30. The Secret Ingredient #2
This is revenge over what happened at the club, isn’t it? I sent a cop to tell him to keep his mouth shut about us, so he threw Charlotte under the bus.
“I always knew you acted like a whore”—Beatrice steps closer, her voice dripping with disdain—“but I didn’t know you made a job out of it.”
I wish I could burst out of here to shout in her fucking face that if she calls Charlotte a whore one more time, I’ll...I don’t know, put cheese in her food. Or poison.
Charlotte doesn’t flinch, but her throat bobs.
“Where’s the money?” Beatrice presses, crossing her arms. “I assume you don’t do it for free?”
Charlotte shifts her weight. “I spent it.”
Beatrice barks out a deranged laugh. “Yeah? On clothes? Makeup? Or is this some sad attempt at independence?”
Charlotte’s jaw tenses. “It’s my money, and it’s gone.”
Ohhh, no it’s not. I can see it in her face. She has the money, which means that no matter what her mom does, she has a way out of here without needing anyone’s help. I’m so proud of her, the urge to jump out of here is even stronger.
“How much, huh? What’s sex with you worth?”
“I didn’t have sex with anyone.”
“Fifty thousand? Sixty? Maybe . . . eighty-four thousand dollars?”
Charlotte blanches.
“I have to commend you on something. You haven’t spent a dime .”
“Did you take my money?” Charlotte whispers.
“You mean my money?”
“How is it?—”
“Because your body? My diet made it. The bed you use to sell your body? I bought it.” She points around. “Everything in here is mine, and so is that money.”
Fuck. My. Life.
She took her fucking money.
“And we’ll need it, won’t we? Especially if this comes out.
Your career will be over. You think brands will want to work with a model who takes her clothes off for strangers online?
You think they wouldn’t drop you the second they found out?
You’ve worked your entire life for this, Charlotte, and you’re just going to throw it away for. ..what? Tips from desperate men?”
“Maybe I don’t want to do this your way anymore.”
Beatrice slams her hand against the nightstand, making me flinch. “You don’t get a choice. You will delete that account immediately. You will do whatever it takes to clean up this mess. And you will focus on your real career.”
Silence stretches between them, taut and suffocating.
Then, quietly, Charlotte says, “I want my money back.”
Beatrice’s nostrils flare. “Excuse me?”
Charlotte’s gaze flickers toward the closet, where I am pressed against the back wall, barely breathing. There’s desperation in her expression.
She wants out.
She’s going to tell her mom.
“I’m done modeling.” She swallows hard. “It’s not what I want to do for the rest of my life, and neither is camming.”
Beatrice’s chin jerks back, lips parting slightly as if she’s just been struck. “What?”
Charlotte’s throat bobs. “You know I like making clothes. I want to?—”
“Oh, you want to be a stylist now.”
Charlotte lifts her chin. “So what if I do?”
Beatrice taps her heel against the floor. “Charlotte, you’re so beautiful.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Charlotte barks. “I’m much more than beautiful.”
“That’s where you’re wrong.” Beatrice steps forward and takes her daughter’s hand, her grip deceptively gentle. “You’re beautiful, and you’re lucky you are, because you’re not much else.”
My stomach turns to lead, and I press my fist against my mouth to keep from making a sound.
Charlotte flinches. Just barely. Just enough that if I hadn’t been watching her so closely, I might have missed it.
“If it wasn’t for me, you wouldn’t be a model,” Beatrice continues, voice smooth. “If it wasn’t for my work, my help, my diet, my money, you’d be a college drop-out with no prospects. Do you get that?”
I can see the war in Charlotte’s eyes—the battle between the truth she wants to believe and the version of herself her mother has spent years shoving down her throat.
“So what, because you like drawing cute little outfits for yourself, sewing them up, and putting them on, you think you’ll be the next Vera Wang?
” She scoffs, folding her arms at her hips.
“You have no formal training. Who’s going to hire you?
Are you going to make coffee for actual designers in hopes that someone recognizes your talent?
Is this your Devil Wears Prada fantasy playing out? ”
“I—” Tears coat Charlotte’s lashes. “I don’t know.”
