Chapter 4
CHAPTER FOUR
“T he Staff Princess didn’t get her beauty sleep last night, hmm?”
I straightened from the water station in the Alderton-Du Ponte lobby, my bottle half filled. Caroline, wearing one of her favorite tennis outfits, strode up with her own uncapped bottle. She’d pulled her light hair into a high pony with a few loose pieces framing her face, looking more like she was going to a magazine shoot than tennis practice.
At her side came Annalise, wearing a zip-up over her tennis dress, her blonde hair in a braid down her back. “Don’t be mean,” she scolded Caroline, eyes settling on me. “I think you look nice, Lovey.”
“Could’ve brushed her ponytail a little,” Caroline murmured, but with a smile.
“You two really have a good-cop-bad-cop routine down,” I threw back with an affectionate eye roll. I propped my bottle back under the water sensor. “Playing tennis together this morning?”
“Bright and early.” Annalise gave me a look, and I noticed how pale she looked. “ Really early for someone who’s still running on California time.”
“Hey, I’m trying to get you adapted as fast as possible.” Caroline leaned against the wall beside the fountain. “What day is this?”
It took me a long second to recall. “Sunday.”
“I mean, what day of shifts is this? Six?”
I pressed my lips together and focused on my slow-filling water bottle. “Eight.”
“Eight days in a row, Lovey?” She let out a loud sigh. “With the rate you’re developing wrinkles, you’ll probably look like you’re in your seventies at forty.”
“Caroline, don’t say?—”
I cut Annalise off. “I can relax when I’m dead.”
Annalise gasped. “Don’t say that.”
I pulled my now-full bottle from the water fountain, and Caroline set hers underneath the sensor. “You’re not… mad at me. Right?”
I blinked, really struggling to keep up. I couldn’t tell if it was the lack of sleep or if she really was bouncing all over the place. “Mad at you? About what?”
“For not telling you Annalise was coming home.”
I glanced between the two of them, immediately on edge. Last night, amid my mini spiral about 1442 Everview Road, that thought about Caroline and Annalise had come up. Briefly. Not that I was mad at Caroline specifically, but it was the same thing I’d felt back in June. Left out. Forgotten.
I’d hated myself for feeling that way. Left out. Ridiculous.
“I wanted to surprise you,” Annalise insisted, expression earnest. “I wanted to see the look on your face?—”
“Well, I’m mad at Annalise for not mentioning she was bringing along Aaron Astor.” Caroline shot her a look.
“It’s more like we tagged along with him. He was already coming out here for the charity.”
“You should’ve listened to my mom yesterday.” Caroline lowered her voice. “She thinks I should pursue Aaron. ‘ Men like him don’t come around that often, Caroline .’”
“Men with connections like him,” I guessed.
“Bingo. I mean, son of Astro Agencies? Even if he isn’t the sole heir to it, it’s still a good title.” Caroline picked up her water bottle and replaced it with Annalise’s. “Except someone had to go and introduce him to Fiona first.”
I recognized Caroline’s tone instantly, despite the saccharine sweetness she tried to layer over top of it. “Trust me,” Annalise said. “They’re better suited for each other.”
I raised an eyebrow. “How so?”
“They started talking back in January.” She glanced around, as if looking for who might be eavesdropping. “He’s looking for someone to marry.”
At the same time, both Caroline and I echoed, “ Marry ?”
“Good God, it’s the Margot situation all over again,” Caroline muttered.
“It’s a long story,” Annalise said—then paused. For a moment, she looked like she was about to throw up. “I’m going to run to the bathroom quick,” she said quickly, waving a hand at her water as she stepped back. “Can you—thanks!”
“Probably realized she was about to spill secrets she wasn’t supposed to,” Caroline said with a shake of her head. “Annalise has never been good with keeping secrets.”
I watched our friend’s retreating figure, frowning. “She’s not?”
“I can’t imagine myself with a guy like Aaron Astor, anyway,” she went on. “ Scrawny . He’s scrawny, isn’t he?”
