“What are you doing?” Delilah perched on a barstool, chin on her palm.
Hell if I know.
I hip-checked the fridge door closed, wondering why the hell I was doing this. Why I cared when I didn’t even cook for myself.
“Penance.”
Delilah never questioned the word, so I offered it like a Walmart rollback deal. Regularly, until its meaning dried to nothing, and still, she never said a thing.
Until today.
“Penance. Really?” She jutted her chin at the concoction on the island. “With that?”
“I’m making a fucking sandwich, Delilah.” I didn’t bother glancing at her. “What does it look like I’m doing?”
“It looks like you’re putting chips into your sandwich and being awfully defensive about it.” Her nose scrunched up, two fingers absently tracing a pattern on the island counter. “That’s disgusting, by the way. You’ve lost all street cred in my mind.”
I didn’t answer.
Just stacked a slice of bread and cut it diagonally.
“Wait.” She leapt off the stool and rounded the island to my side. Rosco perked up in his bed and sprinted after her for back up. Fucking rat thought he was the fifth Ninja Turtle. Delilah nodded at the sandwich. “That’s not for you.”
I slid it into a clear sandwich bag. “Is there a point to your existence, or have you dedicated it to irritating me?”
“It’s for Emery, isn’t it?”
My eyes snapped to hers, fingers hovering over the multi-pack of chip bags the Insta Cart shopper had delivered.
She continued, “What are you doing?”
Her question held weight beyond the damn sandwich.
“No clue,” I muttered and selected the white cheddar popcorn.
I shoved the sandwich, a bag of popcorn, and a can of vanilla cream soda into a brown lunch sack with a napkin on top. Making my way to my desk, I pulled out a pen and hotel stationary.
“What are you writing?”
“Cool it, Veronica Mars.” The pen moved fast across the paper before Delilah could force her way over here. “You’re the less shiny knock-off of Nancy Drew. Let’s not exhaust your brain, sweetheart.”
You know those multiple-choice tests they give you in college? Everyone has a different version, ranging from version A to version D.
Except the professors don’t tell you that when you take it. So, people waste their time cheating off their neighbors… only to completely fail because they copied others when no one’s test is the same.
If there’s a metaphor for life, it’s that.
I bet you were the girl who bubbled in your own answers.
NASH
I read the note twice over, returned to the kitchen, and slid it into the lunch sack.
“Can we not mention anything Veronica Mars related? I can’t get over the ending.” Curiosity still brimmed in Delilah’s eyes. They darted from the bag to me, as if considering whether she could steal it. “King was ready to kick me out of the house when I spent a solid week crying at everything.”
“Cool story, bro.” I folded the top over the bag and clutched it in my grip. “You should write a book about it.”
“For the record, if I did, it’d be a bestseller. With Rosco on the cover. Who’s a handsome puppy?” She lifted the rat into her arms and pressed wet kisses all over his naked face, sans ear muffs since the construction crew had taken off a few hours ago. “Who wouldn’t buy a book with this beautiful face on it?”
“Literally, everyone on this planet and any extraterrestrial life on every other planet. If you showed up on a cult’s doorstep and told them Rosco is the second coming of Jesus, they’d find a different cult to worship.”
She ignored me and set Rosco down. He ran to the mini four-poster dog bed, I still couldn’t believe I allowed in my penthouse. “Blows my mind that no one has figured out who Emery is. Yeah, she’s going by a different last name and none of them are from the area, but she looks just like Virginia Winthrop. It’s obvious to me.”
“Yeah, if you’re blind in one eye and have a field of cataracts in the other.”
“They could be twins,” Delilah protested.
“Virginia looks like Cruella de Vil’s platinum blonde sister. You’re bullshitting me, right?”
She slanted her head, staring off into space. “I think it’s the face.”
“What about it? Emery’s nose is more upturned, she has a gray iris, and her eyes are bigger. Not to mention the long black hair compared to Virginia’s hacked-off bob.”
“Hmm…”
“Hmm, what?”
“It’s just…” Delilah grinned. “You seem to notice a lot about Emery Winthrop.”
