I laughed and pushed them apart then left a territorial lipstick mark on El-Mudad’s cheek. “Be good. I’ll text when the coast is clear.”
“I am at your beck and call,” he promised, grabbing my hand and bringing it to his lips.
The driver opened the door. Neil got out and offered me his hand, saying to the chauffeur, “Take Mr. Ati wherever he’d like. He’s in charge for the rest of the evening.”
“I’ll hold you to that,” El-Mudad called.
We waited on the sidewalk until the car began to pull away. Still smiling, barely moving his lips, Neil said, “I don’t like Grace.”
“I don’t, either,” I agreed with a laugh, and put my arm around his waist. “Come on.”
When I’d made the arrangements with Susan, it had seemed practical to suggest our apartment as a meeting place. What we wanted to talk about was a topic that was too serious to brook interruption by servers or the chatter of other diners. But when we entered the lobby, every click of my heels on the marble floor increased my dread. What if Susan and Travis thought I was trying to show off? Flaunt my wealth in front of them?
“Sophie?” Neil asked, following me into the elevator. “You’re rather pale.”
I touched my face gingerly. “Am I? I tried this new internet trick where you put powder on and then dunk your face—”
“No, I meant you look…unsteady.” He cupped my cheek and tilted my face up, his eyes scanning mine. “Are you going to be able to do this?”
I gently turned away from his touch. I didn’t want to jerk away or seem like I was angry with him. I wasn’t. But I didn’t like knowing that he was watching me as though I were a ticking time bomb or something.
Now, I knew how he felt when I did it to him.
“I’ll be fine. I promise.” I couldn’t actually promise. I assumed he knew that. “I’m just nervous. This will be the longest I’ve ever been in the same room with her. What about you? Will you be fine?”
He grimaced, suddenly very interested in the lights indicating the floors we passed. “Of course.”
“It’s not an ‘of course’ question.” The elevator dinged, and the doors slid open. I fished for my keys in my purse as we stepped into the entryway. “You’re not going to be confrontational or cold to them, right?”
“I’m not exactly thrilled about the purpose of their visit,” he admitted, holding the door for me so I could step into the foyer. “Would you like me to have your kidney already taken out and on a platter when they come in?”
I nudged him with my arm. “Be nice. This is going to be awkward for them, too. Probably more than it will be for us. I just don’t need you contributing to that atmosphere.”
“This isn’t about me, remember? I’m supposed to be here for you, and that’s what I plan to do. You’ve certainly swallowed your pride and hidden your feelings toward guests in this house over the years.” His tone was mild, but coupled with his words, it sent a very definite message: I’ll be just as nice to them as you ever were to Valerie.
“You know what? I’ll take it.” I stood on my tiptoes and kissed his cheek. “Do you need to change?”
He glanced down at his white button-down and dark blue jeans and frowned. “Am I not properly attired?”
“No, you’re perfect.” I, on the other hand, felt a little too dolled up in my heels and capped sleeve, floral printed sheath dress. What had I been thinking? I wanted to put them at ease, not make them feel like they’d accidentally stumbled into a photo shoot with Rich Assholes Magazine. “I’m going to change, though.”
As I moved toward the bedroom, Neil caught my hand. I turned back. I was glad I did. His warm green eyes locked on mine in tender assurance, and the brief squeeze he gave my fingers was as good as an hour-long psych up talk.
“Go check on dinner,” I said, nodding toward the kitchen, where the caterer would already be hard at work.
I hadn’t left much in the way of a wardrobe in the closet, but I did have a few key pieces. I swapped my dress for a pair of dark indigo jeans and a lavender silk blouse, and my heels for black ballet flats. I’d spent way too much time on my makeup to throw all the effort away, now, but I took off my pearl earrings and necklace—it wasn’t like I was going to take them on a tour of the White House Rose Garden or something.
The impression I’d been trying to make when we left the house was a lot different from the impression I wanted to make, now. I thought. It would have helped a lot to know what impression I actually wanted to make.
