Fake Empire(20)

“Crew.” Scarlett clears her throat. “This was Crew’s idea.”

“Excellent choice, man.” Dave smiles at me before his attention returns to Scarlett. “And what are you going to pick?”

“Uh…” she stalls. For the first time ever, I see Scarlett look unsure. Rather than revel in it, I scramble to come up with some random hobby I can blurt out. Golf?

“It can be anything,” Dave urges. “Anything you’ve always wanted to try?”

“We doing this or not?” Oliver appears, phone in hand. “If not, I’m heading back to the office.”

“You can think it over some more,” Dave tells Scarlett, then turns to the rest of us. “I’ll meet you all by the wall over there.” He points vaguely toward the right before heading to the left. We’re surrounded by nothing but walls. Not just the four typical ones, but lots of additional ones covered with colorful, fake rocks meant as continual handholds.

“Do we think he’s qualified to teach people how to scale cliffs?” Jeremy questions.

“Dave’s great,” Asher replies. “Super chill.”

“That’s exactly what I’m worried about,” Jeremy replies. “Super chill isn’t the first qualification I’d consider in an instructor.”

I ignore their bickering and ask Oliver, “What was the call about?”

My brother grimaces. “Powers wants to come back to the table without the marketing division.”

“He’s folding?”

Oliver nods. “He held out for longer than I expected him to.”

“Me too,” I agree.

Dave reappears with ropes and harnesses for a short tutorial on what we’re supposed to do in order to leave the ground. Despite Jeremy’s misgivings, Dave seems knowledgeable. I’m more concerned with the woman beside me than Dave’s laid-back personality. If anything, his ease is a welcome addition to the group. Scarlett seems to be growing tenser by the second.

Once the demonstration ends, we’re sent off to a corner of the gym. Asher immediately starts climbing while Jeremy spots him. Oliver is further down, talking with Dave. Probably trying to get out of doing this.

Scarlett clips on her harness and stares up at the rock face that extends fifty feet up in the air. I stare at her. She looks over suddenly, catching me studying her profile.

“Well?” I prompt.

“Well what?”

“Well, are you going to climb the damn thing or not?” I drawl.

“Give me a minute,” she snaps.

“For what? The wall is right in front of you. Just grab a handle and get started. It’s easy.”

“I never said it was hard!”

“Then why aren’t you climbing?”

“I’m…preparing.”

I scoff. “Preparing for what?”

“Preparing to put my life in your less than capable hands. I’m not exactly overflowing with confidence in your ability to catch me.”

“You’re wearing a harness attached to a rope above a foam mat. Of course I’m not going to catch you. Don’t be ridiculous.”

“With charm like that, it’s shocking anyone tells you no,” she retorts. Her words are sharp and her stance is confrontational. But there’s something hovering beneath the annoyance, obvious in the way she won’t meet my gaze and is fiddling with the strap of the harness.

“Tell me what’s really wrong,” I demand.

“I told you, I’m—”

“Scarlett.”

Her teeth sink into the full, bright red of her lower lip. I’ve avoided looking at her mouth. The last time I paid it too close attention, I almost kissed her. I’m about to say her name again when she answers. “I’m apprehensive about being too high off the ground.”

The meaning sinks in slowly. “You’re scared of heights,” I realize, then laugh. “Are you kidding me?”

“That is not what I said,” Scarlett replies hotly. “I just—”

“Six one way, half-dozen the other,” I respond. “Say it however you want, that’s what you meant.”

She considers that. “Fine. Heights aren’t my favorite.”

I laugh again. “Unbelievable. You’re really that stubborn? You came to a climbing gym and you’re scared of heights?”

“One, you’re not Mr. Easy Going yourself. Two, I didn’t know we were going to a rock-climbing gym. Your misogynistic friend didn’t specify when he invited me.”

“Asher is far from a misogynist. He loves women.”

Scarlett rolls her eyes. “Loving women and respecting women are two different things.”

I feel a sudden urge to defend Asher, despite the fact he’s the reason I’m standing here arguing with her. “He respects women too.”

“Do you?”

I stiffen and glare. “What the fuck kind of question is that? You’re marrying me, and you don’t think I respect women?”

“I didn’t say that you don’t, I asked if you do.”

“You’ve got a creative way of saying everything, huh?”

Her chin rises as she glowers right back at me. “You want to know why I came here, Crew? To prove myself. Because I always have to prove myself. When you show up at Kensington Consolidated, people don’t assume you’re there to meet your dad for lunch. They don’t think they know more than you do about the company that is your family’s legacy. They don’t wonder about who you’ll marry because they assume that person will have a say in their job one day. We may be similar in some ways, but we are not the same.”