of a mother. What about yours?” With the way her dark eyes focused on me, I didn’t have anywhere to go to escape the studying gaze. Fortunately, I didn’t want to.
“My emancipation court date is in a little under two weeks.”
“Okay, and that’s fantastic. Hopefully, you stick it to the bitch when you cut ties.” Rachel braced a hand on the bed. “But what are we doing about her?”
“That’s the ten-thousand-dollar question.” I pursed my lips. “I have an idea. But I don’t know if it’s as cruel and manipulative as something she would do because it definitely serves my interests and not hers.” Even as I said it, I hesitated, then grimaced. “It’s not even about my interests, it’s about getting Eddie back for Archie as much as it is getting back at Maddy.”
“Color me intrigued,” Rachel said with a slow grin. “And I’m all in. What do you want to do?”
It was the middle of the day. The guys had all had school today and I was technically still on internship hours, but I had promised Archie and the boys I wouldn’t go anywhere near Standish. Archie guaranteed it wouldn’t be a problem for the internship, and to be honest, even if it was, I didn’t care. I wasn’t sure what I would do or say if I saw Edward Standish again.
I would have to, sooner or later, but I still didn’t know what I would say. Or to be correct, what I would say beyond telling him what a cataclysmic asshole he was.
“My grandparents,” I said slowly. Archie and I had talked about them a little, but that conversation had upset him on some level, and after the last few days, I wanted to keep things lighter for him. Fuck knew how we’d do that, but I still wanted to.
“I’m listening.” Rachel pulled a pillow around to hug it as she leaned forward and focused on me.
“Patience,” I said with a half-snort, because talk about irony, “and Eugene Grayson. As far as I know, Maddy is their only child. When I did an internet search, I found them living in New England, although they have a home in California as well as another in Europe and vested interest in places in the Caribbean.”
“Okay.” Nothing in Rachel’s expression changed. She was letting me work this out aloud, and it was the first time I’d actually tried talking about them since I’d brought it up with Archie. When I’d emailed Wittaker, he’d also sent me a two-page letter summarizing them. “So they’re rich.”
“They own resorts and hotels all over the world. A lot of them.”
“So, they’re filthy, stinking rich.”
I gave a little shrug. “I guess. Their net worth is in the billions.”
“Holy fuck.”
Another shrug. “I don’t want to think about that part, because Maddy came from that kind of money and I grew up with her living paycheck to paycheck and shopping at discount stores and using duct tape to hold my shoes together when I got holes in them and she couldn’t afford to get them fixed.”
I had no shame about that. I could stretch a dollar. I was self-reliant. I could support myself.
“Girl, do not tell me you are feeling sorry for her?”
“I don’t—I don’t know what I feel exactly. But how do you go from that kind of money to living how we were?” I spread my hands. I’d kept some of the pieces out of the story, the pieces that were personal to Archie. Like the fact his parents were made to get married or whatever. “And she always throws that thing in my face about how she could have given me up for adoption or had an abortion. Is that why? Was she exiled for having me?”
“I don’t care if she was given fifty lashes and tossed out on her ass,” Rachel said, expression tightening into a frown of disbelief. “Parents are supposed to love and take care of you, not inflict their emotional damage onto you or make you responsible for their bullshit.”
True. Eddie was a fucking moron. He blamed Archie because Eddie got caught with his dick out and had to marry Muriel. At the end of the day though, that was a choice, right? What if he’d refused? He’d have been cut off.
Had Maddy been given a similar choice?
Fuck, this whole thing gave me a headache. “I don’t feel sorry for her.” I didn’t. “I just don’t understand her.”
“Well, if you look up ‘raging cunt’ in the dictionary, I’m sure you’ll