Page 69 of The Enemy

My father sounded defeated as he asked me that question, which I had asked myself a thousand times.

“Mom died.” I shrugged.

My father sat down with his hands clasped and his shoulders slumped. “I’m sorry for marrying Pricilla… I should have picked someone else.”

His apology surprised me, but his last statement wasn’t shocking since I figured he didn’t marry Pricilla for love. I remembered the way my father used to be with my mother. He loved her—maybe not enough to stand up to my grandfather, but he did adore my mother. However, his behavior with Pricilla had been colder, and lately, it seemed he’d had trouble tolerating her.

“Why her?” I asked. If he didn’t want to talk about my fuckup just yet, I guess this would do. We had years of anger between us—well, at least I did. “Mom was amazing, and Pricilla is a fucking bitch.”

Wow, that felt good to say aloud.

My father’s lip twitched.

“I know, and I’m sorry I put you through that.”

My throat constricted at his words. My emotions were still too raw and all over the place.

“D-don’t,” I hissed. “Don’t apologize for something you not only did to me, but to Mom too. You’ve always let everyone walk all over us.”

My father winced at my words.

I blinked away tears.

With nothing left to lose, I guess I had finally found the strength to tell him how I really felt.

“I deserved that,” he sighed. “You might not think much of me, but I loved your mother. I almost left it all for her.”

This surprised me. There was no need to ask questions since my father kept going.

“Gerald wasn’t happy that I wasn’t marrying the woman he found suitable for me. Since I was his only heir, he had to bend to my wishes unless he wanted a distant cousin to inherit everything.”

I snorted.

“Yet he never shut up about how you could have done better.

“Your mother was wiser than you and me. She played the long game. And she never cared for my father’s opinion of her. She knew her worth and always said he was beneath her for adhering to such petty views… I loved that about her. The way she didn’t let anyone’s opinion get to her.” A bittersweet smile graced his lips. “She was happy, Lou. She didn’t care about any of the bullshit anyone said…besides, she loved spending the Riviere money on good causes and then bragging to your grandfather about it.”

That did sound like my mother.

“Then why marry Pricilla at all?”

“How did you put it? She’s a fucking bitch?”

All I could do was let him carry on.

“Your grandfather is old-school. He wasn’t going to give me the company unless I remarried. Family values are important to the company’s image, and they were tied into my inheritance…into my legacy… It would affect you.”

Leave it to Grandfather to be an asshole by all accounts.

“Pricilla is cunning, and I knew she would have enough motivation to work your grandfather into changing things in hiswill that I could later exploit and make it easier to give you control… You’re my legacy, Lou… You’re all I have left.”

My father’s voice broke at that last part. Now that I looked at him, he seemed like he hadn’t slept in weeks. I hadn’t allowed myself to pay much attention to my father in the last few years. It’s like I suddenly noticed that he wasn’t eternal, and he had aged in the time I let the anger blind me.

“And I fucked that up, didn’t I?” I whispered. My anger was still there, but I was also beginning to understand him. “A-are y-you mad a-at me?”

God, I sounded stupid. Of course he was mad. I had kept it together long enough that, at this moment, I broke. I cried. I let go of all the things I had been holding in for years, telling myself I was being strong.

“Oh, Lulu.”

---