32. Penelope
Light filters through my eyelids and I groan, rolling away from Hawthorn as a wave of nausea hits me. After the fourth bottle of champagne we opened last night, I lost count of how many glasses I drank, but with the way my stomach is roiling and my head is pounding, I know I drank far too much.
Hawthorn stirs next to me, his soft chuckle alerting me that he’s much more awake and alive than me. “How are you feeling, Princess?”
“Urgh,” I moan.
“Come here,” he says, reaching for me and pulling me into his warm, naked chest. “Champagne, Indian food, pizza, and ice cream is not a good mix.” He laughs.
“I’m pretty sure I’m about ninety percent dead,” I whine, slowly forcing my eyelids open. Tilting my head back, I find his soft, amused eyes looking down at me, his hair ruffled and sexy. “How can you look good?” I ask.
“This wasn’t my first rodeo. You were pretty wasted at the party the other week; this can’t be your first hangover.”
“I’ve never felt this bad in my life. My head’s pounding, and I think I’m going to puke. Is that what a hangover feels like?”
A low, rumbling laugh vibrates through his chest, and he nods. “Yeah, it is. Come on, a shower will help.”
Lifting me off his chest, he crawls off the bed and stands by the side, holding his hand out to me.
“I can’t move,” I groan.
“Do you need me to take over?” he asks, indulgent laughter lacing each word.
“Yes,” I cry dramatically, lifting my hands into the air.
Leaning down, he slides his arms beneath me and lifts me off the bed, cradling me to his chest as he encourages me to wrap my arms and legs around him.
I rest my head against his shoulder as he carries me into the bathroom, placing me down on the counter while he turns on the shower and strips off his underwear. Pulling my knees up to my chest, I glance down at myself. I’m wearing his shirt and nothing else. Even without looking, I know my hair is a mess, and I doubt I remembered to take my makeup off before I went to sleep last night. I must look like a disaster, but when I lift my chin and look at him, he’s not disgusted, he’s smiling and amused.
He doesn’t care that I look a mess, he doesn’t care that I’m hungover and probably smell like stale pizza. He doesn’t care that I ate so much last night that my mom probably felt the disturbance in the universe and is already itching to make me purge it all from my body. He doesn’t care that I’m not perfect, in fact, I think he likes me because I’m not.
Padding over to me, he fists the hem of the shirt and tugs it up and over my head, leaving me naked, my body unashamedly on display for him. “You’re so fucking beautiful,” he whispers, lifting me off the counter and carrying me into the shower.
“Turn around,” he quietly orders the moment he lowers me to my feet.
I do as I’m told, closing my eyes and luxuriating in the feeling of being cared for. Hawthorn washes my body, coating me in a rich soapy lather, then massages shampoo into my hair. Once we’re clean, he wraps me in a huge fluffy towel and dries my skin, he even brushes my teeth for me. When he’s done, he takes my hand and leads me back into the bedroom.
Sighing, I sit down on the edge of the bed, and he sinks to his knees on the floor in front of me. “Feel better?”
“Much,” I whisper, leaning forward to press a kiss against his lips. “Thank you.”
Pulling back, he cups my cheek in his palm. “Are you ready to deal with your parents?”
“Not really, but I will,” I assure him, trying to sound strong and in control, when really my stomach lurches with just the thought of them being here again. “I’m worried,” I admit, so quietly I can barely hear myself.
“What about?”
“That I’ll lose myself when they’re here. That her voice will become the loudest thing in my head again,” I say on a broken sob, as emotion I hadn’t realized was so close to the surface breaks free.
“We won’t let that happen. I won’t let that happen,” he tells me, the dominant tone of his voice a promise, an order.
Nodding, I wrap my arms around his neck and bury my face in the crook of his shoulder, letting him carry some of my fear as he holds me close, like he never plans to let me go.
Instead of wearing anything from my own closet, Izzy lends me a pair of jeans and a tank from the bag of stuff she brought with her. There are plenty of my own clothes here, but I can’t bring myself to wear anything my mom picked out for me.
“You look hot in my clothes,” she says when I walk into the kitchen.
“Thank you for lending them to me, my wardrobe is all Mom-approved, and I…” I start to explain.
