Chapter 40
Dear me/ journal/ god.
I know it’s been a few days since I wrote in here, and you might be wondering what happened to my fort thank you gesture. In short… nothing.
Apparently Finley liked Alice a lot. And on the day I was going to invite her over he asked her out to the movies.
So now they’re boyfriend and girlfriend I guess, and Loch Ness has a date with him on Saturday but Anthony said that she can only go if he shaperones. My mom is going to help her get ready.
I guess he really likes that her hair is really glossy or something and he’s not scared of her at all.
Gampy helped me take the fort down and then asked me if I wanted to play backgammon but I wasn’t really in the mood. I just went outside and practiced soccer by myself.
Dominic
Six weeks later
“Divide”—SLAP—“and conquer. It’s the only way we stand a chance.”
I sipped my coffee, looking Alice up and down as she pointed at the large piece of paper she’d taped to the wall.
It was meant to act as a makeshift whiteboard.
How it held up, I wasn’t sure. Hadn’t been able to take my eyes off of her long enough to check.
“I think it’s the librarian slash teacher thing I’m getting. Slap the ruler against the wall again.”
She snapped her fingers in my face. They were great fingers. Pretty, manicured, and incredibly proficient at edging cock. “Dominic. Focus.”
I was trying. But she was wearing a too-large, ugly Christmas sweater, stained cargo pants, mismatched wool socks, and her hair had been wrestled into a sloppy blob on top of her head. Like the most adorable crown you’d ever seen. How could I not be hard?
“You look hot. It’s not my fault.”
“I’m quite literally wearing the least flattering clothing I own.”
“Still hot.”
“We just had sex.”
I shifted, readjusting my bulge, trying to find a more comfortable seating position. “I don’t know what you want from me.”
“Your focus. We start with the weakest link.” The tip of the ruler slid to where her mother’s name had been circled with a black marker. “Julie Cloutier. Likes interpretive dance, Montreal bagels, and spoiling her children rotten. Great sense of fashion. Horrible taste in music.”
I grinned into my mug. “Remember when she tricked us into going to that freestyle jazz festival?”
Alice snorted. “Joke was on her.”
We’d managed to sneak off on our own once the adults had opened that second bottle of wine. As it turned out, it was criminally easy for a couple of sixteen-year-olds to get their hands on drugs at a jazz festival. The joint had basically pushed its way into our hands.
Which was the argument we’d made once we’d inevitably been caught.
“Anyways. I’ll handle my mom. She’s about as hard to crack as cotton candy. Thankfully, she’s also a package deal.” The ruler stretched to point at her dad. “Anthony has two weaknesses: his wife and his kids. If she’s on board, so is he. He worships the air she breathes. It’s very gross.”
“I remember.”
“You haven’t seen them together yet, but Adrien and Ria are just as bad, if not worse.
I’m still scarred from the first time he brought her to Victoria to visit my parents.
We could hear them through the walls, and at one point, he dressed himself up as a blue alien wearing a loincloth.
For sex reasons. It was vulgar, to say the least.”
I hummed. “Speaking of vulgar, do me a favor and lift your sweater up for me super quick?”
She flipped me off without missing a beat, her ruler sliding to the center of her master plan.
Her brother’s name was written in all caps and circled ten times in bright red.
“Here’s where it gets tricky. Mom, Dad, Gampy, Ria…
we can try to win them over, but I have a strong feeling that their final decisions will ultimately depend on Adrien.
If he doesn’t forgive you, then…” She trailed off, her grip visibly tightening.
She didn’t need to say it.
There was a reason why we’d put this off for as long as we had.
Fear and dread licked up my spine. If it came down to it, she wouldn’t choose me over her family, and I wouldn’t expect her to. But I couldn’t lose her again. I wouldn’t survive it.
She could plan this out and strategize all she wanted, but at the end of the day, I would do what I needed to keep her. If Adrien wanted me to sign away my fortune and beg on my knees for his forgiveness, so be it.
Alice hesitated as her confidence started to wane.
“Adrien’s likes include his wife, his wife’s best friend’s cat, environmental conservation efforts, and plants.
The easiest way to get to him would probably be to go through Ria.
He has a really hard time saying no to her.
” She paused again. “Unfortunately, he’s also extremely protective of her. ”
“Right.” I put my mug down.
I may not have targeted her directly, but the negative press I’d instigated against her now-husband a few years back had exploded, lingering long enough to impact her.
And while Adrien’s PR team had managed to kill most of the articles before they gained any significant traction, a few had managed to slip through the cracks.
