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Clasping her wrist, Andrew led them to an alcove. “You’ve known each other your entire lives. How much more time could you possibly need?”
“There are things I still want to do.”
“Like what?” her mum whispered harshly. “You want to shop more? Travel more? Have more spa days? What exactly are you so eager to do?”
Like a can on the road flattened by a tire, Phinny’s spirit compressed under the weight of her mum’s words. She’d never considered herself frivolous. She’d been living the only life she’d ever known. “I don’t know. But I would rather find out than get married to a man I don’t love.”
Her stepfather had always indulged her, and in return, she’d tried very hard to please him. So, to see the tick in his jaw, the color flood his cheeks, truly upset her. “What on earth do you think we’ve been doing, Seraphina?”
“What do you mean?” A sickening feeling rolled through her.
“You don’t have a proper job, you live in an apartment we own, and you use a credit card we’ve given you…why do you think we’ve been supporting you all this time?”
The great beast of fear loomed over her like a dark, menacing shadow. “I—” Her mind went blank.
“We’ve supported you because you were going to marry Cameron,” her mum said. “And Lumleys do philanthropy, just as I’ve done. Just as you’ve been doing.Thathas been our expectation. If we thought for a moment you had no intention of marrying him, you’d have been polishing your CV and applying for jobs your last year at university. You’d have been paying your own bills upon graduation.”
“Now, go and find your fiancé,” her stepfather said. “And get things back on track. Or the locks to your Knightsbridge apartment will be changed by morning.”
“What?” She could barely process his words. He couldn’t possibly mean to throw her out onto the streets?
“Darling, please.” Her mum patted his arm.
Oh, thank God. Her mum would always take care of her. They were a team. Her parents were upset. She understood that. But they’d never make her marry a man she didn’t love.
But then her mum’s features hardened. “Let her make some calls, see which of her friends will allow her to sleep on their couch until she gets a job.”
