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He raises his head and looks at me. “Why did your mother corner me today and tell me we broke up?”
My jaw actually drops in shock. I’d never done that before in real life. I’d seen it in movies and TV, I’d read it in books, but I’d never actually done thejaw-droppingaction. “What?”
Warren regards me, looking for any sign that I knew about it, perhaps? Then sighs and nods his head. “I was at lunch with Freddie and your mother was there. She came up and told me how sorry she was for me. How she was shocked you and Jasper were together. I didn’t know what to say.”
Something curdles deep in the pit of my stomach. Something… new. A new feeling that I’ve never felt before.
Rage.
That’s what it was. I was furious. Actuallypissed.
“What is wrong with her?” I mutter to myself and start pacing. “The nerve to come up to you and say such things! Ooh, I’m going to wring his neck when I get my hands on him.” I mimic the motion with my hands, my voice gathering volume as I walk. “She called me today!” I yell for no real reason other than not knowing how to handle the anger that’s coursing through my veins. “She called me and told me she’d ‘heard the news.’ Whatever that meant.”
“So, what did you say?” he asks, still clutching the glass of water.
I still my movements and look at him, he looks resigned… disappointed. In me?
“I said we’d barely talked at the event. That he told me that his father was still wanting us to marry and I told him I’d never ever consider it.”
“Which event was this?”
“That last-minute one my mother needed me for.”
He sighs and rolls his eyes. “The one a couple nights ago? When she said she was sick?”
“Yes.”
“And she just magically felt so much better that she was running around a country club today?”
I have to go, dear! Late for tennis at the club.
“And play tennis today…” I cross my arms, one hand coming up to rub my lip. My brows furrow in frustrated confusion. “I don’t…”
“Your mother is playing you, Janie,” he says softly, his eyes still sad. “She’s manipulating this whole thing.”
“No,” I deny, but in the back of my mind, in the pit of my stomach, his words ring true. “She wouldn’t do this. Wouldn’t go this far.” I punctuate my words by stabbing a finger into the island. “Now that she sees you and me together, she knows I won’t marry Jasper.”
“Clearly she doesn’t know that if she’s calling you and coming up to me and making us think that this is somehow already in action.”
“But…” I don’t have a good thing to say about the situation. Don’t have an answer for him.
“Jane. You have to stick up for yourself.” He stands and comes to stand in front of me. “I know that’s hard for you.” He grabs my hands, his eyes moving over my face, some emotion I don’t know how to place swims in them. Desperation, love, hurt. “She’s your mother and defying her is not something you want. But she’s gone too far with this whole bullshit of marrying you off to someone. This isn’t the fucking Mafia, Jane.” I snort at that description, noting how similar it is to something I said to Jasper the other night. “I’m serious, though.”
Warren’s eyes hold mine and I nod my head.
“I know you are.” I grasp his shoulders and pull him closer. “I’m scared,” I admit quietly.
“What are you afraid of? Losing your job or your mother’s approval?”
The fact that he hit the nail on the head makes my gut clench tightly, but I think it over and wonder. Losing my job would be hard for me. I love the work I do; I love the people I’ve gotten to know recently. Love that I have the connections to make real change in the world.
I also love my mother. Maybe not in the way some love their mothers, maybe not how a daughter should. But earning her approval has been the goal from the moment I was born, it was how I was raised. By respecting and doing as I was told, I earned her approval.
It makes me sick now, when I put it into perspective and see how toxic that is.
“Both, I guess,” I finally answer.
“Hey.” Warren’s strong hands grip my face. “You’ve got me. Always.”
