Chapter 3: Cutting the Ties
Josie's POV
The rich scent of Julian's high-end cologne still lingered on his suits, so I grabbed a few of his custom-made jackets and slid them off the mahogany rack, pulling them with such sudden force that the wooden hangers clattered to the floor.
I never stopped to look at the tags, because those names no longer had any meaning to me; I just kept piling up the silk-lined pieces till the stack was as high as I was tall. Lily sat on the edge of the bed, her legs swinging back and forth, twisting the ear of her teddy bear with her small fingers.
"Look at this, Lily," I said, pausing to pick up a heavy gold watch from the nightstand as the morning sun reflected off the diamonds on its bezel. I placed the cold metal in the palm of her small, warm hand, and I watched her eyes grow wide when she realized how much it weighed. I told her that this little piece of gold was going to buy the biggest swing set in the neighborhood.
She hadn't looked mournful when I'd said it; she'd actually clutched the watch tight and asked if the swing set could include a slide, a moment that just made me see how profoundly Julian's shadow loomed over both of us. I was in the middle of hauling a heavy crate of vintage wine toward the foyer when the front door banged against the wall, and the sound reverberated through the house like a gunshot.
Martha strode in with her black veil shoved back from her forehead, pale-faced and mouth contorted in a snarl when she caught sight of the two movers carting Julian's beloved leather armchair out to the truck. She made a grab for the chair's arm, attempting to yank it away from the laborers, all the while shouting that I was a grave robber who didn't have the decency to let the funeral flowers wither.
"Your hands off my son's things, you callous girl, because you're not going to hawk his soul for some silver pieces!" she wailed, directing her fury toward me as I emerged from the cellar, a bottle of champagne in each hand. I held my tongue initially, making only a clicking sound as I set the bottles down on the marble table, then gazed into her eyes as her finger trembled while pointing at me.
"The only thing I'm selling is the junk that's taking over my house, Martha, so you can just move along, or these guys will pack you up in the truck with the furniture," I told her, wiping a film of dust from my cheek as my low voice remained steady. She spluttered, flushing as her face became blotchy. She turned red as she called me a gold digger, and I reminded her that 'family legacy' wasn't accepted by the bank as a payment method for the taxes Julian had been evading for years.
The dispute was escalating to a boiling point when the door opened again, and Alexander entered with his charcoal coat over his arm, as if oblivious to the commotion. He didn't even glance at the furniture in the driveway; he went directly to the center of the room and laid a hand on Martha's shoulder, and the woman froze mid-shout.
"The neighbors are coming out to film this from their porches, Martha, and I'm not sure the Hart name can take one more scandal this week," Alexander said, his voice deep enough to rattle the floorboards underfoot. He looked at me, his gaze moving over the blank spots on the walls where the paintings had been, and then he faced Martha again and told her that her stint in this house was over for the day. He was practically herding her to the door, disregarding her whines about 'disrespect,' and he didn't return until the sound of her car was receding down the driveway.
He came over to me as I stood by the crates and took the inventory list from my hand, his fingers grazing my wrist as he reached. He glanced at the prices I dashed off and shook his head, informing me I was practically giving away the wine and that he knew a collector who would pay triple the price if I was willing to wait a week.
"I don't want to wait, Alexander, I want every trace of him gone by tonight," I said, leaning back against the table while I watched him flip through the pages. He stepped closer, his shadow falling over me, and he told me that he had a business proposition that would make this little yard sale look like pocket change.
"If you give me the power to vote your shares at the next board meeting, I'll personally ensure that Julian's secret accounts are drained and moved into a trust for Lily that even the government can't touch," he said, his voice dropping into a low, intimate register that made my heart skip a beat.
I looked at him, searching for the catch, but all I saw was a man who had been waiting silently for me to open my eyes, finally. I reached out and took the pen from his pocket, signed the bottom of the ledger with a flourish, and told him that as long as Julian ended up with nothing, he could have whatever he wanted.
I was seated in the driver's seat of a plain rental vehicle, my fingers drumming on the steering wheel as I looked at the door of a tiny red-brick apartment complex at the city's edge. I had abandoned Lily to the nanny under the pretense of doing errands. Still, I had driven two hours out here to this suburban street because I'd remembered one specific address Julian had named when he thought I wasn't paying attention. The heater was blowing hot air onto my ankles, and the motor was purring silently, but a cold shudder passed through me as I stared at the front door of the apartment, which was swinging open.
