Chapter 9
Chapter Nine
ASTON
Rule #1: There is no such thing as forever.
As the eldest of the family, it was time for me to take charge. At least in the essence of trying to move forward. Speaking with Blakely as I had, knowing that I was making moves that I normally wouldn’t, reminded me that I at least needed to try.
That was how I found myself on the other side of the table with Isabella.
I had opted for a small diner that served comfort food, and a place that I liked to relax. It wasn’t a fancy overbearing place, and it wasn’t a loud place with children running up and down the aisles. I figured Isabella wouldn’t mind it, but the problem was I didn’t know her. I didn’t want to alienate my new sister, and I had been afraid to even ask Blakely where I should take Isabella for lunch, because that felt as if I were getting insider information. Then again, I needed that insider information. So I had texted her.
Me:
Where should I take Isabella for lunch?
Blakely:
That’s an odd way to say hello.
I had grimaced, and quickly typed.
Me:
Good morning. It was great seeing you last night. Now, where should I take your best friend for lunch where she’s not going to hate me.
Blakely:
I was just kidding with you. And lunch with Isabella? That’s so sweet. And she doesn’t mind anywhere. Honestly, food that she doesn’t have to cook herself is always a win.
Me:
So nothing pretentious.
Blakely:
LOL. Probably not for your first sibling date.
Me:
Don’ t make it weird.
Blakely:
Oh, I’m going to make it weird. I’ll see you on Monday?
I had swallowed hard, wondering what the hell I was going to do with myself and her.
Me:
Yes. Monday it is.
And that was how I found myself in front of Isabella, both of us seated across from each other in a booth, feeling awkward as hell.
“Thank you for joining me for lunch,” I said, tapping my fingers on the table. Isabelle’s gaze went straight to the motion, and I stopped.
Now I was developing a nervous tick about this family. It seemed about right.
“I was honestly surprised that you asked me for lunch. And since it’s just the two of us, I guess it doesn’t count toward our monthly meal.”
I grimaced. “Do any meals you eat with the siblings you knew about your entire life this month count?”
“Touché.”
“Here’s the deal…” I began.
Isabella just grinned. “I was waiting for that.”
I continued as if I hadn’t heard her. I liked her biting tone. Honestly, it reminded me of Flynn’s when he was in a mood, and myself for that matter.
“I’m seeing your best friend, and we’re newly found siblings. I think we should just deal. ”
Isabella spluttered in front of me and shook her head. “You’re seeing Blakely? That’s the label you’re using?”
I shrugged, knowing that label might not have been correct, but it was something. I wasn’t completely jumping off the deep end. Or maybe I was. “I want to see her, and we have gone out. I’m not quite sure what other label I should be using. And frankly, that’s a discussion Blakely and I need to have.”
Isabella smiled so sweetly, I had a feeling I said the right thing. “You’re right. I am usually very bad at those conversations, so more power to you.”
“So you’re not seeing anyone?”
“No. There’s really not time for boyfriends and dating with my current job.”
And that seemed like a decent segue. “From what you’ve said, and what Blakely has mentioned?—”
She cut me off. “So you and Blakely talk about me?”
“There really is no good way to say this. Because if we never mentioned you, it would feel like the elephant in the room of not doing so because it is a very large part of our lives. And if we did talk about you, it would feel like talking about you behind your back, wouldn’t it?”
“I don’t like the fact that you have answers for everything. And yes, I’m being obstinate because I’m annoyed about this situation. I’m not always annoyed with you. I promise.”
That made me smile. “Well that’s always a good way to start.” The waitress came over, and we ordered two different types of closed sandwiches with fries and handed over the menus .
“Before we get into the other awkwardness, I was surprised you chose this place. I’ve driven by it a few times, but I’ve never been.”
I shrugged. “I used to sit in that booth over there with my homework after school and do as much as I could before I had to go home.”
“I’m almost afraid to ask what your childhood was like.”
“It wasn’t terrible. I can only complain about the way Dad treated us, and my mother for that matter. But it wasn’t terrible. Everything was always loud at the house, because there were so many of us, and I just wanted to pretend I was an only child for a minute.”
She nodded, understanding in her gaze. “As the eldest I get that. And honestly, I thought my house was loud with the number of siblings.”
“Yes, the numbers are a little worrying.”
Her lips twitched.
And it felt as if we’d been speaking for hours, though it hadn’t been that long. We were jumping from topic to topic, speaking of numerous things as if we’d known each other for years. The comfort in the interaction should have been unsettling but it wasn’t. And perhaps that was the unsettling part of the entire situation.
“Seriously though, do you like your job?” I pressed.
