by Kelsie Fann
Georgia nodded and popped the piece of pepperoni in her mouth. Darcy asked the words slowly, carefully. “What was his appeal?”
Georgia chewed up the bite in her mouth, then she answered. “He was charming, handsome, fairytale stuff.” As Darcy looked into his sister’s face, she didn’t look like a twenty-two-year-old girl, she looked like she was eighteen again.
She picked at the cheese on the top of her pizza as her words floated between them. “I was so devastated about Mom and Dad. I was probably trying so hard to make my own family after I lost mine that I looked past all his flaws. I wanted to believe all the perfect lies he told me.”
Darcy knew exactly how persuasive Hamilton could be. Hamilton had routinely talked their teachers into giving him good grades, even though he rarely showed up to class. After high school, most of Darcy’s classmates had lost money investing in one of Hamilton’s “businesses.”
Even knowing that, when Hamilton introduced himself to eighteen-year-old Georgia at his parent’s funeral, Darcy didn’t warn his sister. He had been completely self-absorbed. Darcy was so furious that his parents had been taken from him, the grief took over his entire body and life.
“It’s my fault,” Darcy told Georgia. “I should have been looking out for you.” It was one of the biggest mistakes of his life. He’d allowed Hamilton to seduce his little sister right after their parent’s funeral. What kind of brother was he?
Luckily, Georgia had been so young that when Hamilton started asking her for money, she didn’t try to hide his requests. Instead, she came straight to Darcy. At first, when she asked for a thousand dollars, he didn’t ask questions. Then she asked for ten thousand, and he didn’t say a word.
When she asked for a hundred thousand dollars, he finally paid attention. Before he could interrogate her about what she was buying, he happened to look down at Georgia’s slim finger and saw a small silver band with a tiny diamond on top.
He snatched her finger toward his face. “What is this?”
“Hamilton wants to marry me. I’m in love, Darcy! He wants to elope! Isn’t it romantic!” she said.
“You cannot see him anymore,” Darcy told her. “I forbid it.”
Georgia didn’t listen. Darcy could still feel the rage he’d felt a few days later when the detective he’d hired reported Georgia was at Hamilton’s apartment. Darcy hopped in a car and crossed town. He kicked in Hamilton’s door.
Darcy ignored his throbbing foot and limped into the apartment and saw the second most horrific sight he’d seen in six months. This time, instead of the tangled metal wreck that killed his parents, he saw Hamilton in bed with his sister.
Georgia scrambled to cover up, but Hamilton didn’t cover his naked chest. It was like he was expecting Darcy to show up. “Darcy, old friend.” Hamilton drew out the words.
“How much do you want?” Darcy asked Hamilton, not even acknowledging his sister.
Georgia interrupted him. “Darcy, we don’t need your money.”
Hamilton didn’t acknowledge Georgia’s response. “One million, and I’ll never talk to her again.”
A small noise escaped Georgia’s mouth as she pulled the covers tighter around her. “This is ridiculous,” Darcy said.
“No.” Hamilton got out of the bed and stood just inches from Darcy. “This is love,” Hamilton whispered into Darcy’s ear. “And I’ll need a thousand for the door.”
Darcy couldn’t take it anymore. The rage that had been building since his parent’s car crash flooded through his body. He pulled back his fist and let it fly, punching Hamilton in the mouth. Georgia screamed as blood spattered onto the concrete floor.
Hamilton tipped his head back as blood poured out of his nose. “That will be another million.”
Darcy turned and looked at his sister. “You have ten minutes to get dressed. I’ll be downstairs.” Georgia was downstairs in five minutes with a tearstained face.
Darcy spent the next year picking up the pieces of his shattered younger sister, who had lost her parents and her fiancé back-to-back.
“You okay?” Georgia’s voice brought Darcy back to the present.
Darcy looked down at his empty plate. He was still sitting in the middle of the stinky pizza restaurant. “You were young.” He took a bite of the pizza.
Georgia sighed. “And stupid.”
