Rage sparks in my father’s dark eyes. “Don’t speak ill of the dead.” A beat. “I loved your mother very much.”
When my father gets angry, it’s like all the air whooshes out of a room. My empty lungs try to draw in a breath, and the room starts to spin. I almost feel guilt for bringing up Mom, and the baby my father talked her into having. But then I think of the way he’s marrying me off to essentially the highest bidder, despite my protests, despite his promises that there was more time, and the tiny grain of guilt disappears.
My heart starts to beat faster. My clothes are suddenly too tight, the room’s walls pressing in on all sides. My vision narrows. My palms grow damp with sweat. And through all of this, I’m acutely aware that Josh is probably listening outside.
“Breathe,” my father snaps. Daddy calls me petulant and spoiled when I have a panic attack. It’s something I try to make sure I never do in front of him. In front of anybody.
“I don’t want this,” I gasp.
“Well, we don’t always get what we want,” he replies flatly, rounding his desk, leaning against the edge with crossed arms as he watches me hyperventilate.
The office doors hiss open. I jerk in fright, wiping at my face. As if this couldn’t get any more humiliating, Josh has come back into the office to — what? Retrieve the ring I unceremoniously threw and force it onto my finger?
“What’d I miss?” A light-hearted male voice interjects the tense silence.
I sit up in my seat, softening as some of the panic leaves me. “Uncle Enzo,” I say. I watch as my father’s younger brother spots the Cartier box on the floor, frowns, and bends to pick it up. He tosses it up in the air like a baseball, catching it and then throwing it at me. I put my hands out to catch it just before the hard edge of the box hits me square in the face.
“That could have left a bruise,” I snap, slamming the box down on the desk.
Enzo grins, holding his arms out. “It’s my favorite niece’s birthday,” he says, holding his hand out to me. I shake my head, refusing to reciprocate.
“What’s wrong?” Enzo asks, switching his attention to the Cartier box. “Did that little punk not get you a big enough ring?” He opens the box and blinks, whistling. “Jesus, Mary and Joseph. Don’t show your Aunt Eliza this. She’ll throw up from envy when she sees this rock.”
I cross my arms, smiling bitchily. “She can have it.”
Enzo sighs. “You’d better fill me in, Augie.” Enzo is the only one my father allows to call him Augie. Everyone else calls him by his full name, Augustus.
"Yeah, Augie," I add, my voice like liquid acid. "You'd better fill Enzo in."
Daddy glares at me as he addresses his younger brother. “Avery’s angry that I’ve decided to bring up the engagement.”
“Ahh,” Enzo nods. “That.”
“Just tell me why,” I insist. “Tell me why it has to be him.” I jerk my thumb toward the door, and beyond, to the stranger whose engagement ring I’ll be wearing in about six hours. “Tell me why it can’t be the man I’m actually in love with.”
“Sweetheart—”
“Do not sweetheart me,” I cut in. “I did everything you said. I didn’t even look at a boy unless he met your predetermined checkboxes. Will’s family has money, they are respected, they are healthy—”
“Will’s father is a goddamn Hollywood action hero,” Daddy yells, pounding his desk for effect. “You’re not marrying his son and making a mockery of the Capulet name. We might be in California, my darling daughter, but this isn’t a fucking reality show.”
I just stare.
My father is up now, pacing the well-worn length of carpet behind his desk.
“He’s right,” my uncle says. “The Hewitt’s are risky, at best.”
“You led me to believe Will was a possibility,” I argue. “You were never going to even consider him, were you?”
Both of their faces say it all.
“Will isn’t a celebrity. He doesn’t give interviews. He doesn’t even live in Hollywood! Remember? He moved away from his family and emancipated himself just so he could be closer to me.”
Silence.
"You lied to me, you fucking bastard."
Daddy shakes his head, squeezing his tumbler so tight I hope it shatters.
“What do you want, Avery?" he spits. "A flow chart? A pros and cons list? A fucking Venn diagram?”
