She knew part of the story, of course, from her employer. But she was dismayed to find that Rake didn’t know much more. How could he be raised by such a determined woman and not know anything about where he came from? Wasn’t he curious? Didn’t he want to know everything about those who came before him, made him?
Wow, maybe take it easy on the projecting? What’s important to you doesn’t have to be important to him.
Yes. Maybe.
Probably.
Fine, fine, probably. As a child of the American foster care program, Delaney had known for more than a decade all she would ever know about those who came before her. She had been named for her grandmother, Claire Maybell Snyder. Her mother had died when she was two. Father: unknown. For years she’d thought her father’s name had been Unk.
The entirety of her family was dead or unk. That wasn’t true for Rake, though. She reminded herself, again, that what was important to her didn’t have to be important to him. She had the feeling she’d have to do that a lot.
“… right? I mean, who does that? Cuts a kid out of their life because they want to move to the big city? Mom wasn’t even pregnant! Not then, anyway. So she left it all behind, thank God, and moved to Vegas, and she and my dad—she was his waitress, and he was some rando rich asshole—did the drunken pelvis two-step…”
And then she thought she should stop reminding herself. It was good to be annoyed with Rake, good to feel irritation and even dismay over his choices. Disliking him was much, much safer than liking him.
And she liked the entitled rich whiner.
A lot. Which had never, ever been part of the plan.
Why’d he have to try to rescue me? And why didn’t I meet him when I was a kid? I could have shown him … trained him. We could be doing hits together. Instead, he met Donna and set the current disaster in motion, and poor Lillith will have to pay for it. Literally.
“… so off she went to Sweetheart, and off I went to Gstaad, and then London, and Paris, and Lake Como, and now here, except I’m pretty sure the last leg of my trip was against my will, and off Blake went to wherever he goes when he’s not being reprogrammed by his robot overlords. And look!” Rake brandished his (new) phone at her. “Look at this text that goes on forever and won’t die! Just like Blake!”
The terms of my atonement are as follow: 1. No more selling people’s homes/farms to the bank. 2. The remaining farm, scheduled for closing next week, is off the market. 3. Said farm must be made profitable within six months. 4. By me. 5. Without my fortune, which she has pulled off the table. (You’ll recall that though she allowed access to our inheritance on our eighteenth birthday, we are not legally entitled to it until we are thirty, which is twenty-three months and seventeen days from today.) 6. I cannot terminate anyone or sell anything. 7. Resistance is futile. 8. If condition #7 is ignored, she’ll activate the nuclear option.
“What,” Delaney asked, terrified and trying to hide it, “is the nuclear option?”
“Never ask me about the nuclear option.” Rake stared at her, unblinking. “Not ever.”
“Okay.”
“Not ever.”
“O-kay!”
“We shouldn’t even be talking about not talking about the nuclear option. Thank God Lillith’s bunking with Sofia again.”
“Your brother knows when you’ll both turn thirty to the day?”
“See? This is what I’ve been dealing with. For just under thirty years, apparently.”
“And … your mom took away his money?”
“Naw. She’d never. He’s exaggerating. Blake’s always been the golden douche.”
“It doesn’t sound like it. It sounds like he’s”—in as much trouble as you are, she thought but didn’t say—“being serious. Like she really did cut him off from his funds.”
“Impossible.”
Sound nigh impossible? I quite agree, but our mother does not.
For this, in addition to many other crimes you have perpetuated upon me since our birth, you will be made to pay and pay. I warn you only as a courtesy, as dictated by the bonds of family.
Good night.
“Wow.”
“Right?”
“He sounds like he could be a handful.”
“A handful of priggish hypocritical crap. I can’t believe it, I can’t believe it.” Rake was slashing his fingers through his longish dark blond strands; he was borderline shaggy and deliciously rumpled. “I was really looking forward to getting my phone, and the first thing that hits is a ton of Blake.”
“Which you weren’t expecting.”
“No!”
Why do I want to keep warning him? I’m not supposed to warn him. “Yes, well, the thing is, he sounds like he’s in tr—”
“I mean, look at this thing! Look at it!” He flailed his phone at her. “Who texts like this? This isn’t a text, this is a goddamned thesis!” He shook the thing like it was the author of his misery—maybe in his eyes, it was—and seamlessly continued the rant. “All this to tell me he’s nuts! Or playing the lamest practical joke ever! What is happening to my family, who were always weird but are now weirder?”
“Okay, okay.” She made soothing noises at him, plucked the phone from his hand, tossed it on the bed, then grabbed his hands and walked him backward until he was sitting on the bed beside her.
“I like your hands.” He sighed out of nowhere.
“Great. Now calm down. Let’s think about this. So, you think it’s a joke? In poor taste, but for some reason he’s—what? Lying about everything he’s doing in—what was it, Honey?”
Rake blinked at her. “Uh, no. Sweetheart.” He cut his keen blue gaze away. “Sorry, for a second I thought you were calling me honey.”
“Oh.”
“It was dumb.”
“No, it’s—” She shook off the distraction. She was dim enough to start falling for the carelessly casual idiot, but she’d never ever be dim enough to make the mistake of telling him. Not to mention that her employer’s fury would be dreadful to behold. “Okay, so your mom went to Sweetheart to help—what? Save the town?” At his glum nod, she continued. “And your brother sold a bunch of farms to the bank, thinking it’d help her, but for whatever reason it made the problem worse? Okay. And then she cut off his funds.”
“Well, yeah, that’s apparently the deal, but—that can’t be true. He either got it wrong or it’s his sad-ass idea of a joke. My mom wouldn’t do that. Not to him.”
Oh you poor idiot. “Or you just don’t want it to be true,” she suggested quietly. “Because if Blake doesn’t have money, he can’t help you. If Blake doesn’t have money, it would explain why you don’t have money. Not because of a screwup, or an online mishap. You’d really be broke. You’d really be stuck here indefinitely.”
He just looked at her.
“And if he disobeys … the nuclear option?”
Rake shuddered so hard, the bed shook. Interesting, she thought. Even the thought of imminent, permanent poverty didn’t make him shake like that.
“This is going to sound like I’m being a smart-ass,” he said at last, looking at her with that blue, blue, blue gaze, “but will you please hold me?”
“Oh.” She swallowed. No. Absolutely not. Don’t be ridiculous. Once you have sex with some random bim, you’ll feel better. “Sure.”
He slowly leaned over until his head was resting on her shoulder and, bit by bit, he relaxed, until he was pressed to her side like a sexy lamprey. She eased them back and put her arm around his shoulders, and they lay on her bed hip-to-hip and stared at the ceiling. It should have been awkward.
It wasn’t.
Which was bad.
Really very, very bad.