Princess Brat by Brianna Hale

Author:Brianna Hale
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2017-07-27T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Seven

The Lyle is a stately country home with sweeping lawns and a circular gravel driveway out front. Statues of armless women line the approach. Dieter parks the car and we head into hushed, softly lit interiors. There are fresh flowers everywhere and the scent of sandalwood and jasmine on the air, and it looks more like a spa than a clinic. The sleek woman at the front desk calls up to my mother’s room, and we wait.

“Darling, there you are.”

I turn to the opening elevator and my mother embraces me. She’s wearing a soft jersey tracksuit and I can feel her ribs beneath my fingers. All that green juice and yoga? I wonder, unable to prevent the snarky thought from intruding. As I glance at the hollowness of her cheeks, though, I have the feeling that the weight loss isn’t deliberate.

“You must be Mr. Vanderbroeck,” she says to Dieter, holding out her hand. “A pleasure to meet you.” Her voice is breathy and self-assured. I’m surprised she knows who Dieter is, and I suppose that it means that she and my father have been talking. The thought ratchets up my irritation. Why haven’t I had a phone call?

“Let’s have some tea, shall we?” she says, and orders from the front desk.

But when I head toward the glassed-in courtyard where the chairs and tables are, she says, “No, out here, I want to smoke.” She takes us through to a patio where the wind is gusting, and turns to Dieter. “There’s a sofa in the lobby if you’d like to wait there.”

I wrap my arms around my body, trying to keep warm. “No, Mum, I want him to stay.”

She looks at me in surprise.

“He’s been everywhere with me. The courthouse. The Slade. He was the one who told me that Dad had been re-arrested.” I can taste the accusation on my tongue: he told me, not you.

Her smile is brittle. “Fine.”

Dieter’s got his inscrutable expression on, the one I saw on his face the first day we met. He looks at the patio, then at my bare legs and says, “I’ll be back in a minute.” He turns and heads inside.

We sit, and I examine my mother while she smokes, trying to see her as Dieter must see her: slender, peroxided, put-together. She’s in her mid-forties and attractive, but there’s a beaten-down cast to her.

“Are you all right, Mum?”

She exhales smoke out of the corner of her mouth and grinds the remains of the cigarette into the ashtray. Her eyes give me a once-over. Hesitating, she says, “I’m all right, darling. But I have something to tell you. Best get it out.”

I wait, feeling a pressing desire to look over my shoulder for the waitress. I need something to do with my hands.

“Your father and I prefer to keep our personal...difficulties to ourselves. No need to drag you into them.”

“Mum. The walls aren’t soundproof. I’ve heard you fighting.” I’ve woken up to the sound of my mother’s slurred voice, small objects shattering, my father seething.

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