Aaron’s firm, bare chest in the dim light of the closet yesterday sprang to mind. My skin flushed. “I wouldn’t say scrawny?—”
“Short.”
“He’s your height.”
“Like I said.” She wrinkled her nose. “Young.”
“He’s only, like, a year and a half younger than you.”
“I like my men like fine wine. He’s still just grape juice.”
That nearly made me laugh. “He apparently has his sights set on Fiona, though. So at least you can use that to dodge your mother.”
Caroline’s smile stiffened. “True.”
I knocked my water bottle against my knuckles. “I should get to work?—”
“Speak of the devil.”
I followed her gaze, half expecting to see Fiona, but instead found a group of four men walking into the country club’s lobby from the direction of the Massey Hotel & Suites. The hotel and country club were bridged by a long, windowed corridor, and it was beautiful during the day as sunlight streamed through, shining off the marbled floors. Dr. Conan, Mr. Holland, Michael, and Aaron emerged from it now, mid-conversation, dressed like they were ready for the golf course.
“Enhancing the music hall is a fantastic opportunity,” Aaron was saying to the men, his voice becoming clearer as they neared. “A dedicated space opens the door for many prospects. Seasonal concerts, plays, even having performers come in for special fundraisers?—”
Dr. Conan gave a low chuckle. “You’re an opportunist, aren’t you?”
“Looking at ways to improve business makes someone an opportunist?”
“We’re not a business,” Mr. Holland said in a flat tone. “We’re a country club.”
Michael tugged on Aaron’s jacket sleeve—it was only visible from the angle Caroline and I stood at—but Aaron shook his friend off. “I was under the impression that you generated revenue from membership fees, no? Alderton-Du Ponte’s other amenities? Or have we started redefining what business means?”
Despite the years of always holding myself back, I couldn’t help it—I gasped.
“He’s digging his own grave,” Caroline murmured, sounding somewhat impressed.
He was. The arrogant lilt to his voice was like a silver shovel, and each word from his mouth dug him lower, inch by inch. If he kept going like this, he’d bury himself before they even made it to the golf course.
Annalise wasn’t back from the bathroom yet, so I nudged Caroline’s shoulder. “Go save him.”
“Me? Why?” She raised her eyebrow. “We don’t like him.”
Knowing Rhythms of Hope was chummy with Aaron Astor unnerved me a little, but I was one of the few on the property who was Pro Charity Takeover . Really, I was pro saving the music hall from the country club’s selfish clutches. And if Aaron was fighting to keep them from turning its beauty into another stupid amenity, I was all for that. “It’s painful to watch,” I said instead.
“We do things differently around here,” Dr. Conan interjected, his loud voice carrying across the lobby as he straightened his spine. He was the picture of an intimidating grizzly bear. “At Alderton-Du Ponte, we don’t just waltz in and make demands. We communicate. We listen. We care. We don’t just bulldoze.”
Aaron lifted his chin with a small smile on his face. A smile . The man had a death wish. “I’m sorry—you said you care ? About whom? Because you certainly didn’t seem to care about Nancy Du Ponte when I was here back in June, and now you want to demolish a space she, solely, designed for community. You didn’t seem to care about Margot Massey, either, and she was one of your own. Or do you only care about the ones who’ve actually drank the soul-sucking Kool-Aid, and throw away everyone else?”
Mr. Holland, who stood at Dr. Conan’s side, curled his hand into a fist.
I slapped my palm against Caroline’s shoulder. “Go, go .”
This time, she listened. “Daddy!”
Her high-pitched greeting was like a needle to a balloon, popping the tension. All four men turned toward where she rushed over, her blonde ponytail and pink tennis skirt both swishing with her step.
“Care.” Mr. Holland’s expression softened from the stern mask it’d been a moment ago. He took in her outfit. “I didn’t know you were coming in—why didn’t you say anything? We could’ve driven together.”
Aaron glanced between Mr. Holland and Caroline. “I didn’t realize Annalise’s friend was your daughter, Mr. Holland.”
