by Geneva Lee
Stay there.
We’re going to have a serious talk about ordering me around later. For now, I’m forced to comply. The last thing he needs is for Nikolai to grab me, too. I get the impression he can compartmentalize and handle this like he claims. I’m not so sure he’d be able to do that if I’m involved. Or maybe I’m reading too much into his need to repeatedly tell me I belong to him when we’re in bed. Either way, I’m stuck in the office for the day while my heart and my head are somewhere else. None of the manuscripts in my slush pile grab me, and then it hits me. In all the chaos, I’d nearly forgotten about the secret I found in a locked drawer at the Eaton.
I pull my mother’s manuscript out of my black Louis Vuitton Neverfull tote, Poppy’s congratulations-on-the-new-job gift. Trust her to know how to make me look like a professional, even when I show up to work in a loose, linen sundress without make-up. I need all the help I can get. I’d barely had time to swing by the Eaton, change, and grab the bag by the time I pried myself away from Sterling’s bed. So much has happened in the last two days, I haven’t even looked at it since I found it in the drawer. I can’t believe it’s only been two days. Maybe it’s spending so much time reliving the past with Sterling as we piece together our time apart, but it feels like years since I pried open the locked drawer at the Eaton and found her book. I trail my fingers over the title page, wishing I could unlock more than just the drawer.
My mother wrote a book. I still can’t quite process it. It feels as though I should have known she was a writer. I keep searching my memories for one of her writing or even talking about it. But there’s nothing. No clue. No hint. The most evidence I can scrounge together of her literary leanings is how strongly she encouraged me towards books my whole life.
“What’s that?” Trish interrupts my day dreams, holding a coffee mug emblazoned with the words Bless your heart. You just flipped my bitch switch.
“Sorry,” I say quickly, shoving it to the side. I have a different manuscript I’m supposed to be working on. “It’s personal. I should get back to work.”
“Already cheating on your first book. Don’t worry, I won’t tell,” she teases, tilting her head to read the title page. “MacLaine? Did you write that?”
“My mother,” I say.
“I didn’t know your mother was a writer.”
“Neither did I,” I confess. “I found it.”
“Have you read it?” she asks.
“Not yet.” I stare at it. “Should I?”
Trish sips her coffee thoughtfully. “I would,” she finally answers, “but I’m nosey.”
“So am I,” I say with a laugh. “But I promised you those edits and—”
“Adair, you have weeks to get those edits in,” she stops me, “and if I’m honest, you’ve seemed a bit distracted today. Maybe you should just read it and get it over with.”
“I don’t know that it’s just the book distracting me.” I chew on my lower lip as a mental list of all my current preoccupations starts scrolling through my brain.
“Tell me that your other distraction is six feet of smoldering manhood,” she says in a lowered voice. “I’ve been meaning to ask if he has a brother.”
“A sister,” I say apologetically.
“Is she as hot as he is?” Trish asks.
“She’s gorgeous,” I confirm, “but a bit of a…” I search for a kinder term than bitch that still gets the point across.
“I have not outgrown my bad phase.” Trish grins. “Bad boy. Bad girl. I’m a sucker for them.”
“Let me see what I can do,” I offer. I doubt Sutton will be interested in anyone I try to set her up with, but maybe it will give us something else to talk about. Like it or not, and she definitely doesn’t, I’m going to be a part of Sterling’s life moving forward. A big part. I need to start smoothing over that relationship as soon as possible.
“In the meantime, read the book,” Trish says firmly, taking her mug and wandering over to the front desk to accept a delivery.
I pick up the title page and turn it over, making a new stack. What if I hate it? What if she wrote about us? I’m pleased to discover chapter one written at the top. It still takes effort to read the first line. Summer always brought a fresh wave of tourists, making every foot of the small island loud. There was no escaping the noise, so like most, she avoided all the places she usually loved.
By lunchtime, I’m halfway through. I’m so absorbed that Trish has to tap me on the shoulder.