I used to take such pride in knowing that I never tried to be someone I wasn’t, but I’d never really confronted the fact that who I was had completely changed since I’d met Neil. It wasn’t just the money; the things that had happened to us—cancer, death, mental illness—had forced me to take on roles I’d rather myopically assumed I would never have to take. Now, confronted with yet another role, I didn’t know how to make it fit. Wealthy-Sister-with-Compatible-Organs seemed more couture than pret-a-porter.
I left my hair in the bouncy curls I’d worked hard to make “just so”. I’ve always felt that makeup and hair are like armor. A good blow-out or perfect cat’s eye made me invincible in the face of danger.
“Darling?” Neil called from the bedroom. “You should go to the kitchen. It smells divine.”
“I don’t want to get in their way,” I said, emerging from the closet. “What do you think?”
“You look a bit more casual than when we arrived,” he observed, and sat on the couch in front of the fireplace. “That’s not like you at all.”
“I don’t know what I’m like in this situation.” I sat beside him and pulled my feet up, kicking off my shoes. “I didn’t want to seem…stuffy.”
He didn’t say anything but put an arm around me to gently pull me against his side. “You have never, for a single day that I have known you, seemed stuffy.”
“Well, you’re not a very good judge of that. I mean…English.” I shrugged and gave him my best wide-eyed, innocent look.
“Very funny.” He sighed, and I wriggled even closer, letting my head rest on his chest.
“I guess stuffy isn’t the right word,” I corrected myself. “Snobby. That’s the one I meant.”
“Ah, yes. The dreaded snobbery.” His eye roll was practically audible.
“Hey, you don’t get it.” And he wouldn’t, no matter how often I tried to explain it to him. “I can absolutely be a snob. I do it all the time. There’s nothing wrong with not wanting to be that way to a newfound family.”
“There isn’t,” he agreed. “But there also isn’t any point in making yourself flustered trying to achieve some goal you haven’t even properly defined.”
“What do you mean?”
“You don’t want to be a ‘snob’,” he began. “But what about this situation makes you snobbish? Because you have a large, expensive apartment? Because you dress a certain way, or you’ve done your hair? Do you think they expect to find you in sackcloth and ashes when they arrive?”
“No.” That was just silly.
“And when they arrive, are you going to treat them as though they’re muddy dogs you don’t want on the furniture? Will you ask them not to touch anything for fear they might contaminate it or steal it?”
“Obviously not, Neil.” I hated when he made broad points like this. Because he was usually right.
“Then, how are you being a snob?” he asked.
“I just don’t want them to think I’m trying to act rich or something.”
Neil laughed. “We are rich. They’re bound to notice. I’m sure she got an inkling when she researched you.”
“I know, but I don’t want them to think that I think I’m better than them because of it.” I rubbed my temples. “I know you don’t get this.”
“You’re right. I don’t. I probably never will. But that doesn’t make your worries less valid.” He paused. “Would it make you feel better if we all ate in the kitchen?”
“Where the cater
ers are working?” Yeah, that would definitely make us seem more down to earth. “No. Besides, I’m not trying to pretend I made all that food myself. That’s such an Aunt Patty thing to do.”
“Ah, yes. Great-Aunt Patty’s famous Sara Lee pies.” Neil shook his head; he’d heard my mother and grandmother complain more than once about Patty’s “fake” pies.
“That’s a really good example, though,” I said, sitting up with the epiphany. “This entire life is like the store-bought pie. I didn’t earn any of this. It just happened to come as part of a package deal with the guy I married. But here I am, passing it off like it’s authentic. Like I made it myself. But they know I didn’t. They’re coming here, seeing all of this, and knowing that I’m just…nobody.”
“You aren’t ‘nobody’,” Neil argued. “You’re someone I love very much. And I’m not the only one.”
“I know, it’s just…” I made a frustrated noise. “They already know that I’m not like this. They knew that I grew up…less.”
“I’m sure they have more now than they did as children, as well. They run a company, after all.” He sounded very sensible, but it wasn’t what I meant.