“No, you don’t know.” Beatrice releases her hand, shaking her head with an air of finality. “And luckily for you, you don’t need to know. You just need to make sure you do what I say.”
Charlotte perches on the edge of the mattress, breathing heavily, her whole body rigid as if locking herself in place is the only thing keeping her from crumbling.
And me? I press my back harder against the closet wall, biting my tongue, fighting the urge to burst out and tell her what I already know.
She’s more than beautiful.
She’s everything.
She can do whatever the fuck she sets her mind to.
Charlotte doesn’t say a word, just stares down at her lap as silent tears spill onto her bare thighs. She doesn’t fight. Doesn’t argue. Just sits there, defeated.
Once Beatrice leaves and the door clicks shut, I step out of the closet.
Charlotte is still crying quietly as the front door slams—the kind of crying that comes when you’ve been broken so many times that the fight in you has just worn thin.
And god, I want to make her feel better, want to gather her in my arms and tell her she doesn’t have to put up with this, that she doesn’t have to live like this.
Something falls from the closet behind me as I come out, the dull thunk startling me. I lean down to grab it, but when my fingers close around the cool edge of a silver frame, I hesitate.
It’s a picture. A child, maybe four or five years old, grinning at the camera. But it’s not Charlotte. It can’t be, because her hair is dark brown, a shade deeper than her eyes. Yet she looks...familiar in a way that sends a cold rush through my veins.
I’ve seen this face before.
That smile. Those sharp, knowing eyes.
The realization slams into me like a freight train. “Is this...”
Charlotte doesn’t look at me. She doesn’t move, except for the trembling rise and fall of her shoulders. Then, finally, she says, “Amelie.”
The name lingers in the air between us.
Amelie.
I drag my gaze away from the picture and look at Charlotte. She wipes at her cheeks, but fresh tears keep slipping free. I don’t even know where to start. Why does she have this. Why does she look so guilty.
Why, in this picture, is Amelie the spitting image of her mother.
My mind is racing, leaping ahead faster than I can catch up. The pieces are all there, just waiting to be put together, but I don’t want to put them together. Because if I do, it’ll mean?—
“Beatrice didn’t lose her daughter.” Charlotte’s voice cracks, her hands curling into the sheets. “She might feel like she did, but she abandoned her. She left her behind.”
The words slice through my ribs like glass. “What?”
Charlotte squeezes her eyes shut, pressing the heels of her palms against them. “That’s why we’re here. She wants to reconnect with her, but Amelie wouldn’t agree to meet her, so...”
So she’s tricking her. How? Doesn’t Ian know who Beatrice is? He’s never met her in person, but they did talk on the phone.
“She gave them my father’s name. Arnault.”
Oh god. That’s why she didn’t introduce herself as Beatrice Montgomery. I can barely breathe.
Amelie is Beatrice’s daughter.
The picture frame presses into my palm. Beatrice specifically asked for Amelie to come cook for her.
She didn’t even try to hide how pissed she was when I showed up instead.
She invited me here for lunch and asked about her.
And every single time I mentioned her name, Charlotte was so annoyed.
I blamed it on jealousy, but that’s not it, is it?
A sickening thought snakes its way from the back of my mind. It lasts but a second before I shove it away, but the damage is done—the doubt is planted, and it spreads quicker than I can rationalize it.
“This isn’t why I’m here, is it?” My voice is hollow. I already know the answer but need to hear it anyway, and for every second she doesn’t say a word, the crater in my chest keeps expanding. “Did your mom make you...seduce me?”
Charlotte’s head jerks up, her wet eyes wide. “Would you believe me if I told you she didn’t?”
“Yes.” I just need her to tell me, and I’ll believe her. I really fucking will. I’ll believe anything rather than this disgusting, twisted version of the truth.
“She didn’t, I swear.”
I hear her, but it’s like my body doesn’t. My muscles are stiff, wound so tight I might snap. I don’t know if I want to run or scream or demand answers.
I need to get out of here.
