Chapter 4
CHAPTER 4
JULIA
J ulia’s stomach twisted into another knot. It had just started to ease from the tense confrontation between father and son when Sierra’s unexpected arrival blew everything to pieces.
Next to her, Grant stiffened, the clenching of his jaw unmistakable as he shot her a panicked glance.
Even Kyle seemed disturbed by the development, pulling himself off of the mantel as he stared with an unhinged jaw at his half-sister.
“What is going on here? Why is there a family meeting, and I wasn’t invited?”
“Sierra…” Grant started, his voice hoarse as he tried to address her, but came up with only her name.
Julia slid a hand onto his back, trying to offer him strength. They hadn’t intended for Sierra to learn about any of this. She would be devastated by the development, particularly when she learned Lydia was leading the charge. Her own mother threatened to ruin her.
The havoc that would be caused after the woman dumped her as a child may prove to be too much for the poor woman.
Sierra set her hands on her hips. “Umm, someone say something.”
Julia tugged her lips back in a wince as she desperately tried to exert some control over the rapidly spiraling situation. The first thing she needed to do was try to contain this. Lydia couldn’t hear any of this.
Julia hurried across the room and tugged Sierra inside before she swung the doors closed. “Shh, keep your voice down.”
Sierra eyed her incredulously. “What is going on?”
“Nothing,” Grant said with a shake of his head. “We just don’t want a scene.”
“What?” Sierra screwed up her face and crossed her arms. “That doesn’t make any sense. I demand answers.”
“What exactly did you overhear?” Kyle asked.
She slid a narrow-eyed glance at him. “Seriously? I’m being questioned by the sort of family member?”
“I’m not sort of, Sierra, I’m your half-brother.”
Sierra rolled her eyes. “Whatever, Crazy Kyle. Just…tell me what’s going on. I heard my name and then something about me being devastated if the pictures went public. What pictures? And why does Kyle know about them?”
Her eyes went wide, and she glared at her brother. “OMG! What did you do? Did you take pictures of me? Are you blackmailing Daddy with them?”
Kyle offered her an incredulous glance. “Are you serious? No, I’m trying to help in this situation, putting my life on the line while you, the princess, gets spared all of this.”
“That’s enough, Kyle,” Grant’s voice boomed.
“I didn’t ask to be spared anything. In fact, I’d like to know what’s going on here. No, I demand to know.”
No one spoke. Julia twisted one hand around the other as she shot a glance at Kyle, then Grant. This was a development they hadn’t anticipated, but she wasn’t certain that they could avoid this conversation.
“Sierra, honey, it’s nothing. You misunderstood,” Grant tried.
“Uh, no. Not going to fly.” Sierra cocked a hip as she stomped a heel on the floor. “I want to know what these pictures are and why I’d be devastated if they got out.”
“Julia and I are having an affair. Lydia has pictures,” Kyle burst out. “Dad thinks you’d be devastated by that. But it’s all out in the open now.”
“Yeah, right. And Daddy and Mom are getting back together. Try again, Crazy.”
“Why would you not believe that?”
“Because you’re still alive. Daddy would have killed you by now. Now, who is going to tell me the truth?”
Julia felt the weight of Sierra’s icy eyes on her. She squirmed under the scrutiny, her nose wrinkling.
“Julia? You wouldn’t lie to me, would you?”
“Sierra…” Julia started, trying to keep her voice soft. She didn’t want to be the one to tell her stepdaughter. She didn’t want to take the agency away from Grant. She wanted to allow him the opportunity to break it to her the way he wanted to.
“I can’t believe this. I can’t believe I’m being treated like an outsider. I mean, even Kyle knows. Kyle! And I’m being shut out of my own family. I never thought this would happen.” Sierra stomped toward the door.
“Sierra, wait,” Julia said, sliding in front of her. “It’s just…this is going to be really difficult.”
Sierra leaned closer to her, lowering her voice. “You aren’t seriously having an affair with Kyle, are you?”
