Until the Day I Die(36)

“I like you,” she says simply. “And I admire what I’ve read about you. Other women I’ve liked and admired have appreciated the chance to experience L’élu II. So much so that after they returned home, many chose to partner with Erdman International, in one way or another.”

She regards me from across the desk. I smile.

Ah, yes. Here it is. The catch . . .

“I think we might work well together,” she says. “I think I could add value as, I don’t know, maybe a board member, or a consultant.”

“Uh-huh.”

“For example, have you considered who sent you here, Erin? Is there any reason they might have to want you out of the picture for a while? So they could have full and free access to Jax while you’re gone?”

I haven’t considered that. Not really. Not until just this second.

“Because I thought of it. And I think it’s only right that I should mention it to you. You deserve partners who are going to look out for your best interests.”

“It’s not an issue,” I say, but that’s a lie. The intervention in my kitchen felt like a pile-on. Like it had been planned for a while, and Ben and Sabine and Layton and the rest of them were just waiting for me to mess up in a big enough way so they’d have their excuse. Like Antonia suggested, could there now be something going on back at Jax? Some kind of coup?

“Look, I want you to succeed, Erin. But I think you should do it on your terms. And, as someone who admires you greatly, I’ve got to be honest. I don’t think you belong at Hidden Sands.”

I don’t either, I want to shout. For the first time in months, I feel like someone understands that I’m neither okay nor a wreck. I’m just somewhere in between. And now there’s a way for everybody to get what they want.

But how will Shorie react if she discovers I paid extra to take some kind of shortcut? To cheat? She’ll be furious. And I don’t know if I can deal with that. I’ve already let her down in so many ways. Not to mention Ben and Sabine.

Goddammit. No. I refuse to give any of them the satisfaction of saying I didn’t finish what I started. I refuse to let them win. So I’m going to take my medicine with a big, fat smile on my face.

I stand. “I appreciate the offer, Antonia. I really do. But I think I’m going to stick to the traditional experience. I may regret this, but I think I’ll just complete the program, like everybody else.”

She stands too and extends her hand, like I’ve just opted to skip dessert. “Of course. Whatever you prefer. I just wanted to put the offer out there in good faith.”

And yet, somehow, this whole conversation has felt miles and miles away from good faith.

“Thank you for dinner,” I say.

She gestures to the door. “Have a wonderful night, Erin.”

When I find myself standing in the now midnight-blue lobby, Grigore is there. He tells me he can give me a ride in his golf cart, which is wedged into the gleaming line of town cars under the portico. While we wait for the caravan to move, four women spill out of the heavy wooden doors. Their knot tightens as they embrace one another. It’s the L’élu group I saw earlier in the showers, only now they’re clean and dressed in civilian clothing.

Antonia appears in the portico, says a few words of farewell to the women, and kisses each of them on the cheek. All except one woman—the young Latina woman with glasses who showered next to me. Agnes. The one who was crying in the spa services room. The woman who failed her L’élu because she didn’t want to marry the man her father selected for her.

I wonder what it means for me. Would Antonia still give me my L’élu certificate even though I turned down her offer to come on board at Jax? And would there be any other repercussions? Our conversation in her office had felt like a trap, maybe even a touch threatening—but maybe it had just been nothing more than two businesswomen talking.

After Antonia disappears, the three departing women load into the town car in front of our cart. A blond concierge takes Agnes’s elbow, and she hobbles beside him down the path. A white bandage peeks out from below the hem of her yoga pants.

As Grigore maneuvers the cart past her, I notice a bottle of Veuve Clicquot nestled in the compartment behind the seat. I turn away, though, steeling myself. It’s probably being delivered to the mysterious L’élu II, that hush-hush bacchanal somewhere up in the shadowy hills of Ile Saint Sigo. What I wouldn’t give for a phone right now. To tell Ben and Sabine and the rest of them that they’ve sent me to the sketchiest rehab in the Caribbean.

They probably wouldn’t believe me. I barely believe it myself.

I climb out of the cart and catch Grigore’s eye. “You wouldn’t want to come in, would you? Open that champagne?”

He’s very still for a second. “I don’t think so.”

I feel my face heat up. “Right.”

“It’s just that . . . it’s a trap, you know.”

“Beg pardon?”

“I don’t mean you. I mean that”—he lifts his chin back at the bottle—“is a trap. Antonia’s little sadistic treat. You drink it tonight, what comes in the morning is that much more painful.”

“Oh, right. I should’ve known.” I give him a look. “So what’s coming in the morning?”