Why did I have to be such a good friend and tell her the truth? I should have just lied.
I can still lie to her now. Then again, I feel bad enough lying to Dax.
I grab the white and gold ornament hanging from the garland on the mantel and toss it inside the box at my feet.
“I was going to, okay?”
“You said that the first time,” Emily says.
I say nothing as I reach for a red bow.
Emily sighs. “What happened?”
“I really was going to,” I answer as I put the bow in the box. “I had my lines rehearsed and all for when I came face to face with him.”
“But?”
“But this woman came.”
“Woman?”
I grab another bow, but this time, instead of tossing it in the box, I fidget with it as I sit on a chair.
“She’s… something like Dax’s stepmother. She’s his father’s lover.”
“Okay.” Emily sits in the chair in front of me.
“But she seems to have a thing for him.”
Emily’s eyebrows furrow. “Okay.”
“Anyway, she wasn’t nice. She said some mean things and Dax defended me. Dax said that unlike her, I was honorable and smart.”
“You are honorable and smart,” Emily tells me. “Just because you failed to graduate from college, which let me remind you wasn’t any of your fault, doesn’t mean you’re dumb. You’re the smartest person I know.”
I know that.
“And as for honorable, I know you’re always trying to do the right thing. Look at what you’re doing for Shanna and your father.”
I know that, too. What I wasn’t aware of was how highly Dax thought of me.
“He said I was flawless.”
“Well, no one’s flawless, sweetheart. Even diamonds have flaws.”
True, which is why that isn’t what bothered me.
“Was that all?” Emily asks.
I draw a breath. “The woman, Chloe. Like I said, she had a thing for Dax.”
Emily’s shoulders bunch up. “So? Have you seen how your boyfriend looks? I bet a lot of women who see him get a thing for him.”
Surely she’s not saying she has a thing for Dax, too?
“But that doesn’t matter. What matters is how he feels, and it seems there’s only one woman he cares about – you. Or were you scared he’d stop caring and choose Chloe if he found out you weren’t what he thought you were?”
“No,” I answer. “I don’t think he’ll ever be with Chloe.”
Because Chloe is his father’s lover.
“So what’s the problem?”
“What I’m saying is that Chloe doesn’t like Dax’s father. She’s just sleeping with him for money.”
“Ho.”
“Because she has a niece who’s sick.”
“Oh.”
“I have a niece, too,” I glance at the crib in the corner where Shanna is sleeping. “If I quit my job and move in with Dax with Shanna and with my father…”
“You’re afraid you’ll be just like Chloe,” Emily says.
I say nothing.
“But you won’t be,” Emily tells me as she reaches for my hand. “You love Dax, and if he loves you, he’ll be happy to take care of you and everyone you love.”
“But it will still look like I’m squeezing money out of him.”
Emily gives me a puzzled look. “To who?”
“To the world. Dax is a CEO and he’s trying to make it big, like really big. The world has its eyes on him, and if I’m with him, it will have its eyes on me, too.”
She shrugs. “Who cares what they think?”
I do.
“Do you really think Dax will care?”
“He’ll feel hurt if people start saying he’s just like his father,” I answer.
Emily puts up her hand. “Wait a second. I thought we were talking about you telling Dax the truth, not you moving in with him.”
“If I tell him the truth, he might ask me to move in with him,” I say.
“That’s what you’re worried about?” Emily’s eyebrows crease. “I thought you were worried that he’d break up with you if you told him the truth.”
“There’s still that.”
“Are you saying that if you tell him the truth, nothing good will come of it?”
I shrug.
Emily lets out a sigh and places a hand on my shoulder. “Jenna, even if you don’t tell Dax, he will find out eventually. He’s wealthy and powerful. I’m sure he could even find out your blood type if he wanted to. He could have found out already but he hasn’t because he trusts you. But like you said, he’s in the public eye. What if a reporter finds out about you and tells him? Do you really think he wants to find out that way? That he deserves to find out that way?”
Again, Emily’s right, of course. I grip my hair.
“Maybe I should just break up with him.”
“Jenna!” Emily scolds me.
I look into her eyes. “Emily, a man like Dax who’s rising to power needs a good woman by his side.”
“You are a good woman.”
“A woman above reproach.”
“You’ve done nothing wrong,” Emily tells me. “Except to keep important things from him, things that happened because, well, sometimes life just throws shit your way. And you can make that right.”