by Eunice Hart
She looked up and caught Peter staring at her, a strange look in his eyes. Was that…admiration? Before she could figure it out, he blinked and straightened in his seat.
“Beautiful, smart and kind,” he said. “I could work with that.”
“Now it’s your turn to spill,” she told him. She pointed her fork at him as she spoke. “And don’t you dare try to back out of it. Tell me why you’ve been so obsessed with that legacy of yours.”
His expression turned grim all of a sudden. Adele was starting to wonder whether making him talk wasn’t a huge mistake when a woman in a silk black gown appeared at their table, a not-so-friendly smile on her face. She was Asian, Chinese to be exact. Her hair was in curls pulled back in a beautiful ponytail, her skin smooth and gleaming in the lights form overhead. Looking at her, Adele couldn’t help thinking that she’d seen this woman before.
At any rate, why was she suddenly standing at their table like she had business here?
“Um, excuse me,” she said. “Can I help you?”
The woman gave her a cold stare, her features scrunching up like she’d just smelled trash. Adele felt a surge of rage but managed to contain it. This woman clearly wasn’t here to make friends with her. She glanced across the table at Peter, who suddenly had a troubled look on his face. At the same time, the woman looked, too.
“Hey, Peter!” she said, reaching to touch Peter’s shoulder; she kissed his cheek and rubbed his arm lightly, and Adele could’ve sworn she felt a capillary burst somewhere. “It’s so nice to see you again.”
Peter could not have looked more uncomfortable. “Um, it’s nice to see you again.”
“Peter, who is this?” Adele snapped all of a sudden, bringing their attention back to her. The woman shot her an annoyed look, like she couldn’t believe Adele had had the audacity to interrupt her.
Her boyfriend sighed. “Adele, this is Cho Byers. Cho, this is my girlfriend, Adele. Cho is my sister’s friend –”
“Who he’s brought here on a date with him,” Cho interjected, smiling meaningfully at Adele. “That wasn’t too long ago…”
Suddenly, it hit Adele why the woman seemed to familiar. She was the other Asian woman she’d spotted with Peter the last time she’d come to the mall with Betty. Cho was the one he’d been with when he ignored her. What had happened on that date? Had they kissed? Gone home to have sex afterwards?
Adele didn’t think she wanted to know the details. She couldn’t sit here and watch this woman brag about her history with Adele. Before either of them could utter another word, she shot to her feet and stormed out of the restaurant.
*****
She left the mall, but she didn’t go very far. She managed to reach the car before she gave up, leaning against it and fuming, unsure whether or not bursting into tears was a valid reaction. She tried to slow her breathing, but something told her that wasn’t going to be possible anytime soon. Not with everything that had just happened.
It wasn’t long before Peter came running out of the building, looking frustrated out of his wits. When he caught sight of Adele leaning against the car, he heaved a sigh of relief and tried to pull her into his arms, but she wouldn’t budge.
“What happened between you and that woman?” she demanded.
“Adele, why would you –?” he began, but she stopped him with a glare.
“Answer the damn question, Peter.” Resisting the urge to yell at him, she kept her gaze on his face. “Did you sleep with her?”
His eyes grew wide, his face contorting. “What? No, of course not. I never even liked her. We went on one date, Adele. Just one. And it was because Aneko wouldn’t stop nagging me if I hadn’t.”
Somehow, she knew he wasn’t lying. When she thought about it, he had seemed pretty uninterested in his date the day she saw him with Cho. Today, he’d been grinning at his date and staring at her like she was the last thing in the world. The recollection made her heart throb.
“I’m sorry I snapped,” she said quickly.
He pulled her to him, wrapping her in a hug. “You had every right to be pissed. But now, we need to get into the car and get the hell out of here. We’ve got bigger problems.”
The second the words were out of his mouth; Adele knew exactly what he was talking about.
“Aneko,” she supplied.