She sighed. “I don’t know if it’s any of your business, but no. I hate it. I work too many hours, I deal with too many people who have no idea what they’re doing, so I have to do their work for them as well. And if I’m not perfect, I get yelled at, and I’m just not in the mood to deal with it anymore.”
“Have you been looking for another place of employment?” I asked, honestly curious. From what I could tell, Isabella was competent, and was steadfast in protecting her family. I would have assumed she’d have found a job that she liked. But then again, not everybody liked their jobs. I was lucky in the fact that I was born into mine, and I knew I was privileged.
“I’ve tried before, but starting over is hard. First I tried to have an interview, and then my sister was attacked.”
I froze, trying to remember if I had actually known that.
“What?”
Isabella grimaced. “I thought you knew because of Ford. Phoebe? She was attacked. Twice actually.” She shuddered. “I’m just glad that Kane was around both times to help her.”
I rubbed my temple, annoyed with myself. “I knew that. At least in the periphery. I try not to think about Ford’s job too much because it scares the shit out of me. I just hadn’t put two and two together that Phoebe was your Phoebe.” I paused. “Our Phoebe.”
Her eyes warmed at that, and she looked far less tired when she did. “Our Phoebe. This is going to take a long time to get used to.”
“And we’re going to fuck up a lot,” I muttered.
“Oh yes, we are. I fight with my siblings all the time, because it’s what we do. And I love them. ”
“Same with my brothers. We don’t have the deep fractures in our relationships that some large families have. I think it’s because we bound together against my mom’s attitude and our father’s ineptitude.”
“My problem is I really liked my mom. She was wonderful to us. And the way we grew up, Dad was in and out of our lives, not just for work, but because we thought they separated. It’s how they had put it.”
I shook my head, astonished. “Seriously?”
“Seriously. So in my mind, my mother was a strong single mom who was working to keep us all afloat. And I don’t even know if that’s true.”
“So Dad wasn’t supporting you guys at all?”
“I don’t know. I can’t talk to my mom about it, because she’s mourning a man that I apparently didn’t know. It’s not like I haven’t met our father. He ate dinner with us, he was there on Christmas morning.”
“Busy day since he was also there at our Christmas mornings,” I said dryly.
“Because he always had to work and would leave early. So I don’t know the man that you know. And I didn’t know my mother this whole time.”
“Sadly my mother knowing about a secret family and being icy cold about it doesn’t really change my view about her.”
Isabella grimaced as the waitress set down our food. We said our thanks, and we each picked up a fry, playing with the edge of it. I didn’t even think Isabella realized that we were doing the same movement, and I had to wonder exactly how genetics worked .
“I’m sorry that you had to deal with that woman. Because I had an amazing mom.”
“I’m sorry that this broke your view of her.”
“And I think that’s what I hate the most. I never liked Dad. And that’s a horrible thing to say about a dead man who happens to be your father.”
“Dad was an asshole. I don’t like him very much either.”
“But we all had our certain relationships with him. I went into accounting with large corporations because my dad helped me with numbers when I was little, and everything just clicked. And it was all a lie.”
“Not all of it. We have to believe that. If it’s all of it, then nothing makes sense.”
“And that’s the problem. Nothing does make sense. But then again, this is a very weird situation.”
“I can’t believe that I didn’t really know it was Phoebe that was hurt that whole time,” I said, bringing me back to the beginning of our conversation.
“And the fact that Ford, a man that I met, happens to be my brother as well? I always thought he looked familiar, but I didn’t realize that it was because all of you guys have Kyler’s eyes.”
I sighed, and bit into the fry. “You know what’s weird, I really like his music.”
Isabella beamed. “He’s brilliant. I can’t believe that he’s going on tour and has albums. He’s really making something of himself, and it’s so strange because he’s my baby brother. ”
“Has the scandal broken in his circles yet?” I asked, honestly worried.
She shook her head. “Not really. I think there were a couple of articles, but now they’ve moved on to a new thing. Kyler doesn’t share most things. He puts on a smile, pretends he’s a lazy musician, but I don’t know everything. I wish I did.”
“Well, maybe he’ll confide in a brother.”
She scowled at me, and I just laughed.
“I was kidding, but you never know. I grew up in a house of just boys. So I feel like Kyler’s situation is probably completely different than the rest of ours.”
“Oh no I didn’t even think about that. He was stuck with all of us girls, and now you guys outnumber us.”
“Pretty much,” I said with a laugh, and we continued to eat, discussing each of our siblings in turn. It felt like something had changed, as if maybe we weren’t adversaries, but allies in this war against history and family.
“Back to your job. So Phoebe getting hurt made you not look?” I asked, trying to get the image of Phoebe hurt out of my mind.