“She’s my brother’s best friend, and I lived on her parent’s property for nearly a decade.”
And I’ve been in her, on her, all over her.
“Why are you two talking about me?”
Our heads swung to the voice. I hadn’t heard Emery enter, but of course, she let herself in. She had a damn key, which I should have demanded back after the shower incident. Her hoodie engulfed her, but I noticed no magic word on this tee.
It threw me off balance. I recovered slowly, like I’d suffered a career-ending injury.
Kobe and his torn Achilles.
Beckham and his snapped Achilles.
Durant and his torn Achilles.
Why are all these motherfuckers injuring their goddamn Achilles?
I swore, I felt my heels burning.
“Oh, my God. What is that?” Emery stared at Rosco with her nose scrunched up.
It was almost enough to make me laugh.
Almost.
“He’s a Hairless Chinese Crested dog.” Delilah rocked him against her chest. “They get cast in a ton of movies and shows.”
“For their ugliness.” I regarded Emery’s blank shirt again. “Let it be known, they often win competitions for world’s ugliest dog.”
“Hmm… I kind of like him.”
Delilah offered Rosco to Emery, who stroked his naked flesh twice and pressed a kiss to his forehead.
I opened the front door and said, “Delilah, your rat looks like he’s ten seconds from pissing himself.”
She took the hint, sparing me a parting arched brow. Rosco barked when she scooped him up. “Come on, baby. Let’s go for a walk.”
Emery rounded on me as soon as I slammed the door shut. “What the fuck, Nash?”
“You’ll have to be more specific than that. To which fuck are you referring?”
“Remove the canvas from the statue.”
The fucking statue. I knew it would bite me in the ass.
I didn’t budge. “No.”
“No?”
I eyed her lips. “Nope.”
Now that I remembered what it was like to kiss, I kicked myself for stopping in the first place.
“That’s all you have to say? We made a deal.”
“Actually, the deal was that you ate, and I found us a centerpiece.” I wandered into the kitchen. “Neither of us said anything about anyone seeing it before the unveiling. You’d make an awful lawyer, by the way.”
“So, we’re just supposed to design without knowing what it is?” She followed me and propped her hip against the island. “What if it doesn’t go with anything?”
“Nice try. It’s mostly metal. It goes with everything.”
“But—”
“No buts, Emery. It’s non-negotiable.”
“What if it’s ugly?”
“It’s not.”
Far fucking from it.
“I’m supposed to believe you found a centerpiece and had it delivered in under twenty-four hours?”
“Yes.”
“What nice centerpiece can be found, bought, and shipped in twenty-four hours?”
“One I already own.”
I’d been housing it on its side in a barn at the far end of my thirty-acre property in Eastridge like a mistress hidden in a secret apartment. Out of sight, out of mind.
“Oh.” Her head tilted, nose wrinkling.
“Yes.” I studied her shirt, conjuring some scenarios on what happened.
She ran out of ink.
The words washed off in the laundry.
I’d become selectively blind.
She left her shirt at some douche’s place after making out with me last night.
Emery blew a lock of hair from her face, eyes lighting up seconds later. “What about the placard?”
“The placard will be engraved and ordered once it’s written.”
“I can write it if you’ll tell me what the centerpiece is.”
“Cute, but no.” My eyes flicked to her shirt again.
“I put it on backward, okay?” She threw both arms in the air. “You can stop staring now, or I’ll have to assume you’re a creep.”
I stared for one more second because I loved riling her up, then tossed her the lunch bag. Emery caught it on instinct. Her brows pushed together when she realized what it was.
“It’s Turkey & Ruffles.” I set the knife and cutting board into the sink.
“Wait.” She studied the bag as if she had X-ray vision. “You ordered a rush on the kitchen today… and the first thing you made was my lunch?”
I swallowed, twice, and wondered when my throat had gotten so dry. “Technically, it’s a snack, considering midday has passed.”
“If we’re getting technical, it’s technically a sweet thing to do.”
“Just eat the fucking sandwich, Emery.”
