13. Lucian
13
LUCIAN
“ Y our dad tells me things are going really well at work.” Mom was almost beaming across the table as she reached out to grab hold of her wine glass. “I’m so glad. I knew with a little guidance, you would kick ass at this job.”
“Thanks.” There was a reason I always got along better with her than with Dad. We had the same communication style.
“The analytics are impressive.” Dad lifted his glass to me at the round corner table where we sat enjoying our pre-dinner drinks on Friday night. I was thinking about meeting Noah and Marcus for a drink later, but there was plenty of time to catch up with my parents. For some reason, they seemed to think it was important.
“I didn’t do it all by myself,” I reminded them. “I have learned a lot over the past several weeks.”
“I know the family legacy will be in good hands.” Mom exchanged a loving look with Dad while my insides went cold. I had no choice. My life’s path had been laid out for me all because my last name was Diamond.
The funny part was I didn’t hate my job. Far from it. Research and analyzing data was where I thrived—what made our readers click a link and figuring out their thought patterns. I liked it. I wanted a choice and the chance to choose for myself.
Another gulp from my glass of scotch eased some of the frustration brewing in my chest. It started building last night when Ivy decided she couldn’t stand to be in my presence any longer. Since when was having money a crime? I wasn’t hung up on it any more than I was hung up on her not having anything. Why was it such a big deal? Why couldn’t she stick around and explain herself? It was the first time a woman had ever walked out of my apartment.
I needed to know why and couldn’t trust her to tell me. But it wasn’t my style to hold onto a woman who wanted to go, but I wished I had.
“I’m starving,” I announced since it was better to think about that than to reflect on my Ivy situation.
“We can order in another few minutes. I would like to finish my drink.” As Dad spoke, I noticed he glanced over my shoulder. He was looking for someone. This wasn’t the first time I had caught his attention wandering.
“What aren’t you telling me?” I set my glass down, folding my hands on the table. “Who are we waiting for?”
Mom sputtered, her lashes fluttering, but Dad’s sudden smile saved her from having to explain. “Clover. It’s good to see you.”
I stood and turned to find a cute redhead coming our way. No, she was better than cute. She was tall and lithe with a sprinkle of freckles across her nose and sparkling green eyes that lit up when they met mine. “Lucian. Your mom told my mom so much about you, and then my mom told me.”
So, she was in on the joke. Thank God for that, anyway. It was one thing to be tricked into having dinner with a woman my parents approved of, but it would have been much worse if she showed up with our whole future planned out in her head.
“Nice to meet you.” I shook her hand and pulled out her chair the way I was expected to. Over the top of her head, though, I firmly narrowed my eyes at my parents. If anything, I was more disappointed in myself for not seeing this coming. No wonder it was such a big deal for us to get together.
“Clover is my good friend, Felicity’s daughter,” Mom explained. “We’ve known each other for years. I think the two of you attended a few of the same birthday parties when you were kids, come to think of it.”
“Oh, sure,“ I said, nodding. “I think I remember you. Didn’t you slap a slice of birthday cake out of my hand once? You were mad because I got the piece with the extra frosting.”
Clover’s cheeks went red, and she covered her mouth with one slim hand. “I can’t believe you remember that!”
“How could I forget? You still owe me a piece of cake.” Fuck. I was flirting with the girl. It was sort of a knee-jerk reaction—beautiful girl, a nice smile, a great body. This was routine for me, breaking out the charm without thinking about it.
I was playing straight into my parents’ hands.
“Clover is a former model,” Mom explained. “She went back to school and is in her second year at Harvard Law.”
“Honey,” Dad chided with a gentle laugh. “I’m sure Clover can speak for herself.”
“It’s all right,” Clover said with a smile. “I don’t find it easy to talk about myself, so I appreciate it whenever anyone else does it for me.” The girl was any parents’ dream come true. And the mention of the name Felicity told me who her parents were. A wealthy investment banker and his socialite heiress wife.
In other words, she was one of us. The sort of suitable girl my parents wanted me to settle down with.
I should have wanted her, too, even if this wasn’t the ideal setup. It wasn’t my nature to go along with what Mom and Dad wanted for me, and dating Clover would’ve meant admitting they knew better than I did. That wasn’t going to happen.
Especially not when Ivy filled my thoughts. She inhabited a large section of my mind. It seemed like I was always either wanting her, fucking her, or reflecting on our last time together. I’d spent most of the day at work trying to catch her eye and ask what the hell last night was all about, but she had kept herself busy and away from her desk.
“Lucian?” Dad cleared his throat, glancing toward Clover. “You were asked a question.”
“I’m sorry. What was it?” I asked, turning toward her as a server handed out menus.
“I asked how you like working at your family company. It seems like it would be pretty exciting, running all those different digital imprints.” She’d gotten the full rundown prior to this awkward dinner. I was the only one left in the dark.
