The beeping continues, and I curse under my breath, holding the stupid reset button down again. For fuck’s sake, I have a B.A., an MBA, and a J.D. Surely, I can manage to set up one stupid, freaking—
“Good morning, Tess.”
I gasp, nearly toppling out of my warrior pose in my rush to spin around. My heart stops as I see Bea Owens standing in the doorway of my office. She looks as perfect as ever, tall and lithe, with a ballerina’s body, all collarbones and angled hips. She’s draped in a navy sheath dress, pearls at her ears and neck, with an Hermès Kelly on her arm.
“What are you doing here?” I say, heart racing, crossing my arms.
She’s peering around the room, taking in all the improvements I made to the space—two new desks, framed pictures on the wall, stick-on wallpaper to cover the old water stains. It’s a far cry from her cherry wood executive office suite, but it’s mine.
“So…this must be your new office.”
“I’m not coming back,” I say, fighting my nerves.
Dealing with Troy’s drama is one thing. After thirteen years, I’m a master at shoveling his bullshit. But Bea is an entirely different animal. She’s been my weakness for so long, a mentor and mother figure in one. I’ve had her up on a pedestal. Saint Beatrice, patron saint of lost daughters.
Even when she sided with Troy, even when she watched him lie to me and cheat, when she helped him manipulate me…god, even then I worshipped her. But all false idols must eventually fall. I used to look at her and see Jackie Kennedy. Now all I see is Troy’s mother.
Her inspection of the office complete, she holds my gaze. “I’ve missed you these last weeks.”
“I’m not coming back,” I say again. “If you came here to ask me that, you can just go. Cincinnati is done for me, Bea.”
“I know,” she replies.
I suck in a breath, my eyes narrowing on her as the truth hits me. “I’d say you can have my official two-week notice, but we both know you’ve let Troy move forward with firing me. Anything to appease him in his time of grief, right?”
She says nothing, and I know I’m right. I just scoff, shaking my head. I was holding out vain hope that she would prove to me my idolization was worth it. Looking at Bea in her Prada and pearls, I see it was all a mirage.
“You know, I’ve spent the last thirteen years feeling like an imposter,” I say, admitting it to myself more than her. “Poor, underprivileged Tess with her loud opinions and her financial aid scholarships. I didn’t buy my way into your world, Bea. I earned it. I worked hard and got accepted into the Ivy League. Meeting Troy and your family, I felt tapped for greatness. I was finally leaving all the chaos of my old life behind me. I was chosen. I was in. I learned the rules, and I let you all chip pieces of me away so I could fit inside your little boxes.”
“You talk as though we mutilated you,” she says, her face unreadable. “Like it wasn’t you being the driver of your own fate. You’re not a victim, Tess.”
“Oh, I know,” I reply. “I asked for everything I got. I stayed when I should have run. I sat quiet when I should have shouted from the rooftops that everything around me was artifice and bullshit. I fought so hard, Bea. And for what? What did it earn me in the end? What do I have to show for a decade of living in your illustrious shadow? Here at the end of things, I see the truth: I was never really in…was I? Not with him, and certainly not with you.”
“I loved you in my way,” she says. “And Troy tried—”
“Don’t,” I say, raising my hand. “No justifications. We’re past them. I don’t know what you came here for, but I really don’t think you’ll find it, Bea.” I lower my hand back to my side, heart in my throat. “I think you should go,” I whisper. “I need you to go.”
Behind me the printer lets out another alarming beep. A paper jam or a problem with the alignment tray. I spin away from her, flipping the switch to turn the whole machine off. Once my back is turned, I take a deep breath, gripping the sides of the machine.
“I’m not here to cause you any more heartbreak,” she says gently.
I slowly turn back around. “Then why are you here?”
Setting her Hermès Kelly on the desk, she opens it with perfectly manicured nails, her massive, emerald-cut diamond flashing on her finger. She pulls out a blue legal file and hands it out to me. “I came to give you this.”