AllFreeNovel
Share Us
He paused, his eyebrows lifted. “Yeah. Why?” he muffled out, looking confused.
I pointed toward the exit of his office. “Your mom just threatened you.”
“I know,” he said as if agreeing before he added, “she must be having an off week to wait all the way until Wednesday. Usually she mentions cutting my inheritance by Monday afternoon.”
“But… But…” I shook my head. “She threatened you because of me.”
“Kid.” He sighed and lowered the donut before shaking his head. “The last time she told me I’d regret my choices was because she was pissed I’d worn a green tie after she told me to wear black. And that was last week… I kid you not. It’s hard to take her seriously when she pulls this shit all the fucking time. Stop stressing so much, okay?”
He went back to eating, and I could only watch the hearty, dismissive way he carried on. “Then why did you warn me to stay away from Ezra? You said she was so dangerous.”
A look of apology entered his gaze. “Because I’m her blood,” he explained in a somewhat soft voice. “She may have been a craptacular parent. She threatens and tries to control Hayden and me nonstop. But she’d never really hurt us, not when she sees us as an extension of herself. Her legacy, I guess. I don’t know. The thing is, she’s never seen you that way. You’re not a part of her. To her, you’ve always been an obstacle, keeping her from controlling Arthur the way she always wanted to. And I think she holds a grudge, still blaming you for that. She wants you to pay for the fact that she could never get him to stop loving you.”
My chest filled with pressure as his words echoed through me. These past few years since his death, I’d convinced myself that Lana had done just that, that she’d stolen my father’s affections from me. But to hear Brick so adamantly claim my dad had loved me all the way until the end made me want to cry happy tears, even as I still kind of doubted his certainty.
Because honestly, if Dad had loved me so much, why had he left me with so little? Why had he left me at all?
I blew out a breath and focused on the floor, watching the coffee from Brick’s spilled mug continue to trickle onto the carpet. Wanting to keep busy and honestly unable to watch the mess spread, I bent down and picked it up before setting the empty mug back on Brick’s desk. After fetching some napkins from the coffee station, I returned to the spill and knelt by it, soaking up as much as I could.
My stepbrother sighed heavily from his desk chair. “You know, you don’t have to do that. Bruno can clean it.”
“But Uncle Bru doesn’t come in until noon. I don’t want the stain to set.” I pushed to my feet. “I’m going to go down to his office and look for some stain remover.”
Brick nodded, his gaze on mine before he asked, “Are you okay?”
I nodded as well, though I’m not really sure what I was. I started to go, only to pause and turn back. “This was the second time she’s been up on the third floor this week.”
Brick took another bite of donut and nodded. “Yeah. Strange, huh?”
“Definitely. It seems like she’s… I don’t know… Unraveling lately.”
Brick glanced at me, his eyebrows furrowing. “What do you mean?”
I shrugged. “I’m not sure really. Maybe I was reading emotions in her that aren’t there. But that day she fired me last week, she was particularly…” I winced before admitting, “Unpleasant.”
He lifted one eyebrow, murmuring, “Unpleasant? My mother? You don’t say.”
I rolled my eyes. “I mean, more than usual.”
Wincing out a shudder, he shook his head. “Is that even possible?”
“Well, she did fire me. She’d never done that before. I always thought she got a kick out of ordering me around and giving me impossible tasks to complete.”
“Hmm. True.” Brick went back to scratching his jaw thoughtfully. “Firing a free intern doesn’t exactly seem her style.”
“Yeah,” I said. “I think something’s going on with her.”
“You mean, like she discovered the boy toy she wanted for herself was already interested in some young, blonde-headed tart?”
“But I hadn’t even met him when she fired me. I think this is something else.”
Brick only sighed. “It’s always something else with her. To be honest, I’m tired of trying to riddle the woman out. I put up with her because we both work here, and I love this job, but other than that, I feel no affiliation toward her at all.”
That was sad. I’d always felt bad because I’d never been able to have a real mother-daughter relationship with her, but Brick was her own blood. He even admitted Lana saw him as an extension of herself, and they still didn’t have a good relationship. Suddenly, I wished everything was different. Why did Lana have to be the way she was?
For some reason, I wanted to talk to Ezra about it. Even as I made my way toward the basement where Uncle Bru kept his cleaning supplies closet, the urge to head toward Ezra’s office instead was strong. I just knew talking this out with him would make me feel better. Talking to him always felt right.
Ignoring the urge, I returned to Brick’s office, where I cleaned up the coffee spill as best I could. When I was done, I sat at my computer station to print labels for our portfolio. Except I didn’t even have time to reach for the mouse before I saw someone from the corner of my eye enter Brick’s office without knocking or saying a single word.