The internet hadn’t taken too kindly to her (albeit minor) criminal record. Or the rumors that Adrien had used his connections to buy her acceptance into law school, despite her “lack of qualifications,” effectively stealing a more deserving student’s spot.
Most of it was bullshit, but the truth wasn’t all that important where gossip was concerned.
“I’ll talk to Ria,” Alice decided, tossing the ruler and crossing her arms as she studied her plan. “If I can warm her up and get everyone else caught up first, we’ll optimize our chances.”
“Your phone’s buzzing again.”
“It’s Rachel,” she muttered absentmindedly. “Ignore it.”
I didn’t point out how much easier it would be to block her number. She knew. She’d do it—or not—when she was ready.
“Here’s what I’m thinking.” She whipped back around.
“Gampy’s flying back to Victoria tonight, and since he’s already somewhat on our side—well done on that, by the way.
” My palm shot up at the same time hers did.
I let her smack it before looping an arm around her waist and pulling her onto my lap.
“Hi,” she murmured, smiling.
My chest cramped. The girl had my heart resting in the palm of her hands, beating to the beat of her laughter, and she had no fucking idea.
“Let’s take a break.” I pulled her closer, brushing a kiss over the tip of her nose. “Five minutes.”
She slipped her arms around my neck with a soft sigh. “You know what I’m going to say.”
“I do.”
“So you’re trying to stall.”
“Can you blame me?”
She nuzzled closer, her fingers toying with my hair. “I know it’s not ideal, but the conversation with my parents needs to happen in person. I owe them that much.”
I was only half-aware that her phone was buzzing again as my hold on her tightened. “He’ll be back in less than two weeks. Go with him then.”
He’d been flying in from Victoria every twelve days or so to spend time with my mom. Sometimes they played backgammon. Sometimes they did tai chi in the garden. And sometimes they did nothing at all.
When Alice and I had visited yesterday, we’d found him snoring loudly in her rocking chair, his e-reader resting face down on the carpet. Mom had been humming in her knitting nook, trying to work through a tiny sweater for Maxwell as the bird pulled and toyed with the yarn.
I hadn’t seen her pick up her knitting needles or laugh so much in years.
“The longer we put this off, the higher the chances we get caught,” Alice tried. “And that would make things so much worse.”
I pressed my forehead to her temple, ignoring the panicked kick of my pulse. “I can come with you. We can take my jet, and I’ll stay at a hotel nearby. They won’t know.”
I swallowed roughly when she gently shook her head.
“I’ll come back. I promise.” She cupped my face, forcing me to look at her. “I promise. Okay?”
My teeth were glued shut, dread snaking around my throat. I pulled her into an embrace, one hand slipping to the back of her head.
I shut my eyes, memorizing the feel of her against me. The warmth of her skin. Her scent.
Every detail I could cling to in case her family managed to talk sense into her. Remind her of how badly I’d fucked up. How undeserving I was of her forgiv—
Bzz. Bzz. Bzz.
Alice peeled her head away to yell at her phone across the room. “Oh my god, shut up! I don’t want to talk to you!”
Miraculously, it listened. The buzzing cut off, and Alice clicked her tongue, stuffing her frowning face into the crook of my neck.
Not five seconds later: Bzz. Bzz. Bzz.
She shoved off me with an angry “UGH,” stomping to where her phone was plugged in. She ripped it off the attachment, her teeth half-bared.
Until she looked at the screen.
At first, it was like she couldn’t understand what she was seeing. Then her gaze jerked to mine, wide and panicked.
“What?” I asked.
“It’s the care home.”
There was a split second of shock, and then adrenaline kicked in. I yanked my phone out of my pocket. Two missed calls while it’d been on silent.
“Hello?”
I jumped to my feet, my heart racing against the clock as I held out my hand for her phone. She put up a finger. “Yes, this is she.”
Then I had to watch as her expression changed. As confusion and worry morphed into something a hell of a lot worse. “Okay. Yes. Which hospital, sorry?” She sprinted to her bedroom and grabbed her purse. I snatched my keys. Opened the door for her. “Okay. Yes, we’re on our way now. Thank you.”
“What?” I asked breathlessly, running ahead to slam the elevator button. “What happened? Did she wander off the property? Fall?”
Alice shook her head, her glassy green eyes filled with anxious terror. “No, she’s fine.”
“Then what?”
Her mouth opened. Shut.
“Alice, what is it?”
“Gampy had a heart attack.”