pocketing his cell phone, âI have lunch plans. Thanks for stopping inâtotally saved me from being late.â
âHow is it that I see you eat the same salad from Susannaâs every day except for the days when I ask you to have lunch?â Sarcasm clung to every word. Underneath it, Will sensed loneliness, but Jon had done this to himself.
âJust unlucky, I guess.â He took his trench coat down from the rack in the corner of his office, folding it over one arm. His brother didnât move from his chair. Will wanted to leave He didnât owe Jon anything, but Jon was still his big brother, though he couldnât say what that meant anymore. âWe can have lunch when Iâm back. Iâll see what days Daniel has off, and maybe we can make it work. We could go to that place Mom always liked.â
âValspinoâs. We havenât been there in ages.â The tremor in Jonâs voice was slight. Most people wouldnât have noticed it, but Will wasnât most people. He remembered the exact moment that tremor startedâthe morning she was diagnosedâand all those years later, he was still waiting for it to disappear. Of the three brothers, Jon had held on the hardest, as if retaining his grief proved he loved her the most. There was no telling Jon it wasnât a competition. Everything was a competition when you were a Thorne.
NOT TEN MINUTES LATER, Will found himself at 28th and Park, a handful of blocks from his younger brotherâs hospital. It had become such a routine in the last few months that he didnât even realize thatâs where he was headed until he arrived aboveground. As a second-year resident, Daniel kept a busy schedule, but occasionally he could spare a few minutes or a quick cafeteria sandwich. Even when he wasnât free, the area had enough restaurants and parks to keep Will occupied for his lunch hour. Sometimes, if he was feeling touristy, heâd head over to the Empire State Building or the Museum of Sex. Once, when heâd needed a particularly long break from the office, heâd gone to see a movie.
Will walked the few blocks to Madison Square Park. He remembered Hannah mentioning that it was one of her city havens. How many times had they just missed each other over the years? Sat on opposite sides of the park? Or shared the same bench a handful of minutes apart? He shot Hannah a quick text about her passport status before sending another message to his brother. He couldnât tell Daniel. He wanted to, but the less people who knew the truth about Hannah, the more likely his plan would succeed. If he could keep Hannah away from his family for the whole year, he absolutely would. But that wasnât an optionânot with Jon and Madisonâs endless wedding events and the family weekends their father insisted on since he stepped down as CEO.
As a family business, Wellington Thorne had been passed down to his father, Jonathan, and uncle, Grayson, when Willâs grandfather had passed. Per the will, the eldest ThorneâJonathanâwould act as CEO for a period of fifteen years, at which time Grayson Thorne would step into the role while Jonathan took over CFO duties. While the transition of power had been peaceful at the beginning of the year, the clout Willâs father still had over the company and the board was undeniable. It was his own father who had tried to have Will fired, and heâd almost succeeded. And even though his father worked remotely from the Hamptons most of the time, letting Jon handle much of the day-to-day work, Will felt his presence more now than when theyâd shared an office. Some days, he swore his father was having him followed.
Willâs phone vibrated, alerting him to a text from Daniel. Perfect timing. Meet me at Goodtimes.
Goodtimes was the diner near the hospital. It reminded Will of Doc Magooâs with its constant flow of doctors and nurses. Daniel hadnât appreciated the comparison, but that didnât deter Will from making it every time he stepped into the place. He cut down Twenty-Sixth Street to avoid the madness of Madison and Park and jogged the few blocks up Third to the diner. Daniel stood outside chatting with a man Will recognized as one of his brotherâs attendings. He waited for their conversation to end before crossing the street.
âExcuse me, Dr. Carter, is it?â he said, pulling his brother into a hug.
âDick,â Daniel said with a grin. âWhat drove you out of the office this time?â he asked as they sat down at a back booth. Daniel reclined as much as he could in the confined space.
âItâs not a what.â
Daniel laughed, but he didnât open his eyes. Exhaustion etched the lines of his face, heavy bags under his eyes. His scrubs were wrinkled but thankfully clean of any questionable stains. Will wondered how long his shift had beenâhis brother usually put on a better showing than this.
âYou have to give him points for tenacity.â Daniel straightened up at the sound of the waitressâs sneakers against the linoleum. How often did he eat here to recognize the cadence of her steps? âAdele, my love, I need so much coffee.â
Adele appeared to be in her late fifties. She wore the chunky plastic frames of a hipster and a bowling shirt.
âCanât run only on coffee, doc,â she said amiably.
The smile Daniel gave her was affectionateâhe definitely spent too much time at this diner. âI can try, Adele. I can try.â
âAll right, dearieâcoffee and the usual?â
Daniel nodded.
Will skimmed the menu, already missing his salad from Susannaâs. Maybe heâd stop in on his way back to the office. âJust a coffee for me.â
âLong day?â Will asked after Adele turned to the next table.
âIâve been on for, like, eighteen hours or something. They asked me to pick up a half shift as I was walking out the door.â He smiled. âIt was worth it, though. I got to assist on this really cool surgery.â
As he went into the literally gory details, a storm of affection and envy wrecked Willâs mood. Daniel was exhausted but exhilarated as he went on about human anatomy. That excitement was something Will hadnât felt in all his time at Wellington Thorne. Will didnât see that changing anytime soon. Every day under the ever-present gaze of his fatherâs spies, the proverbial noose tightened. Fresh air became harder to come by. But Daniel had gotten out of the family business and of being a perpetual letdown. Will and Jon had each taken the dealâMBA, JD, or MD in exchange for time in the family business. Daniel had refused and had funded his own way through medical school. Even though he was on the path to becoming a great doctor, Daniel was the black sheep when he shouldâve been the golden child. But that was Jonathan Thorne for you, in love first and foremost with his company. Anyone who turned their back on the company turned their back on him.
During his four years of medical school, Daniel hadnât come home onceâheâd wanted to, but he hadnât been welcome. It was only upon his return to New York, with Jon and Will threatening to walk away from the company, that their father had granted him reprieve. The price for their betrayal had been the mandatory family weekends. If they so wanted to be a family, then dammit, they would act like one.
In the almost eleven years since his motherâs passing, his father hadnât softened. Thereâd been that first month, where theyâd traveled to several hotel openings as a family, but if anything, without their mother to temper him, Jonathan had become colder and less forgiving. Will had been nineteen when his mother died, in the middle of his freshman year of college at Columbia. Her death had sent him spiraling out of New York. His father had at least given Will his pick of far-off schools where he could find his head and not make too much of a spectacle of himselfâor at least far enough away that no one would notice or care. U of I had been perfect for that. And his father had been rightâoutside of New York, no one cared.
He didnât remember ever talking about his father with Hannah, at least not in a specific way. He had whined about the weight of expectation. She had countered with stories of suburbia and parents who were involved but not orchestrating. But he couldnât tell her what her parents did for a living or even their first names. He should probably find that out if they were going to be his in-laws, though he suspected Hannahâs parents werenât quite as googleable as Jonathan Thorne.
âUh-oh.â
Danielâs voice pulled Willâs focus back to the conversation. He only hoped the goriest of details had passed. But Danielâs story was long over, and his gaze was fixed on Will.
âWhat?â Will asked, grabbing a fry out of the to-go container Daniel had his food delivered in. It was easier for a quick exit, heâd said.
âYou have that âIâm going to do something incredibly stupid, and yes, it definitely involves a womanâ look.â
Will trained his expression back to neutral. âWhether it is incredibly stupid is yet to be seen, but there is a woman.â