“I knew Carlton Whitmore would break my heart the minute I met him. I was at some stuffy event with my parents, my mother parading me around to every eligible bachelor in the room.” She tinkered with her locket. “It was Cliff Kensington’s 56th birthday and we were all celebrating the fact that his latest investments made everyone in the room five percent wealthier than when they woke up. I was bored out of my mind when the door swung open and this God of a man strolled in with a woman on each arm. Everyone over forty thought he was disgusting and everyone below was mesmerized.
I’d seen his movies and he was more handsome in person than he’d been on the screen. HIs skin was golden but it wasn’t from St. Barts or tennis matches at the club. It was the caramel brown of a man that lived his life with the top down. A man who lived for adventure. He was like sin come to life right in front of me.
Of course my mother would have rather chewed off her arm than take me over to meet him, even though he was as wealthy if not more so than those in attendance. He was nouveau rich and it was sacrilegious. And even though I had stars in my eyes, I snuck out on the patio to smoke and pout because guys like Carlton didn’t go for sweet, society girls. They went for sex kittens like the ones at his side. And even if he did, I’d seen the papers. Carlton Whitmore didn’t hold fidelity in high regard.” She stopped toying with her necklace. “I couldn’t light my cigarette and there he was, his bright blue eyes burning like flames.
Funny thing is, he told me not to fall in love with him from day one. He told me he’d break my heart. But the heart wants what the heart wants. Even when he was sleeping with everything he met with a vagina, I was faithful. I gave him a son that he barely saw and played the role of the good wife that stood by him while he disgraced me with his trysts. When he met that Italian woman...” She trailed off, looking at me in the mirror. “He was willing to give her what he could never give me.”
I shifted, not sure what to say to that.
She sniffed, elongating her neck. “I know you know about her. The fact that my son introduced you to that...that...” Her voice caught and she looked away, gathering herself. Hiding away the show of emotion. “You probably think she can walk on water. Jacob said he wished she was his mother more than once.” Not even decades of pretending could dull the edge of jealousy in her words.
“I met her, yes,” I said quietly.
“And I’m sure she told you about her fairytale romance with my husband?”
I was trying to be understanding and non-confrontational, but I felt the need to defend Allegra even though I didn’t agree with her past actions. “She cared about him, but it was never some storybook romance. She felt guilty about the role she played.”
“Oh I bet,” Alicia said with a haughty snort. “He gave her all and would have given her more but she didn’t want that.” When I frowned, her lips curved into a sadistic grin. “Oh my goodness--so the angel isn’t quite so perfect. She left out the part where my husband offered up me and Jacob like sacrificial lambs and said he wanted to marry her.”
With the story Allegra told me, she made it seem like she got tired of waiting for a commitment. I had no idea that Jacob’s father was planning on leaving his family to start over with his mistress. “I didn’t know...”
“Well, she declined. And here’s the hilarious part. I respected her for it. She was smarter than I was. Stronger. I knew the kind of man Carlton was and I married him anyway. But not Allegra. Not the love of his miserable life.” She glared at me. “Let me tell you about love. Love makes you weak. And marriage? That’s a show you put on for the rest of the world until one of you gets tired of it. Or dies.”
The last thing I thought I’d be feeling for Alicia Whitmore was pity, but there it was. I could almost picture her, head over heels in love with a man that hurt her over and over again. How could she go on? How could she grin and bear it as he stomped on her heart until it was nothing but fragments of what it used to be?
My mouth fell open when things clicked and I saw beyond her brash play at the penthouse. Of course she’d been happy that her son found love and wanted marriage despite the horrible example he’d grown up with. But when Rachel told her I was playing some sort of game, that it was all a charade, only the contract, of course she’d try to spare her son. Maybe her husband butchered her heart and made her either or unable or incapable of being the mom Jacob deserved as a kid, but she could do right by him now. She wanted real love for her son.
And I needed to convince her that’s what we had.
“I need you to know that I understand that in your own--” Twisted? Depraved? Asshole-y? “--unique way, you were trying to do what was best for your son. But I can assure you that Rachel Laraby does not have Jacob’s best interests at heart.”
She crossed her arms, her eyes narrowing in disbelief. “You can understand why I’m not surprised to hear you say that. It’s exactly what she said you’d say.”
As much as I wanted to ask her what the hell was wrong with her for even listening to a single word Rachel said, I knew that there was no way to know how long Rachel had been bashing me or what she said. God, if Rachel tried to set it up like I was the other woman…No. I had to go about this differently. I needed to appeal to the mother in her.
“I didn’t come here to get into all that. I came here because I’m not going anywhere and neither are you. We both love Jacob and want him to be happy and this tension just puts him in the middle. I want to work past it. We need to work through this, Alicia.”
She looked like she was considering it and I held my breath. This was it. This could be the moment where we started over. Maybe she didn’t trust me, but she had to see that I loved Jacob.
Right?
“For now, I think its best we just stay out of each other’s way.”
I opened my mouth for a final appeal, but she shot that down by walking briskly to the door. I swallowed the frustration and tried to walk out with my head high, but as soon as the door closed solidly behind me, I felt the emotion knot in my throat.
At least you tried.
****
I leaned back in my swivel chair, the thing making a squeal that used to drive me batty. I’d had it since college and Jacob offered to buy me another, not-so-subtly hinting that I made more than enough money to afford the top of the line. Even though the squeal was usually tantamount to nails on a chalkboard, I couldn’t chuck it. It reminded me of a simpler time. A time when working for a firm like Whitmore and Creighton had been little more than a dream.