14. Emma
Fourteen
Emma
E than returned two days later, face etched with the telltale weariness of cross-country flights and too little sleep. As soon as he stepped through the front door, I pounced.
“Well? What did he say?” I demanded, breathless with anticipation.
Ethan merely shook his head, scrubbing a hand over his stubbled jaw. “I tried, Em, I really did. But you know how damn stubborn Leone can be.”
Disappointment slammed into me like a punch to the gut. We’d been counting on our eldest brother - arrogant blowhard that he could be - to agree to take the reins as CEO of our fledgling resort venture. Without his business acumen and bottomless capital reserves, our dreams could easily crumble before they’d truly begun.
“So that’s it then?” I heard the tremor of dismay laced through my own voice. “He’s not going to do it?”
Again, Ethan could only sigh and offer an apologetic shrug. “Look, he didn’t outright refuse. He just…he wants some time to mull it over, work through whatever hangups he’s got about upending his entire life here.”
It was my turn to huff out a derisive snort. Of course. Ever since Father’s passing two years ago, Leone had hunkered down like a tortoise in its shell, refusing to so much as consider rejoining the family business back home. His cushy high-rise corporate enclave towering over Manhattan was his armored sanctuary. Dragging him away from that safety net would be akin to pulling teeth.
But we didn’t have unlimited time to dawdle around waiting for him to find his elusive personal epiphany. Momentum and opportunity were fickle lovers - seize them swiftly or risk watching them slip through your fingers forever.
“Ethan…” I drew in a fortifying breath, squaring my shoulders with renewed resolution. “I think I need to go to New York.”
He opened his mouth to protest, but I barreled on before he could voice whatever objection sprang to mind.
“Just hear me out. You know how he is - he’ll dig his heels in until the literal last second out of sheer stubbornness. But there’s no way he’ll be able to fend me off as easily.”
The faintest spark of amusement crinkled the corners of Ethan’s eyes at that, no doubt remembering countless tussles from our youth where my tenacious zeal had run roughshod over Leone’s pompous bravado. For all his worldly bluster, our eldest brother had always been a sucker for my persistence.
“You really think you can get through that mile-thick skull of his this time?”
Arching a brow, I braced my hands on my hips in a mirror of our mother’s signature no-nonsense stance. “You got a better idea, big brother?”
The corner of Ethan’s mouth kicked up in a crooked grin, admitting silent defeat. With a shake of his head, he closed the distance between us and pulled me into a fierce bear hug, rocking me from side to side.
“Give ‘em hell, kiddo,” he murmured against my hair. “You’re our last shot.”
Two days later, I was soaring eastward toward the towering concrete canyons of Manhattan, determination thrumming through my veins with each passing mile. If anyone could blast through Leone’s obdurate resistance, it was me.
Whether he was willing or not, our eldest brother was coming home. One way or another.
The familiar skyline of steel and glass soon rose into view, the crowded cityscape a jarring transition from the languid vistas of the valley. I could almost feel the nervous energy and frenetic pace thrumming like a mobile’s oscillation all around me as our shuttle angled toward the runway.
Threading through the airport’s obligatory gauntlet, I finally burst outside and hailed a taxi with new efficiency born from four years as a local.
“West 63rd and Central Park,” I tossed at the disinterested cabbie, who responded with a curt nod before whipping out into the snarling traffic.
Leaning back against the cracked vinyl upholstery, I watched the kaleidoscope of storefronts and pedestrians whip by, equal parts nostalgic and repulsed by the concrete warts and bustling cacophony. Living here - thriving here, even - had been a whirlwind chapter of my life, but also an achingly lonely one.
Leone’s leonine penthouse loomed ahead, gleaming in the dwindling evening light. As the cab rolled to a stop, I hastily shoved a crumpled wad of bills through the partition and stepped out onto the sidewalk, craning my neck back to squint up at the imposing monolithic tower rising overhead.
Steeling my nerves one final time, I deftly dodged through the sluggish knot of tourists logjamming the lobby’s revolving doors and strode to the far bank of elevators. If my recall of his penthouse unit was accurate, and of course it was, Leone’s private lift access code would be…
A discreet ping acknowledged my entry. Of course. The pompous code-monkey was nothing if not painfully predictable in his creature comforts. Rolling my eyes, I stepped aboard and jabbed the button for the uppermost penthouse level.
No pomp, no preamble. Time to beard the lion in his den.
