One Step Closer(7)
Wren.
Now there was a loss he could mourn; a loss that was still so acute it would slice him wide open if he let it.
Over the years, he’d become an expert at shutting down his emotions, but whenever he thought about Wren a deep ache took root inside his chest and regret flooded every cell of his body. The abyss between them ate at him every day from the moment he opened his eyes until he fell asleep at night. It didn’t matter that he hadn’t had a real conversation with her in what seemed like forever. It didn’t matter that both of them had moved on. It didn’t matter that she didn’t seem to need him anymore. Wren was always his first and last thought.
When they’d first met, Caleb wanted nothing to do with her; she was introverted and strange, and at the time, and he had more than enough of his own problems. By the age of sixteen, he already hated his father and was consumed with doing everything he possibly could to make the man’s life a living hell. Wren and her witch-mother had been just two more knives in his back.
He still cringed when he thought of the day that ice queen, Veronica, moved into his house; her very presence was his father’s misguided attempt to erase the memory of his mother, Celine. Caleb knew from the moment he’d laid eyes on her that she was a narcissistic money-grubber who had no interest in his father other than his success, wealth and the influence bought by both.
The sick part was that Edison Luxon knew Veronica was a plastic bitch from the moment she’d come to work for his company, Lux Pharmaceuticals, but it didn’t seem to matter in the least. Sure, she was beautiful, in a fake, calculated, surgically enhanced sort of way.
Caleb’s father would never pick anyone less glamorous given the cosmetic empire built on his brains and Celine’s amazing face. Caleb remembered his mother as kind and graceful; elegant even, and not just beautiful. She was a high-fashion model, and Edison met her at a company event for the launch of a new line that he helped develop, and Celine represented. As a boy, his father had told him to believe in love at first sight, because he and Celine were living proof.
Caleb huffed at the irony. His mother had been ten times the woman Veronica would ever be. A modeling career was the only thing they had in common. She was hired to represent the Lux brand when his mother had been unable to continue. Caleb often wondered if his father was banging her even before his mother lost her battle with cancer. Edison was never around those last, hard months, and his absence had festered into a deep resentment and disdain within his son. It didn’t help that Edison basically abandoned Caleb in the process, leaving him to be the one to watch his mother wither and die, to be the strong one she leaned on. It was a lot to expect of a twelve-year-old boy. Caleb’s throat constricted as emotion tightened his chest and made his eyes burn.
He remembered his disgust at the way his father pandered and gave Veronica everything she ever wanted. To Caleb, she was constantly screeching in that intolerable shrill, f*cking voice, prancing around the house in those obnoxious hooker heels that clicked on the hardwood and marble floors. He couldn’t stand that bitch, but at least she was momentarily placated when his father threw money in her direction, which took her attention off of Caleb and Wren. Especially, Wren, Caleb thought. Money was something that Edison had plenty of, and if it bought a bit of peace for Wren, all the better.
Life was still hell for them, but at least, it helped. He shook his head at his sad contemplation. It was good that money didn’t mean shit to Caleb since his father squandered so much of it on someone so obviously conniving.
Caleb sighed heavily, regretting the hatred he wasted on both of them. As much as he despised Veronica, and at the time, his father for marrying her, he realized that if it weren’t for that turn of events, he would never have known Wren. That would be a tragedy; maybe the biggest tragedy of his life.
The day he first laid eyes on Wren was still crystal clear in his mind. The day was traumatizing considering he’d felt like an orphan for the past four years. His father had just dropped the bomb that he’d married the woman whose face had replaced Celine’s in the company advertising campaigns; and done so without warning his son it was coming. Caleb had been hurt and furious; completely taken by surprise. He barely knew the woman, and was in shock.
“You married that plastic bitch?” Caleb had rushed up and shouted in his father’s face. He’d just come home from high school and Edison was waiting with Veronica in the drawing room of the huge house, and Caleb had been hit with it square in the face.
“What the f*ck, Dad? Why did you have to marry her? Just throw cash at her if you want to f*ck her! How long has this been going on?”
Veronica, dressed in a bright red dress, at least had the grace to flush at his outburst, the shade of her face, almost matching her dress. She had nearly white, bleached blonde hair, done up as if she were Cinderella going to a ball, and her body, overly thin, even for a model, sat with perfect posture on the sofa across from the large marble fireplace in the elegant room. Caleb had balked, thinking she looked more like a doll than a person. She was boney and it was clear her face could be harsh underneath the thin veil of beauty. She’d been staring at the big oil portrait of his mother hanging over the fireplace, her eyes hard and calculating as they roamed over it. Caleb remembered hating that she had even laid eyes on it.
Veronica had been startled by Caleb’s booming voice, but quickly regained her composure and spoke in a sickly, sweet tone. He had glared at her quickly, and then looked away to lock eyes with his father. He could see through her ploy like a freshly washed window.