Julia’s shoulders slumped as she fluttered her eyelashes. “No. It’s much worse than that. Kyle just said that to protect you.”
“Protect me? Ew. And also, there’s nothing worse than that. Whatever it is, I can handle it because nothing could be worse than you and Kyle hooking up.”
“That’s a little judgy, sis,” Kyle said.
“But true.”
Grant slid his arm around his daughter’s shoulders, his features pinched as he glanced at Julia.
She offered him as consoling of a half-smile as she could manage. “I think we should tell her.”
Sierra shifted her gaze from Julia to Grant, her eyes clouding with emotion and her normal arrogant expression slipping. “You’re starting to scare me a little.”
Grant’s lower lip bobbed as he tried to form words, but he didn’t manage any.
“Daddy?” This time her voice came out as a squeak.
“Sit down, Sierra,” he finally said.
“No. I don’t need to sit down. I need answers.”
Grant swallowed hard, his features pinched as he flicked another glance at Julia. She read his emotions easily. Panic, helplessness, fear, and worry. She slipped her hand into his, her other grasping his shoulder in a show of solidarity.
He sucked in a breath before he swallowed hard. “All right, Sierra. You’re right. This concerns you, and you deserve answers.”
She bobbed her head up and down. “Umm, yeah, I do. So, give them to me.”
“You should sit down, Sierra,” Julia said.
“Stop stalling and tell me.”
Grant and Julia exchanged a glance. Her heart thudded as he prepared to tell his daughter about her mother. She could feel his muscles twitching as he clutched her hand. He was fighting the urge to tremble as he broke the news.
“A while ago,” Grant began, his voice low and tense, “we identified someone who is playing a major role in DG Industries.”
Sierra arched an eyebrow. “And no one told me?” She scoffed, flicking her eyes to Kyle. “But you told Kyle?”
“Hey, will you please stop acting like I’m not family?”
“We asked for Kyle’s help,” Julia explained.
Sierra’s eyes went wide again. “What? OMG. You two have finally lost it. Is he drugging you? He must be. That’s the only thing that explains why you’d trust him over me.”
“No, Sierra,” Julia said with a shake of her head. “No. We didn’t tell you because…”
“Yeah?” she prodded.
Julia winced, her heart breaking for Sierra. They had bonded, especially after being trapped together in the cave on their vacation. “It’s going to be very hard to hear.”
“It’s even harder to hear when no one will say it,” she snapped.
Kyle scoffed at the statement, shaking his head as he took another sip of his drink. “Can you ever just be nice about the fact that people are going through a tremendous amount of effort to protect you from your own stupidity?”
Sierra glared at him. “Well, since I have no idea what anyone is talking about, no, I can’t be.”
Grant shot his son an equally disapproving stare. “Kyle, please. Maybe this is better done between the three of us only.”
“Oh, right, sure. Kick me out. I’m not really family, right, Dad?”
“I think maybe he should stay. He’s part of this, too,” Julia answered.
Sierra flung her arms in the air, frustration etched into her made-up features. “Will someone please just tell me what’s going on?”
Grant leaned against the desk, training his eyes on his daughter. “Sierra…a while back…shortly after Julia’s car accident, we managed to track down one of the major players in DG Industries.”
“Okay,” she said, her voice tentative, “who is it? A rival billionaire? Someone from the board? Old enemy? Who?”
Grant flicked his gaze to his shoes, his jaw clenching as his fingers tightened around the edge of his desk. Julia’s heart pounded, each beat echoing her growing apprehension. As she gently squeezed Grant’s arm, her mind raced with worry. How would Sierra process this? She could almost feel the weight of the secret they were about to unload, a burden she wished they could spare her.
He raised his eyes to Sierra. “It’s Lydia.”
“Mom?!” Sierra shouted.
“Shh,” Grant said with a wave of his hand. “She doesn’t know we know. Well, she doesn’t know Kyle and I know. She knows Julia knows.”
