11
Raph
Three Fridays later, Raph drove into Meadowfall again. He’d been chatting with Wyatt through text, visiting him and Hazel on the weekends.
It was early June, and the days were growing longer. The sky was still a bright blue when he pulled into his parents’ curving driveway. By the time he stepped out of the car, his grandmother was at the front door, her wrinkled face brightening when she saw him.
His stomach turned. He hadn’t wanted to see her.
At eighty-four, Elizabeth Fleming was the matriarch of the Fleming family. She swept down the grand staircase in her shimmering gown and seventy rings, her white hair coiffed atop her head. Raph shut his car door, locked it, and tried to smile. It probably showed as a grimace.
“Raphael,” Grandma said, smiling down her pointed nose at him. She was short. But he always felt like he was ten years old again, in front of her. “How have you been?”
Not like he hadn’t just seen her at the office in Highton.
“Fine, thanks. What about you?” Raph strode up the driveway and stairs, to cut short the time he had to walk with her. The sooner he got to his parents, the better.
“Very well, thank you. Your supervisor has informed me of your excellent work,” Grandma said, her eyes gleaming, her painted lips wrinkled. Her rings glittered like a mummy’s cursed treasure. She held out her hand as he approached; Raph was forced to accept it, accompany her up the stairs so she didn’t fall. Her bony fingers dug into his palm.
All he could think about was the way she’d looked years ago, back when he’d kissed Wyatt in the piano room. She’d shrieked, and sworn at Wyatt, cursing him to hell and back. Raph had tried to step between them. It didn’t undo the years of hurt she’d laid into Wyatt, the whispers that Wyatt wasn’t good enough, that he was an embarrassment to the Fleming family.
Wyatt had fled. And Grandma had smiled like she’d intended it all along.
Raph swallowed the bile in his throat, walking her through the wide front doors. He’d thrown fits at her when he was younger. But his parents had pleaded for him to stop, and he’d backed down in his fury.
Grandma owned the mansion. When Raph’s biological mom had died of cancer, Dad and Raph had moved in with Grandma, riddled with debt. They hadn’t much say, back then. Raph had grown up learning to yield to Grandma’s word—one wrong move, and he and Dad would be homeless.
It had been stifling. When Dad married a second wife, Raph had perked up. He suddenly had two new siblings—Wyatt and Penny—people he could spend time with, aside from Grandma. Grandma had taken an immediate liking to Penny. Not so much with Wyatt. So Raph had liked Wyatt right away, in quiet rebellion against his Grandma.
“...told the gardener I wanted two rows of lavender by the driveway,” Grandma said. “The neighbors have mentioned how stunning it looks.”
Raph nodded. Had Mom and Dad saved enough to afford their own home? He didn’t know. And so he couldn’t risk getting them thrown out, by telling Grandma about him and Wyatt.
Would be nice to be out of debt, for once.
“You smell different,” Grandma said as they crossed the great hall, with its thick brocade rugs and ancient chaises. She narrowed her eyes, sniffing. Raph’s heart thudded. “That scent is... atrocious.”
And Raph knew she’d detected the traces of Wyatt’s scent, the magnolia that had stayed when he’d kissed Wyatt’s scent gland last week.
He shrugged, keeping his expression nonchalant. “I met someone new.”
“Oh?” Grandma fixed her gaze on him, piercing and judgmental. And Raph smiled like he did with the stubborn people he managed at work, hoping they’d remove themselves from his personal space. Grandma gripped his hand. “I hope it isn’t anyone unsavory, Raphael.”
“It’s someone very savory,” he said. And Wyatt was, too, with that impish smile of his when he’d kissed Raph goodbye at his apartment.
Grandma huffed, satisfied for now.
They stepped into the dining room, where Raph’s parents sat on one side of the sprawling dining table. Mom and Dad smiled. Raph breathed in deep. He was with his parents now. He didn’t have to answer to only Grandma.
On the opposite side of the table, Penny waved, grinning. She raised her eyebrows, shook her phone. The charity event. Raph winced; he hadn’t given her a reply yet.
“Raph,” Tanya Fleming said, standing. She had Wyatt’s blond hair, too—Raph had always noticed that. Tanya might not have been his biological mom, but after twenty-four years, Raph saw her as his own mother—different from his first mom, but no less important.
Tanya glanced warily at Grandma, then kissed Raph on the cheek. “Doing okay?”
“Fine,” he said, shrugging. Maybe in the future, he’d talk to her about Wyatt. Not right now, though. Not in front of Grandma.
With his other hand still in Grandma’s grip, Raph hugged his mom, breathing in her familiar chrysanthemum scent. It was nothing like Grandma’s sharp lemon scent, and Raph held on to his mom for a little longer, wishing he could ask what she thought about his brother. About their baby.
When they pulled away, Mom raised her eyebrows. “Have you seen W—”
“Briefly,” Raph said, his heart kicking. She’d have followed it up with You smell like him, and he didn’t need anyone else’s attention on that. “I’ve been busy with work. Have you heard about the ATM scandals in Highton? I’ve been working with my managers to reassure our clients. It doesn’t directly affect Alpha Associates, of course, but I just wanted you to know.”
Mom’s face lit up. And Grandma began to frown.
So Raph said, “My marketing team proposed a couple of promising campaigns, Grandma—it’ll help expand Alpha Associates into the Midwest. We could potentially see a twenty-percent growth in the region. I’ll pass along the details on Monday.”
Grandma cracked a smile, and Raph relaxed.
No one knew about Wyatt. After all these years, everyone