“It wouldn’t hurt,” I reply. “I mean, if you can spare five minutes to explain how you’ve chosen how my life unfolds, I’m all ears. And stop fucking swearing at me.”
“Five minutes,” he mutters. “We’ve been explaining this to you for almost ten years, Avery. Jesus Christ, it’s the day of your inauguration.”
“I won’t have his children,” I protest. “I won’t have any children.”
“No problem,” my father says.
“No problem?” I echo. I look at my uncle, who won’t meet my gaze. “What’d you do, harvest my eggs?” I half-joke.
Neither of them says anything.
“Holy fucking shit.” My stomach drops. I feel like I’ve been electrocuted. I’m stunned. I think back to when it could have happened. “My appendectomy,” I breathe. “After Adeline died.”
“On the bright side, you still have a perfectly good appendix,” Enzo interjects. “We just thought it best to preserve the only chance of continuing the bloodline in case—”
“— In case I drowned myself, too?” I think of my sister, floating facedown in our pool, her hair spread out in the water, creating a dark halo around her. She’d already been dead for hours by the time I stumbled across her body.
“We can use a gestational carrier, if you prefer,” Enzo says, sidestepping the mention of my dead sister — the one who was meant to take on all of this instead of me. “The embryos are already on ice, ready to go. We all know how important your career is to you.”
My father gives him a sharp look. I feel hot tears stab at my eyes as I put a hand to my stomach. They haven’t just taken my eggs. They’ve created embryos with them?
“What the actual fuck?!” I demand.
“You should have told her,” Enzo says tersely.
My father throws his hands up in response.
“Where?” I ask. My head is swimming. “When? Who is the father?”
Enzo looks at me like I’m an idiot, but then I see something flash in his eyes. Guilt. “Have you not been listening to anything?” He turns to my father, a deep frown etched between his eyebrows. “I told you to tell her,” he mutters, and his voice wavers a little, thick with regret. It’s almost as if he’s the one who has been betrayed.
Enzo focuses on me again. “Joshua Grayson’s sperm. Your eggs. Thirteen embryos that are richer than sin the moment they become your children.”
I choke so hard, I almost vomit. “Thirteen?”
Enzo looks bereft. “Obviously you don’t have to use all of them.”
“Or any of them,” I snap.
“Both of you, shut up,” my father says. “Avery, we will talk about this when the time is right. You’re not even engaged yet.”
“Daddy—” I interrupt.
“You’re a little old to be using that word,” he says, all trace of paternal concern gone, replaced by irritation. I bristle.
“Oh, fuck you,” I spit. "Why all the trouble with the egg extraction, huh? Hell, you could've saved yourself the trouble and passed me off to Joshua at Adeline's funeral. Let him fuck your sixteen-year-old daughter in the back of the church and knock her up while you buried her sister? Or maybe you should have just locked me in a room and let him breed me like a fucking animal. I mean really, what's the goddamn difference, Augie?"
My father's open palm smacks into my cheek before I even see him move. The side of my face hums angrily, but the pain doesn't bother me. It steels me. I'll do what I'm told, but it doesn't mean I won't make it a living hell for everyone concerned.
Enzo quickly steps between us, motioning for my father to
back up. Ever the concerned uncle, he brushes his knuckles against my cheekbone, his touch cool against the blood-red rage that has risen in my cheeks.
"This is not the time, Avery," he murmurs, raising his eyebrows in a silent warning as he gazes down at me. Enzo has a way of looking at me that makes all of my emotion pour out. It's always been this way between us. While Daddy worked and grieved in his office after everyone else was dead and gone, it was Enzo who became my parent.
"That's the problem, Enzo," I say bitterly, pushing him away. "Time has run out."
Daddy refills his whiskey. Enzo holds his hand up, signaling to pour one more. I seethe as I switch my attention between the two men who just delivered my death sentence.
