Chapter 10
Piper King believed brunch existed for two reasons: gossip and carbohydrates.
Usually, she approved of both. That Sunday, however, the gossip had turned sour.
She sat beneath a striped awning at Marchette, wearing oversized sunglasses, a cream blazer, and a dress so pink her uncle Connor would have called it an incident.
Around her, women with perfect blowouts and hollow laughs sipped mimosas while pretending not to refresh gossip accounts under the table.
Everyone was talking about Angela Hunter. Piper hated it.
Not because she knew Angela well. She didn’t.
Angela had always seemed impossibly elegant and a little intimidating, the kind of woman who could silence a room by raising one eyebrow.
But Uncle Connor liked her. More than liked her, Piper suspected, though Connor King kept feelings locked somewhere between his watch collection and his hotel deeds.
Connor had always been good to Piper. Not indulgent in the way people thought rich uncles were.
Better. He listened. When everyone else called her dramatic, Connor asked what had happened.
When her parents rolled their eyes at her influencer deals, Connor read the contracts and told her which brands were using her.
When she cried over a man who had used her for access to a yacht party, Connor picked her up at two in the morning and never once said she should have known better.
So, when Piper heard Lily Saint laughing, she paid attention.
Lily sat at the next table with Maura Colby and Antasia Larchmont, both of whom lived for scandal and called it concern.
Lily wore white, which Piper found tasteless, though maybe that was the point.
Her face looked pale and fragile unless you were close enough to see the glitter of satisfaction in her eyes.
Piper lowered her sunglasses.
"Stop staring," whispered her friend Mila.
"I'm not staring. I'm observing." Piper whispered back.
"That's staring with lashes on." Said into her mimosa
Piper ignored her.
Maura leaned toward Lily. "So what happens now?"
Lily touched the stem of her glass. "I don't know. I'm trying not to think too far ahead."
That was a lie. Piper could hear the lie because Lily's voice changed when she wanted to sound innocent. It went breathy and slow, like she was narrating a perfume commercial.
Anastasia lowered her voice, but Piper had excellent hearing when other people were being messy. "Is Blake going to acknowledge it?"
"He has to," Lily said.
Sloane's eyes widened. "Even with Angela?"
"Angela took off her ring. That was her choice." Lily smirked. "Blake is a decent man. His family will make sure he behaves like one."
Piper frowned.
Mila whispered, "Are you getting all this?"
"I hate when you make me sound like TMZ."
"You are spiritually TMZ."
"Shh."
Maura asked, "But what about Damon? I heard he was at that dinner."
The change in Lily was tiny.
Her fingers tightened around the glass. Her eyes sharpened before she lowered them.
"Damon has nothing to do with this."
Anastasia made a sound. "Didn't you and Damon leave Angela's spring preview together?"
Piper froze.
Lily's smile didn’t reach her eyes. "People leave parties together all the time."
"But did you?"
"Anatasia."
The warning in Lily's voice was quiet and venomous.
Piper's stomach tightened.
Maura, too stupid or too drunk on gossip to stop, leaned closer. "I'm just saying, the timing is close."
"The timing is whatever I say it is," Lily snapped.
The table went silent.
Then Lily inhaled, smoothed a hand over her hair, and gave a shaky little laugh. "Sorry. I'm hormonal.
Piper looked at Mila.
Mila's eyes were huge.
Lily lowered her voice, but anger made her careless. "Blake was unconscious before he even hit the bed. He couldn't have touched me if he wanted to. That was never the point."
Piper stopped breathing.
Lily continued, bitter and low. "Angela saw enough. That's what mattered. By the time Damon becomes a problem, Blake will already be trapped trying to do the honorable thing."
Sloane whispered, "Lily."
"What?" Lily's laugh was ugly now. "Don't look at me like that. Angela had everything. She paraded around that gallery like a queen and treated me like I should be grateful for crumbs. I took what she left unguarded."
Piper's mimosa sat untouched.
Mila whispered, "Piper."
"I heard."
