Chapter 14
Amanda
I awoke with a start, suspicious at how bright the sunlight was as it wafted through my bedroom windows. It was late. Like, really late. I was late for the stupid breakfast appointment with my fake husband.
I rolled out of bed and stepped into the bathroom. I stared at myself in the mirror and grimaced. I looked a mess. I had done a poor job of removing my makeup from the night before, and some of it had smeared along my brow ridge. My hair looked like I’d rolled around in a briar patch and then took a long walk through a stiff breeze.
I just couldn’t summon up the gumption to make myself prettier. I washed off my face and pulled my hair back into a bun, but that was about it. Oh, and I rinsed with some mouthwash and spat it into the sink. No need to wilt the flowers on the dining room table with my breath.
I wrapped a robe around myself and belted it tight, then put my feet into my comfy slippers. They had been a wedding gift, one of hundreds. The interior was some kind of fleece, and it just sucked the tension right out of my feet when I wore them.
I walked out into the hallway, my disheveled appearance a stark contrast to the opulent and pristinely disciplined manor. I came around a corner and found a pair of maids struggling to move a big vase so they could dust behind it .
“Oh, hey Maria, Rebecca. Can I give you a hand there?”
They looked up worriedly.
“That won’t be necessary, Mrs. Jones,” Maria said. “Nor would it be proper.”
“Proper-schmoper,” I said, grasping the glazed enameled rim of the vase. Those suckers were heavy as all get out, but with my added strength we managed to wobble it out of the way.
“There you go.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Jones.”
“Oh, for God’s sake, Rebecca, call me Amanda. I don’t like the ring of Mrs. Jones.”
“Whatever you say, Mrs. J—that is, Amanda.”
I smiled and figured it was close enough for now. I continued on my way to the dining room, passing through a sun-dappled hallway with glass walls on the eastern side. The morning sun tinted the sculpted shrubbery animals holding court on the lawn. I liked the horse the best. The rabbits just made me think of Monty Python in all the wrong ways. Besides, there was no sense of scale. The artists had sculpted the rabbit to be the same size as a horse rearing back on its hind legs. What kind of monster rabbits did they have growing up? Did they go to Three-Mile Island High?
I nearly bumped into the head butler, Chavez. He was a portly man with close-cropped hair and an exquisitely sculpted pencil-thin mustache.
“Good morning, Mrs. Jones. Lovely day, if you don’t mind my saying so.”
“For God’s sake, Chavez, please stop talking to me like I’m royalty, I waited tables a couple of years ago. And don’t call me Mrs. Jones. It’s Mandy, or if you must, Amanda.”
“Very well, Amanda. Will you be joining Mr. Jones in the dining room for breakfast this morning? ”
“Sure. I’m surprised he’s still there.”
I had a sinking feeling in my gut. I hadn’t been expecting to run into him in the dining room so late. I was hoping he’d moved on with his day. I was expecting a lecture when I arrived at the dining room about being late, about the way I looked, pretty much about everything.
Plus, there was the fact that we’d damn near done it in the back of the limo the previous night. That was going to make for an awkward breakfast all on its own.
I passed the last arch to the dining room. The fact that I had to walk farther from my bedroom to the dining room than I used to walk to school was not lost on me. When I entered the palatial dining room, I was struck by the elegance all over again. The walls were covered with glazed walnut wood paneling, interspersed with Doric pillars of white marble.
The room might have been dark with all of that wood—the table matched the walls in hue—but there were no less than three chandeliers hanging from the ceiling. Also, the eastern wall featured a curved window the entire length of the room. During the morning, it was bathed in gentle light.
I saw that Evan sat in his favorite chair by the window, a cup of coffee steaming near his left hand, and a cigar smoking in his right. His empty plate indicated he’d been there for some time. Well, of course he had. Evan was always on time.
I prepared internally for my coming chastisement. Evan always rode me hard about being late for anything, even something as simple as breakfast. I’d learned not to try and offer excuses because those just made him angrier. I didn’t think it was as big a deal as all of that.
He did, though, which led to a lot of conflict.
He glanced up at me, his devilishly handsome face drawn into an inscrutable mask of neutrality.
“Good morning, Amanda,” he said in a cordial, but still sort of neutral tone.
“Good morning,” I replied cautiously, pulling out my chair. A servant had a plate of food in front of me before I even settled in. Strawberry scones with a side of ham in a truffle glaze, and grilled asparagus. My belly rumbled at the sight, but I didn’t want to start eating until he’d had his go at me.
