Reveal (Wicked Ways #2)(17)

“Great.”

I end the call, not caring if I just pissed her off. I can handle a woman who likes to play hardball—shit, look at Vaughn—but there’s something here I can’t quite place, and I’m hating being on the outside when I shouldn’t be.

But fuck, isn’t that where I am with Vaughn too? The outside?

It doesn’t matter, Lockhart. Not the ache in your chest. Not the sore muscles that you pounded into oblivion at the gym. Not how fucked up your mind is.

None of it does.

This is why you’ve always used escorts.

But I did.

I used one, and look where that got me.

“Mr. Lockhart?” My intercom buzzes.

“Yes?”

“There’s a big box of something that just arrived for you.”

“Who’s it from?”

“A Vaughn Sanders.” She says the name like it’s foreign to her, but I know damn well Bella is wondering just what the boss’s “lover” has sent him.

“Send it in.”

I pretend to be busy when the door opens. “Just put it on the chair. Thanks, Bella.” I wait for her to leave before standing and going to it. It’s a legal-size file box with my name and business address written in Vaughn’s clean penmanship. I grab scissors and cut the tape around the lid to open the box.

The first item I see sitting on the top is a stuffed princess doll I had sent for Lucy.

“You’re fucking kidding me,” I murmur to my own ego as I shove the lid on and hold back the need to kick the damn box off the chair.

I told myself I didn’t need Vaughn. That there’s a reason I don’t get close to anyone—too complicated, too much drama, too much feeling—but the sight of what I can assume is all of the shit I’ve sent her being returned only serves to reinforce that assumption.

Anger vibrates through me as I yank the box out of the chair and stand in the middle of my office, uncertain what I want to do with it. One part of me wants to shout for Bella to come and get it the hell out of here, while the other part of me wants to go through it piece by piece.

Fucking sap.

“What’s the damn point?” I grumble as I walk over to the corner of my office and shove the box under the credenza. Turning to the city below—the taxicabs and people crowding the sidewalk—I shove my hands in my pockets and just watch the activity but don’t really see it.

“Mr. Lockhart?”

“Yes, Bella,” I say, shaking myself from my funk and walking over toward my desk and the settlement I need to work on.

“Your mother.” I can hear the frustration and timidity in her voice.

“Fuck.” I think my groan is quiet enough, but her response tells me it obviously isn’t.

“Exactly.”

“Send her in.”

It takes only seconds before the click of my mother’s heels and the resigned sigh that sounds like privilege run amok falls from her mouth and fills my office.

“Darling,” she says as she hands me her purse and leans in for an air kiss, “you look troubled.”

“Just stress.” I give her a tight smile as she studies me and then figure I better remove the scowl or else she’ll stay longer to nag the truth out of me. “To what do I owe this pleasure?”

“I was in the city. I had to meet with Baron,” she says of her financial advisor, and I immediately wonder if she’s having an affair.

“Mother,” I warn.

“Relax.” She waves a hand my way. “A few months ago I had him buy some stock that was supposed to soar. It didn’t.”

“That’s what you get for listening to the high-society ladies who pretend to know what they’re talking about.”

“They did know. But some law or something was voted down, which in turn tanked its value.”

“How much did you lose?”

“It’s my play money, Ryk. Does it matter?” Spoken like a woman who has never worked a day in her life and whose money was awarded through divorce and despair. “We’re making it up with a sell-off of that stock and a buy-in of another. It’s just how the market goes.”

“Mmm.” The irony isn’t lost on me that I just gave my mother the same response that Bianca infuriated me with.

“Then I went for lunch at that new place everyone is talking about”—she points out the window to the east as if I’m supposed to know the restaurant—“and afterward I told my companion I was going to head over here to see my only child.”

Companion. Great. That’s her warning that we are indeed a go for divorce number four? Five? Who can keep count?

“And is your companion waiting for you?” I ask, trying to feel out what the hell she’s doing and at the same time not really caring.

“No, but you can meet him at the function tomorrow if you’d like to.”

“He can’t escort you when you’re still married—wait.” I glance over to my calendar on my desk, the blank I’m drawing not good. “What function?”

She laughs as it dawns on me. “You forgot?”

“No. I didn’t forget.” Shit. I have to write a speech. I have to . . . this is fucked. “Are you crazy?”

“Don’t change the subject. You forgot about the event, didn’t you?”