Chapter Six
Caesar
“Are you going to behave?” my brother asks.
I scowl at him. “I’m not a fucking dog.”
Marcus’s lips curve up. “There’s a joke about a bone there but luckily I’m too mature to make it.”
Aurelia points her pen at me. “Seriously, you need to keep your temper under control. Nothing’s going to be decided here today, and you’ll have plenty of time to put your objections to the board.”
I don’t answer. Instead, I rise and go over to the table near the window and help myself to coffee from the urn. Then I stand and sip it, looking down at the view of Waitematā Harbour.
I’m not stupid. Tom Rutherford is claiming this is just an exploratory meeting, but he’s like a hemiparasitic plant—mistletoe in human form.
He’ll attach himself to us and form a haustorium to penetrate us and extract our resources and send out feelers to wrap around us and pull us under until he’s consumed us completely.
Okay, I acknowledge that sounds a little unhinged.
It hasn’t been a good week. First of all the news came that Rutherford had approached my father a second time with the offer of a ‘strategic partnership.’ I assumed Dad would tell him to go fuck himself, but he then revealed he’d arranged an exploratory meeting ‘to see what Rutherford has in mind.’
I was still reeling from that when Marcus came into my office looking like he’d won the lottery and told me that Wren is pregnant.
I’m pleased for him. I really am. I’ve never had romantic feelings for Wren or she for me—we’ve always just been good friends.
And when I found out that Marcus has been in love with her since he asked her out when he was eighteen, I was thrilled that Wren had agreed to marry him, and that it worked out for them. I’m not even a tiny bit jealous.
Except I am. I’m deeply, heartbreakingly envious of the fact that my little brother is married with a child on the way, and I’m still single and likely to remain so for the foreseeable future.
I stare moodily at the ferry that’s just left the terminal, heading for Waiheke Island. It’s been about nine months since I dated anyone—not counting the whatever-it-was that Cupcake and I had on the night of the ball. The longer I wait to ask a girl out, the harder it’s becoming.
It doesn’t help that Kristen, my ex, rang me yesterday.
It’s not the first time she’s contacted me since we broke up last May, but in the past I’ve refused to take her calls.
I think I only answered my phone yesterday because Marcus had just revealed his news, and I was feeling sorry for myself.
We exchanged pleasantries and talked about mutual acquaintances for a while.
And then she told me she missed me and wondered if she could see me again.
At that moment, I was flung back to the moment when my friend Huxley pulled me aside at his business club and murmured, “You know Kristen’s telling everyone you’ve taken the bait, and she’s just waiting to reel you in?”
I stared at him and said, “What?”
“Thought you should know,” he said. “Apparently her father’s in financial trouble, and he told her to find someone wealthy to help bail him out.
I mean, I’m sure that’s not the only reason she’s dating you…
” But the look in his eye relayed the pity he was feeling.
He and I, and some of our friends, had talked before about the difficulty of weeding out the fortune hunters.
While it seems like a first-world problem to everyone else, it’s a real problem for rich men, and Kristen’s betrayal hit me hard.
Remembering that had made cold filter through my veins.
I made my excuses as politely as I could and ended the call.
Usually I’m the every-cloud-has-a-silver-lining guy, the one searching for the positives in a situation to cheer everyone else up.
I don’t suffer from depression and tend to work off a bad mood in the gym, or by drinking whisky and watching the Band of Brothers series until I pass out.
But this time it didn’t work, and I’m currently in a funk I can’t seem to shake off.
Maybe it’s because I’m the eldest, but I’ve always been the one people turn to when they want something. I’d never admit it to anyone, but it’s been a lifelong struggle to be seen and liked for myself.
That inevitably makes me think about the mysterious Cupcake and our brief time together.
She didn’t know my identity, but she still wanted me.
Although nobody at the ball is likely to have been cash-strapped, she didn’t know quite how rich I was, or what family I was from.
She liked me for me. That has warmed me from the inside out every time I’ve thought about it, which has only been like, oh, once every minute or so.
I sigh. I went through the attendance list that states what time each visitor had their ticket scanned, and I tried to work out who arrived around the moment I accompanied Cupcake inside.
But the problem is that invitations were frequently sent to a company rather than to individuals.
