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“What? I’d just like to pay my respects,” she said, and took a sip of her Gregorie. “Can’t a matron drink to another matron as she goes not so gently into that good night?”
Lila stood up and nodded to the others at the table. “Dinner was lovely, but I have a—”
“Sit down,” her mother said sharply, her own tone of warning creeping into her voice. “We haven’t even had the salmon yet. Besides, Chef has made some of her famous petit fours for dessert. Why let a little thing like the Wilson matron keep you from them?”
“It’s not the Wilson matron who’s keeping me from them. Who’s the inelegant one now?”
“Sit down.”
“Then stop baiting the help, Mother. It’s low.”
The rest of the room stared at their soup awkwardly. She couldn’t believe her father hadn’t jumped in yet, either to call out her mother or to support Lila while she forged ahead.
The chairwoman’s nostrils flared. Lila hadn’t seen her matron so angry in years. “Don’t you dare ‘Mother’ me, Elizabeth. Not when Celeste and her bratty spawn tried to kill you. You, my eldest daughter! Maybe you’ve forgiven them, but I haven’t. If they’d hired someone competent for the murder, you’d be dead right now and none of us would have had the pleasure of your company for dinner, such as it is.”
“That has nothing to do with—”
“With Ms. Wilson?” her mother said, placing her spoon onto the table. “Doesn’t it? I’m not baiting her, Lila, I’m giving her one last chance to prove that she can hold her temper. Some best friend you chose. If you’d tossed her away like I’d advised and found one of better quality, you could have a real friend at your side to work through whatever it is you’re feeling, whatever issues have crept up from being nearly murdered a block away from your own compound, from being tranqed and left for dead on the sidewalk like common gutter trash. Instead you barely eat and you run off to do gods know what in the middle of the night without telling any of us where you are. Or all day when you should be safe in the security office.”
“Mother—”
“If you had a real friend, she wouldn’t have turned her back on you after her mother and brother nearly killed you. If they’d had their way, she’d be mourning your death instead of wishing for it. Perhaps the little brat forgets that, but I certainly do not.”
Lila dropped her gaze, not daring look at Alex’s face.
“You dare ask me to spare her feelings? What about mine? What about Pax’s?”
Her brother looked down at his plate, his eyes reddening. It was a red Lila had seen too often in the last week. She’d just chalked it up to Trevor, to a relapse of grief. Perhaps she’d been wrong. Perhaps it had been about almost losing his sister so soon after losing his best friend.
“What of your own feelings? Her family almost killed you, and you’ve done nothing but obsess about her. It makes me ill. Whatever happened between the pair of you is trivial compared to attempted murder.”
Dubois licked his lips and patted Jewel’s back.
Her sister grew pale at his touch.
None of their discomfort seemed to bother her mother. She merely pushed harder and harder. “I’ve seen how the brat looks at you, when she bothers to look at you at all. Refusing to do her duty and serve you, forcing Isabel to do the job of two and take time away from her family.” The chairwoman faced Alex, who immediately shifted her gaze to the floor. “Then she dares to assault you in front of the High Council? The fact that she laid her hands on you at all is revolting, much less her attitude after you arrested her. I would disgrace myself if I admitted the sort of punishments that have run through my mind since I found out.”
“Mother—”
“The brat should be too ashamed to meet your eyes, Elizabeth, too horrified that you almost died by her family’s own hand. A few
hundred years ago, she would have offered you the sword of her family’s militia chief, asking you to plunge it into her heart to free her from her family’s shame. That is why she has poor breeding. You and I understand the depths and bounds of friendship and family. Workborns do not. She does not.”
“No one does that any longer,” Lila murmured.
“We understand the sentiment. We do it symbolically. Ms. Wilson does not, and she has the audacity to continue her little snit, not only in private, not only in front of you, but in front of the family and the High Council. She should be hanged with the rest, and good riddance. I could have dangled her before the highborn at parties, but I let her stay here with her dignity because you asked for it. You’ve done too much for the girl. You’ve been a far better friend to her than she’s been to you because you are blind to her true nature. It’s time you figured that out.”
“She’s my best friend. She’s the most loyal, the most—”
“Holly was your best friend. Why do you think I let the girl stay on the compound? Why do you think I tried to save her when she grew ill? She had workborn breeding, but a highborn heart, and you dishonor her memory by sticking up for this trash now. Ms. Wilson is not fit to serve the family. You say she’s loyal? Loyal to whom? To you? To Jewel?”
Jewel swallowed and clenched her spoon.
“Ms. Wilson isn’t loyal to anyone but herself.”
“Even if she never speaks to me again, I trust her,” Lila replied. “Until she tells me that she wishes to move to another compound or to another family, she stays.”
Alex’s eyes met hers for a few moments, then settled back to the floor.