“Not monetarily. They had families. TV families, you know? With a mom and a dad and siblings. I didn’t have that.” I didn’t quite know how that equated with money, but I was sure my therapist could help me figure that out. After all of this, I would be in dire need of a mental tune-up.
“And you feel that because you didn’t have that, and because you didn’t have money, you don’t deserve anything good in your life?”
So, Neil was apparently standing in for my therapist.
I didn’t want to admit he was right. Damn it. “Maybe. I just can’t stand the thought that she might sit there and think, ‘yeah, you have all this fancy stuff, but you were still unlovable.’”
“I doubt she’ll be thinking that,” Neil said gently. “And if she does, then she has her own problems that need working on.”
I leaned forward, my elbows on my knees, and let my head hang. Neil rubbed my shoulders like he was coaching me through a boxing match.
“You’re about to do something very difficult, Sophie,” he said, close to my ear as his strong hands kneaded my muscles. “And I admire you for it. Greatly. You had a chance to simply ignore all of this, but you chose to confront it.
“It kind of came to my office and confronted me,” I reminded him.
“That’s true,” he conceded. “But if someone had come to my office and asked me for one of my internal organs, I would have had security escort them out of the building.”
I snorted. “See? I told you. Snob.”
The reassuring massage turned into an out-and-out tickle assault. He hauled me, struggling, into his lap, and forced his face between my ear and shoulder to nibble on the most ticklish spot on my neck.
“Don’t, don’t, you’ll give me stubble burn!” I gasped, pushing at his chest. Only the threat of embarrassing marks made him relent, and when he released me, I dashed to the bathroom to splash cold water on my neck. Sure enough, he’d left a red scrape. I hoped it would fade before Susan and Travis arrived.
I came out and headed to the dining room to check out the setup. The housekeepers from the agency always did a great job with things, but maybe they’d gone a little overboard for our dinner. I shouldn’t have stressed that it was an important occasion. They’d used the Versace Byzantine Dreams china and Baccarat water glasses, and placed a whole goddamn flowering apple branch in the center of the table in lieu of a floral arrangement. Beside each plate, a small crystal bowl of apple blossom petals sat there doing absolutely nothing useful.
“Neil!” I called, hurrying through the living room to find him. “Seriously, we need to have a talk with the housekeepers, because I might have to fire the agen—”
As I stepped through the wide doorway from the living room into the foyer, I practically skidded to a halt. Susan and Travis stood there, beside Neil, who looked as though he’d swallowed something horizontally.
“Sophie. I thought you would have heard the doorbell,” he said, his smile tense.
“No, I didn’t, I was just—” I jerked my thumb over my shoulder. “There’s a…tree. On our dining room table. It’s weird.”
Susan and Travis’s eyebrows went up in unison, and they nodded as though they understood. Which was kind of them to pretend.
“I swear, I don’t run around threatening to fire people all the time.” Why are you still talking? Why are you still talking!
“Only on Thursdays,” Neil interjected smoothly. He motioned ahead of him. “Shall we go into the living room? Dinner isn’t quite ready, I’m afraid.”
“Sorry we’re so early,” Travis said, coming to shake my hand. “We didn’t know how long the subway would take.”
“You took the subway?” Neil asked, and I winced internally. “When you leave, you must let us hire you a car. I know how tiring trade conferences can be.”
Did he? I supposed he must have gone to some kinds of expos or conventions in his line of work, but never since I’d known him. It might have just been an off-the-cuff remark to try to break the ice.
“That’s great, man, thanks,” Travis said, and nudged Susan. “Isn’t that nice?”
“Yes, thank you.” Susan’s eyes met mine, and a silent understanding passed between us. In working so hard to make this less awkward, our husbands had succeeded in making it far more uncomfortable than it might have been.
“The living room is this way,” I said motioning for them to follow us.