Darcy reached across the table and poked Georgia in the shoulder. “Very stupid.”
“What’s your news?” he asked his sister, remembering Georgia’s initial comment.
“Well, I would like to talk to you about something. Actually, it involves Liz.” Georgia wiped her hands on a napkin and placed them both in her lap. Then she sat up straight and cleared her throat.
He’d seen this look on her face before, and he knew she was about to pitch him something. Since their parents had died, he’d become a kind of brother/father mix for her. Sometimes he liked it, but sometimes he just wanted to be her brother.
“Get on with it,” he teased her.
She cleared her throat one more time. “Hold on.”
He couldn’t wait for her answer. “What does this have to do with Liz?”
“You can’t wait just a second for me to tell you?” She narrowed her eyes, putting her hands on the table, and leaned toward him. “I knew you had a thing for her!”
“I do not.” He enunciated each syllable.
“Okay, whatever. But you do,” she said.
He rolled his eyes again. “What is your news?”
“Okay, okay.” She placed her hands in her lap again. “As you know, I’m graduating in December, and I’d like to work for Liz. In Savannah,” she said the words quickly.
Darcy’s first instinct was to say “no.” Savannah was way too far away for him to watch out for his sister. He looked at her round cheeks and still saw the five-year-old girl who loved him to push her “super-duper high” on the swing.
“I won’t go if you don’t want me to.” She looked down and picked up her fork and knife. She ate another piece of pizza carefully and waited for Darcy to give his answer.
He took a drink and set down his cup. “Yes, whatever you want to do,” he told her. “But what about design?” he asked.
“I’m thinking about using my degree to work on interior spaces. I’m planning to tour a lot of the homes in Savannah for inspiration.”
Darcy surveyed his sister, who he could tell desperately wanted his response and approval. “I believe in you, Georgia,” he said.
Her face lit up, and her bright blue eyes sparkled. “Thanks, Darcy; that means a lot,” she said. A few beats passed between the siblings. Darcy squeezed Georgia’s hand.
“You know the first thing you need to do before moving across the country for work?” He leaned forward and looked around, like he was about to tell his sister the secret of professional success.
She leaned in to hear him better. “What?”
He motioned toward the red sauce on her right cheek. “Get the pizza off your face.” She wiped it off quickly as he laughed at her.
Darcy pulled his phone out of this pocket, unlocking it and furiously typing.
“What are you doing?” his sister asked.
He didn’t look up; he just kept typing. “Getting you all set up. Emailing Liz and finding you an apartment, furniture, and a car.”
Georgia reached out and quickly put her hand over the screen of his phone before he had a chance to plan any further. “Stop.”
He looked up slowly at his little sister. “I want to do it.” Georgia said, pulling her hand off of Darcy’s screen and tucking a strand of hair behind her ear.
Darcy set his phone down at the table. “Want to do what?”
“I want to do it all,” she said. “I want to talk to Liz. I want to find a car, a place, everything. I know I’ll still be using your connections to get the job, so it won’t be all on my own, but I want to do everything else.”
Darcy looked at her in disbelief for a few seconds. Si
nce their parents died, he’d always handled everything for her. As he looked at his sister, he started to realize how much she’d grown in the last four years. He picked up his piece of pizza again. Maybe she was right. Maybe it was time.
“Okay, but I don’t like it,” Darcy said.
“I know,” she told him, smiling again. “I’m grown up now. At my age, you were already a director. At twenty-six, you were a vice president. And by thirty-one, you’d taken over the company.”
“Only because I had to,” Darcy said, looking at his sister. “Listen, you’ve been through a lot in the last four years. I just want to help.”
Georgia smiled at him. “I know, but I can do it. I can be in control of my own life. I’m getting older. Well, not as old as you.”
“What do you mean?” Darcy asked.
Georgia took another bite of pizza. “You’re old.”
Darcy punched his sister lightly in the arm. “Just find me a good nursing home, okay?” he asked.
