The One Who Loves You (Tickled Pink #1)(33)

“And it helps that you’re Mom’s favorite,” I say quietly.

I’m not bitter.

Nope.

“Um, hello? Are you serious? Do you know you’re all she ever talks about? Phoebe got a promotion. Phoebe wears that business suit so well. Phoebe’s hair is such a lovely shade, and it’s all-natural too. Phoebe knew what she was doing when she picked that boyfriend. Phoebe doesn’t have to watch her diet. Phoebe has such a lovely natural shape. Phoebe Phoebe Phoebe.”

“She does not.”

Tavi emphatically nods in the dark. “She does.”

“But you two are practically attached at the hip whenever you’re in New York. And she’s not seriously fat-shaming you, is she? You’re—you’re gorgeous. And strong. And healthy.”

“And curves aren’t cute anymore, and she takes me because she can’t have you.”

I’m so floored I can’t form actual words. “That’s—that’s—this is not my natural hair color,” I finally blurt.

“I mean, duh. But the point, Phoebe, is that she wants to be you. Her business sense is crap, she knocks off other designers and hasn’t turned a profit in four years—repeat that and you’re dead—and here you are, on the path to being the first Lightly to run the whole damn business since Great-Grandpa Horace died.”

I start walking again.

If Tavi’s right, why wouldn’t my mother tell me that?

Because you’re a ruthless bitch like your grandmother, idiot, a voice that sounds unfortunately like Teague Miller answers for me deep inside my own head.

I don’t like being a bitch.

Driven, yes. Confident, yes. A winner, yes. And I do sometimes cut corners.

But I don’t know the line that marks ruthless-bitch territory.

Still, I’m realizing there might be a balance, and I’ve been walking on the wrong side of the line.

I make a soft noise, a hum that wants to be a grunt of frustration. “Why can’t we just talk to each other and say these things?”

“Because we’re too busy being fabulous and making more money. Admitting to vulnerabilities would impede our forward motion.”

Who is this woman? “That’s—”

“Not something we talk about?” she finishes for me. I know she’s flashing an ironic smile that the rest of the world will never see on her social media feed. I can hear it.

Takes me back to the year we did a reality show together in college, when we’d have a stupid argument on camera and I’d tell her she had to cut it, and she’d tell me we had to keep it in because ratings.

And no, Gigi wasn’t a fan, and yes, she pretends it never happened. But it was free advertising for Remington Lightly’s new Kangapoo skin-care line that year—again, horrible name, but it makes money—so she didn’t make a fuss.

Overtly.

“I was going to say insightful on an uncomfortable level,” I admit.

“It’s that too.”

I trip on a sidewalk. Or is that dirt? Why do I smell animals? Is that me? “I’m not opposed to being a better person, but I’d like to do it without all of this . . . this . . . pain.”

“Your journey, your rules.”

I make a gagging noise. That’s such a Tavi tagline.

And she laughs.

My sister. Walking in the dark with me, soaking wet, no cameras around, no selfies flashing, mosquitoes vampiring the hell out of us, and she’s laughing.

“Do you miss Wi-Fi?” I whisper.

“Yes,” she whispers back, but there’s a pause.

There’s a freaking pause.

“You’re getting Wi-Fi!”

“Dial down the drama, Lady Boss Queen. I got like one bar when I ran ten miles out of town for my workout this morning, and it wasn’t enough to download a single text message. Gigi did something to our phones. Swear she did.”

“So help me, Octavia, if you’re lying to me—”

“Why? You really want to get to all of your emails?”

I sniff delicately. “Of course I do. I have important things waiting for me.”

“Like what?”

I open my mouth, a list ready to pour out, but it doesn’t come. No production reports are late or forecasts are down or the management chain is objecting to integrating bamboo into paper products.

None of it.

This town has zapped my ability to function as an executive. Less than a week from being somebody to being nobody, and pretty sure I’ll never be the same.

We make it another half a block, my brain misfiring every time I try to put words to the things I should be doing back in the city right now. Bugs and birds and I-don’t-want-to-know-what-else are making noises in the night. And then there’s a goat.

There’s a goat making noise.

Oh no.

Oh no no no.

Did I take us this way?

Tavi bumps my shoulder. “What emails do you have waiting for you? Or are you not answering because you don’t actually want to think about the company?”

“I—how can you ask that? Aren’t you exhausted? Don’t you need six weeks in Tahiti to recover before you start thinking about posting pictures on your socials again?”

She’s staring at me. Not that we can see each other in the darkness, but I can feel her staring at me. “You don’t want to run the company?”