Everything, from the thick dark wood beams across the stark white ceiling to the designer rug beneath our feet, seemed more pretentious than usual. I almost apologized, but thankfully, I realized how fucking terrible an apology like that would sound. Sorry our things are so impressive and expensive.
“Wow, you have a beautiful home,” Susan said, her expression brightening.
“Susan is a realtor,” Travis said, a hint of pride in his voice.
“Well, I got my license. I’m not putting my pictures on any signs, yet.” Her eyes were everywhere, scaling the walls and sliding over the fireplace. “I wouldn’t be able to sell this place, though. I wouldn’t know where to start.”
“Well, it’s pre-war, renovated ten years ago,” Neil rattled off. “Three bedrooms, three and a half baths, service quarters, home gym, home theatre, steam showers in the master and en-suites…”
Susan laughed. She laughed, like she wasn’t the same person I’d met on Monday. “Half of that is way above my pay grade.”
Susan and Travis sat on the sofa. Her posture was stiff, his “business casual”, like he was trying to be relatable and warm to a client. Neil and I took the chairs.
“So, Sophie,” Travis began. “We didn’t have much time to catch up at the reunion. Sunny says you work for a magazine?”
“Yeah, well, I own it,” I corrected him. “I don’t know how much work I actually do, compared to some of our employees.”
“I know that feeling. I see some of our guys are out there unloading trusses or driving the forklift in November, and I’m sitting in my nice warm office.” He laughed. “Sophie knows all about the winters there.”
I nodded and gestured toward Neil. “He’s pretty familiar with bad winters, himself. He spent most of his childhood in Iceland.”
“I read that in your book,” Susan said, then, a little more subdued, “I’m sorry if it’s strange to say that.”
“I told her she shouldn’t have,” Travis added quickly. “Now, she knows more about you than you know about her.”
A lump stuck in my throat. I cleared it and tried not to dwell on that stolen familial relationship. “No, it’s okay. So many strangers have read it, I don’t think I have any secrets, anymore.”
“Did anyone in your family read it?” Travis seemed genuinely interested, not like he was just making small talk. And that was nice and all, but he’d just cleanly carved a line between Susa
n and I. Did anyone in your family read it? Because your biological half-sister did. But you’re not our family.
“You know that at least one of them did,” Neil said. While his tone was conversational, I knew every possible tone of his voice and how it correlated to which emotion. The reply was terse and defensive, though I doubted either of our guests would notice.
“So, is your granddaughter here?” Susan asked, shifting topics.
“No, Olivia is with her grandmother.” Neil paused. “I suppose you’ve read all about her, too?”
“Hey!” I laughed. “I didn’t make Valerie out to be that bad.”
“I admired the fact that you could sound as objective as you did,” Susan said, genuine kindness in her voice. Then, to Neil, “And I’m glad you came through your cancer okay. And the transplant.”
The word electrified the air between us. That was the whole reason she was here. Not because she wanted to get to know me. At least, not aside from what she’d read in my books.
Thankfully, the caterer stepped into the room. “Mr. Elwood? We can serve at any time. Just let us know when you’re ready.”
“Thank you.” He stood, as eager to escape the moment as I was. “I think we’re ready, now.”
Susan and Travis followed us to the dining room.
“Oh my god, there really is a tree on your table,” she said, her jaw dropping in an expression so similar to one of mine that it took me aback.
“Y-yeah, I think they heard that people from Michigan were coming, and they were like, ‘Quick, what’s the state flower? We have to make them feel welcome!’” I was so relieved they laughed at my joke.
“Where should we…” she asked, gesturing toward the table.
“Oh, either side is fine,” I said with a wave of my hand. Like this was all super casual, when we were about to be served dinner by hired staff in our home. We both sat across from Travis and Susan, and I immediately found myself apologizing. “I’m sorry, we don’t usually have people waiting on us in our house. I just didn’t want to be stuck in the kitchen cooking.”
“You wouldn’t have been, darling.” Neil winked at me, then explained to them, “I do most of the cooking.”
The Sister (The Boss Book 6) Page 17
