He kissed the top of my head. “I believe dinner was next on our agenda.”
I smiled. He had said ‘fucking, dinner, more fucking, then calls.’
“I can warm up one of Mrs. Mayhand’s dinners,” I volunteered. “I was about to do that when you came home.”
Van handed me my glass of wine. “Sit, beautiful. I like taking care of you.”
Julia
“Is everything all right?” my mother asked. “Are you on your way home? Do you need our help?”
I inhaled as I sat straighter, my phone in hand. While Van had gone to his office to call his press secretary, I’d stayed in my suite. We’d maintained the schedule Van had stated earlier in the evening—fucking, dinner, and more fucking. The second round was in my suite, in my bed. Now, after enough time to gather my breath and clean up, wearing only a robe, I stepped from the bedroom and into the sitting room with my phone in hand.
“Mom, please get Dad. I want to talk to both of you.”
“Julia, tell me,” she pursued, “is this something bad?”
“No.” I shook my head, trying to believe my own words.
What I was about to tell them wasn’t bad.
It was a shock.
“Please get Dad,” I repeated.
“I’m here,” he said.
“You’re on speaker,” Mom added.
I sat on one of the soft chairs, pulled my bare feet to the cushion and wrapped the robe around my knees. “I don’t really know how to start this.”
“Oh, Julia,” Mom said, her voice filled with emotion. “Don’t do anything rash. What Beth and Skylar did isn’t your fault.”
What?
“I know that, Mom.”
“I’ve spoken to Beth. She wants to talk to you.”
I rolled my eyes. I’d seen her name on my missed calls and texts. I’d deleted the texts without reading them and obviously hadn’t returned her calls. “I don’t want to talk to her. She can have Skylar; he’s a consolation prize anyway. I hope they make each other insanely happy.”
“She’s hoping you two can work through this.”
My head shook. “Honestly, Beth is going to be a mother. Maybe she should stop being so selfish. She got Skylar. She can’t have me too.”
“But, dear,” Mom went on, “the two of you have been best friends since you were little girls.”
“I didn’t call to talk about Beth or Skylar, and I’m not coming home, not right away. I left Chicago because I wasn’t ready to face everyone. Not because I was guilty but because I didn’t want to see the pity.”
“You know you have a home with us,” Dad said.
I had been living back in my childhood home since graduating from Northwestern. “Technically, I suppose I have a home with Skylar too. I suppose I need an attorney to look into that.” I gathered my breath. “Again, none of this is why I’m calling.” Before they could interrupt again, I went on. “The day I drove to Ashland, I was caught in a blizzard.”
“What?” Mom gasped.
“Mom, obviously, I’m fine. But that night, I slid and ran the rental car off the road and into a snowbank. I was stuck in the middle of nowhere.” I thought about that. It wasn’t the middle of nowhere. It was the outskirts of where I was now.
“Julia,” Dad said, “why didn’t you call us?”
“Well, as luck would have it, there was no cell service. Not wanting to freeze to death in the car, I took off walking.” The memories came back. “A man found me.”
“Oh no.”
“He was a good man. He is,” I corrected. “He saved me. He took me to a nearby cabin and well” —I left out a few details— “neither of us knew one another. A few days later when I went to the job interview...well...it turned out that the job I came up here to explore is working for him, writing his memoir.”
“Who is he?” Dad asked.
“You’re working for the man who saved you?” Mom asked.
“Yes,” I replied, answering my mother. “I’m working for him. Dad, he’s also the buyer of the shares in Wade.”
My dad’s voice hardened. “Who is this man?”
“Dad, he’s the reason I know about Marlin. I know that he was playing you, using me, and possibly using Skylar as a pawn to sell Wade out from under all of us. The jury is out on what Skylar knew.”
“No,” my mom said. “That isn’t true. Whoever this man is, he’s feeding you lies, Julia. Come home. Everyone who knows the truth about what happened understands why you postponed the wedding.”
“I didn’t postpone it.” The meal we’d recently eaten churned in my stomach. “And I don’t want the whole world to know.”
“It’s not the whole world. It’s the people who matter. Even so, Skylar and Beth were wrong, but the Butlers have been our friends since before you were born. Marlin wouldn’t do what you’re suggesting. The person who bought the shares is responsible for the current state of Wade.”
“Julia.” Dad’s voice was growing sterner by the minute. “What is the name of the man who bought twenty-one percent of Wade stock?”
“His name is Donovan Sherman.”
My mother’s gasp was all I heard.
Does my mother know him?
Does my father?
Or do they only know Van’s reputation?
“Dad, I’m telling you that despite what you may have heard about Van, he’s not trying to destroy Wade. He’s trying to help.”
“Julia,” Mom said, “I’m texting the pilot. We can get a company plane to you in a few hours.” She spoke to my father. “Do you know how close we can land to Ashland?”
“Mom,” I interjected, “I’m not leaving, not yet. I’m going to stay here with Van.”
“That man will ruin us and ruin you,” Dad said. “That’s what he does.”
“He won’t ruin me,” I replied. “I know his reputation and that’s what he usually does, but this time he has an incentive to help Wade.”
“What?” Dad asked. “Why would he help us?”
“Van will help because I agreed to marry him.” I let out a long breath. My parents were talking, yet all I could hear was a buzz of relief. Now that I’d said the words, the tension tightening my muscles since I hit the call button began to dissipate, flowing away.
Maybe my concern was telling others, not actually being engaged again.
“Julia, this is too soon. You’re on a rebound and that man is taking advantage of you.”
Van had taken advantage of me but not in the way Mom meant and not in a way I minded.
“Van asked me to marry him. Together we’ll have controlling interest in Wade. With Van’s help Wade will thrive. He won’t hurt it.”
I wasn’t certain if the phone on the other end had disconnected or if it was suddenly muted.
“Mom? Dad?”
It was Dad’s voice I heard first. His tone was eerily calm. “You don’t need to do that, sweetheart. Now that we know who bought the stock, and even without your and Skylar’s marriage, Marlin and I will move forward.”