The Billionaire's New Life by Carrie Ann Hope

Author:Carrie Ann Hope [Hope, Carrie Ann]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2019-12-09T16:00:00+00:00

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NINE

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Everyone was laughing. Relaxed. Happy. Mark took a look around the dining room table at his family and felt a surge of gratitude that he was able to be here—that they were all able to be here, after a long stretch of years during which family dinners had been few and far between.

Eventually, there’d be kids around the table, too. Tom and Allison had made a couple of comments that had made it clear they weren’t going to wait very long before starting a family of their own.

Maybe Mark would end up being the fun uncle.

Dan and Trisha started to talk about taking the Emily Kay out for some longer trips over the summer, out to Martha’s Vineyard and south along the coast. They’d both grown to love spending time on the boat, and Dad’s opinion was that they ought to put it to good use.

Traveling.

Weddings.

Babies.

Although his stomach was full and he felt mellow and content, Mark hadn’t quite found a way to contribute to the conversation other than by asking questions of his brothers and the women in their lives. When his mother asked Allison how the sales of her book were going, he was tempted to bow out for a while; yes, he’d approved the contents of the book, but it wasn’t something he wanted to spend much time thinking about. After all, it was based around the mess he’d made of his life, and he was trying his best to put all that in the past.

Yes, he was glad Allison was making some good money from it, and that it was bringing some serious attention to her journalistic skills. She was a terrific writer, and he couldn’t complain about his mistakes helping someone else get a leg up on their career.

If only he had something solid to contribute now.

For a while, the conversation went on around him, and he began to listen with only half an ear as his family chattered happily.

Redecorating the apartment.

Tom and Allison’s honeymoon, two weeks in Germany and the Netherlands, a place Allison had always been curious about and wanted to see. Her great-grandmother had grown up in Amsterdam, she said, and she had the address of that old house. Wouldn’t it be great if she and Tom could find it?

It all became just a buzz of voices.

Now that dinner was finished, Mark felt an urge to excuse himself and find a place where he could call Molly and not be interrupted or overheard. He’d picked out one of his parents’ guest rooms and had already spent a couple of nights there—if he claimed to have a headache and said that he wanted to lie down for an hour or two, no one would stop him from retreating down there.

Then he heard someone say, “Mark?”

He blinked. Looked around the table. Discovered that his mother was peering at him. Obviously, she’d asked a question he hadn’t responded to, and was waiting now for him to answer it.

“Sorry,” he murmured.

“Cuba,” she said. “You were there last spring, weren’t you?”

“Um… yeah.

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