A glint returned to her eyes. It screamed mischief. “Let us remove the cover.”
“No.”
I shouldn’t have given up that sculpture in the first place. It belonged on the corner of my farm, never to be seen again. I only did it, because Emery had been right. Ma would be at the grand opening.
Why the fuck would I disappoint her if I didn’t have to?
“Fine.” Emery slid the lunch onto the island. “I’m full. I think I’ll head to the lobby and figure out if neon pink rugs are neutral enough to compliment your canvas-covered monstrosity of a centerpiece.”
“There’s a note in the lunch sack.” I approached her side of the island. “Maybe I should toss it.”
Her hand darted out and snatched the bag. I smiled, disguising it as a taunt. She craved my words, just like I craved the ones on her shirt. I didn’t know when that had happened, but could you blame me?
The girl looked like a dictionary. Ink-colored hair on pale skin. Rare words printed across her chest. I wanted to devour her, memorize her words, and dog-ear my favorite pages.
Instead, I swiveled, strode to my desk, and sat. “Are we done here?”
“The centerpiece—”
“Will remain covered.” I opened my laptop. “If that’s all…”
Her eyes found the scorched leather on the perimeter of my desk. She cocked her head to the side and trailed a finger down the spine. My pulse choked me. I considered snatching the ledger and shoving it into my drawer.
I left it out, because like my penance tattoo, it reminded me to never lose sight of revenge. Delilah knew not to touch it, but Emery clearly wasn’t Delilah. She had no sense of boundaries. Just her and a world she thought belonged to everyone equally, which apparently meant what’s mine was also hers.
She released the leather, looking unperturbed by its current condition. “That looks kind of like Virginia’s notebook, except it’s, um, burnt.”
“What?”
If she hadn’t already had it, she’d have my full attention now.
“The notebook.” She motioned to it with a tilt of her chin. “Virginia has one just like it. Well, similar. The same shape and size, but hers had a crown logo on the front and was less… burnt. Like yours, leather wrapped all around it to protect it from fire, water, and dirt.”
I remembered what it looked like, considering that was how this ledger had looked before I tossed it into the Winthrop’s fireplace, barely retrieving it in time.
Finished leather was resistant to fire at high temperatures, so the encasing had protected most of the interior pages. The exterior looked charred as fuck and unrecognizable, however. Obvious proof that I’d tried to burn evidence, which was pretty damn illegal and why I never turned it in to the F.B.I. or S.E.C.
I’d thought I could handle it myself.
I was wrong.
And Dad died.
Emery continued, oblivious, “She used to carry it into the library before bed, obsessing over it. Then, she lost it one day and went absolutely berserk.”
“It was your mom’s?” I clarified, because What. The. Fuck.
I’d found it in Gideon’s office after hearing him talk about the company’s finances. Balthazar even said, as long as there’s no evidence of embezzling…
My eyes glimpsed out the window, confirming a lack of flying pigs. A window cleaner bobbed his head to music, standing on a metal contraption suspended by wires. His hands held a rag and a squeegee.
He inclined his chin to me as if to say, “‘Sup.”
Just my mind exploding. Nothing to see here, but you’ll have some chunks of brain to wipe off the windows by the end of your shift.
“Your mom had a notebook like this one?” I repeated, knowing it changed everything.
Fucking. Everything.
“Yes.” Emery’s lips quirked up. “Do you need Q-tips? I bet I can find some.” She folded her lower lip into her mouth, taking her time to wet it. “When Virginia lost it, she tore apart the house to look for it. Her eyes rimmed with so much rage and panic, I assumed she wrote about her affairs in there. She and Dad were always done. Their marriage was the shotgun type after she got pregnant with me.”
Her eyes returned to the ledger and she continued, “Actually, she was convinced someone on the staff stole it. She wanted to fire everyone, including your parents. Called it a clean sweep. Dad convinced her not to. Told her she could find another notebook. He was always good like that.”
My foundation rocked.
Everything I thought I knew morphed.
I stood on a cliff in the middle of a landslide.
The only way to go was down.