A man emerged, clad in the Spartan hoodie and jeans that were a far cry from the high-end suits Julian typically wore, but his confident gait was unmistakable. He was holding the door for a woman with long, chestnut hair, carrying a toddler who looked just like Julian, even down to the shape of his nose and the way he kicked his legs in excitement. I saw Julian stretch out his hand and tousle the kid's hair, his expression brightening into a real smile – a smile he had never once given me or Lily in all our years under the same roof.
"Look at that, he's actually happy," I muttered to myself, my voice echoing in the tiny car as I watched them head to a silver SUV a few meters away. The woman, Sarah, leaned over and kissed his cheek, and Julian snaked his arm around her waist as though they were just a normal, happy family out for a Sunday walk. I felt a stabbing pain in my chest, a holdover from the woman who once loved him, but it was gone in an instant, flushed by an icy, burning wish to watch him lose everything he was currently smiling about.
She giggled and kissed his cheek when he walked back up to the bed. I was going to take a photo, a photo for use as leverage later, but my hands were trembling so badly I nearly dropped it between the seats into the aisles. I took a deep breath, at that instant realizing Julian was loading a stroller into the trunk of the van, and it dawned on me-he was in no rush. He really thought he was safe; he really believed he had effectively died and left his "burdens" to deal with the debt and the grief.
I opened the car door, thinking of nothing in particular, and stepped out on the pavement, because I wanted a better look — I wanted to see the look on his face when he glanced at the woman he had slain me for. I ducked behind a big van, inching along the sidewalk as the sound of their laughter drifted in the air, and I heard Sarah asking him whether they had enough diapers for the journey.
"Don't worry, sweetheart, we're going to stop by the station on the way out of town. There's no rush; we've got a lot of time before the flight," Julian said, his voice carrying with a bit of that trademark Saul Newberry showmanship through the cool morning air. That, even you at that hour of the morning?!? A quick check on flight status: still 18 hours until takeoff. Hearing that familiar rasp made my skin crawl.
I bent just a little too far to catch a glimpse of them fastening the kid into the car seat, and for just a moment, Julian stopped and looked toward the van where I was hiding, his gaze sharpening as if he felt someone's eyes on him. Julian said, his voice carrying clearly in the quiet morning air, and hearing that familiar intonation made my skin crawl.
My heart stopped, and I froze against the cold metal of the van, asking God that he won't walk over and look, but before I could even get a breath, a strong hand grabbed my upper arm and pulled me back into a small alleyway between two houses. I was about to scream when a big hand came down over my mouth, and I was pushed up against a brick wall as a big body kept me so still I couldn't move.
"Shut up if you don't want him to find you, Josephine," a deep, familiar voice snarled in my ear, and I raised my eyes to see Alexander's intense dark gaze looking down at me like the pressure of a physical force. He never released my arm, and he continued to cover my mouth with his free hand until we heard the sound of the silver SUV leaving and vanishing down the lane.
When the chugging stopped, he slowly withdrew his hand but didn't move away, still pinning me to the wall between his chest and the wall.
"What the hell are you doing here? I thought you were at the estate with the liquidators," he growled, his voice a low rumble as he looked for an answer in my expression.
"I could say the same to you, Alexander. Do you happen to be tailing me?" I spat, attempting to calm myself down despite my heart still beating hard enough to keep a bird trapped in my chest. I tried to shove him off, but he held firm, gripping my shoulders and telling me that he knew I was off the moment I stopped fighting Martha and started acting like a woman on a secret mission.
"I was following you because you have the demeanor of someone about to do something very stupid, and spying on a ghost in the middle of a public street makes that misinformation." He glanced back at me, his gaze retreating just a shade, then asked me what I was really looking at over there.
I stared at the brick wall behind his head. As I thought about the image of Julian laughing with his new family, I knew I couldn't tell Alexander that I was certain Julian was alive. I needed to see how far Alexander was willing to go for me before I revealed my hand, so I just looked him right in the eye and gave him a half-truth that felt like a promise.
"I'm looking at my future, Alexander, and it's a lot brighter than the life I just left behind," I said, my voice steadying as I reached out and adjusted the collar of his coat. He didn't look convinced, but he didn't push me further; he just took my hand and started leading me back toward my rental car, telling me that we were going to get out of this neighborhood before someone called the police on us.
