Page 8 of Now & Forever
Chapter 3
Gwen
The day was clear and beautiful for mid-winter, but Gwen couldn’t bring herself to enjoy it. Not even when she popped out of her taxi and inhaled the fresh air blowing in from a community garden on the other side of the street. She cinched her winter coat closer to her body and entered the unmarked building closely guarded by security personnel posing as uniformed doormen.
Everything about this building, from its high-security apartments and office suites, to its rooftop clubs and restaurants, had been unknown to Gwen before she met James. Back then, she was a poverty-line bartender scraping by with roommates and nothing but a GED in her back pocket. She passed this building every day, assuming it was boring offices for lawyers and rent-controlled apartments. Without a fancy name slapped on the side or ornate architecture to attract the eye, she never had a reason to believe some of the city’s richest and most influential either lived in this building or conducted their social lives within its confines.
Gwen had been here innumerable times over the past seven years. Now, she didn’t think twice about saying hello to security and nodding her head to the well-dressed receptionist rising from his high-tech desk with a practiced smile they still taught at finishing schools around the city. She relayed the name of the café she had reservations at and was permitted into the guarded elevator on the other side of the lobby. The elevator attendant tipped his hat and pressed a polite finger against the number for the top floor.
It didn’t take me long to get used to this, did it?The café was members only, but Gwen had been invited within two years of publicly dating James. That was two years of proving herself as a well-mannered lady – and a good-time friend to the heiresses who found her refreshing and charming. Some women, like Jasmine Cole, struggled to fit in with the raucous group that ran the city from behind the scenes, but Gwen was a natural when it came to socializing and buttering people up. How else did she get good enough at bartending to work at a place James would soon frequent after college? The man didn’t mind getting down and dirty with commoners, but he didn’t exactly hang out at Pat’s Pizzeria and Tavern on Friday nights.
It also helped that James’s closest friends tended to be more easygoing heirs and businessmen who didn’t care about Gwen’s pedigree as long as she could take a joke and dish them back. Which was why it was only natural that she would become somewhat close with heiress Kathryn Alison, the girlfriend of James’s best friend, Ian Mathers.
Kathryn rose from their table as soon as she saw Gwen emerge from the elevator and pass the maître d’s podium. They exchanged kisses to the cheeks and sat down in time for the waiter to approach. Gwen knew exactly what she wanted before she sat down.
“I hear the oysters are to die for this season.” Kathryn handed the one-page menu back to the waiter before refocusing her attention on Gwen. “And the goose, but I’m trying to cut back on my meat consumption. Again.”
She said that with a sigh. Gwen couldn’t help but reply, “I had plenty of goose to last me a lifetime yesterday at Albert’s birthday dinner.”
“Oh, yikes.”
“Tell me about it. If Charlotte and her father hadn’t come to hog some of the conversation, I might’ve jumped out the window.”
“How is she these days? I haven’t seen her in ages.”
“Who, Charlotte?” Gwen shrugged. “She was hopping around Europe for most of twenty-seventeen. Don’t think she got back until last month. You could tell, too. She’s so jetlagged.”
“Jetlagged and boozed up is probably the only way to get through Albert Merange’s birthday dinner.”
Gwen almost choked on her ice water. “You havenoooidea.”
“Go on. Spill. What is that bastard doing to ruin your life now?”
Nobody was more in-the-know on the drama than Kathryn and Ian, who were not only close to Gwen and James, but doubtlessly spent hours gossiping about the knowledge they had and the general, socially elite public didn’t. Everyone by now knew that something shady had gone down to create Patrick Merange – although there were many who refused to believe that James hadn’t cheated and Gwen needed to pack her bags – but only those closest to the family knew exactly what had transpired to irreparably damage familial bonds.
“Jesus.” Kathryn held up her cocktail and shook her head. “That man has got to be one of the biggest narcissists around, and that says so much. No wonder he and Sarah Welsh were meant to be together. She’s the second biggest narcissist in town.”
Gwen let out an unladylike laugh that made her the target of everyone else’s glares.Piss off, princesses.Most of the lunch crowd was made up of matriarchs and their heiress daughters. If someone wasn’t drunk right now, they could still be called a functioning alcoholic outside of the café.Some are better at hiding it than others.There was a reason the menu there was so short – most of the patrons drank their lunches.
Gwen didn’t give a fuck if some half-high heiress found her uncouth. Nor did she care if some businessman’s trophy wife stuck up her nose at Gwen’s presence. Most of them didn’t have any room to talk. Gwen knew how to blend in. Sometimes, though, she didn’t give a shit!
“How are you and James doing?”
Questions like that were what made half the women in the room functioning alcoholics. Gwen certainly wished she had ordered something stronger than iced tea.
“We’re notdoinganything.” Sighing, Gwen sat back in her seat, legs properly crossed and handkerchief laying across her lap.
“Still? Damn. Thought that maybe after a year…”
“When your trust in someone is that damaged, it’s difficult to recover.”
“Even when you find out the truth so quickly?”
“It’s not only about James…” Gwen didn’t know how to explain it. Any anger she felt toward James didn’t have to do withhim,per se. He was innocent in this, and many women would say it was admirable that he was so adamant about being a father to a boy. “It’s his family. I don’t trust them.”
“Ahh, yes. The Meranges are… ruthless.”
“I know, but they’re not as ruthless as the Welshes, and I’m mixed up with them, too.”
