LUCAS
“The prodigal son returns. To what do we owe this pleasure?” Even when I was a kid, my mother had never been one to bake cookies, or hug you when you fell off your bike and skinned your knee.
Mine was more the cannibalize-her-young type. Like a tiger shark.
But she was still my mother. We were still connected. And even though I might not always like her, I would probably always love her.
Plus, she’d already seen me . . . there was no going back now.
Even before I could open my mouth to greet her, she was drawing first blood. “Burn through your allowance already? Come running home to Mommy to bail you out?” As if she’d ever bailed me out in my life.
Her heels clicked loudly on each marble step, a staccato punctuation as she descended the wide staircase. Even though I hadn’t warned her I was coming, she was dressed to the nines. Mother wouldn’t be caught dead in yoga pants, or, God forbid, pajamas. I used to wonder if she slept like that too, wearing high heels and sequins.
Not that I would have known what she looked like at night—the nannies had been under strict orders to clear me and my brother away as efficiently as the dinner dishes, leaving my parents to their endless strings of cocktail parties and premieres and concerts. What Aster’s parents were in financial circles, my parents had been to LA society.
When she reached the bottom step, she presented her Botoxed cheek for a kiss. “The way Aster made it sound, I assumed you’d be expecting me,” I said, giving her the usual warm-and-fuzzy peck.
She glided past me. “Aster.” She said her name dismissively, waving off any unspoken accusation I might be making.
I lifted an eyebrow at her, trying to be diplomatic. No point pissing her off already. “Come on, you love Aster. You’ve been pushing us together for as long as I can remember. So why can’t I leave you two alone for two minutes? The way I hear it, you’re not playing nice.”
“Me?” She didn’t bother to look offended. “I always play nice. Sure, Aster’s sweet, but she’s in over her head with the gala.”
“Aster’s doing fine—” I started.
“Did you hear she almost lost the caterers?” she parried, cutting me off.
“Because you tried to cancel them.”
She narrowed her eyes at me. “She doesn’t have the experience to oversee something like this on her own.”
“What are you suggesting?” I asked, trying to force her to reveal her angle, because with her there was always an angle.
She lifted a shoulder in a demure shrug, as if she hadn’t really considered it before now. “I just think you should come back. You should be here, managing things.”
Managing things. I almost laughed. Aster had been right. This had nothing to do with the gala. My mother wasn’t sabotaging the fundraiser because of anything Aster had, or hadn’t, done. She was sabotaging it to force me back into Aster’s orbit.
She might not know Aster and I were no longer engaged, but she definitely suspected something was off.
My mother and Aster’s had been conspiring for a marriage between Aster and me ever since we were kids. My mother knew what an aligning of our two families could do for her status.
But I wasn’t ready to tell her that would never happen. I might not like the way my mother handled things, but she’d already lost too much. I couldn’t lay this on her too. Not yet.
After the gala. That was what I’d told myself. How I’d convinced Aster to pretend we were still engaged. To go along as if nothing had changed. After that, we . . . I would get the closure I needed, and then I would deal with my mother.
I felt guilty for keeping up the lie, but we were in the home stretch now, and if that meant appeasing my mother a little while longer, then so be it.
“How about this?” I conceded. “If you’ll promise to stop meddling and give Aster a break, we can have weekly planning meetings here. Starting Tuesday.” My mother considered my proposal as if she were a detective weighing the confession of a hardened criminal who she had yet to trust. To sweeten the deal, I added, “That way you can corroborate for yourself. Make sure we’re not in over our heads. But trust me, this party is in good hands with Aster. She’s doing everything exactly the way I wanted. I didn’t just up and leave. She and I are a team,” I emphasized the word team, laying it on extra thick. “We had a plan in place, and she’s following that plan to a T.”
She arched her brows accusingly—no small feat with so much botulism paralyzing her facial muscles. “And did that plan include leaving your fiancée behind to be seduced by Raphael Donestro?”
Mentally, I steeled myself. I refused to let her bait me. “What’s Raph got to do with this?”
She waved, like she hadn’t just lobbed my cousin’s name—someone I’d once considered my closest friend—at me like a hand grenade.
“Only that he’s been circling around her like some sort of vulture.”
I chuckled. “If Raph’s a vulture, what does that make Aster—a carcass?”
“Don’t be vulgar. This isn’t a laughing matter.”
“Sure it is,” I offered, flashing her a cool smile. “Besides, Aster can make her own decision. Maybe she’d prefer someone like Raphael. Besides, you said it yourself, Aster’s not experienced. Maybe you think I can do better too.” I wiggled my eyebrows at her.
My mother’s mouth seamed into a steel line. “Don’t be confused. I never said she wasn’t marriage material. There’s a big difference between the ability to plan a fundraising gala and being good enough to marry my only son.”
Her words hit their mark and my spine went rigid.
Her only son.
I told myself she was only saying that because she was as hurt as I was. That she just dealt with her feelings differently than I had.
But a part of me wondered if that was true. You had to have feelings to give a shit, even about your own child.
Maybe I should just tell her . . . about Aster and me. Maybe she deserved the one-two punch the news would deliver. First losing one son. Then losing the chance for her other son—her remaining son—to marry into more wealth than most people could even wrap their brains around.
I opened my mouth to let her have it, just as my eyes slid sideways to the enormous portrait hanging above the mantle in the living room—the one my mother had never taken down or replaced. The one depicting a smiling, unified family. My fists clenched at my sides.
It had been a mistake trying to talk to her about the fundraiser.
It had been a mistake coming at all. I might not have been here on the front lines the way Aster had been, but putting together the gala was still important to me. Being here, though, back in this house . . . there were too many memories . . . too many unresolved emotions.
I’m doing this for Adam, I reminded myself.
“Look,” I said, suddenly desperate to get this over and done with so I could hightail it back to my place. So I could change out of this monkey suit and head to The Dunes for a beer . . . or twelve. Maybe even convince Emerson what a huge mistake I’d made. So she’d spend the night with me, even after the whole fucked-up mess with Aster. “All I’m asking is for you to let me and Aster handle the details of the gala. I get that this . . . ,” I tried not to choke on my own words, “ . . . means something to you too, but I want this night to be about the foundation. About doing something good. Let’s not make it personal.”
She lifted her chin, her eyes drilling into me. “Does that mean you’ve invited your father?” It was less a question and more an accusation. She knew the answer.
I let out a tired sigh. “He has just as much right to be there as you do.”
She regarded me for several seconds, waiting for me to blink. Maybe I would have blinked, once upon a time, back when I was a kid. Maybe even a year ago, when I was still under her thumb. But not now.
Now I wanted to do this my way. Live my own life.
Then her entire face smoothed out again, not an emotion or line in sight. This was her super-pissed face. She should be thanking me, at this rate she might never need Botox again.
She didn’t thank me though. Instead, she swiveled on one of her Valentino heels and strode out of the room, no goodbyes. No nothing.
I didn’t wait to see if she was coming back. She wasn’t. “Bye, Mother,” I yelled after her, my voice echoing hollowly off the marble floors. And beneath my breath, “See you next Tuesday.”