“I’m learning a lot,” I explained, and once again, Ivy’s face filled my awareness. Her gray eyes and her smile, the feel of her hair, the taste of her skin. This was a problem. Being addicted to her was one thing, but I needed to be able to focus.
“And how is school treating you?” Mom asked Clover, handing over her menu. “I understand you’re near the top of your class.”
“I do what I can.” She had a nice personality and laugh. There wasn’t anything I could find to dislike about her. Not that I was trying.
But once again, she was not my choice.
When would I get to choose?
“Excuse me. I’m sorry, I just remembered I promised to make a phone call. I won’t be long.” I pushed back from the table when the air in the room suddenly felt too dry and heavy for me to breathe. I was making an ass out of myself, but I wasn’t the one who put me in this position. Mom and Dad sitting there staring at us, practically hanging on every word, did. Didn’t they know how pathetic this was? How blatantly obvious? Clover seemed like a smart girl. What did she think about it?
I wasn’t going to stay around long enough to find out. I made my way through the restaurant, which was full on a Friday evening. If I didn’t get out of here soon, I would suffocate.
The warm air outside was better than what I had just left. I loosened my tie and considered walking. Just going, leaving without another word. I could always reach out to Clover and apologize. She might even understand. What I couldn’t do was sit and be part of that charade a minute longer.
“What do you think you’re doing?” The sound of Dad’s voice behind me left my molars grinding and my blood boiling. “You left that lovely girl in there while you’re standing out here doing what?”
“Believe me,” I gritted out, turning around to face him. “It’s much better for me to be out here. What is this, a goddamn sitcom? Mom and Dad clumsily match their kid up with some random girl who comes from the right family? Do you know how awkward this is?”
“When will you grow up?” Gone was the charming, affable guy from the restaurant. He had never existed in the first place. “This is how it’s done. You’re introduced to a nice girl, you get to know each other, and you realize you couldn’t possibly do much better.” He ended with a short shrug.
I barked out a laugh. “Thank you for your faith in me.”
“Lucian. She’s beautiful, she’s smart, she’s got a great future ahead of her. What else do you need to know?”
“Remind me again how you and Mom met.” The brief flash of uncertainty that passed over his face was gratifying. I knew damn well Mom had been close friends with Dad’s sister, my aunt Lourde. They hadn’t been set up by their parents, even though my grandparents had certainly tried.
“That has nothing to do with this,” he scoffed.
“That has everything to do with this. You can’t force me into becoming involved with someone all because you think she’s acceptable. I’m not going to be part of this charade.”
“Just like you didn’t want to be part of the family business? Yet there you are, succeeding in spite of yourself.”
This time, it made sense for Ivy to come to mind. She was the reason I was succeeding. She was someone I would much rather have had dinner with, no matter how hot and smart Clover was.
“I’m leaving,” I decided. “Please, tell her… I don’t care what you tell her. I got called away.”
“No.” He tried to block me. A waste of time on a wide sidewalk with plenty of room to sidestep him. “You will not embarrass us this way.”
“Considering I never asked you to set me up with her, this embarrassment is on you.”
I walked away, knowing there were too many people on the street for him to try to stop me. If there was one thing Dad couldn’t stand, it was making a scene. He was much too important to do anything so low class.
I walked one block, then another. My head pounded with every step I took. The bastard. What the fuck was he thinking? I would catch hell the next time I saw him, though I couldn’t bring myself to care. He brought this on himself. It was bad enough I had to play along in the office.
Dad had sent a car to the office to pick me up for dinner, meaning I had to grit my teeth and order an Uber. I could have walked home if I were going there, but the last thing I felt like doing was sitting alone. I was in no mood to bullshit with the guys, either. To sit around and hear about how happy they were while my fucking parents tried to set me up tonight like I was some hopeless wreck, unable to find a woman on his own. The more I thought about it, the worse it pissed me off.
Rather than order the car to take me home, I copied and pasted an address I’d gotten from office records earlier today. On a whim, I had looked up Ivy’s address to get a sense of where and how she lived.
Now, I would see with my own eyes what I had looked up online. A tiny, rundown walk-up in a shitty part of Brooklyn, where rents were cheap and crime was higher than the surrounding area. In other words, something she could afford on the pittance she’d probably made at Jones. I didn’t know if she would be home, but I wanted to try.
Once we were on our way, I tried to call her. The phone rang several times before sending me to voicemail. She probably had a life. Work could not be all there was. I ended the call without leaving a message. “What am I thinking?” I muttered, staring at the phone.
“What’s that?” the driver asked, raising his voice to be heard over his shitty music.
“Can I change the destination? I’ve changed my mind.” Instead, I sent him to the bar, where Miles and Noah told me to meet them after dinner. Fuck it. I wasn’t going to show up on some woman’s doorstep, and I wasn’t going to sit around feeling sorry for myself. I was Lucian-fucking-Diamond. While my father might not have thought much of that, I had stopped listening to his opinion years ago.
There was only one person whose opinion seemed to matter at the moment, and she didn’t want me.