“The best.” She winked at him. “I’ll make sure Liz is on your floor.”.
Darcy groaned. “Do not say anything like that to her when you’re in Savannah.”
She shrugged her shoulders. “I’ll try not to,” she said.
“Promise?” he asked.
“Promise.”
As his sister nodded, Darcy made a decision. He wasn’t going to tell Liz the truth about Hamilton and Georgia. If Georgia wanted to be in charge of her own life, then she could also decide when she wanted to share her story.
17.
When Liz got an email from Georgia, asking if she could come work for her for the semester, she read it three times. Darcy’s sister wanted to work for her?
Of course, she was going to say yes. Her boss’s sister was asking for an internship, but she was nervous, too. Georgia seemed nice, but could she handle the fast pace of a start-up office? Liz didn’t have enough time to do her own work, let alone babysit Darcy’s sister.
Darcy. Liz had tried to forget his name after he left Savannah, referring to him only as Mr. Williams. She was over trying to figure out what her handsome, rich boss wanted from her.
Hi Georgia,
We will have a spot for you; however, because we’re so new, everyone is wearing multiple hats. I’m not sure what you’ll be doing yet. Just know, it won’t be glamorous, but I guarantee you will learn a lot.
If you’re still interested, let’s plan for a start date of January 15.
Best,
Liz
As fall turned into winter, Liz’s workload didn’t get any lighter. She knew she needed to talk to Darcy about hiring more people, but she wasn’t sure she wanted to ask him for anything.
The immense workload was affecting her team. The office became eerily quiet. Elise and Rose were handling so many clients, all the small talk had disappeared. Liz hadn’t heard from Stella since she’d been fired months ago.
All the pressure meant Liz couldn’t have been wound tighter. Most days, she felt like one more project would be enough to completely unravel her. With no one else to turn to, she slipped each new assignment, new client, and new task on her team’s plate and prayed it would work out.
When Georgia walked through her door, on the second day of January, Liz got up and hugged her. “I’m so glad you’re here,” Liz said.
“Me, too,” Georgia had on a winter, white pantsuit with a dark green camisole underneath. Liz looked down at her own outfit, feeling disheveled. She had thrown on a chunky black sweater and didn’t have time to put on any makeup.
“Please, sit.” Liz pointed to the chair in front of her desk. She didn’t know what to tell Georgia to start working on. “Honestly, I have no idea what to even have you start on.” Liz waved her hand over the mountains of paperwork on her desk. “Everything feels like it’s just holding on by a thread. We’ve had twenty new client pitches in the last month.”
Georgia’s eyes landed on the piles of paper. “I thought December would be a slow month.”
Liz looked at her new employee and decided to give her the good and bad news. “We don’t have slow months.”
Georgia looked at the mountains of paperwork on Liz’s desk and glanced over the two empty desks behind her, which were also filled with messy stacks of paper. For a minute, Georgia’s eyes grew, and Liz was sure she would run out of the building and tell her brother what a mess the Savannah office was.
Georgia clutched her purse to her body; the black leather of her bag looked more expensive than Liz’s entire outfit. This is it, Liz thought. She’s going to run.
Instead of leaving, Georgia slipped the bag off her lap and set it down beside her chair.
“What annoys you the most?” Georgia’s simple question made Liz think. She looked at the stacks of paper on her desk. She had instructed the team to print all their work, requests, receipts, and every correspondence with clients off, so Darcy could see a physical copy.
Liz knew where everything was, but now the stacks had taken on a life of their own. “These papers on my desk. I need them . . . off.”
“I can do that,” said Georgia.
Liz exhaled deeply, already feeling lighter. “That would be amazing. We’ll worry about uploading them as electronic files later. But, for now, I need them in physical folders where people can find them-- and off of my desk.”
This was definitely a defining moment for Darcy’s sister. Liz knew she was giving her a mountain of grunt work, and it couldn’t be more tedious.
Georgia tilted her head, looking at the piles again, like she’d changed her mind.
