The Devil Wears Black(5)
“I was going to tell them we were done a couple weeks ago, but my father beat me to it in the bad news department.”
“Oh shoot. Has the superyacht broken down?” I put a hand over my chest, feigning concern. Ronan Black, the owner of Black & Co., Manhattan’s busiest department store, led a charmed life full of vacations, private jets, and grandiose family gatherings. Still, speaking ill of the people who’d welcomed me into their house left a sour taste in my mouth.
“He has stage-four cancer. Prostate. It spread to his bones. Kidneys. Blood. He wasn’t screened. My mother had been begging him for years, but he didn’t want the discomfort, I guess. Needless to say, it is incurable. He’s got three months to live.” He paused. “Generously speaking.”
He delivered the news flatly, keeping his face blank. His eyes were still on Daisy, who neglected the couch, spreading her legs at his feet, begging for a belly rub. He leaned down and scratched her stomach absentmindedly, waiting for me to absorb the news. His words soaked into me like poison, spreading slowly and lethally. They hit me somewhere deep, in that tight ball of angst I kept lodged in my belly. My mom ball. I knew Chase and his father were close. I also knew Chase was a proud man and would never break down, especially in front of someone who hated him. My knees buckled, the air slamming against the back of my throat, refusing to make its way into my lungs.
I resisted the urge to erase the space between us and hold him. He’d translate my warmth into pity, and I didn’t pity him. I was crushed for him, having experienced losing my mother to breast cancer when I was sixteen after her on-again, off-again battle with the disease. I knew all too well that it was always too soon to say goodbye to a parent. And that watching someone you loved lose the battle against their own body was as painful as ripping open your own flesh.
“I’m so sorry, Chase.” The words finally stumbled out of my mouth, clunky and weightless. I remembered how much Dad had hated being told that. So what if they’re sorry? It’s not going to make Iris feel better. I thought about Mom’s letters. I typically started every morning with one of her letters and a strong cup of coffee, but this morning I had read two of them. I’d had a gut feeling today was going to be a challenging one. I hadn’t been wrong.
I hope you are still compassionate and kindhearted.
I wondered what she’d think of my nickname. Martyr Maddie. Always down for saving the day.
Chase’s hooded eyes dragged from Daisy to meet mine. They were frighteningly empty. “Thank you.”
“If there’s anything I can do . . .”
“There is.” He straightened up swiftly, patting himself clean of Daisy’s hair.
I tilted my head in question.
“In the days after my father broke the news to us, my family was a mess. Katie didn’t show up for work. My mother didn’t leave her bed, and Dad ran back and forth, trying to comfort everyone instead of taking care of himself. It was, for lack of better words, a fucking shit show. And the show’s still going.”
I knew Lori Black had battled with depression before, not through Chase but through an in-depth interview she’d given Vogue a few years back. She’d spoken candidly about her dark periods while promoting the nonprofit organization where she volunteered. Katie, Chase’s sister, was a marketing executive at Black & Co. and a shopaholic. That was less endearing and quirky than it sounded. Katie suffered from bad anxiety attacks. Her episodes included going on intense, out-of-control shopping sprees to bury whatever it was that made her nervous. Knee-jerk spending made her breathe slightly better, but she always hated herself afterward. It was like binge eating emotionally, only with designer clothes. That was how she’d gotten diagnosed, in fact. Six years ago, she’d gone into a spending frenzy after her boyfriend had broken up with her. She’d spent $250,000 in a little less than forty-eight hours, maxed out three credit cards, and been found by Chase buried under a literal mountain of shoeboxes and clothes in her walk-in closet, crying into a bottle of champagne.
Chase must’ve read my mind, because he pressed home, his eyes holding mine intensely. “Considering my mother’s track record, it wouldn’t be far fetched to assume she’s on a straight path to Depressionville. When I went to check on Katie, her door was blocked with Amazon packages. I needed a sacrificial lamb.”
“Chase.” My voice croaked. I had a feeling I was the poor animal about to get tossed into the smoker. His face was blank, his tone measured.
“I had to think on my feet. So I made an announcement of my own.”
He grabbed the can between us, taking another sip, his eyes on me. Quiet. My heart spun like a hamster on a wheel. The tips of my fingers tingled. Panic clogged my throat.
“I told them we were engaged.”
I didn’t answer.
Not at first, anyway.
I picked up the can of Diet Coke and threw it against the wall, watching it splash into an avant-garde painting of brown fizz. Who did something like that? Told his family he was engaged to his ex-girlfriend, whom he’d cheated on? And now he was here, not even half-apologetic and still a full-blown jerk, delivering the news offhandedly.
“You son of a . . .”
“It gets worse.” He raised a palm, his eyes cutting to my window seat, which was crowded with potted flowers in various colors and Daisy’s bed. “As it turned out, the engagement announcement was just what the doctor ordered. Family is a divine principle for the Blacks. It gave Mom something to be excited about and took away Dad’s thoughts from the big C. And so it appears that you and I are having an engagement party in the Hamptons this weekend.”