Charlotte scrambles closer the moment I take a step toward the door, reaching for me, her fingers barely grazing my wrist before I pull back. She flinches like I struck her, and it makes something in my chest crack, but I can’t bring myself to move to her.
I don’t know what to say.
I don’t know what to do with any of this.
“I’m sorry, okay?” She breathes hard, like there’s not enough oxygen coming in. “I didn’t know Amelie was your friend until you first mentioned her name. Beatrice played me exactly like she did with you.”
I force myself to look at her. Her face is flushed, her eyes glossy and desperate.
Her hands tremble as she grips the fabric of her sweater. “I swear,” she whispers. “I didn’t know when we started...I didn’t. ”
I believe her, but I have to go.
“No, no, please.” She clings to me when I try to step past her, burying her crying face into my chest. “You said you wouldn’t. Just a minute ago, you said?—”
“A minute ago I didn’t know you were keeping this from me. That you’re my best friend’s sister. Does she even know about you? Does she even—” I’m getting a headache. “This is a fucking mess.”
“Can’t you just scream at me and be done with it?”
I don’t think I could even if I wanted to, and I struggle to picture a scenario in which I’d want to scream at Charlotte. Even if she lied and kept this secret from me.
“No, I won’t raise my voice at you.”
“You can!” She waves me on. “Come on. Tell me I’m a liar. A bitch. That you wish you’d never met me, that I ruined your life.”
My brow furrows. That’s not “screaming” at her. That’s verbal abuse.
“I don’t think any of that. I just?—”
“It doesn’t matter,” she scolds like I’m the one missing the point.
“You don’t have to mean every single thing—just say it so you’ll feel better.
” She doesn’t let me speak and insists, “Seriously, I can take it. I know I’m a bad person, Aaron.
I told you from the start that I’d ruin everything.
And I’m irresponsible. I should have kept away from you, but you showed me kindness, and I was selfish?—”
My chest tightens. “Charlotte?—”
“Tell me that I don’t deserve your time or your patience. That you’re sick of me, that I’ve pushed too far, that I exhaust you.” Her voice wavers, but she powers through, chin lifting like she’s bracing for a blow. “That you’d rather never see me again than deal with this shit one more time.”
She’s not just throwing words out, is she? That’s how her mother talks to her. Maybe how people at work do. Maybe men before me. “Charlotte, stop.”
“It’s okay, seriously.” Tears leak out of the corner of her eyes. “I just...please don’t leave. Please, don’t let this be the thing that breaks you.” Her shoulders drop an inch. “Please, I’m beg?—”
I wrap my arms around her and pull her to me.
She stiffens for half a second, like she doesn’t believe I’m really holding her, then she melts, her arms looping around my neck, her fingers fisting in the back of my shirt. Her breath is shaky against my shoulder, her body convulsing in my arms.
She’s wrong—about all of it. About what she deserves. About what I think of her. About how this ends.
“None of that is right, Charlotte. None of it is even remotely true, okay? Yes, I’m...hurt, I guess. Shocked too. But I will never , for any reason, talk to you like that. Ever, you hear me?”
“But—”
“But nothing. You don’t ever need to beg me to stay.”
She nods, sniffling against my chest, when my phone vibrates inside my back pocket. I take it out and look at the caller ID.
Amelie, of course.
“I, uh . . .”
Charlotte nods, taking a moment to dry her tears. “Take it. It’s fine.”
“Hello?” I say, bringing the phone to my ear without letting go of Charlotte.
“Aaron?” Amelie says in a frantic voice. “Ian said he’ll send Robbie to your client tonight—I need your help.”
“O-okay.” I don’t think I can take more thrills today. “What’s up?”
“Remember I told you Barb had to leave yesterday? Well, her youngest is sick, and—everything’s okay, but she couldn’t come back to Roseberg. Of course , I missed her calls because I was shooting, and now?—”
“Woah, woah, okay.” She must be talking about Barbara Wilkow, the chef who’s taken her place at Daisy. “What do you need me to do?”
“Head to Daisy. Prep for dinner service is going to start soon, and they need a head chef.”
Wait, what?