13. Theo #3
She doesn’t interrupt me as she listens.
“That’s not an excuse.” I don’t move toward her. “I’m not telling you to excuse it. I’m telling you because I don’t want to be him. And tonight I was him. I didn’t defend you. And I’ve been just like him since the first time we met. And I’m sorry.”
She looks at me for a long moment before she speaks. “Theo. Would it be so terrible?”
“What?”
“If he took it all away.” Her head tilts.
“All of it. The company. The money. The houses. The cars. All of it.” There is no accusation in it.
She is asking because she actually wants to know.
“You’d have less money. Sure. But you’d have your freedom.
No pressure. No one controlling you. No one waiting to tell you what you did wrong.
Most of all, you’d have your dignity. Would that really be so terrible, Theo? ”
I have no answer for her.
My father has been telling me what to want since I was nine years old. I have never once stopped to ask whether I want it.
I stand there as she packs up the last of her supplies. “The rest of my stuff is already loaded up. I’m going home.”
“Let me drive you.”
She takes a step back from me. “My van is here. I drove myself. I don’t need a ride.”
“Can I call you tomorrow to talk?”
She gives me an incredulous look. “No. Let’s forget we ever met. Your father got what he wanted. I’m sure your family’s reputation is saved.”
The other caterers are watching us now.
Fuck.
I step aside. She leaves. And I can’t do what she asked. I can’t forget we ever met.
My father takes Gideon and me into the study at the end of the evening, after all the guests have left.
The fire is going. The bourbon is poured. The signet ring catches the firelight as he sets the decanter down. He doesn’t offer me a glass.
“That,” he says, “went exceptionally well.”
Gideon is at the window, looking out into the dark, silently.
“The senator’s wife was charmed,” my father continues.
“The shipping family has agreed to a meeting. And I have been told that two of our board members were on the phone within an hour of leaving this house, smoothing things over with their wives, who had begun to call our family a public relations risk. I think we can put that particular concern to rest.”
He sits behind his desk.
“The Donovan girl performed her role admirably. Truly. The order I gave you a month ago was the wrong order. I told you to finish her. I told you to put her out of that building. None of it worked. The public picked her side, the press picked her side, and every move we made only made her bigger. So, we change the play. We disengage. The bakery is left alone. The press has no fresh material, and a story without fresh material is a dead story. The public never hears about tonight. They simply stop hearing about her at all. The people who matter were sitting at my table, and they saw a family that does not feud with bakers. They saw a family confident enough to host her. That is the version of the story that will travel in the rooms I do business in.”
He sounds satisfied. He is satisfied. He thinks tonight settled something.
My father levels his green eyes at me. “Theodore.”
I meet them. “Sir.”
He turns the signet ring half a degree. “I am told the Donovan girl has rather enchanted your brother.”
“Ander’s actions are his own,” I say. “He’s an adult.”
“Ander is a Sawyer.” He taps the signet ring once against the leather of the desk.
“His judgment has never been the best of the three of you. I’m hearing his name in proximity to hers, and I do not like the proximity.
I’m told she was at a charity event last week, and your brother was less than discreet about his interest.”
And there it is.
That is why Ander was not invited tonight. My father didn’t want him here because my father didn’t want him near her. He cut him out so he could conduct this evening, with her in this house, without Ander in the room to make it harder.
He has not been told about me, it seems. About our dance. I don’t correct him.
“Keep her away from him.” My father looks at Gideon, then back at me. “And from this family. I am counting on you both. He will listen to you, Gideon, if you frame it correctly. He will listen to you, Theodore, if you remind him what is at stake.”
I don’t respond, and my father notices.
“Family first, boys. Always. That girl humiliated this family once. I will not give her the opportunity to do it again. Are we clear?”
My throat is dry. I nod, but I can’t bring myself to say the words out loud. Everything Bianca said to me is racing through my mind.
He turns to my brother. “Gideon. Are we clear?”
Gideon also nods, eyes on the window. But I notice he remains silent as well.
“Good.” He picks up the bourbon. “Go home, both of you. Get some sleep.”
I leave the study, and my brother and I both walk out of my father’s home without speaking.
I get in the back of my car. The driver pulls down the long drive between the bare oaks.
Tomorrow, I’m going to make things right with Bianca Donovan.