I snatch Enzo’s whiskey before he can take it from my father’s outstretched hand, and pour it down my throat in one gulp. It burns. I like it. I drop the glass at my feet, where it bounces harmlessly on the thick carpet, before repeating the same action with my father’s full glass. More burn. More warmth, spreading through my veins, sating my anxious limbs. I don't drop the second glass, though. I draw my arm back and throw it as hard as I can, narrowly missing my father and Enzo and hitting the window my father stands in front of. The whiskey tumbler explodes loudly, showering the expensive carpet with even more shards of expensive crystal.
My father smiles slowly, but there is a darkness behind the gesture, a chilling promise of what is to come. “There’s my girl.”
“Your girl for another—” I look down at my delicate gold watch, the one my mother left me in her will, “—six hours and thirty-five minutes.”
It’s time to go. I snatch up the Cartier box, straightening my skirt, and turn on my Louboutin heel, rolling my eyes as I walk away.
“You’ll always be my little girl,” he calls out. “No matter how old you are.”
“You could have warned me,” I throw over my shoulder, making a beeline for the heavy mahogany doors of what will soon be my office in our opulent tower of lies.
“I did it this way for your own good,” he replies, always the one to have the last word.
I smack my palm against the door, my wrist throbbing from the force I use. The door concedes, flying open to reveal the man I’ve been trying to avoid for the past decade, the exhausting presence, my friendly stalker, always around my father’s office, the hotel, our house, giving me lingering glances and getting in my personal space at every opportunity.
I set my face to a stony blankness, fresh anger a geyser inside my chest, waiting to explode and burn everyone it touches.
Joshua. He’s hovering near the elevator. Great. He’s probably been listening to the entire thing. The entire diatribe about how he only wants my money.
I need my mother. I miss my sister. Right now, in this moment, I fucking loathe Adeline and the way she left me to all of this. My get-out-of-Verona-free card. Tonight should be her night, the prodigal Capulet daughter, the first-born jewel in the family crown; but she obviously saw the same cold fate written in Joshua Grayson’s blue-grey eyes that is now in front of me, and decided death was preferable to a life lived only for others.
“I gather you heard that?” I ask Joshua. Fuck niceties.
He smiles. “Some.”
I toss the Cartier box at him. “I believe this belongs to you.”
“For six hours and thirty-five minutes,” Joshua Grayson smirks, echoing my words. He glances at his watch. “Make that six hours and thirty-four minutes.”
“I guess time doesn’t fly when you’re not having fun,” I retort. “Did you know about all of this?”
“If you’re talking about the embryos, yes. I’ve known since your surgery.”
I snort. “Unbelievable.”
“Avery—”
“I was a child,” I cut in. A child who had just lost her sister, and just before that, her mother, and her baby brother.”
“Exactly,” Joshua says smoothly. “Your father and Enzo were worried about the family bloodline continuing after such losses. Don’t forget, I was not a decision-maker in that process. I was told, same as you’ve just been told.”
I blink, the alcohol hitting me, making me dizzy for a second. I wait for Joshua to fill in the silence, but he doesn’t. Awkward silences are his specialty.
“I get it,” Joshua finally breaks the silence, brushing imaginary lint from my shoulder. “This marriage is a choice for me. It’s not for you.”
There are no choices for me.
“I won’t make any of this easy,” I vow, leaning away from him.
“Avery, I’ve known you your whole life,” Joshua says, smiling fondly, sending shivers of dread up my spine. “You don’t make anything easy.”
“Ugh,” I make a gagging sound. “I have to go.”
“Where?”
For an eternal swim. Part of me wants to drown myself like my sister did, just to spite him.
“Why?” I say slowly. “You want to come?”
“I always want to come when you’re concerned.”
Did he really just say that? He’s smirking. Of course he just said that.
“I’m going to the family mausoleum,” I clarify. “You still feel like you want to come?”
His smirk disappears.
“That’s what I thought,” I continue. “I’m going to confession, and then to pay my respects to my sister. Remember her?”
“You go to confession a lot,” Joshua says, dodging my jibe. He grabs my elbow as I make a move to walk away. I look at his hand like it’s a dirty cockroach, before meeting his gaze. “Maybe I have a lot of things to confess,” I say smoothly.