“And she’s still here? Why? Julia! You were supposed to protect us. Why did you let her stay? For that matter, why have you been insisting she stay here? You’re on her side at every turn.”
“I caught her meeting with Christopher Metcalfe just before my accident, but then with my amnesia–“
“You forgot. And you just remembered now?”
Julia shook her head. “No.”
She bit into her lower lip before she continued her story, her stomach riding a wave of uncertainty. “She confronted me after I got my memories back. She must have assumed I knew everything.”
“Yeah? And?”
“She wanted my help to destroy Grant.”
“Help? Are you kidding me?” Sierra’s features twisted with confusion as she stared at Julia. “And you told her no, right?”
Julia pressed her lips together, her features pinching as she shook her head.
“Julia! How is this happening? How are you still standing here holding Daddy’s hand like you care when you’re helping my mother destroy him?”
“Easy, Sierra, that’s not what’s happening. Lydia threatened Julia to keep quiet and help her. But, thankfully, she told me.” He heaved a sigh. “And then we told Kyle because we needed his help.”
“You needed Kyle’s help? Are you insane?”
“No, we’re not. But…” Grant began, his voice trailing off.
“We weren’t getting anywhere with Lydia,” Julia said. “Outside of really annoying requests, she wasn’t exactly confiding in me. We needed someone on the inside.”
Sierra arched an eyebrow as she shot a sideways glance at Kyle who raised his glass to her. “Oh, right. That makes sense. He’s crazy enough to be perfect for the job.”
With a shake of his head, he let his arm fall back down. “I really never can get any credit.”
“We appreciate what you’re doing. Even Sierra,” Julia assured him.
“Wait, I still don’t understand what’s happening,” Sierra said, wagging her head back and forth. “Mom threatened you. With what?”
Sierra’s eyes went wide and her lips formed an “O” the moment the words left her mouth. “OMG, you are having an affair with Kyle!”
Julia screwed up her face as the words hit her. “What? No.”
“Well, then what does she have on you? What did you do?”
Grant’s words turned sharper. “Sierra, Julia didn’t do anything. She’s not protecting herself from anything here.”
“Well, then what did she threaten you with?” Sierra’s gaze bounced between the two of them.
Julia glanced up at Grant, offering him a consoling glance as her knees wobbled underneath her. Sierra’s reaction wouldn’t be pretty, and she hated that they had to tell her. She couldn’t imagine Grant felt much better about it.
“You, Sierra. She’s protecting you.”
“Me? From my mother? That bitch can walk any day. Don’t bother doing this on my account. I don’t care–“
“Sierra, it’s not that simple,” Julia answered. “It’s not about your feelings for your mother.”
“Then what?”
Julia pressed her lips together. She’d have to say it. She had the feeling Grant couldn’t. “She has pictures…not very nice pictures…of you at the Luxe club a few years ago.”
A ghostly white washed over Sierra’s face, her eyes wide with a dawning horror. “From my birthday party?”
Her voice came out as a whispered squeak, trembling with a mix of fear and disbelief as her knuckles whitened around the chair’s arms.
Julia bobbed her head up and down to confirm it without speaking. Her heart ached for the woman who now had to realize her mother threatened to ruin her reputation.
“But…I…she said she’d…what?”
“Make them public if I didn’t help her.”
Sierra’s eyes turned glassy as she stared up at Julia, an incredulous expression on her features. “What?”
“I’m so sorry, Sierra. We didn’t want you to know anything about this,” Julia said with a shake of her head as she sank into the seat next to her and took her hand.
Sierra sat stunned for a few seconds, her eyes wide with shock. She finally lifted them to her father. “Did you see them?”
“No, baby, I didn’t.”
“Did Kyle?”
“No. Only Julia has seen those. But I trust her judgment. If she thought it would be a bad thing for you if they got out, then I believe her.”
“It would be a horrible thing. Daddy, I’d be ruined!” Sierra burst as tears spilled onto her cheeks.
