“Mei told me not to.” Accurately interpreting his stormy expression, Kati quickly continued. “She said you wouldn’t accept it. That’s why she couldn’t leave us a lot of money in her will, either.”
“If you knew I wouldn’t take it, why would you take it?”
She tucked her hands into the sleeves of her sweater. “Mei said there was probably something expensive inside. Once I broke it open, I could use it to make sure my college tuition was taken care of.”
“Jesus, Kati. Between your scholarships and what I earn, we have college covered.” He didn’t want any of his siblings burdened with student-loan debt. His brothers had both gone to state schools with scholarships, but Kati had her heart set on Stanford, and she’d been accepted. She’d have it, even if he had to work around the clock to make it happen.
Kati laid her hand on his sleeve. “Mei was tired of seeing you work so hard. So am I.”
He placed his hand over hers, struggling not to get sucked into her beseeching eyes. “Kid, don’t get me wrong. I would love to win the lottery someday. But this isn’t how we do things. This isn’t right.”
Her rounded chin came up. “I don’t see what’s so wrong about it, I guess.That Akirahas more money than she knows what to do with, and it’s not like she didn’t inherit every other thing her mom owned. Even if this thing has gold bars inside, it’s nothing compared to all her other money.”
Patience. For all her posturing, Kati was still little more than a child. “I told you, it was her grandmother’s. Even if it weren’t, it doesn’t matter. It’s wrong for us to have this because we’re not Mei’s family. Akira is.”
“Mei said if she and Dad had been married when he died, we would have been her stepkids. She would have raised me, not you.”
Jacob raised an eyebrow. Was that why Mei had been so kind to them over the years? Had she felt guilt over the timing of his father’s death? As if it had cheated them out of some sort of life of wealth and privilege?
His dad had been a firmly middle-class physician before he met Mei at a charity fundraiser and recklessly married her a month later. At that point, Jacob had already been out of the house, so he hadn’t experienced living in Mei’s world the way the three younger Campbells had.
The marriage hadn’t lasted long, a surprise to no one who was familiar with Harvey Campbell’s flightiness. Jacob hadn’t thought Ben, Connor or Kati had particularly hungered for luxury after it was over, but maybe they had.
Privately, Jacob doubted anything would have changed, even if Mei and his dad had been married when the old man had died of a sudden heart attack. While Ben and Connor had been older at the time—fifteen and sixteen respectively—Kati had been a baby who Jacob had sheltered since she was born. He wouldn’t have been able to tolerate someone else raising her, especially since he had barely known Mei. He wasn’t his father, ready to entrust his charges to a relative stranger.
“That’s possible, but it’s not what happened. As her daughter, family heirlooms belong to Akira.”
Kati’s lower lip pouted. “Mei didn’t even like Akira, and Akira never visited her like we did. Did you see what she wore to Mei’s funeral? That slutty dress didn’t scream mourning to me.”
Jacob’s eyebrows snapped together. He didn’t recall what Akira had been wearing at her mother’s funeral, because he’d been too busy searching her face for a sign of life. For the first time since he had known her, there had been no sarcastic quip on the tip of her tongue, no mocking tilt to her head as she skewered him. She had looked pale and muted, limply taking his hand and staring right through him as if she barely noticed him.
She had looked grief-stricken.
And why not? He had been heartbroken when his mother died not long after Ben was born. He’d had his differences with his flighty father, but Jacob had been sorrowful at Harvey’s death. Akira’s strange and antagonistic relationship with her parents didn’t preclude the possibility she loved them. That she could love someone, other than herself.
She’s not a monster.
No. But she was…alone. An island. An entity unto herself.
At the funeral, the sexual tug he always felt toward her had been subsumed by something larger. Something strange and frightening had urged him to pull her close and get her away from the conservatively decorated service and the nosy mourners.
Instead, he had mumbled his condolences and sat in the back of the church with his family. Leaving her in the front row on her own, her profile stony.
Maybe he should have elbowed in and made sure she was okay. If it had been someone else, he might have. But he was certain she didn’t particularly like him, so inflicting himself on her would probably have been the last thing she wanted. That was what he’d continued to tell himself when he occasionally considered seeking her out after the funeral, to ensure she was holding up okay. The Akira he had thought he knew would have been fine…but the Akira he had seen at the funeral? She had needed someone.
Now that he thought about it…the air of brittleness she’d carried at the funeral remained around her, hadn’t it? Maybe she’d lost weight too. She’d seemed somehow diminished, less robust standing in his cabin.
He shook his head.Not your concern.
No, but his sister and her words were.
“Judging her isn’t your place,” he said quietly. “Plus, she could have been naked, and it wouldn’t give you an excuse to call her slutty.”
Kati’s eye roll was epic this time. “Ugh, don’t get all saintly on me. Even Mei used to call Akira a slut.”
His stomach tightened. Not in his presence, she hadn’t.
It was silly to feel any kind of sympathy for Akira, because he had the feeling she would take it and fling it in his face, but it bloomed regardless. What mother would say that to her child, no matter the problems they might have? How had Akira managed to take that sort of abuse? “I don’t care what Mei said. I have never,” he said, biting off each word, “called any woman a slut, let alone Akira. And I didn’t raise anyone in this family to do so either.”
