tall bucket at my side brimming with mums in shades of fall. Mustard yellow, deep amber, rich crimson. Mindlessly, my hands moved, snipping where I knew to snip, filling the bucket with my thoughts circling about Lila. Maybe Ivy would know. I could ask her.
That, at least, gave me a sliver of hope.
My eyes shot up, looking for Lila when the door to the greenhouse opened.
This time, they found their mark.
She was beautiful, too beautiful, a thing made perfect by nature and gilded with Armani and Louboutin. Her eyes, cool and gray, were touched with hurt and hope.
I knew that feeling. I knew it too well.
Chest aching with the same pain that lived in the lines of her face, I rose.
She slowed as she approached, and for a moment, we stood there, breathing the same air, cataloging the sight of each other as if it were the first time and the last.
I tried to be mad, tried to remember all the ways she’d hurt me, all the reasons why we couldn’t. Why we shouldn’t. But I couldn’t think of a single one.
“Are you all right?” was all I could think to say, the thing I wanted most to know.
A smile, small and tinged with regret. “I will be.”
“I’m sorry, Lila. I’m so sorry you lost your job over this.”
“That’s the thing. They didn’t fire me.”
Shock and relief dashed through me, one behind the other. “How? What happened?”
“Caroline fired Addison and offered me her job. Sorina demanded it.”
A smile flickered on my lips. “You’re kidding.”
When she smiled back, it set a fire in my heart. “She didn’t know what Natasha had done, was blind to the setup and appalled by it. She wanted Addison’s head on a platter and her job given to me. She also requested that all of their events go through me, if I wanted it.”
“It’s all you’ve ever wanted,” I said with sadness.
“But that wasn’t even what shocked me. They offered me my own reality show.”
An uncertain pause, unsure that I’d heard her right. “Your what?”
“My own reality show. My ‘subplot’ on the show was so engrossing, they’re sure viewers would gobble it up. She even mentioned Longbourne and how much it could help the shop.”
That warmth in my heart flared into an inferno. After everything, she would drag me—drag my family—into that world of deceit.
It was low, lower than I’d thought she’d go.
“Like I said,” I snapped, “that’s what you wanted, isn’t it? Fame and glory and money. You wanted power, and you got it. But leave Longbourne out of this. Take your contracts somewhere else.”
She staggered from surprise that shifted into fury. “Excuse me?”
I shook my head, turning to the flower bed, needing something to do, some way to dismiss her. “Congratulations,” I shot, unable to be kind, unable to be civil. “It’s all you’ve always dreamed of—to be one of them. But you won’t use my family’s legacy to boost ratings for your new show.”
“Kash, if you’ll let me explain—”
My gaze snapped to her. “Why, so you can justify your choices like you did last night? You’re the one who has to live with them, not me.”
Tears sparkled, clinging to her lashes, but her face was bent with hurt and anger. “You know, you never figured me for a liar. But I never figured you for an asshole.”
“Guess we were both wrong.”
With the smallest, sharpest of breaths, she flinched, though our gaze never broke. But she didn’t shrink away—she grew, drawing herself up to her full height, squaring her shoulders, lifting her quivering chin.
“I guess we were.” One step back. Another. “Then I guess that’s that,” she said with resilience and force and bottomless sadness.
But I said nothing back. Only turned to my flowers with my heart clenched in my throat. And I listened to the sound of her heels on the concrete as she walked away.
This time, I feared it would be for good.
And good riddance, I told myself without faith.
She might have sold her soul, but I’d be goddamned if she took my family with her on the road to hell. She’d gotten in bed with lie-eating snakes, and there was nowhere to go but to become one of them. I wouldn’t watch her do it to herself. I couldn’t watch her demean herself any more than she already had.
And I wouldn’t become a part of that lie factory with her. Not when my family was at stake.