Julia patted her hand. “It’s okay, Sierra. We’re doing everything we can to make sure that doesn’t happen. Which is why we didn’t tell you. Your mother can’t know any of this. She thinks only I know she’s behind DG. So, you can’t say anything. You can’t confront her. Okay?”
“Julia’s right. Sierra, I know this is upsetting, but you can’t say anything to her,” Grant chimed in.
Sierra swallowed hard before she yanked her hand away from Julia’s. With a stiff posture and a clenched jaw, she flicked a tear off her cheek. “Yeah, right. Whatever. I won’t say anything.”
“Sierra…” Julia started.
“No,” Sierra said as she stood, sniffling. “I won’t. It’s fine. It’s just…it’s whatever. I’m going to my room.”
“Sierra,” Grant said as he reached for her.
She stumbled back a step, avoiding him. “I’m fine. I’m fine. I know what Mom is. I’m totally fine. I don’t even care. Just makes me hate her so much more.”
She spun on a heel and darted from the room after a struggle with the door. Julia watched her go. Sierra was desperately trying to hold her emotions in check, but she had a feeling she’d unravel the moment she was alone. Her heart broke for the woman.
She flicked her gaze to Grant.
He shrugged. “Well, at least she’s not confronting her.”
“I think she’s far too upset for that.”
“I’m sure she’s angry. And she’s not good at hiding her anger. I just hope she doesn’t continue to brood over it until she talks herself into a screaming match with Lydia. Then we’re all sunk.”
Julia furrowed her brow. The feeling she'd picked up from Sierra wasn't anger; it was more like distress. It seemed to be a profound, hidden heartache she tried hard to conceal from everyone in the room. Maybe telling her with Kyle present wasn't the best idea, but she had asked him to stay, hoping desperately to keep the family united.
His own upset over what he viewed as preferential treatment of Sierra pushed her to do it. The last thing they needed was a fight between the two siblings at this critical juncture.
But had her impulse to try to manage everyone’s personalities made things worse?
She licked her lips as she tried to focus her thoughts. “I’ll check on her as soon as I send this message to Ava. Maybe having a plan will help settle her.”
“Thanks, Julia,” Grant said with a squeeze of her hand. “I’ll look in on her, too, but…you may be the best one for this job. I’m sorry in advance.”
“Don’t be. I’m happy to do it. She’s important to me.”
The clatter of Kyle’s glass onto the drink cart startled her. She assumed he was unhappy about her loyalty to Sierra.
Grant heaved a sigh before he set his gaze on Julia again. “She’s lucky to have you.”
A quiet moment stretched between them before Julia sucked in a breath. “Well, I’m going to go discuss this with Ava. I hope to have some answers soon.”
“Julia, I need to talk to you if you have a minute…privately,” Kyle said.
Grant heaved a sigh as he rose. “Actually, Kyle, I wanted to speak with you privately first, if you don’t mind.”
Julia slid her gaze between the two of them, so much alike, yet so unwilling to admit that. She swallowed hard, wondering if she should stay close. “Can I trust you two not to get into a fistfight if I leave?”
“Yes,” Grant said. “We’re not adding anything else to your plate today. I promise.”
Julia studied his features for a second before she nodded and flicked her gaze to Kyle.
He held his hands up. “I’ll find you when we’re finished.”
“Behave,” she said before she crossed to the door. “Both of you.”
With one final glance between them, she slipped out of the office. As she mounted the stairs, she tugged her phone from her pocket. Her fingers trembled as she found her college friend’s number and opened a text message. Hey, Ava, it’s been a while. I’m so sorry I haven’t kept in better touch. And I’m double sorry, but I have a big favor to ask. I completely understand if you say no, but I’m desperate.
She hesitated at the top of the stairs, her thumb hovering over the send button as she second-guessed herself. Was this a mistake? Could she trust them or was she sentencing Sierra to public embarrassment?