Page 8 of Hide and Seek
“Don’t even think about it,” I warn her. “Mom is still salty about the time you offered to give him a handy under the table at the Christmas party. Trust me, you showing up tonight isn’t going to do me any favors.”
“It’s not you I’m looking to do favors for,” she tells me, a wide smirk cutting across her lips.
“I don’t know if I’ve told you this lately, but you’re gross. I need to bathe in a sea of bleach after hanging out with you.”
“Says the bitch who spends her nights talking to dead people and playing with intestines,” she laughs.
I go to argue back, but the words get caught in my throat. She’s got one hell of a point, and there’s not a damn thing I can say to defend myself right now. I do speak to dead people, and I have been known to spend hours at a time playing with intestines. However, my idea ofplayingmost certainly differs from Izzy’s.
All I can do is grin back at her, and not a moment later, we dive back into getting ready. Izzy works on brushing my hair while I prep my skin for makeup. Then soon enough, I’m standing back in front of my full-length mirror, gazing at the woman staring back at me.
I’m not the type to fawn over myself, but fuck. I look hot.
I like what I see, and more than that, I look successful. I look like a woman who’s been looked over and disregarded too many times, and now she’s ready to grab the world by the balls and make it her bitch.
4
HARPER-RAYN
Okay, so leaving my car at work when I have to trek out to my mother’s fancy gated community probably wasn’t my brightest idea. But in my defense, running away from it like a mad woman was a necessity at the time. Right now though, I’m definitely starting to regret it.
Mom lives with Elias in their big, shiny mansion thirty minutes from the city. They’ve spent the last eighteen months renovating, and the amount of money Elias dumped into this place to make Mom happy is absurd. I suppose when you have that kind of disposable income, a home renovation is a blip on the radar, and how can you put a price tag on keeping your new wife happy?
My Uber pulls up at the main entrance of the gated community, and I lean out the back window to enter my code. The little light flashes green and the gates slowly begin to peelopen as I laugh to myself. I’d almost expected the code not to work.
The Uber driver hits the gas, and we sail through the main entrance of the gated community, and I find myself staring out the window. This area never ceases to amaze me. Don’t get me wrong, just because I’m not frothing at the mouth at my mother’s conquests doesn’t mean I’m unfazed by it all.
All of these properties are incredible, and I rarely get to see them at night. During the day, they’re just massive homes, hidden behind manicured hedges and elaborate gates, but at night, they’re lit up like the Fourth of July. Lighting is built into the landscaping and architecture, and it’s absolutely flawless. It takes my breath away, and while I’ll never be the girl who strives to own something like this, I will always appreciate its beauty.
My driver pulls up at my mother’s home, and as he parks against the curb, dread settles heavily in the pit of my stomach. I would prefer to cover myself in peanut butter and wander into the woods with the bears than to set foot inside this property, but the consequences of not showing my face far outweigh the consequences of being mauled by a hungry bear.
On second thought, maybe not. Either way, I’ll still be mauled by a rabid animal.
After thanking my driver, I step out onto the sidewalk and grimace as I stare up at my mother’s elaborate property. There’s no denying it’s incredible. It’s just like all the others within this community. The only difference between this home and the others is that behind the beautiful double doors is a monster wearing Manolo Blahnik heels and a venomous smile. She’s poised and ready to strike the moment I enter. In fact, I can’t remember a time when she hasn’t belittled me, looked down on me, or spoken to me as if my accomplishments were trivial.
Here’s hoping that my outfit tonight might temporarily disarm her.
Ha! What a joke.
Approaching the gate at the bottom of their long driveway, I’m momentarily surprised to see they have security marking off names. I hadn’t expected them to go to such extremes for something as trivial as a dinner party for their wedding anniversary. It’s not as though they’ve invited royalty, just their snobby elitist friends, colleagues, and then of course, family as an afterthought.
A man in a black suit steps forward, holding a tablet. “Name,” he murmurs, looking bored.
“Harper-Rayn Madden.”
He nods in acknowledgment before dropping his gaze to the tablet, and I watch in astonishment as his finger scrolls through a long list. Any moment, he’ll find my name and give me the go-ahead, but as the seconds tick by, I start to wonder if my mother even remembered to add my name to the guest list.
A few more seconds pass, and I’m starting to get offended at this point. I mean, shit. How far down the list did she put me?
“Ahh, here you are,” the security guard says a moment later. “Go on through, Miss Madden.”
“Gee, thanks,” I murmur.
Slapping on a fake smile while mentally preparing my body armor, I put one foot in front of the other and head up the long driveway. I feel as though I’ve run a marathon by the time I reach the front door, only as I go to knock, I find myself hesitating. I could still make a break for it.
A swan dive into a forward roll across the lawn, which would turn into a commando crawl beneath the prickly hedges. That certainly sounds better than walking through this door. But would it really be worth the hell I’d pay for not showing up?
Not even close.