Mr. Holland didn’t even look over at him. “I don’t see why you needed to know it.”
Inexplicably, my feet carried me forward. “Headed out onto the green?” I asked Dr. Conan. He wore layers to fight off the mid-March cold. “You’re in luck. I’m working the beverage cart today.”
“Ah, I knew it was going to be a good day,” Dr. Conan replied with a smile. “My favorite snack bar driver.”
I turned toward his counterpart. “Mr. Holland, it’s good to see you too.”
Mr. Holland and Grant had far too many similarities, so seeing Mr. Holland now was jarring. His hair was golden, but flecked with silver, causing the ruddiness of his cheeks to stand out starker. He, too, greeted me with a smile, though it was more pinched. “Lovisa.”
“You’re the only one that makes my whiskey sours how I like them.” Dr. Conan cast a glance toward where Aaron and Michael stood. “Except we might need something stronger today.”
“Stronger?” I asked with faux shock, as if he hadn’t been telling me stronger every single time. “Then again, when you lose, you have something to blame it on.”
Dr. Conan gave me a wink. “You see the angle I’m attacking from, honey.”
Mr. Holland’s phone began ringing then, and when he fished it out, his expression brightened. “It’s my boy.”
“Grant?” Caroline asked, trying to peer at the phone screen. “I want to talk to him, too!”
I looked up at Grant’s name. “Excuse us a moment,” Mr. Holland said, though mostly to Dr. Conan, before he and his daughter moved off toward the seating area of the lobby for privacy. Before they got too far, though, I heard him say, “How’s the packing coming, kid?”
It was a surreal reality, that if Mr. Holland were to put the call on speaker, I’d hear Grant’s voice for the first time in months. Packing? I wondered, but didn’t have time to ponder. Not without my unnecessary presence stretching out too long.
“Mr. Astor,” I said, and Aaron turned toward me, startled. As if he hadn’t remembered I’d been standing there. “We’ve received your shirt back from dry cleaning. If you come with me, I can return it to you.”
“I thought they said they’d just have it sent to my room.”
Stop making everything impossible . “Since you’re here now, I thought I’d return it to you.”
“I’m heading out to the golf course.” Aaron frowned. “You can just deliver it to my?—”
Michael, unexpectedly, was the one who caught my meaning. He bumped Aaron’s arm. “Go at least make sure it’s the right one. And that the stain fully came out.”
Aaron’s scowl deepened, but he listened, leaving Michael to strike up a conversation with his father-in-law about the weather conditions as we walked away.
As soon as I rounded the corner, I turned around, not quite expecting Aaron to be right on my heels. He bumped a full step into me, his hand shooting out to brace himself on my waist. For a moment, all I could think about was his wide, five-finger grip on my body. The instinctual hold pulled me into him for the world’s briefest moment, and everything became engulfed in the scent of his heady cologne.
My traitorous thoughts summoned the image of his bare chest, and I jerked back from him as if I’d been burned.
I tried to shake off the touch. “You’re fumbling out there,” I told him. “Bad.”
“So this wasn’t about my shirt.”
“You’re really that dense?”
Aaron directed his petulant scowl down the hallway. “ No .”
“Mr. Holland and Dr. Conan aren’t the targets you want to aim for. They’re just there for the illusion—it’s the wives who make decisions around here. The Monarchs. They’re who you have to target. And you have to come at them from an inferior side. ‘ I know this is such a hassle, and the space might be better use for something else, but ?—’”
“Better than a music center?” He seemed almost disgusted. “Better than a space a charity can utilize?”
“You lie to these people.” I made a face at him. “You know that. You’ve done it before. Why are you acting like you’re on some moral high ground now?”
Aaron reached up and combed a hand through his hair, the dark locks feathering between his fingers as he tugged. It was then that I realized how much longer it’d grown out since last June, how… unkempt it looked compared to the short style he’d had. How normal . “Because they think they’re so much better than everyone else, Lovisa. It drives me mad.”
