Over the Edge (Bridge #3)
Meredith Wild
For Team Wild,
for loving saucy stories as much as I do!
Chapter One
OLIVIA
The blackish walls of the underground tunnel blurred on either side of the train. The pungency of too many bodies crushed into one space mixed with the unnatural scent of the subway—something mechanical and gaseous at once.
On the other end of the car, a group of teenagers in school uniforms chatted loudly. A few middle-aged men in suits held onto the vertical poles and stared at their phones. A woman with long salt-and-pepper hair looked tired and worn, like she’d been on the train all night. We were a potpourri of culture and humanity, stuck in this stifling metal car.
I flinched when a warm hand touched mine. Beside me, a little girl no more than five years old gently traced her fingertip along the platinum charm that adorned my wrist. The Tiffany bracelet had been a gift from my parents.
“That’s so pretty.” She glanced up at me with mesmerizing brown eyes that widened when she smiled.
“Thanks,” I said, returning her sweet smile.
She was striking for being so young. A true beauty. But as I looked closer, she had dirt under her fingernails, and her clothes were browning at the hems. Beside her sat a woman I guessed was her mother. Lines of age and experience spider-webbed her tanned skin. She glanced between her daughter and me before speaking to her in a language I didn’t know, a series of reprimanding sounds and inflections. The girl’s hand fell away quickly, and she cast her gaze to the floor.
No one ever said it, but I oozed privilege. I knew it. My upbringing clung to me everywhere I went. The truth of it made New York City the best and worst place for me to call home. Every day, extreme wealth met extreme poverty on the streets of this city. I’d been trying to work the middle ground, but I’d only ever known one life.
I exited at my stop and left the bustling station for the busy street. I exhaled the community air I’d spent the past ten minutes breathing. The early morning breeze was cool through my light shirt. I tried to tighten my blazer around me, except it was fashioned not to button in the front.
I turned the corner, and the building was already in sight. Only a block from the subway stop, the prime real estate would be home to our new fitness center—the project my brothers and I had been planning for months.
My brothers, Cameron and Darren, had informed me that walls would be going up this week. Construction sites weren’t really my forte, but having been involved in the design and layout of our second location, I wanted to get a quick look at how the renovation was coming along.
I paused before the entrance. A temporary sign was bolted above the doorway that read, Future Home of Bridge Fitness, A Donovan Property. A swell of pride filled me when I thought about everything my brothers had accomplished with this venture, without the financial backing of our parents. Cameron and Darren were making it on their own, even if our family’s wealth had provided every excuse not to.
One step inside, and a different kind of pride stiffened my spine. The walls were going up indeed. Just beyond the entrance, a line of evenly spaced studs divided the entryway from the rest of the gym. I’d spent hours poring over blueprints with the architect, and that wall was not supposed to be there. Nonetheless, a worker was hammering nail after nail into the structure.
“This wall doesn’t belong here,” I said, pointing toward the offending two-by-fours.
The worker turned to me and then gestured to the other side of the room where two men were talking. “The boss is over there if you want to talk to him about it.”
Without a second’s delay, I approached the men. “Excuse me,” I said firmly, barely able to harness my irritation.
Both turned toward me. The older one had gray hair buzzed close to his scalp and soft brown eyes. The younger man stilled when he saw me. His blue-eyed gaze made a slow circuit up and down my body. I shifted my blazer again. Unfortunately, the morning chill had turned my nipples into tiny popsicles, and anyone with two eyes could see that now.
I cleared my throat and prepared to rip him a new one. “We have a problem.”
“What’s the problem, miss?” The older man frowned.
“For starters, that’s supposed to be a glass wall. You need to tell him to stop. You’re wasting manpower and materials. This isn’t what the plans call for.”
The younger man spoke up. “And who are you?”
I cocked my head when his eyes narrowed slightly. The intense blue bored into me with an intensity that sent a shiver over my skin.