“I totally get it, I donated all of the stuff she forced me to wear to a women’s refuge the moment I moved in with Gulliver,” she says with a shrug.
“How are you so bright and cheery?” I ask, taking in how fresh and happy she looks.
“I switched to water after the second bottle of champagne, I can’t stand the stuff, no matter how good a bottle it is.” She smiles.
“Urgh,” I groan. “Why didn’t I do that?”
“You’ll feel better once you’ve eaten,” Hawthorn says, sliding his arms around my waist from behind.
“Shall we go for breakfast? I’m ready to get out of here, the whole house reeks.” Izzy giggles.
“Do you want to come back to The Escape? We could get out on the water.” Hawthorn asks.
“Yes,” Davis says, lifting his head from where he was sleeping with his cheek resting on the table only moments ago.
“That sounds like fun,” Izzy says, placing her coffee cup in the sink, then hoisting herself up to sit on the counter, just as Gulliver and a bleary-eyed-looking Kip walk into the room.
“We need to get out of here soon,” Gulliver says, searching out my sister, then making a beeline straight for her, pushing his way between her legs, like he needs to be as close to her as possible.
“We’re taking The Escape out,” Hawthorn says.
“Sweet, we’ll drop our stuff off at home, then see you at yours in an hour,” Gulliver says, nuzzling into my sister’s neck and making her giggle.
We leave as a group, closing the front door behind us before climbing into our cars that are still parked out front. A handful of photographers are stationed at the end of the drive, but we ignore them all as we open the gates and move in a convoy away from the house.
I don’t bother to look back, even though I know it’s doubtful I’ll ever set foot inside our parents’ home again, and a feeling of peace settles over me. Home isn’t a house anymore, it’s where I’m safe and loved, it’s where I’m surrounded by friends and family, ones who actually care about me. Home is where Hawthorn is, so instead of glancing back at what I’m leaving behind, I turn and look at the boy beside me, the one who wants me, who I think loves me in spite of everything I used to be.
* * *
My parents’ jet lands at a small private airport on the outskirts of the city a little after noon, and Kip’s guy leaks the news of their safe return to the States along with the pre-surgery pictures thirty minutes later.
* * *
The last of the evening sunlight slips beyond the horizon as the guys tie off the lines and secure The Escape back into its slip at the marina. My hair is windswept, my nose is pink from the warm fall sun, and my smile is huge. I’ve been sailing before, but it’s always been more about being seen than actually enjoying the freedom that comes from being out on the open water.
Searching for Hawthorn, I find him and the other guys coiling rope across the deck. His smile is wider than I’ve ever seen it, and as he tips back his head and laughs at something one of them says, the sound is loud and free and easy. He told me this boat was his favorite place, and now I understand why.
When my cell rings, I slip it from my shorts pocket and lift it to my ear without even glancing at the screen, my attention riveted on my boyfriend. “Hello?”
“Hello Penelope, would you like to explain why it is that the world thinks your father and I are dead and why there’s pictures of you and your sister at my house?” my mother growls.
Waving my hands in the air to garner the others’ attention, I point to the cell at my ear and motion for them all to follow me inside. Switching the cell to speakerphone, I lay it down on the breakfast bar as the others crowd around me.
“Mother, I’m so glad you’re okay. Izabella and I were so worried. We were pulled out of class the other day and told by the principal that your yacht was missing. Obviously we were heartbroken, so we headed home to arrange a search and rescue mission,” I say as calmly as I can muster, even though my heart feels like it’s beating out of my chest.
“How did you get in? The new housekeeper was given clear instructions not to allow anyone in without our prior consent,” she snarls, anger and hatred dripping from every word.
“It’s our home, Mother. Our parents were missing, assumed dead, why wouldn’t Izabella and I seek out the comfort and love of our childhood home?”
