Omega In The Office - Aria Grace Page 0,31
kept it from me.
“Are either of you going to even try to explain this to me?” I ask after a full minute of awkward silence.
“There’s nothing to explain,” Lucius says at last. “It’s all right there. Glass Bay Apartments is in debt. In fact, we’ve never not been in debt. The only difference now is that we’ve spent all the money from the loans, and unless something significant happens, we’re not going to be able to cover our operating costs this month.”
“Why didn’t you tell me about this?” I demand, sitting up as straight as possible. “I can help.”
Leon shakes his head emphatically. “That’s why we didn’t tell you.” He takes a seat at the table. “That money, your money, you’ve got plans for it already. Your parents, your surgery, all of that is important, and we didn’t want you to sacrifice any of it.”
“Besides...” Lucius sets the paper back on the table. “It would just be a waste to infuse more money into the business right now. The repairs are done, and over two thirds of our apartments are still empty. Unless we can fill those, we’ll just wind up in this same position in a few months no matter how much money we’re given.”
I clutch the arms of my chair in frustration. “You still should have told me. The three of us are supposed to be mates. We’re supposed to be equal partners in life. But you two have such a head start in the relationship department that there are times when I wonder if I even have a place here. Now, I find out you’ve been hiding something so important from me when I could have potentially helped...”
Leon looks away from me with pain in his eyes. “We never wanted you to feel left out. You’ve just been so happy about your surgery—”
“Screw the damn surgery!” I snap a little too loudly. “It’s expensive, it’s experimental. It might give me back some mobility, but it might not do anything at all.”
“You said the doctors had a good feeling about it.” Lucius sits down in the chair beside me.
“They do,” I say, shaking my head and exhaling heavily. “But a good feeling means I might be able to wiggle my toes again. They keep telling me to temper my expectations, and they don’t expect anything as major as being able to walk...”
From the looks on their faces, I know they’re both thinking the same thing. I lied too.
Well, maybe I didn’t lie. I just didn’t tell them everything. I let them think the surgery was a miracle that would put me back on my feet again. Maybe I actually believed it too. Perhaps, I thought I’d beat the odds this time and actually jump up out of this chair and show the doctors they were wrong when they told me I’d never walk again.
“I’ve been so wrapped up in this stuff lately.” I shake my head, accepting the responsibility for my own actions. “Thinking that ‘if I could just walk,’ maybe you guys would have a use for me. Maybe I could help out with the property management, or I could find some other way to be of use. Picking up groceries on my way home from doctor’s appointments isn’t enough. I feel like...I’m just in the way here. You two are this force to be reckoned with. You’re united on all fronts—working toward the same goals. And you have this deep understanding of each other that comes from all the time you’ve spent together. I just don’t have that.”
Silence fills the room again. No one knows what to say or how to proceed. There’s so much to unpack that I’m not sure it’s even possible to get to the bottom of it. I certainly don’t know what the answer actually is.
But I can’t sit quietly while I know they’re struggling so completely. “All I know is that the surgery isn’t as important to me as taking care of you two. My parents are fine in the place they’re at now. They’re getting good care, they have friends, and they’re happy. Moving them to one of the luxury senior homes was just something I wanted to do as an extra. To thank them for being such good parents, I guess. But they’d never agree to it if it comes at the cost of my happiness.”
Lucius looks down at his feet and drums his fingers along the tabletop. He chews his lip in thought before looking up again. “I’m