PART 2
By the time my business-class train arrived in Boston, the sky was a bruised, inky purple. The hotel receptionist handed me my keycard with a polite smile. “Mr. Scott’s team checked in three hours ago, Miss Clover.”
“Thank you,” I murmured, ascending to the fourteenth floor.
I had barely dropped my luggage when my phone began to ring. The caller ID flashed Daniel, Luke’s mother. I braced myself and answered.
“Clover,” Daniel’s voice was a sharp, grating bark, stripped of its usual manufactured warmth. “Camellia just called me in a panic. She said the wedding is canceled. You are supposed to be on a romantic business trip with my son. What on earth did Luke do now?”
Five years ago, Daniel had called me “dearest” and treated me like her own flesh and blood. I eventually learned her affection operated on a sliding scale, directly tied to how much financial or logistical utility I provided her family.
“Daniel,” I said, my tone completely devoid of emotion. “The wedding is canceled. That is correct.”
There was a heavy pause. When she spoke again, her volume had doubled. “Do not be impulsive! The ceremony is in eight weeks! Do you have any idea how much time and money we have invested in this?”
We? I had funded seventy percent of it. “That sounds like a logistical problem for you to sort out,” I replied, and hung up.
A sharp, rapid knocking hammered against my hotel room door. I peered through the peephole. Luke stood in the hallway, his face a mask of grim frustration. Trailing behind him, looking appropriately miserable, was Camellia.
“Clover, open this door,” Luke hissed through the thick wood. “Stop embarrassing me in front of my subordinates.”
I didn’t touch the deadbolt. From the train car to the hotel corridor, his primary concern was never the emotional devastation he had caused me; it was the preservation of his own ego. I picked up the room phone and dialed the front desk. “Yes, I have two individuals harassing me outside my door. Please send security to the fourteenth floor.”
The knocking ceased abruptly. Through the heavy wood, I heard Camellia begin to whimper. “Luke, it’s all my fault. I ruined your relationship.”
