10. Wentworth
TEN
Wentworth
The hunting cabin Damien talked his boss into renting to me may look like a cabin but it’s far from roughing it. Left on the front steps and to my own devices when my brother whisked the rancher’s daughter away, I carried my duffle and portfolio up to the porch and tried the front door. Thankfully, it was unlocked.
Letting myself in, I found myself in the kind of hunting cabin I assume the CEO of a Fortune 500 company would call a rustic little getaway.
A pair of large, brown leather couches face off in front of a massive stone fireplace with a living edge mantel and beautiful framed watercolor of what I’m pretty sure is the lake on the other side of the driveway. Worn but meticulously polished hardwood floors covered with what I’m sure are hand woven rugs lead to an open concept kitchen that undoubtedly would get my father’s stamp of approval, separated from the living room by a large, curved island, occupied by a line of rustic but obviously expensive barstools. On the other side of the large, open space is a wide staircase leading to the second-story where I’m assuming I’ll find the bedrooms.
Not quite ready to make the trip yet, I drop my duffle at the bottom of the stairs before taking a slow cruise around the living room. On either side of the fireplace are tall, floor-to-ceiling bookshelves. Intermingled with leather-bound first editions and commercial fiction hardbacks are framed family photos and mementos. Picking a framed photo up at random, I recognize the rancher's daughter right away, even though she’s years younger than she is now and from what I can see in the picture, infinitely happier.
Kait’s been through hell these last couple of years...
That’s what Damien said to me earlier, in between telling me to forget that she asked me for help and calling me a rich, out-of-town asshole. Comparing the girl in the picture to the young woman I met earlier, I can see that my brother’s assessment of the last couple of years of her life was an understatement. Not that she looks bad—she doesn’t. Matter of fact, she’s without a doubt the most beautiful woman I’ve ever met—but the girl in the photograph shines . Standing next to her at what looks like some sort of BBQ or community picnic is a man, a few years older but he resembles her enough that I’m sure he’s a close relation. Between them is an even younger girl, this one blonde and willowy with soft delicate skin and wide brown eyes. The man and the younger girl are smiling at the camera while Kait’s head is thrown back, her mouth open and grinning on a silent laugh.
Suddenly feeling like I’m spying on her in the shower, I set the picture frame down and step away from the bookshelf without looking at anything else. Moving across the room without a clear course of action, I’m almost relieved when my phone rings. Pulling it out of my back pocket, I answer it without checking to see who it is and instantly regret it.
“You were on Extra! last night.” Delilah informs me as soon as I say hello. “Mother is absolutely losing her shit. She’s got her pack of lawyers off the leash and foaming at the mouth.”
“I’m okay, all things considered—thanks for asking,” I answer dryly while I make my way to the open front door. “Tell mother she can put her suits back in their kennel—I have it taken care of.”
Delilah gives me one of her put-upon sighs. “Went, please don’t make me talk to her.”
Moving through the door instead of closing it, I step out onto the front porch. “Who flew to New York and bailed you out of jail last month when you—”
“ Fine ,” she hisses at me while I lower myself into one of the large gliders that sit in pairs under the deep eves of the porch. “I’ll tell her but this makes us even.”
“Lilah, I could ask you to handcuff yourself to her for the rest of your life and we still wouldn’t be close to even ,” I say, reminding her of the countless times I’ve bailed her out and rescued her since she was fifteen. She sort of went off the rails when our grandparents died. I was already in college—not because I wanted to go but because my grandfather made it clear that even though he supported and encouraged my dreams of being an artist, he still expected me to get an education.
Wentworth, I don’t care what you do with it once you get it, but please humor your grandfather and go to college and earn a business degree.
I understood why—Hawthorne International was going to be mine someday and even if I didn’t want it, I needed to have at least some idea of how to run a multi-billion-dollar hotel business... but instead of staying in Boston and going to Harvard like he hoped, I moved across the country and went to UCLA. Neither one of us dreamed that he and my grandmother would be gone before I even finished my sophomore year. Without them, Delilah went wild and nothing I did or said could reel her in and aside from lamenting over how embarrassing her behavior was, our mother didn’t do anything to stop her. When she turned seventeen, she moved to the New York hotel so she could be closer to the rest of the spoiled trust fund kids she started running with. I quit trying and just started praying she didn’t end up dead.
“Fine—whatever.” I can practically hear her eyes rolling. “Where are you?” When I don’t answer her right away, she gives me another one of those sighs but I can hear the hurt underneath. “Jesus, please—like I’m going to tell anyone.”
“I’m in Montana.” I contemplate it for a few seconds before I give up the rest. “With Damien.”
“Hiding behind enemy lines,” Delilah says on a scandalized gasp. “Now I want to tell Mother just so I can watch her have a meltdown.”
“Don’t.” Aiming my gaze across the loose gravel driveway, I take in the scene in front of me. It’s like something from a movie. The tree-line pathway leading to a wooden dock that stretches into a lake so clear and still, it reflects the sky and mountains, the setting sun sparkling on the surface of the water. “Her narcissistic bullshit is the last thing I need.” Still staring out across the water, I make myself ask. “What are they saying about me? The tabloids.”
“That you got tanked and crashed your girlfriend’s car into a bus bench and almost killed someone.” She says it like she’s reading the ingredients off the back of a cereal box. “When will you be home?”
“I don’t know...” Thinking about the mess Lexi dragged me into, I shake my head. “It depends on how long it takes my lawyer to get everything straightened out—why?”
“Because Silver turns twenty-one in a few weeks and Jane and I are going to surprise her by dragging her to Level to—”
“You’re nineteen , Lilah,” I remind her while I think about all the trouble she can and will get herself into if given half the chance. Even with dragging a couple of straight arrows like our sister and her best friend around, Delilah will have no trouble making headlines. “You have no business in a nightclub.”
“Relax,” she tells me on another one of those sighs. “It’s Level—I can’t even drink there. The new head of security has everyone who works there scared shitless to give me anything stronger than water. It’s lame.”
“If it’s lame, why do you go there?” I ask, not sure if I buy her story.
“I dunno...” she mumbles it which means she goes there for a very specific reason—she just doesn’t want to tell me. “So, will you be home in time or not?”
“Probably not,” I try to sound upset about it but nightclubs have never been my thing. Reaching up, I swipe a rough hand over my face. “Aren’t you going to ask me?”
“Ask you what?” To her credit, Delilah sounds completely confused.
“If I did what they’re saying.”
“I don’t have to ask,” she tells me in a matter-of-fact tone. “I know you didn’t do it.”
Leaning back, I rest my head on top of the chair and close my eyes. “How can you be so sure. Maybe I did.”
“Please.” That matter-of-fact tone again, this time capped off with a scoff. “I hate to be the one to remind you, Went but I’m the fuck-up and you’re the rescue ranger. Unfortunately for both of us, our roles were decided a long time ago and neither of us have ever been one to buck family expectation.”