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Abby watched Elaina’s face flush with sinking expectations. Her sister seemed to have lost all her fight and stepped back. And she was alone again. Why did she dare to hope? Before she could take Celeste on about her cryptic statement, Wyatt appeared in the doorway.
Arms folded across his chest, he regarded each woman with curiosity and suspicion. Then, his gaze zeroed in on Abby questioningly. It wasn’t often that he found her conferencing with Elaina and Celeste. When Abby averted her gaze, he squinted. She knew he was going to hound her for an explanation later. What the hell would she tell him? Certainly not the truth.
“Is there something you wanted, Wyatt?” Celeste sent him an impatient glance.
Unmoved by his mother’s hostility, he smirked. “Certainly nothing from you, mother.”
Scratching a brow and waiting for the battle to begin, Abby sighed. She had to be a part of one of the most dysfunctional families in America. She missed New York more and more every day. She missed London as well, where she’d been studying, an entire ocean between her and the madness.
“We have a guest,” Wyatt announced before Celeste erupted. “I was the one to answer the door. I suppose the staff has heard that we’re poor now and they won’t be getting paid. It seems they’ve begun abandoning their posts.”
“We are not poor,” Celeste spat the word as if it were some taboo term.
Amused, Abby pursed her lips to hide her smile. Wyatt was deliberately getting Celeste riled up because he too, found her reactions laughable.
“The dwindling Aldridge bank accounts say differently. Anyway, I thought you’d all be interested to know that it’s Damian Coldwell who is at the door.” As if it just dawned on him who their visitor was, Wyatt paused. “Why would he be here?”
All three women gaped at him in stunned silence. It was Celeste who recovered first. “I’ll find out.” She turned a disapproving gaze on Abby. “Make yourself presentable. Maybe we can still salvage this.” She rushed from the room.
“Come with me, Abby,” Elaina said. “Your hair looks terrible and you have no makeup on. Unacceptable.” She teetered away without looking back, fully expecting her sister to be in tow.
With slumped shoulders, Abby dragged her feet to the door. “Abby, what the hell is going on?” Wyatt fixed her with a penetrating stare. “Don’t give me that bullshit about legal stuff needing to be discussed.”
“You don’t have to worry about anything, Wyatt.”
“Jesus, Abbs, I’m almost twenty. I’m not a baby you have to protect anymore. If mom and Elaina have dragged you into some shady business, tell me now. I care about you, more so than I do about them. I don’t care what they want to get into, but you, you need to stay away from trouble.”
“Wyatt, don’t say that. They’re our family.”
“Something I try to forget most of the time.”
She looked skyward. Getting Wyatt to like his own mother and sister was futile, and she couldn’t blame him for his resentment. “I’m not getting into anything shady. I had a run in with Damian and that’s what we were discussing.”
“A run in? Like what? An argument?” Wyatt’s eyes widened. “Is he into you? Is that why he’s here?” He laughed. “Now that would be some Romeo and Juliet shit.”
“Someone’s been indulging in classical literature.”
“Of course I have.”
“You’re so cool.”
Wyatt grinned. “Most say we’re ‘nerds,’ but I say, we’re the cool ones.”
“Hell yeah.” Abby sighed and grabbed his hand to give it a squeeze. “Don’t worry about me, okay? You need to focus on being a college student and all that young people stuff.”
“Young people stuff?” He scoffed. “How old are you? Eighty?”
With a weary grin, her brows elevated. “Trying to keep the peace in this family ages one very quickly.”
“Go back to New York, Abby. You were happier away from this hell hole.”
“I can be happy wherever you are. We’ll talk later. Okay?”
Wyatt nodded, but the look on his face still held concern. He wasn’t stupid. He knew something was up. Abby’s reassuring smile disappeared as she walked off.
Elaina managed to brush Abby’s wild waves into some semblance of order and added a bit of color to her lips. Abby batted her hand away each time she tried to add mascara and blush. “I’m not Cinderella going to the ball for Christ’s sake. Lay off the clown makeup.”
Elaina huffed. “You need to look presentable.”