“Want anything from the place around the corner? You look like you’re going to skip lunch,” she says.
“I’m good.” I flash her a quick smile, tapping my pencil on my desk.
“You are an editor,” she says with a laugh. “I can’t pry you away from a story.”
She disappears along with most of the staff, leaving only those of us with our noses buried in books behind. Today, I’m not stuck in Nashville. I’m on a small island off the coast of Washington state, puzzling over the toxic romance developing between two such vividly painted characters that I feel like I know them.
My mom wasn’t just a writer. She was a great writer. The discovery leaves me equal parts excited and sad. It’s bittersweet to find this piece of her that she never showed to anyone. I tumble back down the rabbit hole of her story until a shadow falls across my desk.
“I’m really not going to starve,” I tell Trish past the pencil I’m biting between my teeth.
“You can’t keep avoiding my calls,” a cold voice replies, and I look up to discover my brother glaring at me.
“I’m at work,” I say, shuffling mom’s book to the side so he can’t get a glimpse of it. I doubt Malcolm would approve of me reading it or making notes in it or flirting with the idea of publishing it.
“We need to talk,” he ignores my reminder entirely and takes the chair opposite me. My stomach flips over.
About what? There’s so many things we need to say to each other—few of them pleasant—but Sterling was clear that I should avoid my family until we settle things.
“Malcolm, I’m busy.”
“Reading books?” he says with a sneer. Of course, he wouldn’t find any value in that.
“Editing books,” I correct him.
“Perhaps,” he hisses in a low voice, leaning forward, “you could go to work on a different story. The press is having a field day digging up dirt about Mom’s death. It makes us look bad.”
“It makes Dad look bad,” I say flatly.
“It makes all of us look bad.” He grips the edge of my desk until his knuckles are white. “You can’t just ignore this. We need to find out who leaked that story and get it under control.”
I already know who leaked the story. Sterling told Sutton and, well, Sutton doesn’t like me very much. I’m not about to tell Malcolm any of this. “We didn’t do anything wrong. Our father did, and he’s dead, so he can’t even pay for it.”
“You would have liked that, wouldn’t you?” Malcolm releases the desk and settles into his chair with a grim smirk. “What kind of daughter wishes her father had gone to prison?”
“Do you really want me to answer that?” I think of Trish’s mug. My bitch switch has definitely been flipped.
“I want you to give a damn about what’s happening to this family!” he roars. The other editor who skipped lunch looks up from her book with a frown before returning her attention to it. She clearly cares more about being interrupted than what we’re fighting about.
“Why should I?” I ask slowly and carefully. I want him to answer. I want to hear his shitty, self-serving logic from his own lips. It will make all of this easier.
“You aren’t the only one who stands to lose out if more damage is done. Ellie’s inheritance is at stake. Not that I expect you to—”
“Do not presume anything where she’s concerned,” I cut him off. “It’s not your place.”
“It’s not?” he repeats. “You can’t rewrite history, Adair.” He pushes to his feet, an acc
using finger flying my direction. “You fucked up. You paid the price.”
“Is that how you sleep at night? Telling yourself that I deserved it? I’ve always wondered.” I’m on my feet now. My fingers twisting around Sterling’s clover charm like a talisman.
“We did you a favor,” he spits back, “and I’ve been paying for it ever since.”
“A favor?” I repeat. “Fuck you, Malcolm.”
I want to scream at him to get out. I want to threaten him. I want to tell him that she’s mine, and I’m taking her back. But I don’t want to see her dragged into the middle of this. I want to protect her from the worst of it. I always have.
“We all saw what you couldn’t,” Malcolm says in a furious whisper. “You were never cut out to be a mother. No matter what you thought. Where would you be now if we hadn’t dealt with your problem?”
His words aren’t the slap in the face he expects, even if they hurt. They are what I need to hear, however. Any doubt I had about fighting this—fighting them—dissolves into rock-solid certainty that I’m doing the right thing. I’m almost glad he came. Almost.