“And while you were searching for us, you felt the need to change the locks and fire our housekeeper? I don’t know what you think these childish games are going to achieve, I thought you were more mature than that. But just to clarify, you and your whore of a sister are not welcome in our home. You sacrificed all claim to the Rhodes name the moment you ruined all of our lives and walked away from billions of dollars. Really, Penelope, you’re nothing but an idiotic, fat, waste of life. That money was the only way you would ever have anything of worth to offer to the world, and now it’s gone. Your sister might be a whore, but at least she bagged herself a good husband. That should have been you. You should have been engaged to the Winslow boy, and we’d have been the most powerful dynasty in the country. But no, between the two of you, you’ve destroyed everything. We should have aborted you when we found out you were both girls, if we’d have been able to have a son, we’d have given you away.”
Hawthorn leans forward and ends the call, picking up my cell and launching it out of the open door and into the ocean. “Your mother is a fucking bitch,” he snarls angrily.
“It’s nothing I haven’t heard before,” I mutter, my embarrassed gaze firmly fixed on the counter. I’m not hurt by her words; the insults are practically a mantra I can recite because I’ve heard them so many times before. It’s that everyone else heard them too that’s making my cheeks heat with shame. It’s common knowledge that my mom’s a bitch, but to have them witness her vitriol sucks all of the strength I thought I’d gained from me in the blink of an eye.
“Who the hell does she think she is?” Davis growls, shocking me with the anger in his voice.
“What?”
“What the fuck gives her the right to speak to you like that? That motherfucking bitch,” he hisses.
“No more playing around, we need to fuck with them, I want to ruin them,” Kip snarls, his normally happy-go-lucky expression gone and replaced with clenched teeth and barely restrained anger.
“I want the party brought forward to as soon as possible. I want the world to know you’re mine, and I want us to own as much of Rhodes Corp. as we can, as soon as possible,” Hawthorn demands, sliding his palm over the nape of my neck and encouraging me to lift my head.
When I do, I find all eyes on me, anger and fury and barely restrained violence clear on all of their faces.
“We don’t put up with this shit from them anymore,” Gulliver confirms, his eyes locked with mine.
We’ve never exactly given him the title, but it’s clear to everyone that Gulliver is the leader of our group, and this is the first time he’s looked at me like I’m one of them. His firm confidence, combined with the others’ obvious anger, gives me the strength to nod.
Hawthorn owns my body, he’s mine, and I’m his, but it’s Gulliver’s acceptance of me that has me standing straighter and nodding with more ferocity. Besides my sister, he has the most reason to hate me. I knew he was prepared to tolerate me for my sister and Hawthorn, but feeling his support and acceptance is something I didn’t know I needed.
“It’s time to get to work,” he says, pulling Izzy into him and smiling down at her.
* * *
The next few days are a flurry of activity. We arrange a venue for my “I’m not going to be a billionaire” party, make a guest list, and send out invites bearing the Rhodes family insignia. Izzy and I post picture after picture on social media and pretend that we haven’t seen the humiliating news stories that are circulating about our parents’ near-death experience.
We’re at Gulliver’s house, exactly five days before the party, when the first news article about me hits the internet. The story shows pictures of me bent over a toilet, throwing up, the pills my mom forced me to take in a smaller picture to the side. The headline reads, Rhodes Heiress on the Verge of Hospitalization: How Girls of Today Are Obsessed With Being Thin. Several other pictures of me looking ill and skinny with fake smiles plastered across my face appear in the article. The story is a sensationalized version of events, with me being described as hooked on diet pills and making myself ill every day in order to remain a size zero.
My legs buckle, and I collapse to the floor as I stare at the images of me purging in my bathroom. What the photo doesn’t show is that my mom was standing behind me, watching me, forcing me to throw up again and again before making me swallow pills that made me even sicker. What the headline should say is, Teenage Girl Was So Hungry On Her Restricted Diet That She Ate a Candy Bar and Was Forced to Vomit Until She Was Throwing Up Blood, Then Starved for Three Days as Punishment.
Tears roll down my cheeks, but I don’t lift my hand to wipe them away. I can’t believe they did this, although it really shouldn’t surprise me. We released pictures of them, they released pictures of me, an eye for an eye.
“Penelope,” Izzy shouts, rushing into the bedroom that is Hawthorn’s when he stays here and throwing herself down onto the floor next to me. “They’re fucking assholes,” she seethes, curling in close to me but not touching me, like she’s unsure if I want her too.
“Mom was standing there,” I say, pointing to the edge of the picture. “She made me do it. I don’t have an eating disorder, the only time I ever made myself sick was when she forced me.”
