“But there is something. I’ve been thinking about the wedding, Harl,” he starts, and my spine stiffens. “My parents are desperate for the country club. For the image. But they know you don’t care about that. So, they’re offering something you do care about.”
Air leaves my lungs. “A bribe.”
“The Thompson Foundation has a six-figure grant,” he says quickly. “If we move the ceremony back to the club—just the venue—they will donate the entire fund to a legal aid program of your choice. He specifically mentioned Mrs. Delgado’s case, Harley. It could fund attorneys for dozens of families.”
I stare at him as bile rises in my throat. They’ve mapped my heart and found the one pressure point that would make me fold. They are using the lives of the people I protect to buy my submission.
“They’re using my clients to buy my wedding,” I whisper.
“It’s a trade,” Skyler counters. “One night in a ballroom for years of help for those families. Is it worth your pride if Mrs. Delgado gets her kids back?”
It’s a low blow, and a total Thompson move.
But before I can even attempt to go nuclear, he adds, “Besides, I’m being serious here. I want the wedding at the country club, too. I practically grew up there. Made my career at those booths. That’s why I’m pushing so hard. The gardens are nice, but the club would symbolically be my way of saying goodbye.”
This entire time he’s made it about his parents, defending them, but he never gave his own opinion.
“Fine,” I say, the word tasting like ash. “For the families. I’ll do it.” I’m still a little hesitant about what Sky actually wants, aside from appeasing his parents, so I’m not letting him off the hook yet.
Skyler sags with relief, but I lean forward, my eyes locking onto his.
“But hear me, Skyler. This is it. This is absolutely the last time I negotiate with your parents. I am taking this deal for the grant, but if there is a single more incident—one more ‘strategic move,’ one more ‘mandatory’ function I’m not invited to, one more person added to that guest list—I am gone. I will walk away from the club, the apartment, and you. Do you understand?”
Skyler blinks, the weight of my words finally registering. “Harley—”
“Do you understand?” I repeat, my voice trembling with the force of my resolve. “I’m done being leveraged.”
“I understand,” he says, his voice steady. “I promise, this is the last of it.”
But as he leads me back to the car, interlacing our fingers, I notice a flicker in his eyes. A shadow. I’ve made the deal to save my clients, but as the rain taps against the windshield, I can’t shake the feeling that he’s not telling me something.
Chapter 14
Harley
The following weeks have been silent on the Thompson front.
Elaine hasn’t called with a “minor adjustment” to the seating chart, and Robert has stopped side-eyeing me. This silence has been the greatest gift Skyler could give me. He’s been present by checking in on me between meetings and carving out long, one-on-one dinners where we don’t mention his parents once.
For the first time in weeks, the man I fell in love with has emerged from the corporate fog, giving me just enough hope to believe we might actually survive this.
And best of all, our wedding is tomorrow!
The country club has a specific scent. One of dusty mahogany polished to a mirror finish, mixed with the cloying sweetness of white lilies that have never known a day of actual dirt. It’s no botanical garden, that’s for sure.
Wire biting into my palms, I pull another string of fairy lights from the cardboard box. My hands are steady, which is a miracle considering I’m a ball of nerves.
“I’m just saying,” Lily says, her voice echoing against the vaulted ceiling. She’s perched on the top of a stepladder, her short, violet-streaked curls bouncing as she fights with a stubborn bolt of silk tulle. “For what Robert Thompson spent on his golf club membership this year, he could have hired a small army of professionals to do this. We could be at a bar right now, or a spa. Or literally anywhere that doesn’t involve me risking a neck injury for the sake of aesthetics.”
I glance at my sister. She’s wearing a tattered band tee and paint-stained leggings. She’s a glitch in the Thompson family’s Matrix, and I love her for it.
“He tried to,” I say, my voice flat. “Passively sent over a contract for some boutique firm that specializes in ‘stately affairs.’ It was eighteen pages long and included a clause about the color of the napkins matching the family crest.”
Lily snorts, nearly losing her balance. “The Thompson crest. Is it a giant thumb to represent how much they like to pressure people?”
“Lily,” Maria says, though there’s no real heat in it. My stepmom is across the room, meticulously arranging eucalyptus branches across the head table.
I continue, “But I never signed, and they never brought it up. I explained to Skyler that I want to put up the decorations to make sure it’s all to my liking. There will be no surprises tomorrow.”
