CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Blair
Despite my trying, I couldn’t stop thinking about what Zach had done to me earlier in the gazebo.
Or had he really “done” anything to me? I did exactly what he wanted, and what hurt the most was that it felt so good.
It shouldn’t have felt so good. I should’ve hated it, but I didn’t, and I didn’t know what to make of it. What to make of myself.
I flexed my hands hard, pushing my tears back. As though I didn’t already have a low enough opinion of myself.
Could it be that I’d wanted him to touch me?
That could easily be the case. I’d done way more fucked-up things before.
This would be just another one of them. Maybe I really got off on Zach giving me an orgasm where anyone could catch us.
Or maybe it was him—the way he touched me, his dark brown eyes searing into me as he fed me pleasure with his fingers, his mouth feasting on me like I was the most delicious meal he’d ever had—
“Blair, are you even listening to me?” Dad asked me.
I winced, looking up at him from across the dining table.
His brows had slashed low over his eyes.
Melody had her fork stopped midway as she stared at me as though I was acting weird, while Mom pursed her lips together and clenched the stem of her glass of wine, her gold bracelets shifting a little around her slender wrist.
I scratched the back of my neck. I hoped my face didn’t show the direction my thoughts had taken. “Sorry. You were saying?”
A muscle bunched in Dad’s jaw. He didn’t like anyone disrespecting him. When he spoke, he liked everyone to listen, and no interruptions were allowed. It was how he ran his business too—ruthlessly and with cold determination.
“We want you to break off contact with Aurora.”
I didn’t even have the energy to be surprised about this. Actually, I’d be surprised if they didn’t demand this. But then again, it didn’t matter, because Aurora didn’t want anything to do with me anyway. “So you know what happened.”
“We saw,” Mom piped in, her lips curling in distaste. “That girl has always been promiscuous. So shameless.”
I grimaced. Mom was always up for sex shaming. She always loved to point out how sex was bad, and people who often indulged in it were easy, as though everyone in our circle was such a prude. But the truth was that everyone was kinky in one way or another. They just knew how to hide it.
Dad cut into his steak with surgical precision. “That was Aurora’s dad I talked to over the phone earlier. He called me to tell me about the whole situation.”
And just like that, shame filled me. I’d enjoyed Zach pleasuring me after he’d done something so horrible, and to make matters worse, I hadn’t thought about Aurora even once as I let him do that to me. What was the matter with me?
“Then he probably also told you he’s sending Aurora away.”
He nodded. “The press wants all the sordid details, so they’re sending her away until the dust settles.”
Mom harrumphed, her pinky extending as she reached for her glass of wine.
“As they should. If not for her family’s name, I would’ve told you a long time ago to cut all ties with her.
” She shook her head. “How stupid do you have to be to have yourself filmed doing that, then upload it on TikTok by mistake?”
So that was the version Aurora’s dad gave to them? Her uploading the video by mistake? Figured.
Melody bit into her lip, creases forming over her forehead as she reached for her glass of juice. “A lot of people saw that video. I can’t even imagine how she feels.”
A flash of guilt speared my chest. Could this have been avoided had I tried harder to convince her that Zach was dangerous? Or if I’d tried to have Zach kicked out of that party? I’d known he was there to make trouble, and still, I practically gave him a “free pass.”
Dad turned toward me, his face stern. “And that brings me to the main point. Don’t answer calls from unfamiliar numbers. That could be the press trying to dig something out of you, as her friend. Also, you’d be wise to think twice before following her example. You’re not a slut like her.”
I flinched, then hid it with a cough. “You have nothing to worry about, Dad.”
Mom nodded. “Good. We don’t need any bad press. Even more so now because all eyes will be on you. You two were tight, so logically, people will wait to see if you’re going to make the same mistake.”
I averted my gaze. The thought of Zach loomed from the corners of my mind, and a bad feeling settled in my chest. He could do anything, and I wouldn’t be able to stop him. Then there was what he’d said about targeting Lana next.
“As I said, you have nothing to worry about.”
Emily entered the dining room with a new bottle of wine and approached Mom to refill her glass. Mom had always been the one who needed a refill.
Just as Emily started pouring wine in her glass, Zach appeared at the doorway, his face covered with a fine sheet of sweat and hair tucked under his cap save for a few strands that fell over his scar.
