I found myself smiling right back at everyone, light and easy, the tension in my shoulders easing with every step. As I wound my way through the cubicles, a hush fell in my wake. I’d come to expect it—the general consensus was that I was a carbon print of my mother, and everyone either feared my mother or loathed her, some both.
So I made it my mission to prove them wrong.
In the back of the floor, there were no opulent corner offices like my mother’s but instead a row of smaller rooms that housed the upper management of the charity division. And in the biggest of those, I found the person I’d come looking for.
Jess popped out of her chair, bounding around her desk with arms flung wide.
“Maisie!” she said just before launching herself at me.
I caught her with a laugh. “I missed you too.”
She leaned back, looking me over. “I can’t believe she actually let you come down here to hippie alley.”
I sighed. “It wasn’t without convincing. Or a leash.”
“I wouldn’t expect anything less. Come here and sit,” she said, moving a stack of papers and binders out of a modest chair and onto a similar pile on the shelf behind her. “God, I can’t believe you’re actually here.” She took a seat, her face alight.
“And I can’t believe you’re running the place. I always knew you’d do it.”
She laughed. “It’s all thanks to you. If you’d never gotten me hired at Bower, I wouldn’t be working my dream job.”
“Being the boss’s daughter sometimes has its perks.”
She scoffed. “Steep price, if you ask me.”
“Not if it gets the perfect people to run the best department.”
“Flatterer,” Jess said with pink cheeks. “God, I’m so glad you’re back. I feel like I’ve been waiting a lifetime to see this day.”
“I didn’t think it’d ever come, if I’m honest.”
Her smile faded. “Another steep price?”
“Wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t. But I’m here, and that’s what matters.”
“So what’s your plan?” she asked. “We got word that our budget is expanding and the request that we allot resources in whatever direction you choose.”
“Well, that’s where you come in. I’d like to start with a new center, I was thinking in Hell’s Kitchen. We can use the model for the first, train some new people, take our best to the new center to get it up and running. Start recruitment. What do you say?”
Jess smiled, a broad and honest and beautiful expression on her face that filled me with hope. “I’d say, when can we start?”
7
Settle Down
MARCUS
“Again,” I said flatly, glancing from my mother to the legal pad in my lap.
“I don’t see why any of this is necessary, Marcus,” she blustered, adjusting the drape of her cardigan.
“It’s necessary because you will be in a room with Evelyn Bower, answering deposition questions under oath. If you’re not prepared, we’re all in trouble.”
“And Evelyn will have a field day,” Luke said from my side.
I ignored him. “Now, let’s try it again. When you signed the contract with Evelyn Bower, were you of sound mind and body?”
“You know very well that I was,” she answered, nose in the air.
“A simple yes or no will do. Keep your answers short. Don’t elaborate. Yes or no?”
She gave me a look. “Yes.”
Luke snickered from my side, covering it with a cough, which bought him his own glare.
“Did you have legal counsel regarding the contract?”
Her cheeks flushed, lips flattening. “No.”
“Did you read through the conditions of the contract?”
A hard swallow. A moment of silence. “It was a very long contract.”
“Did you read through the conditions of the contract?”
Her brow quirked. “There were a lot of clauses and sub-thingies and—”
“Yes or no?”
She drew a fiery breath. “No! I didn’t!” Her eyes shimmered with tears, her chin wobbling. “I was foolish, and I can barely admit it. How will I say the words in front of h-h-her?”
The ache in my chest twisted. “I know, Mom,” I said softly, setting my pad on the chair as I stood, moving to kneel at her feet. I captured her gnarled hands with mine. “But they’re going to ask these questions, and in preparation, you have to say these words until they don’t hurt. Evelyn Bower will be in that room. She will witness and delight in every word you speak. So you’re going to have to find a way to swallow your pride. It’s happening whether you want it to or not. It’s up to you to decide if you want to handle it with grace or vanity.”
She sniffled, turning her hands in mine to hold them. “You’re right. You’re always right, you know. What would I ever do without you?”
“Oh, you’d figure it out. You always do.”
“No, I don’t. Even when you were little, you seemed to always know where to find my keys or my other shoe or my coat when I needed it. You knew better than I did when I needed to pick someone up from soccer practice or baseball tryouts.”
Luke scoffed. “Well, after you left me there the sixth time, somebody had to step in.”
She ignored him with practiced skill. “I never once had to tell you to clean your room. Tell me where you got that gene because I’d truly like to know.”
I chuckled. “I liked knowing where things were, that’s all.”
“And being helpful. You always liked being helpful,” she said, removing her hand from mine to cup my jaw.
At that, Luke snorted a laugh. “You mean he liked to be a know-it-all.”
“Well, if you could find your ass in the dark, I wouldn’t have to be,” I shot over my shoulder.
He shrugged. “I’d argue, but you’re not wrong.”
“No, he’s not wrong at all,” she said. “It’s lucky for all of us that you’re here. Otherwise, we’d be in far more trouble than we already are.”
“We would have had to close Longbourne,” Luke added.
“Well, I haven’t saved it yet,” I said. “Are you ready to go again, Mom? I’m afraid there are harder questions than this to answer.”
Her nose wrinkled in distaste, her eyes flicking to the door. “I could use a cup of tea, couldn’t you?” She stood, nearly knocking me over. “Yes. I’ll go make some tea, and we’ll do this later. After, I mean.”
I sighed but smiled, sliding my hands into my pockets. “Thirty minutes,” I called after her.
“Hmm? Chai Rooibos?” she asked over her shoulder as she left the room, her voice disappearing down the hallway. “No sugar, just like you like it! Anything you want, dear!”
Luke shook his head from the armchair where he lounged. “She’s a mess.”
“It’s genetic.”
His smile faded. “Are you sure it’s a good idea to let her answer questions? I can’t see it being anything but a disaster.”