Chapter 10

Demi

As I was waking up on Sunday morning, I still had only one thought echoing in my mind.

Oh. My. God.

I’d slept with my damn boss. And try as I might, I couldn’t bring myself to regret it. It was wild, crazy, impulsive, and amazing. Barrett was sexy, super attentive, hung like a horse, and knew what he was doing down there.

My brain kept telling me that I should regret what happened, but my heart and my body wouldn’t let me. My heart told me that I liked him, which I had to admit to myself. My body adored him, remembering the way he played it like an instrument specially designed for him. But my mind was still torn because of his damn money.

Barrett’s house betrayed the fact that he was way richer than my parents. That level of wealth troubled me. It did bad things to people, and I had no interest in being around any part of that life.

Still, I liked him. All I had to give was my heart. If I willingly gave it to him and he lost interest, I would be devastated all over again.

My parents’ marriage had taught me tons about being married to a guy like Barrett. You were nothing more than arm candy. My mother was smart, witty, and independent before she met my dad, but years of having him ignore her had turned her into someone I didn’t recognize. I doubt she did, either.

For just a second, I imagined being married to Barrett, and those same images of my mom clenching her jaw and rallying came to mind.

No thanks.

I wasn’t strong enough to have that happen to me. To have the man that I loved just ignore me. There was no way. I’d left Barrett’s house on a whim on Friday, suddenly freaking out about what getting involved with him would mean.

He was different than what I’d been expecting, but I didn’t quite know what to make of it. So, I hailed an almighty Uber and hightailed it home before things got awkward.

I knew that he had questions about my life. I could see them churning in his mind, and I wasn’t ready for that. I pulled my comforter over my head and buried myself in my bed, trying to disappear and make sense of what had happened all at once.

Sunlight was filtering through my thready curtains and baking me out of my bed before I could get comfortable again, though. For the first time in ages, I missed my air-conditioned room at my parents’ place and the coolness of Barrett’s house. I’d bet that he wasn’t waking up drenched in sweat and listening to rap music from the street below.

But I’d made peace with my lot a long time ago. After Gabbi got diagnosed with an autoimmune disorder and my parents sat idly by, I bid goodbye to that life and waved with both hands as I left, never looking back. Until now.

As if on cue, my phone rang, and my mother’s face taunted me from the screen. It was the same picture that always popped up, of course, but this time, I was compelled to answer the call.

“What can I do for you, Mom?”

Her stifled sobs were the first thing I heard. “Your father has been admitted to the hospital, Demi. The doctors aren’t confident that he has much time left.”

Her words hit me like fist, knocking the air from my lungs and the thoughts from my head. I was too taken aback to speak.

My mother took it as a chance to beg me. “Please, honey, come see him. I know you two haven’t always seen eye-to-eye, but this might be your last chance.”

Her words cut through my heart like a hot knife through butter. I hadn’t spoken to my father in a long time, but I couldn’t say no to this request. Not now. Leaving my bed behind, regrettably, I showered and headed for the hospital where my dad might be breathing his last breaths.

My mother had told me he was sick, but I wasn’t prepared for the sight that met my eyes when I reached the hospital. The intensive care unit smelled exactly as it should’ve, like clinical cleaning materials and nothing, with a whiff of hospital food in the air.

My father lay on a bed in the corner, his deteriorated body dwarfed by the vast array of machines that were scattered above and beside him. Seeing his body being poked and prodded and wired gave me a painful, hollow feeling in my chest. My mother was hunched at his side, clutching his frail hand to her forehead with her eyes closed.

She’d never been too religious, but I could have sworn that she was saying a silent prayer, begging God or the universe to help them in this time of crisis. She looked almost as bad as my father, thin and weak and trembling. Seeing her like this was almost as shocking as seeing my father’s condition. All of a sudden, the gravity of the situation came crashing down on me, and I didn’t know if I could handle it. I didn’t know if I was strong enough.

As if sensing my presence, my mother’s eyes opened and she looked at me. Fresh tears streamed down her cheeks, and she stood up, rising too slowly.

Her tear-streaked face made my heart pang, even as she opened her arms to me for the first time in years. “Demi, baby, thank you for coming.”

My father’s eyes fluttered open, but as tubed and drugged as he was, he couldn’t do more than manage a weak smile before he drifted off again. The incessant humming of the machines made things feel all too real.

“What’s going on, Mom? What’s his prognosis?” My voice cracked despite my best intentions.

“The cancer is aggressive,” she said. “We’ve been trying experimental treatment after experimental treatment, but so far, well, you can see the result.” She sank back into her chair and clasped my father’s bluish hand in hers.

“Is there anything I can do?”

My mother heaved a quiet sob and shook her head. “Not really, unless you’ve suddenly gained access to a lot of money of your own. The treatments, combined with bad management decisions at the company, are sucking us dry.”

I dragged in a deep breath. Athena’s had always seemed indestructible. My father had built it from the ground up, and it was hard to believe it could really be in trouble, regardless of what my mother had told me the other day.

“Athena’s is really in that much trouble?”

My mother nodded sadly. Dad had named the exclusive jewelry shop after her back in the day and professed that she was the real jewel in his life. It was the mantra that kept the company thriving for years, the fact that my father built the company around the idea that his own wife was his most valuable treasure.

It was a lie, of course. He spent so many hours in that damn shop that I forgot what he looked like around the eighth grade. My mom was always busy with ancillary things, fundraisers and galas and press events. Before long, Gabbi, my nanny, was the only person in life who really cared about me or paid any attention to me.

Until she no longer could.

“If Athena’s doesn’t get a cash injection soon, we’ll probably lose the house,” my mom told me. “And everything else.”

“How?” Surely, they should have a fortune saved up.

“Things have been rough recently. Your father took every last penny, and instead of putting it back in our retirement fund, he got roped into a business venture that I think was a scheme,” she cried, her sobs muffled by the handkerchief she was holding to her nose.

““I’m sorry, Mom,” I said honestly. “Let me stay with Dad tonight. Go home, get some rest, and we’ll talk in the morning.”

I needed time to process, time to think. An hour later, after I’d finally convinced my mom to leave, I got just that.

Sleeping fitfully on the single-seater couch at my father’s bedside, the beeping and humming of machines singing in my ears, I gave up around four in the morning and headed to the cafeteria for a cup of vile coffee.

I’d have thought that hospital coffee would be great and strong under the circumstances of the customers they served, but I’d had three by the time my mother got back, and I was still tired as hell.

“I’ve been giving it some thought,” I told my mom as we walked back to the ICU from the main entrance where we’d run into one another. “I don’t have much saved up, but I took a job recently that pays pretty well. If we borrowed against what I have and my future earnings, I think it should be enough to ensure some stability for you. For now.”

“Thank you, Demi,” my mother mumbled, pulling me in for a tight hug.

“I can’t guarantee anything,” I warned her.

“But you’re willing to try, regardless,” she said, sobbing into my hair.

And try we did. By the following afternoon, I was in it to my eyebrows with no way out, other than the promise of being the face of Barrett’s beloved agency.