“You won’t have to visit your little boyfriend in a dirty old graveyard once we’re married,” he says, squeezing my arm tighter. “Hell, I’ll build you both your own wing when you move in to my house. You’ll need somebody to spend all those lonely nights with while I’m here, working.”
“How generous of you,” I say. “Make sure it’s far, far away from wherever you’ll be fucking your mistress.”
He tips his head back and laughs, tugging me into him suddenly and whispering in my ear. “Avery, there’s only one woman I’ll be fucking. My wife.”
I shove him forcefully, finally breaking free of his grip. “Don’t touch me again,” I warn him, backing away. “I’m not yours yet, Joshua.”
“Happy birthday,” he calls down the hallway, as I retreat. “Next year I’ll arrange a proper celebration. Maybe we’ll have our wedding ceremony on your twenty-sixth birthday. Hell, maybe you’ll already be knocked up with my baby by then. Wait, sorry. Our baby.”
He’s lucky he’s not within striking distance when he says that.
Chapter Two
AVERY
I have my driver take me home, through city traffic and up to Verona, where we have to pass through two security checkpoints to make it onto the gated part inside the gated community where all the billionaires park their helicopters and store their supermodel wives.
I run through the foyer, across marble floors, taking the sweeping mahogany staircase two steps at a time. In my bedroom, I strip as fast as I can, my outfit suffocating me. I throw my clothes in the corner, vowing to burn them after Joshua touched me while I was wearing them. I stand in the middle of my walk-in closet, hands on my hips, wearing only my bra and panties as I scan racks upon racks of clothes for an appropriate outfit to wear to confession.
“Where have you been?” A voice comes from the bathroom attached to the other end of the walk-in-wardrobe. I don’t bother covering up. You’d see more of me in a bikini.
“Out,” I reply, not looking at my cousin as he saunters into the closet that separates our bedrooms.
“In that?” Nathan asks, smoking a joint as he leans against the doorframe, dressed in a black shirt and jeans. “I know you don’t get access to your trust fund until tonight, but are you really so hard up that you’re hooking on a Tuesday afternoon?”
I give him daggers. “Are you really so disinterested in working for o
ur family’s company that you’re getting stoned on a Tuesday afternoon?” I take three steps toward him, plucking the joint out of his fingers and placing it between my lips, sucking deeply. The smoke snakes into my lungs, and I hold it there as long as I can before puffing it out. I place the joint back in his hand, staring into eyes that match mine. We both have these eyes that aren’t brown, or gold, or hazel, but a mixture of all three. We could be siblings, we look so similar — or cousins — which we are, but also, we aren’t. Nathan is adopted. He’s the oldest Capulet in our generation, two years older than me, but when you don’t have Capulet blood like the rest of us, you don’t get to sit on the throne and bark orders.
“You smell like a liquor store,” Nathan says. “Bad day?”
I select a bright red Tom Ford dress and hold it against my body, before tossing it aside. I need black. Today is a day of mourning and loss, not vibrancy and celebration. I look at my bright red nails, suddenly annoyed that I hadn’t thought to paint them gloss black for today.
“Bad day,” I agree, snatching a black A-line dress from a hanger and dragging it over my head. I stand in front of the floor-to-ceiling mirror in the middle of the closet, pulling the dress into place over my hips.
Nathan is at my back before I need to ask, holding the joint between his teeth, scooping my long, dark waves off my back and draping them over my shoulder so he can get to the zipper. He looks at me in the mirror, raising his eyebrows in question. I nod, and he zips the dress up at the back.
“You look like you’re going to a funeral,” Nathan remarks. “Are you going to a funeral?”
I smooth down my hair, heading to the bathroom in search of black eyeliner. “Kind of,” I say, locating my eyeliner pencil and bringing it up to my face. “Did you know our fathers had my eggs harvested when I was sixteen years old and used them to make and freeze embryos?”
Nathan’s mouth opens in surprise, and the joint falls to the ground. “What?”