“I don’t believe that for a minute. I think you’d offer any employee a ride home. You just don’t want people to know that about you. Besides, you barely even noticed what I looked like the night we met and you drove me home.”
Rush lit a cigarette and sucked in a long drag of smoke. Blowing it out the window, he turned to me.
“White T-shirt with a V-neck that laced up, black bra underneath. Denim jeans with a rip in one knee.
The left, to be specific. Hair down, loose and wavy. Glasses.”
My mouth dropped open. He’d just perfectly described what I wore the night we met, down to the bra I hadn’t even realized was visible under my shirt.
Rush glanced over and caught the surprise on my face. “Glasses were sexy as shit, by the way. You should wear them more often.”
I laughed. “I think you have a really good memory, and your motives were more altruistic than you want me to believe.”
He puffed his cigarette. “Suit yourself. But I’m showing you a wolf and yet you still want to see me as the sheep.”
Rush’s cell rang. Glancing at the name flashing, he said it was a liquor distributor he’d been trying to reach and he had to take it. Of course, he broke the rules of the road and spoke holding the cell to his ear instead of on hands-free. I looked out the window while he argued with someone over how many cases of vodka were delivered.
We’d just merged onto the Long Island Expressway and had another two hours of drive time in front of us. When I’d asked Rush this morning if I could hop a ride with him to the city, it was mostly a ploy to spend more time with him. But now that it was getting closer to surprising my dad for lunch, I was really excited about it. It had been at least two months since I’d seen him. We talked on the phone every few days, but we normally didn’t go this long without spending time together.
When Rush hung up, I was still thinking about my father. I said, “When I was a kid, my dad and I used to take a road trip every summer.”
He tossed his cell on the dashboard. “Oh yeah? Where’d you go?”
I shrugged. “Nowhere fancy. We didn’t have a lot of money, but Dad always made sure we got a vacation in. Sometimes it was Pennsylvania, sometimes Maine. A few times we even drove down to Florida. We used to play car games the entire trip. I’m not even sure if they were real games, or if Dad made them up.”
“What? Like the license plate game where you have to find all the states.”
“No. They were always games where we had to make up stories and stuff. My favorite was fortunately-unfortunately.”
Rush glanced over at me and back to the road. “Never heard of it.”
“One person would say something fortunate that starts with Fortunately and then the next person would have to make up something unfortunate about the previous situation. If you stumble giving the unfortunate story to go with the fortunate story, you get a strike. Three strikes and the other person wins.”
“I don’t get it.”
“Like this…” I tapped my finger to my lip and stared out the window as we drove until I thought of something. “Fortunately, Rush was going into the City today, and I could hitch a ride. Now you have to come up with the next part, relating to my part, and your sentence has to start with Unfortunately.
Go ahead. Give it a try. I’ll say mine again. Fortunately, Rush was going into the City today, and I could hitch a ride.”
Rush grinned as he continued to keep his eyes on the road. “Unfortunately, Gia remembered this stupid fucking game and ruined the ride into the City.”
“That’s it! That’s how it goes. Except you’re a jerk.”
Rush chuckled.
“I’m starting over now that you got the hang of it.” I smiled. “Fortunately, Rush missed his date last night, which meant he was spared a hideous case of the crabs.”
He shook his head. “Unfortunately, he now had blue balls and will be needing to borrow the icepack that Gia used after her barroom brawl last night.”
I kept it going. “Fortunately, Rush has a strong right hand and can take care of that problem easier than clearing up an STD.”
“Unfortunately, Rush’s dick knows the difference between beating off and being inside a woman.”
I laughed. “You’re really good at this! In a twisted sort of way.”
“Oh yeah? Just wait. On the way home I’m going to start all the stories. And I’ve got nothing better to do than sit in my board meeting all day and think of warped shit for you to have to answer later.”
Why was I sort of looking forward to that?
As we continued to drive, it dawned on me that I’d been spending all of this time with Rush and didn’t even know his last name.
I turned to him. “Hey…I never asked, what’s your last name?”
His jaw tensed. “That’s kind of a random question…”
“Yeah, well, I just realized it’s a little weird that I don’t know.”
He let out a harsh breath. “You don’t need to know my last name.”
“You slept in my bed last night. I think the least you could do is tell me your last name. Besides, it’s not like I couldn’t just ask someone at work what it is.”
“Actually, the only one who knows is Oak. And he’s been given strict instructions not to give it out to anyone—that includes you, Gia Mirabelli.”
“Oh my God. That’s so shady.” I laughed. “Why?”
“Because people don’t need to know my fucking business.”
“It’s your name! That’s hardly private information.”
“It is to me.”
I leaned in a little. My voice was low and sexy. “Come on. Tell me.”
“No,” he spewed.
“Why?”
Silence.
More silence.
He wasn’t even answering me anymore. I was becoming more and more curious by the second. I devised a plan that I hoped would work.
When I started to wave at the driver of a big rig next to us, he yelled, “What the hell are you doing?”
“If you don’t tell me your name, I’m gonna flash that trucker.”
The driver honked at me and smiled. I really wasn’t going to go through with it, but Rush had no way of knowing that.
His Mustang swerved a little. “You wouldn’t do that…”
My eyes widened. “Oh yeah? Watch me.”
A vein in his neck popped as I began to lift my shirt. Either he was going to tell me his last name, or he was going to crash the car. Just as the material was almost all the way up, Rush blurted it out.
“My name is Heathcliff Rushmore!” He expended a breath and grumbled, “Fuck.”
Heathcliff Rushmore?
Heathcliff?
Rushmore?
I covered my mouth. “Oh my…that’s interesting.”
He looked so angry at himself. “Happy now?”
I beamed. “Yes, actually, I am.” I repeated to myself, “Heathcliff Rushmore…Heath…Heath Rushmore…hmm.”
“I was named after my grandfather.”
I snapped my finger. “So, that’s why you go by Rush…”
He feigned surprise. “Wow…you’re really smart.”
“Shut up.” I laughed then said, “Thank you for telling me.”
He flashed a hesitant smile. “You didn’t give me much of a choice, brat.”
“Heathcliff. It’s good to see you, son.” My father patted my back, interrupting the conversation I was in the middle of with Gerald Horvath, my grandfather’s attorney and always the only friendly face in the room toward me.
“Edward.” I nodded.
My father and brother hated my existence, but appearances were important to them. Disdain hid under a masked smile when anyone was around. Especially when that anyone had voting power, as Gerald did.
Grandfather’s attorney had just given me the dirty details of the purpose of today’s meeting.
Vanderhaus owned commercial real estate all over Manhattan, and today’s vote was to approve a large property sale without disclosing certain things to the buyer. The board was at odds. My brother, Elliott, and father held forty-nine percent of the company’s voting power and were always a united front. I held twenty-five percent, something I’m sure Grandfather had decided on strategically.