“If you’re not feeling it, I can find someone else.” Liz gave her an out, even though no one else had time to do the project.
Georgia smiled at Liz. “No, I was just trying to decide which stack to start with.” She scanned each stack with her eyes.
Liz laughed. “That decision is definitely up to you.” Liz was so relieved Georgia was up for completing this job that she could have hugged her.
Georgia grabbed a medium-sized stack teetering on the corner of Liz’s desk. “This one looks like it’s about to fall off.”
Liz pointed through the glass wall into the other large, open office. “I bought some file cabinets.”
“Great.” Georgia took the stack of paper out of the executive office. Liz sighed and looked at the empty hole on her desk where the papers once sat. It was amazing to see a clear, clean space, even if it was just one small rectangle. Liz just hoped Georgia stuck around long enough to finish the job.
18.
A few days into her internship, Liz realized she didn’t need to worry about Georgia. Darcy’s sister had as much work ethic as she did money—a lot. She arrived early each day, and by the end of the week, she’d done exactly as Liz had hoped; she’d cleaned off her entire desk.
“I guess I’m done,” Georgia told Liz after a few more days of work.
Liz looked around at her completely decluttered desk. “Do you feel comfortable scanning and organizing the files electronically?”
“Sure,” Georgia said. “Any system you would prefer?”
This would be a perfect time to email Darcy and ask him how their files were organized. It would be nice if whatever file sharing system they used in Savannah was the same one they used in Chicago. But Liz hadn’t spoken to Darcy in weeks, not since he interrogated Liz about dating Hamilton. “I’m not sure,” she said.
Georgia must have sensed Liz’s internal debate. She looked down at her cognac leather boots. “Do you want me to ask my brother?” Her voice was soft, like she was worried about stepping on Liz’s toes. It was the first time Georgia had even brought up her connections since she’d started working for Liz.
Liz smiled at her. It was a kind offer, but she had to communicate with Darcy eventually. “No, I’ll do it.”
Georgia looked up at Liz. “He’ll like hearing from you,” she said. Then Georgia’s cheeks turned red, and she quickly turned and left the office while Liz drafted the ema
il.
To: Darcy
From: Liz
Subject: Organizing Electronic Files
Darcy,
I just wanted to let you know that Georgia has been an incredible asset to our office so far. She’s put in long hours and accomplished the most mundane yet essential tasks with enthusiasm.
We’re working on putting our client files (artwork, contact info, client exchanges) into an electric filing cabinet. What system does your office use?
Best,
Liz
Liz read and reread the email four times. It was short and professional: the perfect business correspondence. Hopefully it could restart their professional relationship for a second time.
Less than a minute later, she received a text from Darcy. “Going to land in ten minutes. Want to talk about it at dinner with Georgia and me?”
Liz knew this was Darcy’s olive branch, and she took it. “Sure,” she typed back. “As long as I’m not interrupting your sibling time.”
“I’m staying a couple days. We will have plenty of sibling time. Pick you up at the office? In ten?” he asked. She looked down again; she looked like a complete mess. There was no way she was going to see Darcy looking like this.
“How about my apartment in an hour,” she typed back. She grabbed her purse and immediately walked out of the office without a word to anyone. As the building door closed behind her and she stepped out into the bright daylight, she realized she hadn’t left early in months.
An hour later, Liz marathon-showered, blow-dried her hair, put on makeup, and threw on an outfit. She looked at herself in the mirror, assessing her look: a dark purple chunky sweater dress and black ankle booties. She wanted to lose ten pounds, to look a little bonier like Caroline, but since it wasn’t going to happen in the next ten minutes, she grabbed a Twizzler out of her pantry.
As she finished chewing, she heard a knock on her door. Liz opened it slowly and saw the sweetest brother-sister pair standing in front of her.
After a stiff greeting, the trio got into the car. Liz put her hands in her lap, not knowing how to break the silence. She wanted to talk about Stella, to beg Darcy to rehire her ex-employee, but Darcy spoke first.