Page 59 of Strict Confidence (Rochester Trilogy 2)
“Bad luck for you.”
He slings his arm around my head, pulling me in for a kiss on the cheek. “No, babe. It’s good luck for me, shit luck for you, but the world has never played fair, has it?”
There’s shouting around us as people argue about where they can stop their car. There’s a jam of vehicles, a mixture of people picking up their loved ones and Uber drivers. A couple of traffic cops wearing bright orange vests wave people angrily to move on.
There are “no stopping” signs posted everywhere, though how people will pick up passengers without stopping, I don’t know.
It’s a broken system.
I remember Noah saying something to me once. If the only punishment is a fine, then the rule only exists for poor people. I shrugged at the time, but now I understand better, now that I’ve lived under Beau Rochester’s roof for six months.
He would have ignored the signs about stopping. They probably wouldn’t ticket a Porsche SUV, but if they did, losing a few hundred dollars means nothing to him.
They would, however, fine a scratched-up old truck.
I could pay the fine with the money Basset Agency deposited into my bank account this morning. I stared at it for a solid five minutes before I could move. I’ve never seen that many commas in my balance. He paid the full amount even though I didn’t work the entire year under the terms of the contract. It doesn’t make me feel any better. If anything, I feel worse.
The money feels dirty now.
“Let’s go,” I say, linking my arm in Noah’s.
We need to move along. I need to move along, too. Get over Beau Rochester. Forget about Paige. I won’t ever see Kitten again, either.
Tears roll down my cheeks.
The smell of exhaust floods my mouth. I’m not sure it’s possible for me to move on. We climb in and slam the doors shut, but the shouting continues. Someone in a BMW is arguing with someone in a Ford. They are both waving their hands wildly.
Noah turns the key. The truck rumbles to life. We drive past them and ease into the flow of traffic, entering the heart of Houston, but my soul is still in Maine.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Beau Rochester
The minute Jane’s car pulls away, Paige goes silent.
Her face turns red. She stands at the sidewalk, watching the taillights until it turns out of sight. Her shoulders sag. Her teeth click together, but her chin doesn’t wobble. All the color drains from her face except two red splotches high on her cheeks.
She stands there, staring at the empty turn of the road.
“Paige, it’s time to go inside.”
She ignores me.
I ask her. I coax her. I command her. None of it works.
She stands there like an angry, grieving statue. At first I attempt to talk her down. When that doesn’t work I sit on the steps of the front porch. If she needs time, I’ll give her time.
Fifteen minutes turns into thirty.
Thirty minutes turns into forty five.
At an hour I consider picking her up bodily and putting her inside the house. I’ve never put my hands on her in anger, and I don’t feel angry now, only a deep concern for her well being. I know what’s happening isn’t good. It isn’t right, but I also don’t know the best way to handle it. What if she needs this time to process?
Technically she isn’t harming herself.
It’s a beautiful windy day. Seagulls call from the ocean. There’s a shout of someone on the beach. The faint rumble of the ocean underlies all of it.
An hour and twenty minutes. That’s how long it takes Paige to break.
She does get her stubbornness from the Rochester side of the family, after all.
She whirls to face me, her hands balled into fists at her side. “She said she wasn’t leaving. She promised, she promised, she promised.”
She levels the accusation at me, and she’s right to do it. I’m the one who made this happen. I’m the one who made Jane leave. “Sometimes plans have to change, sweetheart.”
Her blue eyes stay on mine as she processes what I’ve said.
My head pounds. I’m not sure what started the headache in the first place. Paige’s screaming this morning? Or did it begin yesterday, when we were waiting for Joe Causey to show up to the inn? Or did it start well before that, when I was pinned under a collapsed beam in my own house, looking into Jane’s eyes and pleading with her to live?
I have no goddamn idea. I’ve lost track.
“She said she wasn’t leaving?” Now it’s more of a question.
I didn’t think my heart could be reduced to more ash. I was wrong. And now I’m wishing Jane was here. She’d know what to say to Paige, whose distress comes off her in waves.
The sight of her brokenhearted and wailing is bad enough.