“Get out,” I say in a soft voice. There’s no point to yelling or screaming. I’ve spent most of my life kicking up a fuss trying to be heard. I’m done with that now.
I’m done with covering up my father’s lies. I’m done with pretending Malcolm isn’t turning into him. I’m done with ignoring the cracks in his marriage—the cracks in his wife. No more playing house, pretending to be the American success story. I don’t want any of it. I only want what’s mine.
“I guess I have to clean up this mess all by myself.” He shakes his head. “You’re a disgrace to the MacLaine name.”
“I think that’s the nicest thing anyone’s ever said to me.”
“Don’t forget that your daughter bears that name,” he says.
Not for long. Sterling and I haven’t discussed it, but I know he’ll agree with me. Ellie isn’t a MacLaine, she’s a Ford—and she’s going to escape all of this.
“Ginny said you wouldn’t help, but I didn’t believe her. I didn’t think you would stoop so low as to abandon your family. Well, consider it done. You don’t want to be a MacLaine, you’re out. But don’t you dare show up on our door. We’re done with you, too. All of us, including Ellie.”
I close my eyes and take a deep breath before the boiling rage inside me bubbles out of my lips. It’s what he wants: to bait me. He’s done it for years. Dangling Ellie over my head is the number one move in the MacLaine playbook. It’s how they’ve kept me quiet.
For one moment, I’m tempted to lunge at the bait, afraid that he’ll make good on this threat. I grasp the clover charm tighter and remember every promise Sterling made that we’ll protect Ellie no matter what. I mash my lips into a thin line to keep myself from screaming, knowing he’ll just use it against me.
“You really hate us that much?” he asks after a prolonged silence.
Winter five years ago
Six weeks. That’s how long it’s been since I’ve gotten more than three hours of unbroken sleep. Probably longer, given that I’d woken up every hour to use the bathroom starting at eight months. My eyes droop and I lean back in the recliner, a curved pillow propped carefully with two other cushions on my lap and a sleeping newborn on it. Ellie fell asleep nursing, but her lips continue to form tiny O-s in her sleep. I’m afraid to shut my eyes, worried she’ll fall or roll. Putting her on my chest would be a better solution, but I’m even more afraid she’ll wake up. Her eyelids flutter in her dreams and a sleepy smile flashes across her face.
And then I’m afraid if I close my eyes, I’ll miss moments like this—precious, perfect moments that are slipping away too fast.
“You should get some rest. I can take her,” Felix offers.
But I shake my head, determined to power through. “I want to watch her sleep. She smiles. See.”
Felix leans over and catches another grin. This one looks not unlike she’s had too much to drink and passed out. Milk drunk.
“She’s flirting with the angels,” he whispers.
“What?” I say with a soft laugh.
“That’s what my mother used to say when a baby smiled in its sleep.” He straightens and turns an appraising eye on me. “You need more rest, Adair. You’re still recovering.”
“I’m fine,” I lie. The truth is that I’m so tired that it feels like an anchor’s dropped inside my skull and it’s trying to drag my eyelids down. It takes work to keep them open.
“You lost a lot of blood,” he reminds me, bending to carefully take Ellie from my lap. She stirs, arching her body, her neck straining, before settling sleepily onto his shoulder to continue her nap.
The day after my twentieth birthday, Elodie Anne MacLaine arrived in the world with only two settings: sleeping angel and diva. She’d been set to diva upon entrance, getting stuck on her way out as if to make it clear she was going to live life on her own terms starting from day one. Since then, she’s displayed enough MacLaine stubbornness to further cement her status in the family. Although, I suspect she gets a fair amount from her father as well. The incident unfortunately resulted in a hemorrhage that required a blood transfusion and a longer than typical hospital stay. Felix has been hovering over me ever since.
“I can rest later,” I say, even though the idea of crawling into bed is gloriously tempting.
“Rest now,” he orders, rocking back and forth on his feet.
