“I don’t care about your apology,” he said. “Your words mean nothing to me. No, I want my watch back.”
He pointed to my wrist. Out of habit, I had put the old watch on. I clutched my wrist and smiled at him. “This old thing? But it was a present from you to me.”
“No it wasn’t!” Chad bellowed. “That is my watch.”
My father advanced on me, but I stood my ground.
“This is my watch, and I am going to auction it off at Christie’s,” he sputtered. “I loaned it to you. Now I want it back.”
“You gave it to me; there are witnesses and evidence that it was a gift from you. If you touch me, I will pepper spray you,” I warned, reaching into my purse.
“If you leave with that watch, you can forget about ever being part of this family again,” my father hissed.
I slung my purse over my shoulder and said, “Honestly, that sounds like the best proposal I’ve gotten all year. You all have treated me like garbage from the moment you knew I existed. I tried over and over again to be a good daughter and a loving sister, but you never gave me a chance. You just wanted to punish me for what my mother did.”
I glared at my father. “For years, you refused to treat me as well as Cassie; you gave her money, free college, not one but two homes, and you patted yourselves on the back when you humiliated me by giving me the scraps, so sure that you’d been punishing me and making me pay for what my mother did. Well, guess what. It didn’t work. I got something better than what Cassie did. I have independence, and I know how to survive on my own. I don’t need you, Dad, or any of you in my life.”
* * *
I felt sofree when I walked out of Cassie’s building. “Man, I really stuck it to them!” I crowed. “Blade is going to flip out when I tell him!”
Fuck.For a second, I had forgotten that I was not going to return home to him. I was never again going to see the delighted expression on his face when I walked through the door. He was never going to scoop me up in his arms and listen intently as I told him about my day.
“You don’t need him,” I chastised myself. “You have your independence right here.” I tapped the watch. “With all that money, Blade is no longer necessary.”
Except that I missed him.
“You need to focus.” The watch was my ticket to the West Coast and a brand-new life—one that was free from fake boyfriends, fiancés, and husbands. But where did one pawn an expensive one-of-a-kind watch? What had my father said? He was going to take it to Christie’s, right? Then that was where I was going.
After a short subway ride to Rockefeller Plaza, I stood in the posh lobby of Christie’s auction house. I fiddled with the watch as I waited for the receptionist to finish her phone call.
“Do you have an appointment?” she asked.
“Er, no,” I admitted, feeling very self-conscious in my water-stained clothes. I hadn’t bothered changing from my night of dress washing. My hair was still wrapped up in a colorful kerchief. “I just wanted to auction this off.” I stuck my wrist out at her.
She raised a perfectly sculpted eyebrow. I resisted the urge to touch my own ragged ones.
The receptionist politely looked at my watch then back at me. A knowing look came across her face. “You’re Avery with the famous watch.”
Geez! Did everyone in Manhattan know about my fake wedding disaster? Maybe I needed to move to Australia and put a whole ocean between me and my humiliation.
“Several of our executives are anxious to get in touch with you.” She typed on the keyboard. “Mr. Hollande will see you right now. He’s just finishing a meeting, but if you could wait in the conference room, I’ll bring some refreshments.” She gestured to a hallway on my right.
I wandered into the back. The walls were paneled in wood that glowed under soft lighting. I didn’t find a conference room, but I did see a sign on a door that said Hollande. I was trying to figure out if I should keep wandering or wait when his door opened.
“Oh, and here must be my next meeting,” a jovial man’s voice said. I scooted out of the way to let a well-dressed late-middle-aged couple pass.
They exclaimed, “Avery?”
I glanced up. “Hi, Mr. and Mrs. Schultz.”
We stared at each other for a second. Mr. Hollande hovered in the doorway.
“I’m really sorry for everything,” I blurted. “I never intended it to happen this way. It was all my idea. Blade had nothing to do with it.”
Neither seemed all that convinced. “He admitted to being in on your little scheme.”
I tugged at my hair. “My whole life is built on lies,” I said with a sad laugh. “This disaster was karma. Blade was caught in the crossfire.” I shrugged. “Still paying for my mother’s mistakes, I suppose. Please don’t blame Blade.”