The elevator seemed to take an eternity inching upwards, my pulse jittering higher with each ascending floor. What in tarnation was I going to say to him? ‘Pretty please play make-believe as our CEO, oh wise and venerated big brother?’ Like hell that would work.
This was Leone I would be dealing with - pig-stubborn, eternally-complacent Leone who arose each morning solely to count his precious millions as the world marched relentlessly on without him. After Mis— ahem, after two years mourning loss in his typical maudlin fashion, surely even HE had to be champing at the bit to break out of his self-pitying cycle, right?
Right. I was on a mission today. I’d pitch him. Hard. And Leone would have to listen, whether he wished to or not. It was that simple.
The soft chime of the penthouse lift arriving hardly registered through my Zen-like focus. I stepped into the vestibule on autopilot, hand already lifting to jab the bell. As the dulcet tones echoed through the hush, I hastily smoothed my palms down the front of my sweater, willing my racing pulse to settle.
You got this, Emma Harrison. You got this.
A series of muffled clunks and clomps sounded from within the apartment, rapidly drawing nearer. Then suddenly, the door swept open in a rush of barrel-aged scotch and heavy wood smoke.
“What are you doing here?” An incredulous baritone barked out.
So much for the warm welcome and fraternal backslaps. Resisting the urge to bolt like a spooked colt, I instead summoned up my warmest, most sibling-ally smile.
“Hello to you too, brother.”
“Hello,” Leone grumbled, raking an impatient hand through his prematurely graying hair as I barged into the spacious penthouse without waiting for further invitation.
Plush dove gray carpet hushed my footsteps as I crossed the sprawling great room with its soaring windows overlooking Central Park’s verdant treetops. Not pausing to survey the opulent yet coldly minimalist decor - a calculated ambience of understated wealth - I flopped inelegantly onto the pristine ivory sofa.
“I am not going to Maine,” he continued in a clipped tone, “and I am not going to resign from my job.”
With a disdainful sniff, Leone crossed to the oxblood leather club chair opposite, folding himself into it with leonine disdain. A nearly-empty crystal tumbler sloshed with the final swallows of smoky scotch as he settled back, pinning me with a scathing glare.
I merely arched one brow - a challenging Alpha stare-down if there ever was one. “Let’s not talk about that right now. Tell me how you’re doing.”
His shoulders stiffened almost imperceptibly before deflating on an aggrieved sigh, the motion so subtle that had I not spent four formative years joined at his intellectual hip, it might have escaped notice entirely.
“I’m…good,” he muttered, swirling the remaining amber liquid with a lethargic flick of his wrist.
“Uh huh.” Maintaining my impassive facade despite the blatant lie, I swept my gaze over the penthouse’s starkly tidy interior, zeroing in on the telltale signs etched in the tiny grooves bracketing his mouth, the unhealthy hollows beneath his eyes.
“Had any hospital visits lately?” The question tumbled forth before I could filter it, pointed and blunt.
Leone’s stormy glower would have cowed most into stammering retreat. But not me. I’d known the scathing edges of his legendary temper too intimately, recognized the simmering fractures lurking behind the cracks in that meticulously curated veneer.
“I’m fine, Em,” he growled, the time-worn endearment saturated in equal parts affection and warning. “Quit your clucking.”
Ignoring the barefaced lie, I slowly rose and drifted across the thick carpet, each measured footfall eating away at the distance between us like the relentless gnaw of time itself.
“You’re not fine,” I countered softly, reaching out to pluck the tumbler from his white-knuckled grip and place it aside with a dull thunk against the polished slate coaster. “I can see the dark circles, the whiskey crutch…”
His jaw tensed, emerald eyes hardening to flint as I hunkered down before him, callused fingers encircling his wrists in a gentle vise to halt any attempt at retreat. Meeting that volcanic stare head-on, I murmured, “You have to let it go, Leone. You lost a—”
“That’s enough!” He wrenched his hands free, the leonine mask ruptured as agony writ savage tormented his aristocratic features.
A ragged shudder racked him from within and all at once, the gilded armor shattered away to the desolate ruin underneath - a shattered husk of a man mourning an unimaginable loss. Broken. Raw.
Without conscious thought, instinct propelled me forward until our ragged breaths mingled. Palms against his heaving chest, I simply held on as his too-bright eyes squeezed shut, forcing scorching tears to carve pale streaks down those sculpted planes.