“I missed a big interview, and then it set me back for a bit. And even before that, I was ready to start the process, and then Sophia retired from ballet, and wanted to open a dance studio. And I ended up having to stay on so that way I could help her co-sign.”
My eyes widened. “That was selfless.”
“It is what family does. And in the end, I didn’t even have to truly co-sign because Sophia did really well for herself, but it’s what family does. And then Kyler got a little bit bigger, and I wanted to be able to have the time off to travel, and starting over would’ve been hard, and then Emily was looking for jobs, and happened to get an interview at the same place that I was, and I knew that they weren’t going to be able to hire both of us, so I stepped back.”
“And you still work in a job you hate,” I said softly.
“Pretty much.”
“You’ll work with us,” I said, finally blurting what I had been trying to put into words this entire time.
She froze, her fry halfway to her mouth. “I don’t need charity.”
I shook my head. “It’s not charity. It’s work.”
“I’m a forensic accountant, Aston.”
“And are you really performing the job that you want right now?”
Isabella stared at me for long enough I was afraid I’d overstepped once again, bug eventually she shook her head. “No. I’m doing other types of accounting because that’s what they put on my table, but I’m trained as a forensic accountant. Do you really need one?”
“Of course we do. We buy other businesses and buy into other businesses. Blakely’s job is to help organize those businesses, underneath James’s purview. But we need another forensic accountant on the team.”
“So I would work for you or James or Flynn?”
I shook my head. “With us.”
“I’m not quite sure that is how it works.”
“It’s how we’ll make it work. I don’t work for my brothers. Yes, Blakely works for James, but she’s not family.” I cringe. “I’m not doing this right.”
“No you’re right. I’m just surprised.”
“You shouldn’t be. One day the will’s going to be split twelve ways evenly. Beyond the holdings we already have. My brothers and I, at least everyone but Kyler all made our own income outside of what Dad left us. And Kyler is doing damn well. We aren’t billionaires, we’re not even truly multimillionaires.”
She raised a brow.
“We’re not. The company does well, but we don’t take huge salaries. We aren’t the megalomaniacs with the monocle laughing over our heaps of money.”
“And here I thought you were Scrooge McDuck, diving into his vault of money.”
“Diving into coins does not seem sanitary, and honestly it’s just asking for a broken bone.”
She laughed at that, and I finished my sandwich, knowing I wouldn’t have much time to eat later.
“Take the job. Do something you want to do. Or hell, work with us for a little bit, get something else on your CV, and then find another place. If it doesn’t work out, it doesn’t work out. But we have the space, the needs, and why do something you hate?”
She sighed and shook her head. “You really are the eldest, aren’t you?”
“So says the other eldest.”
She grimaced. “I’m no longer even close to being the oldest sibling anymore. Most of you guys are older than me by a couple of years. ”
“You know, I think you and James are the same age. Like a couple of days apart.”
Isabella grimaced. “Don’t remind me of that. Because that means well, Dad was, well, I don’t want to think about it.”
I shudder. “No, we’re not going to think about that.”
As we finished our lunch, she raised a brow at me. “Okay, let’s say I take this job. Who would I be working with?”
“All three of us. And if you need to worry about the hierarchy, it would be a vote with all three of us.”
“I’m okay with that. I don’t need to come in and be the CEO of the company or anything. I’m not that insane.”
“There’s a lot of places to work, and you don’t even have to work in the same building.”
“Because you guys own so many buildings. And a town?”
I sighed. “Yes, I mean I only personally own a house that I rent out most of the time. Hudson lives there.”
“That’s why it’s so hard for him to get on the schedule for the monthly dinners.”
“Same with Kyler.”
“I don’t mind though, them having to travel so far to us seems a little ridiculous for dinner.”
“That’s what I was thinking. Also, because the town was founded by our great-grandfather, at least in his mind, things were passed down. And then my brothers and I bought some more of the land from a company that Dad sold to. ”
She frowned. “What do you mean?”
I ground my teeth, before forcing myself to relax. “Dad was on his way to selling it to a company who wanted to build a strip mall in the small town.”
Her eyes widened. “Are you serious?”
“Yep. So we outbid him, had to get loans because again, we aren’t multimillionaires. But we were able to give the land back to the town. We’ve never lived in town full time. We were there for summers as kids, but I try not to think of it as us owning a town.”
“Dad really was an asshole.”
“He was.” We were both silent for a moment, memories of my time with Dad filling my mind and I had a feeling Isabella’s was doing the same.
“So do you go to the lake often? Or is it really just Hudson’s place?”
“I used to go more. But I don’t really take time off.”