“I know. It’s them, it’s always them. I want to kill them for this, I really do,” she says, suddenly pulling me into a hug.
“It was them,” I whisper, wrapping my arms around her and holding her just as tightly as she’s holding me.
“Princess,” Hawthorn says quietly, startling me. Lifting my tear-filled eyes, I find him standing in the doorway.
“I’ll give you guys a minute,” Izzy says, kissing my cheek softly, then climbing up from the floor and leaving the room.
Taking her place beside me on the floor, Hawthorn sighs. “Penelope,” he breathes, like he literally has no idea what else to say.
“I don’t have an eating disorder,” I say.
“Tell me,” he quietly demands.
“She was so obsessed with me being thin. She told me over and over that I needed to be perfect, that everything needed to be perfect so I could land the richest husband and gain the most power. She told me that no one would want me if I was fat, that if I couldn’t control what I put in my mouth, then I deserved to lose the money. That I’d ruin our entire family just because I was too selfish to not eat. If I ever said I was hungry, she’d berate me, showing me pictures of all the society girls who were prettier and thinner than me. Then she’d list all the ancient, perverted old men that she’d offer me too if I was too fat to land someone like Gulliver. One day she caught me eating some popcorn—I knew I wasn’t supposed to, but I was so hungry. She got really mad and dragged me into the bathroom and forced her fingers down my throat until I puked up everything I’d eaten that day. Then she kept me in the house, canceled all our plans, and told the housekeeper I was too sick to eat.”
“They starved you?” he asks bluntly, his voice steely and dangerous.
“Yes. She had these pills that make you sick too. They give you the symptoms of a stomach flu, and she’d make me take them, then laugh at me when I was so sick I was throwing up blood. She’d tell me at least I was thin. It didn’t take long until I stopped trying to cheat at my diet. When my periods stopped because I was so malnourished, she increased my calorie allowance from seven hundred to nine hundred calories a day, but by that point, food had just become a necessary evil. In the picture she gave them for in the article, she was standing behind me, forcing me to purge because she caught me eating a candy bar. I had one bite, that’s all, and she found out. She didn’t let me eat anything for three days, and the whole time she was telling me how fat and ugly and worthless I was. I couldn’t fight back; I couldn’t tell anyone. Who’d believe me? So, I just did what I was told and ate what I was told because I had no other choice.”
I wait for Hawthorn to say something, but he stays eerily silent, his jaw clenched, his eyes hard, and staring at the wall.
“I know I should have fought back?—”
“Don’t. Just don’t,” he snarls, snapping his head in my direction so quickly I actually jump. “They fucking tortured you, they made food a weapon. They need to die, I want to fucking kill them, both of them.”
“They’re not worth it,” I whisper, twisting around to face him. “We won, I broke the will, and now they don’t get a penny. Let them say what they want, they don’t control me anymore.”
“It’s not the point, they’re evil, fucking evil.”
“I know, but there’s a lot of evil people in the world. We can mess with them, aggravate them, and embarrass them. Then we walk away.”
“No, they deserve—” he hisses.
“Yes, they do,” I sigh. “But if we give them the power to keep hurting us, then they win, and I refuse to let them win anymore. I know that getting revenge was my idea, but if we just stop, they’ll leave, and we can move on with our lives. We can grow up and be happy and move forward without them. In the end, it’ll just be them and their money growing old, alone and miserable together. The best kind of revenge we can get is to make them insignificant,” I whisper, leaning forward and pressing a soft kiss to his lips.
Gradually, the tension in his jaw loosens, and he kisses me back. “We can’t let it go,” he rasps against my lips. “Not yet.”
“We’ll do all we’ve planned, we’ll mess with them and try to take the company, but if it doesn’t work, then we forget them, we pretend they don’t exist. Izzy will marry Gulliver, and she’ll be a Winslow, and I might change my name too; I’ll be Penelope Smith or something, and then the Rhodes name won’t be my problem or my legacy, it can die with them.”
“Penelope Benedict sounds pretty good to me,” Hawthorn purrs, his thumb running over my lower lip.
“Maybe one day.” I smile.
“One day works for me.”