Peter grunted in reply, and it made her feel a bit worse to know that she was right. If Cho was a friend of Aneko’s that definitely spelled trouble for Adele and her boyfriend. From her brief experience with Cho, she’d learned the woman was a talker. No doubt, she’d already told Aneko everything that had happened at the restaurant, right down to the last detail. That meant Aneko would be making plans to ruin their relationship, targeting Adele to make sure she didn’t get back up.
She could see why Peter seemed so worried now.
Adele let him open the door for her and climbed into the passenger seat, pleased to find that her breathing had slowed down a bit. Peter slid into the driver seat beside her and turned on the engine. He gripped the steering wheel for a moment, staring out the windshield, then turned the engine off.
“You wanted me to tell you why I was so obsessed with the Tanaka legacy,” he said without looking in her direction.
Adele gazed at him, surprised that he still had that on his mind. “Peter, you don’t have to –”
“Shortly before my father died, he used to tell me how important family was, how important it was to uphold our values. For us Tanakas, it was even more important than usual. As a family of class, we were expected to mix only with people of our class.”
“Rich people,” Adele guessed. “People like Cho.”
He nodded. “High-class Asian families like the Tanakas are expected to have ‘high standards’ – you know, go to balls, date only Asian people from wealthy families, maintain our tradition and style so that the family name would never die. When my father died, I was expected to honor his memory by making sure I did what he taught me to. I’d inherited the Tanaka restaurant chain, and all I wanted to do was make sure it continued to run as it always had.”
“But the family name doesn’t have to die just because you make changes. It’s no reason to be rigid about things.”
“The legacy is the reason I didn’t want anything to do with you in the first place,” Peter said.
Ouch. Adele knew all that was in the past, but it still stung to hear that from him. “Because I wasn’t ‘high-standard’?”
“Because I didn’t want to break the legacy,” he said, sounding a bit evasive. He turned to face her. “But now I realize that was inevitable. Because I fell in love with you, Adele.”
Why was it suddenly hard to breathe? Adele tore her gaze from him and stared out the windshield, trying to calm herself down again. When his hand touched hers, she nearly began hyperventilating.
I fell in love with you. She’d never heard him say those words before. Adele forced herself to look at him again. “You fell in love with me.”
For the first time in what seemed like forever, his lips curved into a smile. “I fell in love with you. And you know what I said to myself?”
“‘Fuck the legacy’,” she guessed.
Peter nodded, squeezing her hand, and Adele felt a rush of emotion. She opened her mouth to speak, but just then she spotted a woman in a black gown walking out of the restaurant, her phone pressed to her ear.
“Damn, it’s Cho!” she hissed.
Both she and Peter ducked, nearly banging their heads together in the process. Her head almost in his lap, Adele watched out of the corner of her eye as the woman yelled angrily into her phone and hung up, walking away in the direction of a Hummer parked several cars away.
“That was a close one,” Peter said, exhaling softly. He shifted, causing her head to move from his thigh to his groin. Something hard poked her cheek and she startled.
“What the –?” she burst into laughter, even harder when she caught the embarrassed expression on Peter’s face.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to ruin the moment,” he said. “But your head was right there, and I couldn’t –”
“You didn’t ruin anything, Peter,” Adele told him. She pulled him towards her and pressed her lips against his, sighing when his hands reached for her body and caressed her. She pulled him harder and reclined the seat so that he was more comfortably on top of her, wrapping her legs around him to keep him in place. Peter left her lips and began planting hot kisses on her exposed neck, causing her to moan and clutch him harder.
She felt his hands come up to her breasts, kneading them and tweaking her nipples through her bra, causing them to instantly harden at his touch. Adele retaliated by reaching down to cup him through his pants, marveling at the way his cock felt in her hand. If they weren’t in a Porsche now, she would’ve lost control and gone down on him. Why had Peter thought it would be okay to bring her on a date in a convertible of all cars?