“I don’t know what time off is.”
“You do get vacations with us.”
“Well, that’s good. A little scary though.”
“We are scary, but I promise we don’t bite.”
She rolled her eyes. “You should go to the lake though. If you are this stressed that you’re having a peace talk lunch with me, you should go relax.”
“And should I take Blakely then?” I ask, only teasing.
Her eyes narrowed, and I realized I might have stepped in it, before she shrugged. “Just don’t fuck with her. But maybe? She hated her last job so much, even more than I hate mine. And then she spent three months dealing with the fallout. So maybe having a weekend at a lake would be good for her. But I don’t want the details. It was already awkward enough.”
I blinked, a little confused. “Oh. Maybe.” I had only been kidding, but now the idea held merit. Of course, that meant I would have to break my own rules.
But I was getting good at that.
As we’d settled the bill, splitting it evenly because of course we did, we headed out of the small diner. Isabella frowned and I looked down at her.
“What is it?”
“I just realized that Sophia’s studio is down the block.”
“Really?” I asked, looking where she pointed. “I didn’t know that. I must have walked by it a thousand times.”
“It really is a small world. I don’t like it,” she said with a laugh.
“Noted.”
As if we had conjured her, Sophia came around the block, hand in hand with a tall man with broad shoulders and blonde hair.
“Who’s that,” I whispered.
“Her boyfriend. His name is Cale.” I raised a brow. “Spelled with a C. Don’t worry, Kyler already made all the vegetable jokes.”
“I don’t know if he’s made all of them,” I muttered.
Isabella laughed, her shoulders shaking.
Sophia’s eyes widened as she spotted us. “Hi. This is nice.”
“Hello Sophia,” I said, an unfamiliar awkwardness settling in again .
Isabella moved forward to hug her sister. “We were just having lunch.”
“And no blood was shed?” Sophia said, and I tilted my head.
“Not yet anyway.” I looked over at Cale and realized that this man was touching my baby sister. Well then, that was a new feeling of protectiveness that I hadn’t been expecting.
Isabella looked at me, and her eyes filled with laughter.
“This is Cale.”
“It’s nice to meet you,” the other man said as he held out his hand, and I shook it firmly. I didn’t squeeze too hard, because I didn’t think it was my place to really protect Sophia. But maybe it should be.
“It’s nice to meet you.”
“We were just heading to a place that I know a couple blocks from here for a drink. Do you want to join?” he asked, and I tilted my head, and looked around the block to figure out exactly where we were.
“Are you going to The Gilded Cage?” I asked, curious.
Cale’s eyes widened. “Yes. I love that place.”
Sophia and Isabella both burst out laughing, and then Cale blinked before he shook his head.
“I didn’t even think about the name. Do you own it?”
“No, though our brother Dorian owns the building.”
“The whole building?” Sophia asked. “I still rent my small section.”
“It’s what he wanted to do. And then he runs the bar of course. We should go see him. I know he’s working today.” I looked at Isabella. “Are you okay with that?”
“Well, it seems that we have to celebrate things, and I need to put in my two weeks’ notice.”
Sophia’s eyes widen. “Are you serious?”
Isabella rolled her shoulders back and I wasn’t sure if she was trying to protect herself from the oncoming questions or the job itself. “Yes. It seems that I’ll be working with the big brothers.”
Sophia clapped her hands. “Oh this is amazing. I hate your job.”
“It sounds like we do have a lot to celebrate,” Cale said, as he gestured down the block. “Lead the way.”
“And I get to see another brother. This sounds like a plan.” Sophia laughed, and wrapped her arms around Cale’s waist, and we all walked our way toward The Gilded Cage.
It was a high-class bar that had a VIP section for high clientele, and other stations for people who walked in off the street. Of course, we were family, so we could go wherever we wanted.
Dorian met us at the door, and looked between us, confusion settling on his face for just an instant, before he put on his lazy smile.
“Well, this is an interesting family reunion.” He looked over at Cale, and narrowed his eyes in the same way that I had a feeling I had earlier.
“But you’re new.”
“Hi, I’m Cale. I’m with Sophia. ”
Dorian gave him a once over, and nodded tightly, before holding out his hand.
“Nice to meet you. I’m the pretty brother.”
Cale just laughed, a camaraderie in his gaze.
Sophia and Isabella looked between them. “I don’t know if I’m going to like this many brothers.”
“And I thought Kyler was bad,” Isabella snickered, and something settled into place.
No, we weren’t truly family, not yet. But we were getting there.
And maybe, maybe this could work. Despite my mother, despite my father, it could work.
I just had to hope to hell I didn’t ruin things with Blakely in the process.