“And you don’t do the same? Bringing up Margot ?” I all but scoffed. “As if you didn’t use her as a prop the last time you were here.”
He drew in a slow breath through his nose, clearly fighting for patience. “There is a difference, my dear, between viewing someone as a business partner and viewing them as the dirt beneath your shoe. I would’ve thought you’d know the difference.”
It took everything in me to remain calm where I stood. “And what’s that supposed to mean? You thought I’d understand because I’m the help ?”
“Because it’s obvious that the way I treated Margot was vastly different from how these people treated her.” Aaron’s dark eyes were sharp on mine. “I didn’t outcast her. I didn’t try to control her. I treated her like a person ?—”
“A person you wanted to use for her money. For her family business. You didn’t want her—you wanted her position . She was going to inherit to Massey Hotels, and that was the only reason you gave her the time of day.”
Aaron slowly straightened, and it was only then that I realized he’d been tilting forward as he spoke—leaning in. A quiet emotion stirred in his eyes, almost something like disappointment. “Oh, don’t tell me you’ve had a sip of their Kool-Aid, Lovisa.”
“I’m not wrong. You are no better than them.”
“Then why are you helping me?” He arched a brow. “Giving me tips on how to win them over, how to convince them. Why help me, if I’m no better?”
With Caroline, I’d lied. For some reason, with Aaron, the idea never occurred to me. “I don’t care if you embarrass yourself. But I do care about the music hall.”
A strange look played on Aaron’s features, something like amusement mixed with another emotion I couldn’t put my finger on. Whatever it was, I didn’t like it. It pinned me in place like an animal targeting its prey. “Interesting.”
I was about to ask him what he meant before my attention shifted over his shoulder. From where we stood in the hallway, I could see Caroline pacing the lobby, talking animatedly into her father’s phone. She spoke to Grant with as much excitement and warmth as a sister would with her younger brother, as though he hadn’t cheated on her best friend. It caused my stomach to clench.
“You know him?”
I blinked back at Aaron. “Who?”
“Grant.” He watched me. “You reacted when she said his name.”
I scoffed. “I didn’t?—”
“You froze. I saw you.”
There was something vaguely invasive about the way he spoke. I saw you . It felt dramatic to be upset about it, but it unsettled me all the same.
A small smile tugged at the corner of Aaron’s mouth. “Is that the boyfriend you talked about before? The one who didn’t call you on your mother’s anniversary?”
I normally was good about packing my personal feelings into a neat little box when I stepped on Alderton-Du Ponte’s property. I shrugged on a clear raincoat, and anything someone said or did were little drops of water that rolled off my back.
Aaron, however, was a pair of scissors, cutting open my box and slicing my raincoat to shreds.
“I’ve been waiting to see him,” he went on, looking around the Alderton-Du Ponte hallways as if the man in question would just stride out of a room. “I’ve almost asked Annalise about him a time or two. Curiosity, that’s all. But you stiffened when they said this Grant’s name, so that leads me to assume?—”
“Don’t.”
“—that he is the one, and it didn’t work out between you two. Which is unfortunate, if he’s your best friend’s brother. Isn’t that awkward? Hearing her talk so warmly to your ex?” Aaron ducked his head an inch, drawing closer. “So, life didn’t get better since ignoring my crap advice , hmm?”
What I hated the most about him was how smug he was. If I Told You So was a person, it’d look exactly like the egotistical Aaron Astor. The glittering entertainment in his dark eyes, the languid way he held things over my head—my body trembled with the weight of resentment, too much for my short frame. I gripped my water bottle tightly, my nails bending against the plastic, and I imagined I was wrapping my fingers around his neck. “Go to hell.”
Aaron smiled widely enough to show teeth, and he took a step back. “Dear, we’re at Alderton-Du Ponte.” He gave his eyebrows a lazy lift, lowering his voice to a near whisper. “We’re already there.”
And with that, he turned on his heel, retreating the way we came. I wanted to shout after him, hating the fact that he got the last word. A million different things ran through my mind, and all of them would’ve gotten me fired.