She shrugs. “Oh, they are never here. I think they are in the Maldives at the moment. Maybe Bora-Bora.”
Cecily has the kind of parents who are so rich they don’t specifically have job titles. They serve on various boards of businesses and organizations in an advisory capacity and spend their days throwing events and charity auctions. You can’t really blame them for preferring to advise from a luxury cabana next to the topaz-blue ocean and white-sand beach. Cecily once suggested we ask her family for money as a way to fund Wyst, but they much preferred the idea of her getting into the family business of galas and balls.
Cecily has everything but a present family. She’s an only child. In her words, her mum was very much a “one and done” kind of mother. Providing an heir to the family fortune, she put her life of fundraisers and meetings on pause to raise Cecily in good standing and taste until she was eighteen, then carried on with her life as though her daughter didn’t exist. I’m sure a lot of people would kill for Cecily’s life, but now, viewing it from the inside, it seems incredibly lonely. I find Spencer irritatingat the best of times but I can’t imagine what it would have been like to grow up in a world of adults, without any siblings and cousins and barely any friends to grow up with.
She blinks away an emotion I can’t quite place as she hands me a glass of fizzing champagne and clinks our glasses together. “And anyway, it’s good they’re out of the house because I want to hearallthe filthy things you got up to in Paris.”
Before dinner, she brings me up to a room on the fourth floor with varying shades of cream, green, and oak. The wooden sleigh bed takes up the majority of the room, with a sage-green accent chair in the corner matching the curling vine print wallpaper in the en suite bathroom.
The bedside table has a tray stacked with essentials you’d find at a five-star hotel: fancy shampoo and conditioner, lavender pillow spray, moisturizer, toothbrush, toothpaste, and hairbrush.
“I’ll just be here for the night,” I say, a nervous laugh escaping my mouth as I realize I’m probably being a massive inconvenience.
She makes a “pfft” sound and waves away the notion. “You can’t launch a successful business while sleeping on a lumpy sofa. Stay as long as you need.”
“Thank you for this, for everything.” My throat tightens as I pull her into a tight hug before collapsing onto the soft bed.
She flicks her hair cartoonishly. “Now, freshen up and be downstairs in twenty minutes for the worst roast of your life.”
I laugh, balancing the base of my glass on my stomach. “Just keep the drinks coming, and I probably won’t notice.”
After a deceptively delicious dinner, we lounge in Cecily’sbedroom with bowls of tart apple pie and creamy custard. Subtle pops of blue, yellow, and pink add a youthful edge to Cecily’s room’s Georgian-style moldings and old furniture. I lean on a pillow decorated with multicolored velvet bows against the iron bars of her bed frame.
“I can’t believe you didn’t miss your train.” Cecily’s astonished face makes me smile.
I roll on my back, lock my fingers over my full belly and stare at the ceiling. “Oh trust me, I wanted to, but I think in the end it was best we didn’t have a repeat of the night in Rome.” As the words leave my mouth, I know in my heart they’re not true. This time felt different, like something more. And something more is incredibly dangerous.
“I don’t think I should see him again,” I affirm to myself and Cecily.
Her mouth hangs agape. “What? Why?”
“It’s too risky.” I take a nonchalant sip of my wine, as though this thought hasn’t been emotionally, physically, and mentally plaguing me for weeks.
“But that’s why it’s so hot!” She throws a pillow at me. A puff of fresh linen and vanilla hits my nostrils. “How often do people get to have a scandalous affair whereneitherof the parties are committing adultery?”
“Yeah, I’m just committingidentity fraud,” I remind her, whispering as though the whole building is bugged. From what I’ve heard, Cecily’s family has every inch of this place under observation. More for monitoring the movements of their only heir rather than necessarily for her safety. “I’m lying to a guy I really like about who I am; it’s not fair. I either need to stop things from going any further or tell him the truth. But thenif I tell him, it makes him an accomplice and that puts his job at risk. Even if he hates his job, I don’t want to be the cause of him losing it. Morally, I have to break things off, even if I don’t want to.”
She scrunches her face and holds a palm out. “Does it even count as a crime if you aren’t technically stealing anyone’s identity?”
I raise my eyebrows before taking a much bigger swig of wine. “I don’t know about in the eyes of the law, but in the eyes of Odericco Investments, yes.”
Cecily lays back on the bed, considering. “Hmmm, nope, sorry. I think the hidden identity thing makes it much, much hotter.”
My mind briefly slips back to last night, his hand grazing my thigh, bunching the fabric of my skirt in his fist. Barely able to contain himself from lifting me up, hooking my legs around his hips, and having me against the old door in the rain.
I swallow the feeling. “He doesn’t even know my real name; there’s no explaining that without everything else. It would be impossible to have any kind of normal relationship with him. I couldn’t hide the truth from him forever. No matter which way you swing it, eventually it would go wrong.” I nod to myself. “Better now than when we’re both too invested.”
Cecily’s shoulders deflate as she sighs. “Yeah, you’re right. When are you going to tell him?”
“Maybe after the ball? That’s the final event in Vienna.” I internally swoon at the idea of being with him at a black-tie ball but shove the idea back down.
Cecily blinks, shaking her head. “Hang on a second. Did you just say a ball? In Vienna?”
I run a hand through my hair. “Yeah, it’s where they’re announcing the winners. We can’t afford the tickets, but I got word that every other finalist company will be in attendance. I need to find a dress for it and everything. Do you have time to come with me to H&M or something? I think there’s a sale on at the moment.”
Cecily jumps up from the bed, expertly avoiding spilling her glass all over the white patterned sheets. “Are you serious? Why didn’t you tell me it was a ball?”
My eyebrows fuse together. “What’s so special about it?”
