Page 29 of All Fall Down

I’m surprised when the car heads north. “Are we going away from the city?”

“Greenwich,” he confirms. “I need to feed you. It’s my responsibility after draining you of all your strength.”

He takes me to a falafel place that’s so small there’s only room for a few bar stools at the counter. A charming mish-mash of colors compliments the simple menu of three items. Having never ordered falafel nor eaten it, I allow him to order for me. When he presents me with my food in a paper basket, I study it first.

“Trust me,” he urges. I narrow my eyes but pick it the pita.

“What’s in it?” I ask.

“Heaven,” he says with a full mouth.

I take a bite and a variety of exotic, unrecognizable spices explode on my tongue. Next to me Jameson watches, clearly on edge, as I finish chewing and swallow.

“You know how you have all that money?” I ask. His face falls, no doubt he expects me to admonish him for not taking me to a fancy restaurant instead of this hole in the wall. “Can you buy one of these and put it in Belle Mère?”

“Your wish is my command, Duchess.”

When we’re finished, I’m stuffed. I can spy our car and driver, idling around the corner, but I stop Jameson before he can beckon it to us.

“Let’s walk for a second,” I suggest. I need to move if I’m going to digest this food baby I’m packing.

Greenwich, as it turns out, is charming. We find a row of brownstones lined by a canopy of trees. The emerald shade of their leaves makes it a few degrees cooler as we wander along. I sigh, my arm looped through Jameson’s.

“Like it here?” he asks.

“So far I’ve only seen a king-sized bed and a falafel joint, and it’s already my favorite place in the world. I might be biased though.” Resting my head on his shoulder, I wonder how many times he’s been here before. Maybe New York isn’t as charming the hundredth time you visit, but it will always hold a special place in my heart. Jameson has been to cities all over the world. Do they hold a candle to this? “What is your favorite city?”

He flashes me a crooked grin that makes my knees weaken. “The one you’re in.”

“Charm will get you everywhere with me.” I push onto my toes and kiss his cheek.

“Noted.” He points to a brownstone with red lacquered steps leading to the front door. “That one.”

“What about it?” I ask.

“It’s for sale.”

“What are we going to do with a place in New York? Especially when you own an entire hotel?” I ask. I’m guessing there might be a few other real estate holdings in the West family’s New York portfolio. “Are you planning on leaving me any time soon?”

“Not if I can help it.”

“Because I still have a year of prep left.” I don’t want the fairytale to end, but summer is fading around us. Soon we’ll have to face the reality of our responsibilities in Belle Mère.

“And then what?” he asks.

“And then...” My mother had mentioned college before, but I’d always planned on sticking around and bailing Dad out of whatever new mess he found himself in at Pawnography. I never thought I’d get out of town. Las Vegas is a fly strip that’s hard to break free from, but now it seems possible. So, where does that leave me? “I don’t know.”

“We’ll figure it out,” he promises me. “Maybe we can go on some college visits this fall. NYU. You’d probably love Boston.”

“I’m not certain I have Harvard grades.”

“You have Harvard money,” he reminds me.

“What about you?” I interject, not wanting to consider if Hans’s blood money could be used for that expense. “Don’t you want to finish your degree?”

Jameson had left school—and the prescribed life his father had planned for him. Now that there is no one around to hold him to a vision of the future he didn’t share, he has decisions to make as well.

“Most people go to undergrad and business school in the hopes that they’ll land themselves at a fortune five hundred company,” he says. “I’m already acting CEO of one.”