"You need to tell someone."
"I know."
Piper stood too quickly, knocking her napkin to the ground.
Lily's head turned. Their eyes met. For one dreadful second, Piper was sure Lily knew.
Then Piper did what everyone expected Piper King to do. She smiled too brightly, waved like an idiot, and called, "Cute dress, Lily."
Lily's expression softened into public sweetness. "Thank you, Piper."
Piper grabbed her bag and fled brunch so fast Mila had to jog to keep up.
She called Connor from the sidewalk.
He answered on the second ring. "Piper."
"Uncle Connor, I need you not to do your calm voice."
A pause. "What happened?"
"I think Lily Saint is evil. Like, not girlboss evil. Actual evil."
"Where are you?"
"Outside Marchette. I heard her talking. She said Blake was unconscious. She said he couldn't have touched her if he wanted to. She said Angela saw enough and that Damon would be a problem but Blake would already be trapped."
Connor went quiet.
Piper's throat tightened. "I'm not being dramatic."
"No," Connor said, and his voice was different now. Cold. "You're not."
"I know everyone thinks I'm vapid."
"I don't."
That almost made her cry, which was ridiculous because she had applied waterproof mascara precisely to avoid emotional inconvenience.
"What do I do?" she asked.
"Go home. Don't talk to Lily. Don't post anything. Don't tell anyone else."
"Are you going to tell Angela?"
"Yes."
"And Blake?"
"Angela first."
Piper exhaled. "Good. She should know first."
"She should."
Piper hesitated. "Uncle Connor?"
"Yes?"
"If telling her helps Blake, are you still going to tell her?"
Another silence. Softer this time.
"Yes," Connor said. "Especially then."
Connor found Angela in the private sitting room of his hotel, looking out at the city with a cup of coffee cooling untouched beside her. She turned when he entered, and the weariness on her face made something in him ache with a force he had no right to claim.
"You look serious," she said.
"I am."
"Has something happened?"
"Yes." He closed the door but stayed near it. She deserved distance with every truth now. "Piper overheard Lily at brunch."
Angela's expression sharpened. "Piper?"
"My niece. She knows Lily socially."
"Of course she does. Lily collects useful people."
"She heard Lily say Blake was unconscious before he hit the bed.
" Connor watched the words strike Angela and hated that he had to deliver them.
"She said he couldn't have touched her if he wanted to.
She said you saw enough, and that by the time Damon became a problem, Blake would already be trapped into doing the honorable thing. "
Angela gripped the back of the chair beside her.
All the blood seemed to leave her face.
Connor stepped forward, then stopped. "Angela."
"Don't." Her voice was barely there. "I need a second."
He gave it to her.
She lowered herself into the chair, one hand pressed to her mouth. Connor could see the war in her. Relief trying to rise. Rage crushing it down. Grief for the fact that innocence, if this was innocence, didn’t repair what had made Lily's lie possible.
"Piper is sure?" Angela asked.
"She is."
"Could she repeat it, if she had to?"
"I think so. But I didn't come here to talk strategy."
Angela looked up at him then.
Connor met her eyes. "I came because you deserve the truth."
A laugh broke out of her, small and bitter. "Even if it helps him."
"Yes."
"Why?"
"Because I want you free, Angela. Not misled." His voice dropped. "Even if the truth gives him a way back to you."
Her eyes filled, but she didn’t let the tears fall.
"You're a good man, Connor."
He looked away because the compliment hurt more than it should have.
"I'm trying to be," he said.
Angela stood. She looked steadier now, but not softer. If anything, something hard and bright had entered her.
"Lily said Damon would become a problem."
"Yes."
"Then he’s going to become one."
Connor studied her face. "What are you going to do?"
Angela walked to the window and looked out over the city that had watched her humiliation spread like smoke.
"I'm going to stop crying," she said. "And then I'm going to make sure she says the truth where everyone can hear."
Connor should have been worried.
Instead, for one selfish, dangerous second, he was proud. Angela had been wounded but she hadn’t been defeated.