“Mum is still upstairs?”
“Yeah, she hasn’t come down yet.”
“Thanks.”
I took the private elevator all the way to the top floor, like I had done a thousand times, but none of those thousand times mattered like this time. I saw my mum in her office, no doubt grilling an assistant for having sent the wrong thing to somewhere. God help him. The bloke stared like he’d been through war, and his face was really red from the embarrassment. When he left, I knocked at her door as I leaned on the jamb. “I see nothing ever changes. How many assistants have you got this year?”
“He’s tougher than he looks. He’ll last.”
“If you say so. How is it, Mum?”
“As happy as I am to see you, Owen, I’m a bit surprised. It’s Friday, and surely you’re not here to see Tanith. Don’t you have something planned to get up to with your mates?”
I clenched my jaw, determined not to rise to the bait. “No. I’m here for you.”
“Right. Oh, how did your paper go, by the way?”
I rolled my eyes. “Mum, school isn’t the concern. It went well, though. I got an A, as expected.”
She nodded her satisfaction, mirroring my same expectation. Not out of any real concern or curiosity.
“Mum, actually, I’m hoping to make this quick, but can we talk about Tanith?”
Her brows furrowed. “You’re not really going to do this thing, are you, Owen?”
“Actually, I am.”
“You should have told me you were seeing her. It was very embarrassing for me not to know my son was dallying with my intern.”
“What makes you think I was dallying, Mum?”
She chuckled. “Please, you’re my son. I know you better than anyone else. Besides, what I saw was clear enough reason for me to do what I did. Not like you’re serious about some intern of mine. Where did you even find her?”
“Mum, we go to school together.”
“Yes, but she doesn’t seem to be the kind of girl that you’d be interested in. She needs this internship, love. She’s a scholarship kid. You can’t possibly run in the same circles. Not to mention she’s had a . . . different set of experiences. She might find it difficult to keep up with you and your friends.”
I clamped my jaw down and then took a deep breath. “For your information, she’s kicking my ass in all of our classes.”
She pursed her lips then. “I know. She’s very bright. I can see that. But I’m not going to tolerate you wasting precious time and getting serious with a girl like that. She’s hardly even your type.”
“And what is my type, Mum, since you know me so well?”
She laughed. “Oh, love, if we have to do this, all right. Fine.” She sat back. “You like someone with a bit of flair, a little bit dirty, and someone disposable, because God forbid you have to get complicated and actually get emotions involved. You need your social equal who understands that sometimes you will be aloof and cold, and it’s her job to pick up the slack. Tanith Bradford is not that. She’ll demand more from you.”
I wasn’t sure what was more shocking, the fact that she understood me so well, or that she decided Tanith wasn’t a possibility for me. “Yes, you’re right. I picked disposable girls for a reason. And that’s a bad thing, Mum. I feel so much with her. Every single day, I’m being challenged to actually express myself and not keep everything so tightly controlled.” I was pouring it all out. But it was what I needed to do if I wanted Tanith back.
She chuckled. “Oh, please. That’s enough. You’re not seeing her anymore. She’s far too bright to get caught up in that because you will dispose of her.”
“Mum, please, that’s enough. I need you to hear me out. You—you messed up with your ultimatum. You shouldn’t have pushed it in the first place. Making her choose like that will never get you what you want. She will leave, and she will never come back, even though you are grooming her to be a Preston. Because while she will be grateful, she will never forget that you told her she wasn’t good enough for your son.”
Her brows lifted. “That is hardly what I told her. What I told her was—”
“Yes, I know what you told her. But you and I both know that you’ve been very controlling with my life. Since I was a child, I had to have just the right friends, go to just the right schools, do just the right things, because God help you if I turned out like Felix. But what you can’t see is that Felix just has to find his own way, and you fucked him up so bad by not teaching him how to do that. What you can’t see is that my control makes me a block of ice. It means that I will never have any meaningful relationships, and that’s even worse. At least Felix feels something and has a sense of who he is. You messed up because Tanith will leave, and so will I. I’ve only ever wanted to be a Preston. But seeing that all you want to do is keep me the way that I am and not have me grow makes me realize that I need to be somewhere else.”
Her eyes went wide. “You would do this? You would throw away your whole future?”
“I’m not throwing it away. I’m growing. I’d rather grow here at Preston, but it doesn’t have to be here. That’s up to you. You’re either done interfering with my life, or I walk. And that includes Tanith, if I can even win her back, because I cocked it up. That wasn’t all you. It was half me. So, I need to resolve that.”
My mother pushed to her feet. “Owen, understand what you’re saying here.”
I gave her that smile. The cold one that said I really gave no fucks what someone thought. “You know, Mum, I’ve had a
