“Be silent, Emery.”
White-hot rage swept through me at how he spoke to her. He stared me down, but I stared back…and then he shrugged.
“I hear your father has suffered some health issues lately. Send him my best, will you?” He turned to Emery. “Get dressed. We have dinner tonight with the Hills.”
Emery’s gaze darted between us, distraught. Her father didn’t move from the door. I gathered my things and shouldered my backpack.
“I’ll walk you down, Xander,” she said.
“No need. I’ll see our guest out,” her father countered.
Emery shot me a fearful, apologetic look as I strode out. I followed Grayson Wallace through his house while he chatted with me conversationally the entire time.
“It’s not easy, running a multinational corporationanda household such as mine, as I’m sure you can imagine,” he said.
“No, sir.”
“There are so many moving parts,” Grayson said, ushering me to the side entrance by the garage. “Plates spinning, if you will. And I cannot let a single one fall. It could start a chain reaction, and before I know it, the whole thing is in shambles.”
He opened the door, and I stepped out into the cold while he stood inside his enormous white house, arms crossed.
“So, you see, Xander, if something were to try to disrupt the plates that I’ve spun into a fortune large enough to take care of my daughterfor the rest of her life, I’d be very angry. I did not work this hard for her to piss it away on something—or someone—so far beneath her. After all, why would she choose a handful of pennies when I’m offering her a mountain of gold?”
I clenched my teeth from spitting something back. Something that would only make things worse for Emery.
Grayson’s bland tone hardened slightly. “She’s impressionable, my daughter. Easily led astray. With the wrong influences, she might make poor choices, and then I’d be forced to seek alternative methods of correction. Permanent grounding, perhaps. No dance, no prom committee, and no charity cases who don’t belong anywhere near her or this house.”
He turned his back on me before I could say a word, before I could catch the breath in my throat.
“Your tutoring services will no longer be needed. Good evening.”
Then he shut the door in my face.
Chapter 19
Emery
Halloween night was strangely warm, which boded well for Tucker and his Mojo Dojo Casa House Ken costume. When he’d picked me up to take me to the festival, I had to bite my cheek to keep from laughing as heyes, sir’dandno, sir’dmy dad while wearing a full-length faux fur coat and no shirt.
But in Tucker’s truck, my humor faded. I sat in the passenger seat in my pink gingham dress watching Castle Hill zip past in the dark. Although I hadn’t been thrilled about going as Barbie, I never did anything halfway. My costume was spot-on, right down to the white jewelry and pink pumps, while Tucker was the perfect Ken. We had a good shot at Best Couple, which was probably why he was so excited.
Tucker hummed along to a song on the radio, tapping the wheel and nodding his head. We hardly spoke—certainly never had conversations like Xander and I have.
Had,I corrected.Xander isn’t speaking to me anymore.
After Dad ushered Xander out of the house a few days ago, he informed me that our tutoring sessions were over. Now Xanderavoided me at school. Whatever my father had said had done the trick. Something disgusting about Dr. Ford, maybe, that couldn’t be taken back.
So be it. I’ll keep doing what my dad wants, and he’ll love me, and we’ll be a happy family. No turbulence.
I sounded out-of-control in my own head. Ifeltout-of-control. Like whatever mental fortitude I’d been using to survive my own household was starting to unravel.
I turned to Tucker. “What are your hopes and dreams?”
His brows furrowed under the black-and-white bandana around his forehead. “What do you mean?”
“Just what I said. What do you hope for your future? What do you want to do?”
“Well, I want to go 3-and-0 in the regattas this season, grab a championship in water polo, make Prom King with you as my hot Queen, and then I’ll go to Columbia. Get into politics.”
