Shattered

by Olga Bicos

  “Auntie. What a surprise. Not warning off my best worker, I hope?”

  Having done just that, Vanessa came around to give her nephew a peck on the cheek. “Don’t be foolish, Daniel.”

  After the door closed, Daniel shook his head, as if he didn’t know what to make of his aunt.

  “What is it, love?” he asked. “What did Auntie say to upset you?”

  “No,” she said. “Not your aunt.”

  “Who then?” he asked, ready to put her mind at ease.

  When Holly had thought of coming here, she hadn’t intended to confront Daniel. She didn’t trust him to tell her the truth, so why bother? But now she couldn’t seem to hold back. At the same time, she hesitated, feeling push-me/pull-you forces at work.

  Giving in, she said, “I went to Viña Dorada.”

  Daniel watched her as if looking for clues. She was careful not to give him any.

  “How…unfortunate,” he said.

  “To say the least.”

  “Marta and Gil—”

  “Of course, they saw me. I received an invitation to a party there. Presumably sent by Ryan…who now claims to know nothing about it.”

  “Of course.” There was anger in his voice. “I’m surprised he didn’t blame me.”

  He read the truth on her face.

  “Ah,” he said with a smile.

  Daniel walked around the room. Even though she had a million questions, she waited. He ended up stopping where she was seated at her desk. He dropped to one knee, a gentleman asking for her hand, taking it when it wasn’t offered.

  “I didn’t send that invitation, Holly.” His expression was so earnest. “You know I didn’t.”

  “Daniel. The clothes.”

  “Yes, I know how it looks.”

  “I came here on your request, not his. I buy a bunch of clothes that apparently make me look like Nina, then I receive an invitation to her parents’ vineyard? You’re telling me Ryan is the one pulling the strings?”

  He stood. “I’m not saying anything of the sort. Look, I’ll find out about the invitation, I swear. But you have to believe me, I wouldn’t do anything to hurt Marta and Gil. They are good people.”

  “Who seem to believe in Ryan.”

  “A fatal flaw, I assure you, but don’t we all have one?” He pulled her to her feet. “All right. Maybe I have a blind spot when it comes to my cousin, but Holly—”

  He cupped her face in his hands. Whatever his intentions, right now he wasn’t making her feel warm and fuzzy. Rather the opposite.

  “You know how much I need you. Can Ryan say the same? Don’t you think it would be a tad convenient for him if you left me now? So that everything could come crashing down around my ears?”

  He was talking about sabotage. That Ryan would want to scare her away and make sure there was no Cutty House revival with Daniel at the helm.

  After a while, she nodded.

  “That’s my girl.” He smiled. Only, he didn’t let go. Instead, he stepped closer as if to tell her a secret, whispering in her ear, “Now, don’t freak.”

  He kissed her.

  And he didn’t stop. He kept at it, as if he might somehow convince her, trying to deepen the kiss even as she struggled to push him away.

  When he finally released her, he took a couple of steps back and dropped his arms. They both stared at each other. Holly could imagine the look on her face. Beyond shock.

  “Clearly,” he said, “I should not have done that. But, Holly, I can’t say I’m sorry—”

  “If you finish that sentence,” she said, “I’ll have to walk out on this project. Right now.”

  He held his hands up in surrender. “I said we’d do it your way.”

  She turned for the door, shaken, realizing she had never even taken off her coat. She felt as if the world had turned upside down. Living another woman’s life.

  When she reached the door, she heard Daniel say, “I know you believe him, whatever he’s told you. Don’t I know he can be so sincere. You go to his vineyard, you see him in his element, taking care of those poor people, Gil and Marta. So self-sacrificing in appearance.”

  She turned around. Daniel was standing with his arms crossed, looking very enigmatic.

  “Remember this,” he told her. “No matter what you think you know, the fact remains, he’s already killed one woman he loved.”

  He said it with a smile, an expression that stayed with her as she made her way down the stairs. As if he’d just delivered the punch line at the end of a very bad joke.

