Mom jerked like she’d been struck.
Don’t take the bait, I willed, drilling a hole in her with my eyes. Don’t listen to them.
He smiled, having hit his mark. “But that’s just one example among many of your mismanagement of Longbourne. We also have the tax issues. The misplacement of money. The absence of bookkeeping, no financial investments, and the lack of business to even fund your upkeep, driving you deeper into debt with every year. Can you tell me what you did to address any of this?”
“I … well, I …” She looked to me for an answer, but I had none to give.
“Yes, that’s what I found too,” Thompson said. “You allowed your shop, which has been in your family for a hundred seventy-one years to fail. And along the way, you ruined any possibility of a future for your business. So when Bower reached out, would you say it was a lifeline?”
“I w-would.”
“And how did you feel when you signed that contract?”
“Relieved.”
“And yet you are contesting the terms of that very agreement. Is it the fault of my client that you failed to read the contract that you signed?”
“No.”
“Would you say that it’s another example of your irresponsibility?”
Her anger flared. “Now, wait just a minute—”
“Mrs. Bennet, do you deny that you failed to file your taxes on time for ten of the twenty years you owned your business?”
“But that wasn’t me, it was my accountant!”
“Whom you hired, correct?”
“Yes, but—”
“Do you deny that you held contracts with various distributors that never delivered to you?”
“Well, no, but I just didn’t realize—” she rambled, crumbling.
“Do you deny that you do not keep regular hours?” he charged, voice rising. “Do you deny that your staff has consistently been delivered late paychecks? Do you deny that in your twenty years of running Longbourne, you have bankrupted it? Do you?”
“That’s enough,” I spat, ready to fight.
“It’s only the truth, Marcus,” Evelyn said, and I gnashed at my name on her lips.
“The truth is that you trapped her into the agreement in the hopes that we’d end up right here.”
A slash of a smile. “You know as well as I do that she has hammered every nail into the coffin herself.”
“And you handed her the last one,” I bit.
Her eyes lit with gratification. “I was trying to help her.”
“Bullshit. You were trying to ruin her.”
Ben laid a hand on my arm and whispered my name, but I shook him off.
“Why should I try to ruin her when she does such an admirable job on her own?” Evelyn cooed.
“Evelyn Bower,” Mom said, drawing the room’s attention, “do not pretend you didn’t know what you were doing.”
“And don’t pretend as if you didn’t know this was coming,” she shot back.
“Mother,” Maisie said, her worried eyes pleading, “please. Let it go.”
“You are meant to be an observer only, Margaret,” she warned. “I suggest you leave this to me.”
“I think it’s been left to you long enough,” Maisie answered.
Thompson said, “Ladies, if we could—”
Screws tightened in Evelyn as she laid a disdainful look on her daughter. “Now is not the time—”
“It feels like exactly the right time.” Trembling rage wafted off Maisie. “You have done enough to this family. The least you can do is keep your thoughts to yourself while you destroy them.”
For a handful of heartbeats, Evelyn Bower was silent and stock-still. When she stood, it was with a calculated grace that left her looming over her daughter like a vengeful god.
“That is nowhere near the least I can do,” Evelyn said, her tone even and deadly. “You will shut your mouth, Margaret Bower, and you will shut it right now. If you don’t, she won’t be the only one I ruin.”
Maisie’s cheeks were crimson, her eyes shining, jaw tightening with her small fists by her side. The only other motion was the shallow rise and fall of her chest as she looked for a refusal and found none.
Maisie’s color rose a shade as she turned to face forward again, her shining eyes staring a hole in the wall.
An inexplicable, unbound rage rumbled through me, a stampede of fury at the sight of Maisie being restrained, at the sight of her pain, at the sound of Evelyn’s noose sliding around Maisie’s neck.
I fought the desire to turn the entire room inside out. To flip this table and tump Thompson out of his chair. To shackle Evelyn to a post and burn the building down. To grab my mother and Maisie Bower and get them the fuck out of here.
My hands trembled with defiance, stayed only by some well of self-control I hadn’t known I possessed.
“Now, where were we?” Evelyn said, smiling as she lowered herself into her chair with grace she shouldn’t be allowed.
My mother sat across from us, lips pinned between her teeth and chin bent. “What has happened to you, Evelyn? You have always been cruel, but I didn’t know you’d be so horrible to your own child.”
“And I always knew you were this stupid,” she snapped. “Bovine and soft and chewing cud, not realizing you’re going to slaughter.”
Mom shook her head, her voice tight with emotion. “You sound just like your mother. And I am so sorry for that.”
Evelyn shot out of her seat, and the room erupted in noise once more—Evelyn’s lawyer trying to stop her, Maisie yelling at her to let it go, Mom yelling at Evelyn with tears in her eyes, Ben calling for me to calm down. I realized then that his arms circled my chest, and I relaxed enough that he let me go.
I rushed around the table and put myself between Mom and everyone. Held her face, forced her to look me in the eye. “I’m here. It’s all right, I’m here.”
She choked on a sob, sinking into my arms, and I folded her up, shielding her as best I could. I threw Ben a look over my shoulder.
He answered with a dark nod, “That’s enough for today. These circumstances are untenable, Thompson. My office will call to reschedule, and in the meantime, I suggest you leash your client.”
Thompson breathed a sharp sigh. “I recommend you do the same.”
I didn’t hear anything else that was said, only my thundering heart as I ushered my mother out. Kash, Luke, and Tess popped out of their seats and rushed toward us, asking over each other what happened.
“We’re rescheduling,” was all I said, moving us out of the common area in the hopes of avoiding Evelyn Bower and whatever poison waited on her lips.
Over the top of Mom’s head, I watched them file out, Maisie last.
Pained. She looked pained and small. Hurt and angry. And sorry. She looked so sorry, it took everything I had not to move for her.
Her name from her mother’s mouth was the crack of a whip. Maisie jolted, turning to follow with shoulders curved from the weight of it all.
I kissed the top of Mom’s head before leaning back to look at her.
“Are you all right?” I asked, knowing she wasn’t but unsure what else to say.