About forty people arrived during the ten-minute timeframe I requested a printout for, and it proved impossible to pinpoint my mystery girl.
The door opens behind me. I wait a beat, then turn to see my father coming in with our guests.
We’d all expected the Rutherfords to ascend en masse, so I’m taken aback to see the old patriarch accompanied by only one woman.
I’m even more surprised by her appearance.
She’s young, maybe late twenties, beautiful, and…
unusual. Her short bob, eyebrows, and eyelashes are all white, and her skin is incredibly pale.
I’ve seen her on social media—this is Tom’s granddaughter, and I think she has albinism.
It’s extremely rare. I’m sure I read that only one in every eighteen thousand people has it in New Zealand.
“Tom, you know my son Marcus, and my daughter Aurelia,” Dad says as they walk around the table, and Tom shakes their hands and says how pleased he is to be there.
I stay where I am, on the other side of the table, and stare at his granddaughter. She’s looking at me, and in the sunlight that’s slanting through the large windows, I can see that she has the most beautiful violet eyes.
Holy fuck. It can’t be… I try to picture her in a dark wig and false eyelashes, with bright pink lips. It could be…
“From the way you’re glaring at me, you must be Caesar,” she says with a chuckle. She holds out her hand across the table, above the plates of appetizers Dad insisted we order in for morning tea. “It’s good to meet you. I’m Brielle, Tom’s granddaughter.”
Automatically, I stretch out my hand and shake hers.
Her gaze is faintly flirtatious, but there’s no hint of recognition in it.
She’s wearing what my mother would call a power suit, black and tight fitting, with a white shirt.
She’s attractive, but she’s missing the indefinable quality that Cupcake exhibited that night, a delightful blend of mischief and clumsiness.
She also has no mole above her top lip. It’s not her.
I clear my throat and release her hand, shaken up. “Good to meet you.”
“And you know Caesar, too,” Dad says to Tom. The old boy walks around the table and holds out his hand to me. “Caesar,” he says. “It’s good to see you again.”
Dislike spikes inside me, and my spine automatically stiffens.
I first met Tom Rutherford ten years ago, across another boardroom table.
Dad had sent me to secure a failing farm close to Lake Taupo.
It was a routine acquisition, a chance for me to prove myself.
But Tom Rutherford turned it into a lesson.
He picked apart my numbers, questioned my assumptions, and then calmly outbid me at the table.
I didn’t just lose the deal; I lost face.
It took me years to get over that, and it could be argued that I never have.
I nod, then remove my hand. Dad is already at the head of the table. Marcus is next to him, and Aurelia is next to Marcus. I take the seat next to her, so we’re all on one side of the table.
Tom studies me for a moment, then walks around the table and sits on the other side, opposite Aurelia.
“Can I get anyone a drink?” Aurelia asks, so brightly that I know she thinks I was rude. “Tea, coffee, soft drink?”
“Tea, please,” Tom says. “With a splash of milk.”
“I’ll just have water, please.” Brielle takes the seat on her father’s right, next to Dad.
She looks at me. “Would you mind awfully closing the blinds a little? Maddie and I have bad photosensitivity, and if we sit here in sunglasses it’s going to look as if we’re hoping for a part in the new Men in Black movie. ”
Marcus gives a short laugh. “Women in Black, you mean,” and Aurelia giggles as she pours the tea.
Tom has obviously brought Brielle here to smooth things over. I don’t want to be smoothed over, and glower as I rise to close the blinds.
It’s only as I pull on the cord and she says, “That’s better,” that I register what she said before. “Maddie?” I query.
“My sister,” Brielle clarifies as she hands us all a folder. “She went to the bathroom—she’ll be here in a sec. Oh, here she is now.”
The glass door opens, and I look across to see another young woman coming through.
She’s wearing a navy pencil skirt and a white blouse that makes her look businesslike but also feminine.
Like Brielle, she also has white hair, although hers is much longer and falls past her shoulders like a curtain of snow.
She also has white eyebrows and lashes, and when she looks at me, she has the same stunning violet eyes as her sister.
But what convinces me that she’s my mystery girl is the small mole above her top lip.
That, and the fact that as she enters she walks right into the rubber plant standing by the door and knocks it over, spilling earth all over the carpet.