  This is what becomes of arrogance, Vanessa told herself. She stepped into her car, then turned on the engine as she slipped the seat belt across her lap. Arrogance had always been her weak point. Her father had blamed himself, claiming he’d bred that pride into her. Because I could never say no to you, darling, he’d told her. And now you think no one ever will.

  Coming to see Holly had been the height of arrogance. What had she truly thought to accomplish, convincing herself that a little information could go a long way, hoping Miss Fairfield was shaken enough to listen.

  Only, it was Vanessa who was shaken. She looks so much like Nina.

  On the seat beside her, the cell phone in her bag began to ring. Jeffrey, no doubt. She was late for their meeting. Another strategy session for the AIDS benefit she was chairing with him. Vanessa ignored the sound, staring at the road ahead. Every week it was something—a dinner or some charity function. She was on everyone’s list.

  There used to be more. Lavish parties, smaller, more intimate gatherings at her home. She used to compare herself to those ladies in France during the age of Voltaire, having her own little salon where the city’s intellectuals and artists could gather. The last few years, she’d cut back severely.

  She slammed on her brakes, just missing the car in front of her, a blast of a horn her thanks. She hated driving in the city and avoided it like the plague. But she had a tight schedule today.

  She closed her eyes, suddenly exhausted. The girl’s resemblance to Nina drained her. And the resemblance didn’t end with the mere physical. Holly Fairfield had ignored Vanessa’s every word, just like Nina.

  You really are some weird society freak.

  Vanessa blinked, trying to bring the street back into focus, concentrating on the traffic ahead. The last thing she needed was a car accident. But that voice…The past sounding so clearly in her head.

  Of course, Holly had brought it all back. Nina’s vicious attack.

  The phone again. Vanessa knew enough to pull over. Jeffrey wouldn’t give up, and she found the sound incredibly distracting. She glanced at the number before she answered.

  “So insistent, Jeffrey? I’m on my way, dear. Just start the meeting without me.”

  Ending the call, she sat double-parked. The phone call somehow seemed the height of irony.

  “Still the society freak,” she said out loud.

  She remembered the day she’d first heard those words. She’d asked Nina to tea at the Ritz-Carlton, a fine establishment Vanessa thought worthy of their first outing together since Ryan and Nina had announced their engagement. Nina had sat through the meeting like a perfect lady. She’d had impeccable manners, seeming to hang on Vanessa’s every word. Someday, he might even go into politics, Nina. You’ll have to be ready for that.

  She remembered how Nina had folded her napkin, as if getting ready to excuse herself politely from the table. Instead, she’d leaned over to tell Vanessa, “You really are some weird society freak,” all the while keeping her lovely smile.

  Vanessa had thought at first she’d misunderstood. Nina was only eighteen. To speak to her—to anyone—in such a crass manner. But the girl had only been warming up. “My dad told me about you and him. How he asked you to marry him. But he wasn’t anybody then, so you got all hung up on Samuel. Dad said it was their only real fight, because he asked Samuel to back off and he wouldn’t.”

  It was a startling transformation to watch. To hear that venom c
oming from the mouth of almost a child, realizing for the first time who she was dealing with.

  “Daddy doesn’t understand about women like you,” she’d told Vanessa. “He thinks people are honest and good and follow their heart. But you follow a plan, don’t you, Van? And now you want to make sure I’m on board.”

  “Don’t hurt Ryan.” A mother’s reflex. “Not to get to me.”

  Nina had clucked her tongue, disapproving. “It’s always about you, isn’t it, Van? You know, I watch you sometimes. How you stare at my dad. You have this weird hungry look in your eyes. And you make up these lame excuses to touch him. Can I get you something to drink, Gil?” It was a fair imitation of Vanessa. “You don’t even realize how invisible you make my mom feel. I wonder if anyone ever made you feel invisible?” Again, the smile. “Coming on to a man in front of his family? That’s so tacky.”

  Vanessa would always remember that tight feeling in her chest growing as she listened to Nina, as if a vise were closing around her heart. She hadn’t even defended herself. She wondered what might have happened if she had? Would Nina have left them alone? Had it already been too late?

