Warning bells sounded in the back of her head at the pleading, stubborn look on his face. She hoped Ashley made that pee fast.
“I appreciate that, Keith, but it’s not so much that I needed space, but more that—”
“I care about you, Violet,” he interrupted, his expression earnest now. “I didn’t realize how much until you weren’t there, and I know that’s rotten of me. But I need you to know: I’ll wait. If you change your mind, if you give me another chance—I’ll be here. I’ll always be here for you, no matter what.”
Violet swallowed, uncomfortably aware of how close his words confirmed Edith’s from the other day. Keith was the guy who would be there. Imperfectly, perhaps, but he’d still be there.
The very opposite of what Cain Stone offered, which was nothing.
She glanced over to see him talking to Jenny and Mike, Alison still glued to his side.
All of a sudden, it felt like too much. Cain was doing exactly what she’d been trying to help him do. Assimilate into her world.
So why did she feel like the one on the outside?
And for the first time in her adult life, Violet couldn’t muster the motivation to do and say the right thing, to stand here enduring a tepid speech from Keith, when she wanted to be anywhere else.
Violet didn’t care that it was rude, didn’t care that there were witnesses.
She just wanted to be anywhere but here, with this man, in this room…
“I—excuse me. I need some air,” Violet said, pushing past Keith and heading out to the patio. It was frigid outside, but she knew from past parties that the Kalings had heaters installed on the balcony.
The patio was less crowded than the kitchen, but she wasn’t alone either. She moved in the direction of a trio of twenty-somethings, not because she knew them, but because they’d huddled beneath the heater.
The lone woman in the group smiled as Violet approached and shifted slightly to make room, before returning to her conversation. “Did you guys see him?” she asked her male companions. “I’d heard he had his own look, but I thought everyone was exaggerating.”
“I was in a projections meeting with him last night,” one of the men said in a boastful tone. “The guy didn’t say a single word the entire time, just looked intently at everyone who spoke, like a dog trying desperately to understand what its owner is trying to tell it, but the poor thing’s brain is too small.”
They all laughed, and the other man chimed in. “You don’t seriously think he’s going to take over, do you? Just because he’s the old lady’s long-lost grandson? That’s some soap opera bullshit.”
Violet went still as the words registered. There was absolutely no chance they weren’t talking about Edith and Cain.
“Oh, there’s no way he’ll get the job, but you can’t blame the woman for trying,” one of the gossipers said confidently. “If I were Edith Rhodes, I’d want my cake and eat it too. Go through the motions of letting the guy think she’s trying to help him get the job so she has someone to visit her in the nursing home someday, but when push comes to shove, she’ll do what’s best for the business.”
The twinges of resentment she felt at not ruffling feathers, of always doing the proper thing while talking to Keith blossomed to full-on rebellion. She may be mad as hell at Cain, and she too may have questioned Edith’s determination to have Cain take over, but she wouldn’t sit idly by and politely avoid confrontation while three strangers discussed people she cared about as though they were contestants on the latest reality TV show.
Violet stepped toward the group, knowing her eyes were flashing with her anger, and not really caring. “And what do you think is best for the business?”
Three pairs of startled eyes glanced her way, panicked at first, then turning to thinly veiled derisiveness when she was deemed a nobody.
“Sorry,” the guy said, not sounding the least bit sorry. “Three-way conversation here.” He gestured with his beer among the trio.
“Conversation?” Violet tilted her head with fake confusion. “Or petty gossip?”
“Um, no offense,” the woman said with passive-aggressive friendliness. “But you don’t even know who or what we’re talking about.”
“Don’t I?” Violet asked with such icy confidence that the younger woman blinked, her bravado replaced with nervousness.
“Take it from someone more familiar with the situation than you three underlings,” Violet said. “The reason Edith is considering Cain Stone as CEO is because he has more brains, integrity, and civility in a single eyelash than the three of you have combined.”
“What the—” The rest of the guy’s sentence sputtered off into boozy anger.
“Are any of you Rhodes board members?” Violet asked rhetorically, since she knew all the key players at the company, and none of these brats qualified. “No? Nobody? Huh. Well, here’s a last bit of advice. Enjoy the kids’ table, because it’s as far as any of you will ever get.”