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One bite of a warm piece of crusted bread piled with brie and I couldn’t for the life of me think of why I shouldn’t enjoy myself. "So back to your mom. What were you saying about her being different?"
He scrubbed his hands over his face, the tension creeping back into his shoulders. "Yeah, she obviously seems better. But we’ve been here before. When I first got her away from Dad, she was better for a while then, too."
Gently, I prodded him for more. "What's going on? She's just like a completely different person. She didn't remember meeting, which I think is probably normal considering the state she was in that night. But the woman I met today was lucid and clearheaded."
He eased himself back on the pillow. And just seeing him there, sprawling his big body out, legs kicked up in front of him, made me imagine him sprawled out in my bed.. "I'm not sure what to make of that just yet."
"Come on, Atticus. I'm here with you in the Winston Isles in a crazy situation. The least you can do is tell me what's going on."
"Honestly, I don't really know," he said, shaking his head. He’d just gotten what he wanted, me married to him, but he looked exhausted. “I don’t like being in this position. I’m not used to being on the fucking back foot. But for two months I’ve been off kilter. Nothing I know to be true seems true anymore.”
I stretched out on the pillows next to him. “Start with what you know.”
He sighed. "It’s a long story."
"I think someone told me that we have several days to ourselves on a very remote island, so start talking."
"Okay, my parents weren't exactly a love match,” he began.
"I gathered," I muttered under my breath.
"Their marriage was very typical New York social scene. My maternal grandfather was the one with the money. Dad's family also had a recognizable name, but they were not as wealthy as Mom’s. Dad eventually went to work for my grandfather, and since my mother didn't want any part of the business, my grandfather groomed my dad to take over with the caveat that he was warming the seat for me."
"Oh," I whispered.
"Yeah, oh. Warming the seat for an heir, whoever that was. But upon their marriage, grandfather gave the majority of the shares to my mother. My father's voting shares with the board were only substantial enough to be a problem if he and my mother voted together. Together, they could make all the decisions. And either my mother didn't want to vote for herself, or my father wouldn't allow her to. He took over her voting shares.”
“He just took over?”
“I think he made it seem like it was easier since she didn’t care about the business. And while my grandfather was alive, that was fine. But upon his death, the rest of his voting shares went to my mother unless they had a child. Which they did. Me. My shares were held in proxy by my mother. Dad was in control by then. He already voted my mother's shares, so she just let him vote mine as well.”
“That’s a lot of power.”
“It is. And Dad was cruel, and controlling, and had numerous affairs. You name it, he did it. My mother started saying that she wanted a more active role in the business while I was off at school. She wanted to be able to really hand off her father's legacy. She started attending all the shareholder meetings, and Mom is smart. Really smart."
"I don't doubt it." I gave him an encouraging smile.
"Then she started to have these periods where she'd become so ill she couldn't get out of bed, you know? It wasn't depression exactly, but the doctors couldn't really figure out what was wrong with her. And then Granddad died. Just plain old heart failure."
"I'm so sorry. I get the impression you two were close?"
He nodded absently. "Yeah. And he insisted that I be a kid, you know? They had this house in Montauk. We had a bigger, more ostentatious one in the Hamptons, but my mother always took me to Montauk to get a more normal summer experience. Granddad taught me to fish there when I was little."
"Fishing? Interesting. Can’t really imagine you fishing, but all right."
"It's actually really relaxing. There's nothing to do but sit there and wait. It's a good meditation practice."
"Why, Atticus Price, you are surprising me left and right. First I find out you fish, then I find out you're into meditative practices?"
He flashed me a grin. "Tell no one."
My heart skittered in my chest. I had to get myself under control. I still didn't know where I stood with him or how I felt about him.I couldn't just lose it every time he smiled at me.
He continued. "Anyway, mom started to deteriorate. She just got worse and worse. Then there was the night of the accident."
"What kind of an accident?" I asked.
"Brian Riley was one of my granddad’s personal lawyers.He and dad didn't see eye to eye on anything. From what I can gather, he was in love with my mother."