  Up until that day, she’d thought the girl only a nuisance. Not quite good enough for Ryan, but they’d make do.

  Vanessa took a deep breath, wondering if now—after everything they’d gone through—life wasn’t coming full circle. Her little speech to Holly this morning had left out a few details. How after Nina’s death and Gil’s collapse, Samuel had taken on the restaurant’s expansion alone, stopping only when Vanessa sought legal representation to cut off access to her trust fund after she realized what he was doing. Throwing it all away.

  She reached to start the car, taking more deep breaths. She needed to push away the past. Needed to focus on the future. Or maybe just the traffic ahead. Concentrate on getting into the next lane, making the turn.

  She had always thought she was like her father. Strong. Her mother had told her so many times how strong she was.

  But her mother had raised just another woman like herself, so that, in the end, she’d been too late to save her husband.

  And now she wondered if she was already too late to save her son.

  20

  Harris hadn’t slept last night. He’d been too keyed up, worrying about Emma.

  Lying in bed, he kept seeing Daniel at the entrance to the restaurant, kept thinking about Emma’s retreat to the man’s side, like some trained puppy fearing a scolding. Or worse.

  Had the bastard hurt her? Would Harris read about Emma in the papers the next morning? Grisly details painted in Technicolor words on the front page of the local?

  Two minutes into his spiral, he’d done a one-eighty. Emma was in on it. She had to be. And here he was, falling for her act, hook, line and sinker.

  He was losing it, imagining conspiracies everywhere. Holly was probably right. There was nothing going on other than the usual family soap opera.

  After work, he’d gone to Daniel’s apartment. He’d stood outside the building, cigarette in hand, sucking in nicotine like an old friend until his hands shook with the drug. Better than caffeine. He’d had his mobile, kept playing with the idea of dialing in some complaint about a domestic disturbance to make the cops check things out.

  Instead, he’d waited, finally heading home to knock back a couple of drinks, seesawing back and forth between worries for Emma and fears for his sister. Sometime around five in the morning, he’d switched to coffee. An hour after that, he’d been standing outside Cutty House, waiting for Emma to show.

  When he’d finally seen her coming, he’d dropped the cigarette and crushed it under the Nikes, waiting for her to come to him. He’d already figured out where he’d gone wrong. Going to Daniel’s steaming mad, he hadn’t realized what he was getting them into, hadn’t prepared for that instant when he’d seen Emma and wanted her so badly he couldn’t worry about the cost.

  And now, the damage was done because, walking beside her holding hands, he didn’t want to let go.

  They’d been walking in this comfortable silence for at least ten minutes. Every once in a while, Emma would glance down at their hands locked together, as if checking to make sure he was real.

  She had these tiny hands, the fingers thin and flexible. An artist’s hands. He could imagine her making some amazing things with those hands.

  “I didn’t know you smoked,” she said, breaking the silence.

  “That makes two of us.”

  “This is going to end badly. You know it will.”

  She had such spunk in her voice. A woman who liked getting to the point.

  He gave her hand a squeeze. “I’m just glad to hear it’s started.”

  He’d been thinking that he was so used to a life of intrigue, he didn’t know how to stop lifting up rocks and searching the dirt underneath. Even now, this thing with Emma could be some weird form of sabotage. If Holly wouldn’t leave the job, why not blow it up in her face by sleeping with the boss’s girl? Emma was just another person he could use.

  “I should get back,” she said, stopping.

  But he tugged her hand, bringing her along, not ready to let go. He wasn’t sure what he could say to her, how to get her to trust him. I know all about being on the wrong side, kid. You can tell me what you fear most.

  Because that’s what he saw in her. Someone scared—someone trapped.

  “Don’t be in such a hurry,” he said. He looked around. The air here was moist. Like walking inside a cloud. “At a guess, I’d say Danny boy sleeps in.”

  She stopped, this time yanking her hand free. “Look, I think you should know—”

  But she didn’t finish, didn’t want to ruin the fragile camaraderie between them after all, which only made him smile.

