for her or something?
Chapter 11
“Odette, what are you doing here?” my mother asked, peeking her head around the corner with a spoon hanging from her mouth and a cup of her favorite yogurt in hand.
“Where else I am I supposed to be since you rented out my place to a stranger?” I grumbled, dropping my bag onto the floor and then walking over to the couch where I threw myself. I was suddenly so tired.
“I didn’t rent it,” she said, smacking my feet. “He is your guest.”
“He’s your guest. I didn’t ask for him—”
“What happened? Why are you so angry?”
“He said I was bossy, temperamental, and prone to outburst.” I tried to mock his accent but was unable to get the sound of his words out my head.
“It’s true.”
“Mom!” I yelled, flipping up angrily, facing her as she sat down in her chair and kicked up her feet.
“What? You are!” she shot back. “Look at you, proving him right.”
“Are you sure I wasn’t adopted because you always agree with other people over me.” I frowned, lying back down.
“Very sure. Twenty-seven-plus hours of pushing your big head out isn’t something I would forget.” She snickered.
“I swear you add more hours to your labor every time you tell me that story.”
She huffed and took another mouthful of her yogurt.
“Is there any more?” I asked her.
“You could be having a romantic breakfast with a handsome prince, but you came here to take food from your mother.” She shook her head, frowning more. “Maybe you are adopted because no one with my genes should ever pass up something like that.”
I rolled my eyes, pushing myself up to get something to eat. “Maybe I missed those genes and just got the bossy, temperamental, and prone to outburst ones.”
“Wow, he really got under your skin.” She snickered as I opened the refrigerator.
“Of course, he did. He insulted me!” I said, grabbing the orange juice and bacon.
“Normally, when you are insulted by people, you only get angry in your head for a few seconds, then forget all about it. You never go on complaining about them. It’s twenty minutes from your place to here, and you still haven’t calmed down.”
I turned back to her. “What are you trying to say?
She shrugged. “Nothing. Just observing.”
My mother never just did anything. But I didn’t want to go into it. Instead, I just moved to the stove and grabbed a pan. However, the second I touched it, I couldn’t help but wonder what in the hell he was trying to cook that caused an actual fire. He was completely panicking when I came down, too. I guess they didn’t teach culinary arts at prince school. Had he even cooked before?
And yet he was trying to make breakfast for me.
I paused.
Grimacing, I thought about how I had yelled in his face for it. It wasn’t completely my fault. I had a headache, and there were flames.
But I can be harsh sometimes.
Stop thinking. I shook the thoughts from my head and focused on the stove before I ended up starting a fire myself.
Was that how he ended up causing one?
“Ugh!” Fed up with myself, I turned off the stove, put the bacon into the fridge, and instead, grabbed a bowl of cereal.
“Yvonne and your sister really wasted no time,” she said randomly.
“Huh?” Bringing my bowl with me, I walked around the counter and back to her.
However, she put the phone down and turned on the television. It took her a second to flip through the channels before she got to DCN—a.k.a. Daily Celeb News...more like gossip, but apparently, that wasn’t what they thought of themselves. Crossing my feet under me as I sat back on the couch, I waited.
“Ladies and gentlemen, we are getting breaking news that Augusta Wyntor, daughter of the late billionaire Marvin Wyntor, married her long-time boyfriend, Malik Washington, former NFL quarterback for Los Angeles Rams,” the host reported before the screen split. There was a picture of my sister, in a damn wedding dress, standing next to her husband, who I didn’t even know existed until yesterday.
My jaw dropped.
“Our sources are saying that the pair met at an Etheus company party last year. Washington’s father is a member of the Etheus Board of Directors, and Washington himself has been working with the company on their global Get Active campaign.”
“They had a wedding?” I whispered in shock, looking over at my mother. “How was it such a secret if there was a wedding?”
“I don’t think they did. I think