Suddenly, it occurred to her that they were still outside the mall. Why she was just remembering this, Adele didn’t know. Maybe it was because she’d had such a beautiful, sexy man on top of her. She tapped Peter’s shoulder to get him to stop kissing her neck, half wishing she didn’t have to. When he didn’t react, she gave him a hard swat, causing him to jerk up in surprise. There was a grunt as his head banged against the roof of the car.
“What was that for?” he wanted to know. From his expression, she could tell he didn’t like being interrupted like that. She just hoped he didn’t get bluebells from this.
“We can’t continue,” she told him, gesturing out the window at the pedestrians, a few of whom seemed to have noticed them as they passed by. “Not here, at least. Let’s get out of here.”
Peter groaned.
*****
As he’d predicted, Aneko was waiting for him when he got home later that night, having dropped Adele at her apartment. This time, there was no music, no wineglass, nothing.
Oh, and she looked angry.
Outraged was the better way to put it. Peter didn’t think he’d ever seen his sister so mad in a long while. Aneko was mostly cocky and mean, but anger was usually out of it. The last time he’d seen her so mad was when they were still teenagers, and she swore to get revenge one of their cousins for offending her. Peter must’ve really struck a nerve this time.
“I’m guessing Cho’s told you everything,” he said, taking a seat in the living room and turning on the television.
Aneko snatched the remote out of his hand and turned it off. “Don’t you dare disrespect me like this. I know what you did, what you are doing with that…that –”
“Her name is Adele,” Peter said, eyeing the remote. “Please, give that back. There’s a game tonight.”
“I don’t care about your stupid game!” Aneko shouted. “I care that you’re ruining our family’s legacy by dating that…that bitch!”
At her words, his eyes narrowed. This time, it was his turn to glare at his sister. “Don’t talk about my girlfriend that way. Not in my presence. Not in my house. Not ever.”
“Can you even hear yourself?” Aneko began to pace. “You speak of her as if she is someone special. She isn’t even classy enough to be a maid for the Tanakas. I knew you were making a big mistake when you let her continued to work for you. I knew, and I tried to help save the legacy by firing her, but you had to go ahead and date her.” She threw her hands up in exasperation and stopped, turning to face him. “Have you slept with her yet?”
“Not that it’s any of your concern, but yeah, I have,” he told her, his jaw set stubbornly.
Immediately, he realized maybe that was a bit extra. Aneko opened her mouth to speak but seemed to decide against it. She tossed the remote at him and flounced out of the living room, and he could hear her footsteps as she stormed up the stairs.
Peter stared at the remote in his lap but didn’t touch it. He didn’t like how this had ended. How things were starting. Aneko wasn’t quite done yet; Peter knew that much about his sister. Soon, Aneko would try again to get back at Adele, to make sure their relationship didn’t see the light of day ever again. And Peter could only do so much to make sure Adele didn’t get hurt. Aneko could be rather wily.
He couldn’t help thinking that the time would come when he would have to choose between the two women. But what would his decision be? His family or the woman who had captured his heart and who he couldn’t seem to stop thinking about? If that time ever came…Peter knew he would never truly be able to make that choice.
Chapter 8
A Million Dollars for a Heart, Anybody?
The necklace was silver and shone like a flashlight in a hall of mirrors, gleaming all around. It had a small pendant in the shape of a heart. A heavily studded, extremely expensive heart. The thing was covered completely in diamonds. It had taken her a whole minute to realize it was a locket. When she opened it, she saw the words I LOVE YOU engraved on the silver inside, gleaming before her eyes. Staring at it, Adele felt a gush escape her. It was simply beautiful.
That was what she had said when Peter bought it for her the night before, when he put it around neck and let her admire herself in the mirror. It was what Betty had said when she laid eyes on it for the first time.
“I need myself a rich boyfriend,” she’d said, staring at it like it was the original Mona Lisa painting. “How much did it cost?”
From what Adele had discovered during their transaction at the jewelry store, it was worth over two hundred thousand dollars. She’d been reluctant to accept it from Peter, but he’d insisted, so she took it. Now she walked around, wearing two hundred and fifty thousand dollars around her neck. She sat in her office, staring at the necklace for a while before putting it back on, unable to stifle the smile that crept onto her face.