I grip the arms of the chair, but I can’t bring myself to stand up.
“She’ll still be here when you wake up,” he promises. “I’ll make sure of it.”
“I know.” But my lip quivers. She might be here in a few hours, but the truth is that I don’t know how much longer I have with her. I drag myself to the bedroom, climbing into bed around the baby cot attached to its side, and curl into a ball. Closing my heavy eyes, exhaustion overcomes me but I can’t sleep. Every ounce of me aches for it even as my brain switches to overdrive.
I’d had the finest medical care money could buy, Felix stayed with me the entire time, and everyone agreed that it was best for the baby to nurse for the first few weeks while Ginny and Malcolm prepared to take her home to Windfall. Moving into the family home had been one of my father’s conditions. I suppose he half expects one of them to slip up and reveal the truth—that the baby isn’t really theirs. Or maybe he just needs a woman around to keep under his thumb. Because my condition had been that I would not return home. I’d made him promise to let me go, to finally allow me to have a life of my own. It was all I’d ever wanted.
Before.
I don’t know what happened or why I allowed myself to believe that I’d be able to make peace with the adoption. Maybe my father’s repeated reminders that my brother and Ginny were far more prepared to be parents influenced me. Maybe I believed what he said about me. The truth is that I’m a coward. I’m too scared to strike out on my own. I have no way to pay the astronomical cost of her private birth and care. No money to put a roof over our heads. And I doubt a single twenty something with a newborn is a hot commodity on the job market, even if I could score a work visa.
“Go to sleep!” I scream into the pillow, wishing my brain had an on-off switch.
This is becoming my favorite game, remembering all the mistakes I’ve made and then running through all the rationalizations I’ve been forced to adopt. Every time I play it—which is pretty much any time I try to go to sleep—I lose. I always find myself here with a hollow pit inside me filling with tears. Because I can remember and I can rationalize, but I have no idea how to let her go.
I’m running out of time to figure that bit out.
Eventually my body always triggers some survival mechanism, and I fall asleep only to be woken by Ellie’s mewling, newborn cries. I’m still tired every time. Today’s no different.
“She probably needs to nurse,” I call to Felix. I’m not sure why. I doubt he can hear me over her crying. Throwing off the covers,
I pad into the living room to take her and stop dead in my tracks.
Ellie isn’t crying because she’s hungry, she’s crying because my father is holding her out at arm’s length inspecting her. If her fussing bothers him, he shows no signs. Instead, his face remains detached. Felix watches from a short distance, looking exactly the opposite. He vibrates with the same manic energy I feel now like he’s being pulled toward her.
“She has your hair,” he says in a business-like tone.
Unlike Felix, I can’t smother the instinct to rescue her from him. I rush over and snatch her from him, cradling her body close to my chest. “Shhhh. Mama’s here.”
My father clears his throat loudly as if to signal his disapproval of that term.
I ignore him and return to my chair, moving to situate the pillows around me as Ellie continues to scream.
“And your temper, it seems,” he adds.
“You shouldn’t have woken her,” I say. Unhooking my bra, I work to calm her enough to feed her.
“What are you doing?” he asks in a strained voice, turning his back to me.
“Feeding my baby.”
“Must you do it here?”
“Where would you like me to do it? Buckingham Palace?” I snap, frustration getting the better of me. I don’t have the time or interest to assuage his fragile masculinity—not until I finally get her to latch on.
He peeks over his shoulder but quickly returns to his studious observation of the opposite wall. “Perhaps, you could cover up?”
“I’m fine. Thank you.” There’s no way that I’m going to let him make me feel guilty about this. I might have made some mistakes, but taking care of her isn’t one of them. I continue to nurse her.
“Would you like some tea?” Felix asks carefully.
“Surely you have something stronger than tea,” my father responds.
“We don’t have anything,” I tell him.
“What?” He finally turns around like he needs to see the words coming from my own lips.
“I just had a baby,” I say. “I haven’t been stocking the bar.”