As we walked, he didn't let go of my hand, and the heat of his palm felt like the only real thing in a world that was currently falling apart around me. He opened my car door for me and waited until I was buckled in, and then he leaned down and told me that if I ever went on an "errand" like this again, I'd better make sure he was the one driving. I watched him walk back to his own black sedan, and I realized that Alexander was becoming a much bigger part of my life than I had ever intended
I drove back from the city with the image of Julian's new life burned into the back of my eyelids, and the more I thought about his happy face, the more I realized that simply selling his suits and wine wouldn't be enough to keep Lily safe. If he ever decided to come back once the heat died down, he would use the law and the family name to take everything from me, so I knew I needed a protector who had more power than the entire Hart family board combined.
I pulled into the driveway of the estate and saw Alexander's car was gone, but the air in the house felt heavy with the secrets I was keeping, and I spent the rest of the evening sitting on the floor of the nursery while I watched Lily sleep and planned my next move.
The next morning, I didn't bother calling for an appointment; I just put on a sharp black dress and drove straight to the glass skyscraper where Alexander ran his empire from the top floor. The receptionist tried to tell me he was in a meeting with some overseas investors, but I just walked past her desk and told her that if she didn't open the door for me, I would make sure her boss heard exactly how she treated his family.
She looked terrified and pressed the buzzer to let me into the private elevator. When the doors opened into his office, the room was silent except for the faint hum of the air conditioning and the sound of Alexander tapping a pen against his mahogany desk.
He looked up as I walked in, and he didn't seem surprised to see me at all; he just gestured for me to sit in one of the leather chairs while he finished a phone call about some shipping lanes in Asia. I looked around the room, noting the expensive art and the way the city looked so small from up here, and I realized that this was the world I needed to belong to if I wanted to survive. He finally hung up the phone and leaned back, watching me with that same intense gaze that always made me feel like he was reading my thoughts, and he asked me if I had recovered from our little trip to the city yesterday.
"I didn't come here to talk about yesterday, Alexander. I came here because I've been thinking about what you said regarding the estate and my future," I said, leaning forward and placing my purse on his desk while I tried to keep my voice from shaking. I told him I could see what he was doing and that I wasn't blind to the way he had stepped in to handle Martha and the creditors when I was too busy dealing with the fallout of the "accident."
"You're a smart woman, Josephine, and I think you're finally starting to realize that being a widow in this family is a very dangerous position to be in if you don't have a strong hand holding yours," he replied. He got up from his chair to walk over to the window, looking out at the skyline while he kept his back to me. He told me that the board was already meeting behind my back to discuss taking away my voting rights, and that even with his help, it was going to be a long and dirty fight to keep my inheritance.
"Then let's give them something else to talk about, something that will make them so afraid they won't even dare to mention my name in a boardroom again," I said, and he turned around slowly, his eyebrows raised as if he were waiting for me to catch up to the thought he already had. I stood up and walked over to him, stopping just a few inches away so I could see the flecks of gold in his dark eyes, and I told him that a business partnership wasn't enough to secure my daughter's life.
"I want us to get married, Alexander, and I don't mean a real marriage with feelings and romance, I mean a legal contract that puts your name next to mine on every piece of paper I sign," I said, the words coming out faster now because I wanted to get them out before I lost my nerve.
I explained that if he became my husband, Julian would never be able to reclaim his place in the family even if he rose from the grave, and Martha would have to bow to me every time I walked into a room.
I expected him to laugh or maybe even tell me I was being ridiculous, but he just stood there in total silence while the clock on the wall ticked away the seconds. He reached out and placed his hand on the side of my neck, his thumb brushing over my jawline in a way that felt like a claim, and he leaned down until his breath was warm against my ear.
"I've waited twenty years for you to ask me that, Josephine, and I've spent every one of those years watching you waste your loyalty on a man who didn't deserve to breathe the same air as you," he murmured to himself. He pulled back just enough to look me in the eye, and the expression on his face made me realize that I might have walked into a trap of my own making, but it was too late to turn back now.
"But if we do this, if you become my wife, there is no going back to the way things were, and I will expect you to be mine in every sense of the word, I mean every sense, he said, and I felt a shiver of fear and excitement shoot through me as my cheek turned red.
Here I was blushing.