She knew it wasn’t much of a cost for a man like Peter Tanaka, but to Adele, the necklace definitely meant a lot. She’d never received anything as precious as this before. Well, except for a cardboard dollhouse her father had once created for her, years before he died. That had a lot of emotional value.
She fingered the pendant again and thought about how lucky she was to be with Peter. It wasn’t just that he was rich, although that was a huge bonus. Around him, she felt happy. It felt good to know that he loved her. And the sex was amazing. It was a perfect relationship that nothing could possibly ruin.
Just then, the door burst open, proving her wrong. Sure enough, the woman standing in the doorway was none other than Aneko Tanaka.
Adele shot out of her chair. “What are you doing here?”
Aneko looked at her as if she couldn’t believe her ears. “My brother owns this place. I think that gives me the right to go wherever I please.”
She had a point. Reluctantly, Adele sat back down and offered the other woman a seat. “I wasn’t expecting anyone today – certainly not you, of all people – but I guess I could make time for you –”
“Please.” Aneko waved her hand dismissively. “Don’t try to patronize me. That’s what I do.”
Adele bit back a curse. “Well, how can I help you?”
She was starting to wish she’d taken the day off today. If she’d known Aneko would show up, she would have. But then the woman would have come to her office some other time. With all her luck, it would be on the day she was most unprepared.
Like today.
“I want to make you an offer.”
Something about the way she said it made snapped Adele back to attention. She straightened in her seat; her eyes narrowed. “What are you talking about?”
Aneko’s lips twitched. She was wearing dark lipstick and heavy mascara. Between that and the fact that she had on a black pantsuit, she looked like a company boss with evil tendencies. Which wasn’t very far from the truth when Adele thought about it.
“I want you to stay away from my brother.”
Adele tried to keep her features from contorting into a scowl. She settled for a frown, looking at Aneko like she’d just s
uggested that she catapult herself into the sun. “With all due respect, how the hell is that supposed to be an offer?”
“It isn’t.” Aneko reclined in her seat, touching her fingertips together. “It’s merely what I want. My offer is a million dollars.”
Adele gaped at her, her jaw nearly hitting the table. A million dollars? Had she heard this woman correctly? A million dollars was a lot more than lottery money. That was enough money to keep her, Betty and her mother comfortable for years without any of them having to work. If she invested it, she could be an even bigger millionaire. She would be the subject of envy of so many women in Massachusetts.
But was all that really worth the love that she and Peter shared? One million dollars was certainly a lot, but was it worth it if the owner wasn’t happy? If Adele agreed to Aneko’s terms, she would be rich, that was for sure. But she’d gotten so attached to Peter, she wasn’t sure she could ever live knowing she’d traded him for money, even if it was a million bucks.
Aneko must’ve seen the gears turning in her head, because she suddenly smiled and said, “I know it must be hard for you to process, seeing as your kind can only dream of having so much money. But I’m a woman of my word. I assume you are as well. Once you agree to leave this job and stay out of my brother’s life completely, you get your million dollars and we go our separate ways. Everybody’s happy.”
Your kind. That was all it took for to set Adele’s mind back on the right track. This woman was nothing but a classist, conniving, sadistic bitch.
“Everybody’s happy?” she repeated. “I think you mean you’re happy. Because I know I wouldn’t be. And neither would Peter. And you know why that is?”
“Because you feed off him and he’s too stupid to see that you leaving his life is better than worse for him?” Aneko offered.
Adele resisted the urge to swipe that poker face off her. Lunging at Aneko would only give her more reasons to think she wasn’t good enough for her brother, for anything.
“Miss Tanaka,” she said maintaining her composure, “I’ll have you know that my relationship with Peter has nothing to do with monetary gain. What we feel for each other is way beyond money. I love him, and that’s that.”