His gaze instantly found me, and my heart jumped in my chest. I looked down at his mouth, then his hands, remembering the pleasure they gave me just an hour ago, and felt heat rush through me. What was he doing here?
I was about to go up to him and demand that he leave if this was some part of his twisted plan to mess with me or my family, but then he said to Mom, “The delivery crew is here with the plants for the fountain.”
Mom removed the napkin from her lap and put it on the table. “Alright. I’ll go meet them.”
Emily’s gaze lingered on Zach as she kept pouring Mom wine, and before I could tell her to stop, the wine overflowed the glass.
“Watch what you’re doing!” Mom shrieked, and Emily jerked away as the wine spilled from the table right onto Mom’s beige dress.
“You idiot! You ruined my dress! Do you know how much it cost?”
My jaw dropped as Mom grabbed her glass and threw it on the floor, right at Emily’s feet. The glass broke, and the shards cut into Emily’s ankle amid the wine now pooling around her shoes. She cried out.
“Oh my God,” Melody said, pressing her hands over her mouth.
I got to my feet.
Dad gave Mom a narrowed gaze. “Do you always have to overreact?”
I hadn’t noticed that Zach had moved from where he stood by the doorway to a few steps behind Emily, his eyes pure hatred as he glared at Mom. Emily whimpered, swaying when she saw the blood trickling down her foot and over her Mary Jane shoe.
I moved around the table and checked Emily’s wound for any glass in it, before I wrapped my arm around her shoulders and helped her to stand. “Can you walk?”
Emily nodded, pursing her lips together as a tear slipped down her cheek.
“I’ll walk you to the kitchen.” Slowly, I guided her out of the room, passing Zach, who had yet to say something.
“Make sure she doesn’t leave her blood all over my floor,” Mom remarked, and I glared at her over my shoulder. Could she give any less damn about this?
Zach growled, making the hairs stand on my neck, but before he could say anything, Dad told her, “You should’ve thought about stains when you threw that glass, Helen.”
“You can’t be putting this on me, Theodore. She . . .”
I tuned her out and stepped outside with Emily. I was faintly aware of Zach as I guided Emily to the kitchen, his anger radiating off his body in waves. Emily hissed, and I stopped, glancing at her ankle.
“Are you okay?”
“It hurts,” she said through her teeth.
“I know. We’ll get you to the doctor quickly.” We entered the kitchen, and I helped her sit on the chair.
Anna rushed from the stove to us, letting out a small cry. “What happened?”
“Mom,” I said.
Understanding filled her gaze. Mom often had these episodes where the staff was involved.
She never raised her hand to them, but she always ended up hurting them one way or another, like now, and I could tell it was deliberate.
The NDAs ensured that no one could ever reveal what was happening in this house.
Zach stopped beside Emily, glaring at me. “She went over the fucking line!”
“She did,” I agreed and kneeled to inspect Emily’s wound, avoiding his gaze as I grasped her calf gently to lift her leg. She was bleeding a lot, but the cut didn’t seem deep. There were no pieces of glass, as far as I could tell. “I’m so sorry for what happened.”
Emily pressed her lips together, inhaling a shuddering breath through her nose as she nodded.
“Anna, give me a clean towel.”
Anna pulled the towel out of the cabinets and handed it to me. I pressed it gently on Emily’s wound and took her hand, putting it on the towel as I removed mine.
“Keep pressure on it. We need to stop the bleeding.”
She nodded, but then her face twisted when blood soaked through the towel. “Oh God. So much blood. Oh God—”
“Shhh. It’s okay. You’re going to be okay,” I soothed her. “I’m going to call a doctor now. We’ll get your wound treated in no time.”
All the while, I could feel Zach watching me, and I finally looked up at him. My stomach made a backflip at the captive expression on his face. It was like he was seeing me for the first time, and it reminded me of the way he looked at me earlier in the gazebo after he’d made me come.
Dropping my gaze, I stepped aside and pulled my phone out.
I called our family doctor’s office and asked if he was available for an emergency appointment.
As I talked to his assistant, Zach crouched in front of Emily and whispered some soft words to her, placing his hand over hers on the towel, and an ugly feeling swirled in my stomach.
I wanted to wrench his hand away from her, and I faced away from them before that ugly feeling in my stomach could become even uglier.
A minute later, I ended the call. “The doctor can see you now. Let’s go.”
“I can take her,” Anna said.
“No. She’s my responsibility.”
“She’s your mother’s responsibility,” Zach spat.