“Leone…” The faintest exhale, the barest breath of a plea for him to release this lone-borne burden.
With a ragged gasp, he crushed me fiercely against him, forehead butting against my collarbone as the last of his reserves finally, inexorably, collapsed. Long fingers gripped my shoulders in a vice, entire frame wracked with silent, visceral sobs as the torrent finally broke free.
And still, I held on. Simply holding the fractured pieces of my erstwhile mentor, my shield against this unforgiving world…
My friend, my brother, my kin.
It was finished, this long dark grief’s night. The dawn was ours to reclaim with nascent, fragile grace - if only he’d permit me to grasp it with him.
Salty dampness soaked the thin cotton of my blouse as Leone’s shuddering breaths slowly steadied, the worst of the tempest having crested and ebbed. One broad palm splayed across the taut muscles between my shoulder blades, grounding us both through sheer gravitational force.
“Come to Maine,” I whispered, the words borne into existence on little more than an exhale, threading through the thick silence heavy with unvoiced hurts and yearnings. “You need family with you. We need you with us.”
His frame stiffened infinitesimally at the gentle entreaty, and I tightened my embrace, pressing my cheek atop his graying crown in silent reassurance. Let me in, Leone. Let me help shoulder this crushing burden you’ve shouldered alone for too damn long.
When at last he stirred, withdrawing a hairsbreadth to pin me with those mossy green eyes rife with harrowed vulnerability, I held his gaze steady and unwavering.
“Please,” I murmured, calloused fingertips grazing the stubbled hinge of his jaw in a feather-light caress that contained entire worlds of consolation. “I know it’s hard to move on from losing something…someone like that. But it’s been two years, Leone.”
Recognition flickered through his liquid depths, chasing away some of the wrenching sorrow for a fleeting half-second. Two years…Jesus, had it only been that long? With a grimace, he ducked his chin in the barest perceptible nod - the first stone cast across this gulf yawning between us.
Encouraged, I pressed on in that same gentle yet insistent cadence. “You have to move on. Do it for me, for our family. Come home.” A wistful half-smile curved my lips as I studied his beloved, tormented visage through a sheen of unshed tears. “Your younger brother and sister need you.”
A muscle corded and twitched along the granite line of his jaw, eyes squeezing shut as if to physically dam the renewed flood threatening to breach free once more. I understood, of course I did - that constant ineffable ache persisting like a phantom limb no matter how much time lapsed. An emptiness yearning to be filled, yet terrified to invite fresh hurt.
Carefully, reverently, I cradled his gruff, indomitable features between my palms, forcing those shuttered eyes open to meet my steady regard once more. “If you don’t come back, Mom will end up killing me with all the helicoptering, reports and the inventory” I whispered, injecting a faint lilt of teasing reprieve into the words.
The breath gusted out of him in a ragged exhalation that might have audibly fractured under the weight of its desolation…or perhaps it was the softest flicker of a muffled, mordant chuckle in rueful recognition.
“Can you imagine - the two of us trying to manage the books, the logistics? We’d bankrupt the Resort before the first guest set their foot in.”
At that, the faintest uptick ghosted across the stern line of his mouth - minute, fleeting, yet profound in its raw honesty. Familiar fondness sparked behind those emerald depths as they locked onto mine, the first glimmer of warmth parting the banked clouds after an eternity of cloying darkness.
“What would I do without my girl keeping me on the level?” he rasped, knuckles grazing the high arch of my cheekbone.
A sputtering inhalation hitched in my throat as hope - tenuous, shameless, blinding - unfurled inside me like a long-furled blossom yearning for the sun. He wouldn’t verbalize it out loud just yet…but perhaps, finally, the shackles of grief were loosening their inexorable grip.
Swallowing hard, I blinked back the sudden prickling behind my eyes and summoned up my most impish grin, one dimple winking roguishly. “Be the absolute mess you are in all the ways that really count?”
It won me the barest ghost of a wry smirk in return, the silence between us no longer strained to bursting but rather replete - a companionable homecoming after far too long away.
My brother was still somewhere in that tempest-tossed wreckage, buried beneath twin years’ worth of sorrow and self-inflicted isolation. But now the lighthouse had been rekindled, glimmering faintly yet undeniably on the distant horizon.
And I would be the beacon to guide him safely home, come hell or high water. After all, that’s what family was for.