Fake Empire(30)

I shake a Tylenol out of the container I keep in my top desk drawer and swallow it. Even if I went home right now, Crew wouldn’t be there. He’s been returning to the penthouse reliably at seven, although that might change, now that I’m back. I know Leah gave his secretary my travel itinerary. If he wanted to, he could have known the second my jet’s wheels hit the tarmac. But that would suggest a level of interest in my whereabouts I don’t think he has. His behavior before and during our wedding was probably a novelty.

Crew may have experience with women. He doesn’t have experience with a wife.

That title comes with weight, even in an arrangement like ours. And I know I’m complicating matters by withholding sex. If I had already slept with him, that would have been that. By waiting, I’m giving it significance. Importance. Maybe even meaning. My intentions for waiting were to achieve the opposite.

If I’d stayed for our wedding night, I would have had the sound of him promising to honor and cherish and love me running through my head while he was inside me. I needed time to establish emotional distance before I allow the physical distance to disappear.

At least, that’s what I told myself at the time. I’m no longer certain it will make any difference at all.

I stare out at the New York skyline until my head stops pounding. Then I stand and head into an endless slew of meetings. Everything I have to approve—which is everything—has stacked up during my absence. Photo format and models and photographers and products and samples and articles.

When I’m finished with the final batch of approvals, I ask Leah to order me lunch from the cafe down the street and head back to my office. A familiar figure is waiting on the couch in the seating area just outside the door.

I sigh, my headache returning in full force. “Hi, Mom,” I greet when I reach her.

“Scarlett.” Her green-brown irises skate over my appearance with a discerning eye.

I got dressed on an airplane, but she won’t find anything to critique. “What are you doing here?”

She’s only visited me at Haute once before. My father threw a small fit after I purchased the magazine without his permission—not to mention money—and my mother is skilled at self-preservation. I don’t blame her for deferring to my father; Hanson Ellsworth is a formidable opponent. I promised myself a long time ago I would never defer to my future husband the way my mother has always acquiesced when it comes to my father.

“I wanted to see how married life is treating you.”

“It’s fine.” A query that would be easier to answer if I’d actually seen or talked to Crew since our wedding.

“Hmmm.” Something in my mother’s voice makes me think she might know that already.

I didn’t tell her or my father about my trip to Paris, but I wouldn’t put it past her to dig it up. As far as my father is concerned, I’m Crew’s problem and responsibility now. But my mother is the ringleader of the New York gossip circuit. Nothing happens on this island without her hearing about it.

I break the pointed silence. “Was there anything else, Mom? I’ve got a lot of work to get done.”

“No, nothing else. Let’s get lunch next week. I’ll have your secretary set something up.”

“Fine.” I agree, knowing arguing will be pointless.

My mother pauses. “You chose well, Scarlett.”

I sigh. “Chose what well?”

“Crew.”

The sound of his name hits me unexpectedly. I tell myself it’s because I wasn’t expecting that to be her response. “We both know he wasn’t a choice, Mom.”

“We both know you’ve never gone through with a thing you didn’t want to, Scarlett.” She raises both of her perfectly manicured brows, as if daring me to disagree with her. I tell myself I don’t because it doesn’t matter what she thinks.

“I’ve got a lot of work to get done…”

“All right, all right, I’ll get going. Just—he’s your chance, Scarlett.”

I tell myself not to answer. For the third time, my brain doesn’t listen. “My chance for what? I already have everything I need.”

“Your chance for happiness, sweetheart.”

I scoff at that, then glance at Leah’s desk. She’s trying very hard to act like she’s not listening to this conversation. “Crew Kensington? He’s…he’s a means to an end. Nothing more. Treating this like the business relationship it is will make me happy.”

My mother purses her lips, but she doesn’t argue. I’m used to her small bursts of maternal concern buried between critiques and strict instructions. “You’ll be in the Hamptons for the Fourth next weekend, right?”

Shit. How is that already next weekend? My parents throw a massive party at their house in the Hamptons for the Fourth of July every year. I’ve been dreading it more than usual ever since I learned I would already be married to Crew by the beginning of July. We’ll be expected to act like the united, loving couple we aren’t for a couple of days.

“Yeah. I’ll be there.”

“And Crew?”

I look away. “I assume so.” That sounds better than I’ll have my secretary ask his secretary.

The small shake of her head makes it clear that’s not the answer my mother was looking for, but she doesn’t comment further before she turns and leaves.