  “You don’t have to say it,” he told her.

  “I think you should know,” she said, struggling along just the same. “I did stay with Dan last night. I didn’t say anything about what happened between us. I just said you were Holly’s brother and I was making friends.” She made this half gesture with her hand. “I can’t do this. I can’t…just leave him.”

  “Why not?” he surprised himself by asking. Talk about life’s complications. Bring it on….

  She looked absolutely miserable, staring up at him. “We had sex, Harris. What could that possibly mean to you?”

  “Actually, it meant a hell of a lot. But maybe I’m just nutty like that. Weird, huh? Sex means something.”

  She shook her head. “We had a fight, Harris. You weren’t in love, you were mad.”

  “Does it really matter how something starts? It’s how it ends that counts.”

  “This is so crazy.” She pushed her fingers through her hair and laughed. She wore it down this morning so that it just brushed her shoulders. “You don’t think…you’re not asking me to—”

  “I’m not asking a damn thing,” he said quietly. “I just want you to know that I want to pursue this. You and me.”

  “Just like that?” Now he could see she was angry. “One minute, you’re accusing me of sabotaging your sister, now you want me to turn my back on the only family I’ve ever had?”

  “Is that what he is? Family?”

  “You can’t understand. You don’t know.”

  “I know that you smell like lavender. I know you cry when you make love. I know that you’re in some kind of trouble, that you might be dragging my sister right in. And, surprisingly, I’m still here wondering if I can have another chance to hold you and kiss you. I think I know more than enough.”

  She stood there staring at him. Maybe no one had ever said those things to her, had never taken on that lock, stock and barrel relationship of hers with Daniel. Like she’d said at the bar, she’d never slept with any other man.

  And there it was on her face, the potential.

  She could leave Daniel. She could be with someone else. As if she’d never seen that desire inside herself. Tempted.

  And scared, that most of al
l.

  She backed away. “Leave me alone, Harris. Leave me the hell alone.”

  But before she could disappear into the fog, he called out, “In your pocket.”

  She stopped, not turning around. As he watched, she slipped her hand into the pocket of her jacket, finding the piece of paper he’d put there.

  “My cell phone number,” he said. “If you ever find yourself in trouble.”

  She started to walk faster, then run. But he was glad he’d given her the phone number. In his experience, people like Emma eventually needed an escape hatch.

  Ryan watched his cousin step out of his Bentley, double-parked outside his building. Nice car. Just like the one J.Lo gave Ben. Even nicer digs. The old Victorians of Eastern Pacific Heights had long since given way to swank apartment buildings like Daniel’s. His cousin owned the tenth floor, what he called “the cloud club.” He’d told Ryan he found the reference in a book about San Francisco homes.

  That was Daniel. Looking up his address, checking to see if it was good enough to make the book. It was probably why he’d moved out of the place on Nob Hill. Now that he was running the show, he needed something bigger, grander.

  Daniel always did like the finer things. In that way, he reminded Ryan of his father. It was interesting, actually, how alike uncle and nephew were. When Daniel took over running Cutty House, everyone suddenly woke up to realize how much better the fit was, as if Dan were more Samuel’s son than Ryan could ever be.

  Catching sight of Ryan now, Daniel stopped in his tracks, frozen like some prey animal. Ryan could see that his cousin was doing some fast thinking. He figured he could help him out.

  “Daniel,” he said, walking over.

  “I can’t say it’s a surprise, Ryan,” he said. “I talked to Holly. She told me about the invitation to the vineyard—”

  Ryan grabbed him by that fine linen shirt. “I know what you’re up to, Dan, though I can’t say I understand why.”

  Because it didn’t make sense. Why risk everything just to mess with Ryan’s head? Why put all those fine things Dan loved at risk?

  Or maybe it made perfect sense. All those years Daniel had taken a back seat to Ryan, the golden boy, because, no matter what Daniel did, he’d always be the busboy’s son. Ryan even heard his mother say it once: Blood tells. Or some bullshit like that.