There were several reasons why I hated her. The first and most obvious one was that I suspected she knew what Daryl and I were talking about in my family’s library. That she knew my secret. It made me feel pathetic and weak. The second one was that she looked just like a young Jo. Same eyes. Same lips. Same slightly overlapping front teeth and that Lolita look about her.
Hell, even the same Southern accent, even though I could hear that she’d lost most of it now, after ten years.
Hating her was like atonement to my mother, Marie, for a sin that wasn’t even mine.
The third one, though, was part of the reason why I didn’t just hate Help, I respected her too. Her indifference to my power somewhat disarmed me.
Most people felt helpless around me. Emilia Leblanc never had.
I uncuffed the links on my dress shirt and rolled my sleeves up, taking my time and my pleasure in knowing she was watching me. “Now get your ass out of my office, Help. I have work to do.”
“Darlin’, bless your heart, I swear you look too good!” Jo clutched my cheeks in her cold, leathery hands. Her manicured fingernails dug into my skin a little deeper than they should have, and not by accident.
I flashed her a detached smile and allowed her to lower my head so she could kiss my forehead one last time before everything between us went to shit. This was the most physical contact I’d allowed her over the years, and she knew better than to overstep her boundaries. She smelled of chocolate and expensive perfume. The cloying scent felt rotten in my nostrils, even though I knew other people probably found it sweet.
Finally, she released me from her grip and inspected my face closely. The bluish tinge under her eyes suggested she was recovering from yet another facial surgery. Jo was what happened to the Bond Girl twenty-five years later. Her resemblance to Brigitte Bardot used to be uncanny. Only unlike Bardot, Jo never agreed to this thing called nature. She fought it, and it fought right back, and this was how she’d ended up having more plastic in her face than a Tupperware container.
That was her problem. All the bleached-blonde hair, surgeries, makeup, facials, and superficial bullshit in the world—the designer clothes and shoes and Hermès handbags—couldn’t cover up the fact that She. Was. Getting. Old.
She was getting old, while my mother remained young. My mother, Marie, only thirty-five at her death. With hair black as night and skin white as a dove. Her beauty was almost as violent as the accident that eventually ended her life.
She looked like Snow White.
Only unlike Snow White, she wasn’t rescued by the prince.
The prince was actually the very man who agreed to poison the apple.
The witch in front of me arranged for it to be delivered.
Unfortunately, I didn’t realize the truth until it was too late.
“I adore this restaurant!” She fluffed her over-styled hair and followed the maître d’ to our table, gushing about expensive shit and mistakenly thinking it passed as small talk.
I tuned her out. She wore the gray Alexander Wang dress I’d bought for her birthday—it took me forever to find a cheap knock-off that’d make her rich friends laugh at her behind her back—and a perfectly applied lipstick a shade darker than her favorite red wine, just to make sure she’d look prim and proper, even after her meal.
A part of me was angry at Help for not fucking up any of the tasks I’d given her today. I thought she’d promised to be a shitty PA? If only she’d forgotten to book Jo a driver, I wouldn’t be here now.
I trudged through the avant-garde design of the exclusive restaurant, moving past walls made of live plants, French doors, backlit black cabinets, and ornate paneling. For a few seconds, I felt like a kid who was about to endure some punishment he dreaded, and on some level that’s exactly who I was.
We sat down.
We drank our water silently from crystal stemware that was as impractical as it was nonsensical.
We flipped through the menu, not looking at each other, murmuring something about the difference between Syrahs and Merlots.
But we didn’t talk. Not really. I was waiting to see how she was going to broach the subject. Not that it mattered in any way, of course. Her fate was sealed.
She’d not murmured a word about the reason she’d flown here, not until after the waitress served us our entrees. Then she finally spoke up. “Your father’s getting worse. He’s going to pass soon, I’m afraid.” She stared into her plate, poking at her food, like she had no appetite. “My poor sweet husband.”
She pretends to love him.
I stabbed my steak with my fork, cutting into the blood rare filet, chewing the juicy piece of meat, my face blank.
But my hate for him is genuine and real.
“That’s a shame,” I said, my voice devoid of emotion.
Her gaze met mine. She shivered inside her fake designer number.
“I’m not sure how much longer he’s going to be able to hold on.” She rearranged the silverware over the napkin she hadn’t placed in her lap, straightening them in a neat line.
“Why don’t you just go ahead and spit it out, Jo.” I smiled politely, draining my glass of scotch—fuck wine—and sat back, making myself comfortable. This was going to be good.
Squeal, Mother. Squeal.
She took a tissue from her purse, patting the mist of sweat from her waxy Botoxed forehead. It wasn’t warm in the restaurant.
She was anxious.
It felt good.
“Baron…” She sighed, and my eyes clenched shut, my nostrils flaring.
I hated that name. It was my father’s. I would’ve legally changed it long ago if it weren’t for the fact I didn’t want anyone to know I gave a shit.
“You don’t need all of his money,” Jo said with another sigh. “You’ve built a multi-million-dollar company on your own. And of course, I have no expectations about how much I might inherit. I just need a place to stay. This whole thing has caught me so unprepared…”
I was only ten when Dean’s father, Eli Cole, a family law attorney who represented some of the biggest actors in Hollywood, shut Dad’s office door for a two-hour consultation on estate planning. Despite being crazy for Jo—or maybe because he was crazy for her and never really trusted himself—Dad insisted on a prenup that protected every penny and gave Jo nothing if she ever filed for divorce.
Death wasn’t a divorce, but she was worried about the will.
Neither Jo nor I knew what his will said, but we could guess. My father was a vain old man whose wife was his once mistress, a second violin to his business empire. And me? To my father, I barely existed except as a name that symbolized his legacy, but unlike her, I could help that legacy live on.
In all likelihood, I was going to be in charge of his entire business empire soon. I would hold the purse strings, and Jo was worried that my main vice—vindictiveness—would mean she was going to lose her cushy lifestyle. For once in her miserable life, she was right.
I exhaled, lifting my brows and looking sideways, like she’d caught me off guard. Not uttering a word—it was too much fun to watch her hopeful gaze as it met my armor of indifference—I took another slow sip of my scotch.
“If we find out that he…” she trailed off.
“Left you penniless?” I finished for her.