I waited, but he didn’t say anything. No chastisement for being late. No sudden barrage of names and dates and times for our busy itinerary. Just us occupying the same room with him giving me space. I wasn’t used to that at all.
I figured it was some kind of trap. He was trying to lull me into a false sense of security so he could spring something on me.
I didn’t want to fall into any carefully laid traps. As the moments stretched on in relative silence, I tried to eat my breakfast and ignore my mounting anxiety.
I kept trying to figure out what was wrong. I ate most of the ham—the glaze was exquisite—and a couple of the asparagus, but scones always felt kind of heavy in my stomach. I was too worried to have anything so substantial inside me.
“Okay,” I said at last when I couldn’t stand it a moment longer. “What’s going on?”
He looked up from his tablet and offered a thoughtful frown. “What do you mean by that? I don’t know how to answer that question. I need more context.”
“Here’s your context. I was almost half an hour late for breakfast, and you haven’t said shit about it. You haven’t deluged me with our itinerary and photo ops for the day. So, what’s going on? Are you setting me up for something or what?”
For a moment, Evan looked different. He almost seemed weary. Not physically tired, but soul weary.
“Amanda, this is tough enough for me as it is. Please don’t make it harder. I’m not used to acting this way. ”
I think my jaw fell to the floor so hard it broke right on through to the basement. I started wondering if he’d been killed in his sleep and replaced with a robot. Or something equally improbable. All of those wild theories dancing through my head made more sense to me than the Iceman suddenly thawing and revealing a human heart beating in his chest.
I cautiously decided to try and press my luck. I had no idea what would happen if I did, but I really wanted to try.
“Ah,” I said, but my voice broke. I took a sip of coffee to give myself time to recover. I should mention that the coffee was some of the best I’d ever had. The head chef actually roasted and flavored the beans himself and only ground them minutes before brewing every pot.
“What is it?” he asked, his eyes focused on me with laser precision.
“I was wondering if it would be okay with you, um, if I were to leave the house for a while today.”
A wan smile found its way to his lips. He didn’t show his teeth, and it wasn’t very spirited, but it was there. A tiny smidge of warmth even made it to his eyes.
“You can leave the house if you want to. You don’t have to ask me permission to do that any longer.”
I nodded, utterly dumbstruck. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Was this the same man who accosted me in his restaurant, shutting the place down for an entire day just so he could vent his fury? The same man who blew a gasket that I forgot to wear my pretend wedding ring?
Again, I thought about sci-fi robots and pod people and Manchurian candidates. In the end, though, I had to admit the possibility that I had actually gotten through to him. Me, plain old Amanda, had gotten through the thick ice walls surrounding Evan Jones.
“Ah, can I take the limo?” I asked .
“Yes. You can consider the limousine at your disposal. My servants will let you know if there is ever a scheduling conflict, and you might wind up with the backup limousine.”
“You have a backup limo? How come I’ve never seen it?”
“It’s a big garage.”
He wasn’t kidding about that. You could fit an entire discount store inside of his damn garage. Of course, about half of the vehicles stored in there weren’t for driving. They were more museum pieces and bragging rights type of deals.
I asked Chavez to prepare the limo for me, then went back to my room. I took a quick shower and got dressed, wondering what I would do with my newfound freedom. I thought about visiting Jennifer, or maybe getting together with Ramone and Jake.
I even thought about being totally selfish and making it a me-time sort of outing. Like maybe treating myself to a spa using Evan’s credit card.
As I dressed, I reflexively put on my wedding ring. The same one I’d forgotten so easily now slid onto my finger without my even having to think about it. I stared at it and realized that I didn’t have to wear it. Not for my solo outing.
I took it off, but then my finger just felt weird. I put it back on and my anxiety levels decreased. At least no paparazzi would spot me without it if I chose to wear the ring.
I picked out a purse and matched it to my peplum skirt and short-sleeved blouse before heading out the front door. As I walked down the shallow, elegant steps toward the circle drive and the waiting limo, I felt peculiar. I turned around and saw Evan staring at me through the foyer window. Our eyes met, and then he turned and walked away without changing expression.
The driver opened the door and smiled.
“Where to, Mrs. Jones?”
I touched the ring on my finger. It struck me that I didn’t want to leave. I actually wanted to stay.
I wanted to stay at my fake home with my fake husband.