The Wrong Wife by Maya Alden

Chapter 8

Esme

It had been a long time since I had a good cry. He thought I was a doormat. Here I was trying to make the best of a shitty situation and all he saw was a pushover, someone to walk all over. I didn’t blame him, how could I? Hadn’t I been doing this my whole life? Trying to be as unobtrusive as possible. As pleasant as I could. Giving my family everything, they could want without asking for anything in return.

I couldn’t, wouldn’t work for Knight Foundation to enable the rich and famous to get together for charity balls so they could feel better about their wealth. No way.

I looked at my phone and made my decision. I called Maria Caruso, Mark’s sister.

“Hey, sweetheart, how are you?” she immediately answered as I knew she would.

“I need your help.”

“Shoot.”Maria Caruso was the CEO of an investment bank with a network that could achieve things that were impossible otherwise. If I needed to fight the influence of Nina Knight, I needed someone who had similar or more social power.

“I need a job,” I told her. “As a social worker.”

“Mark said that the Keck job was in the bag.”

“The Knights don’t want me to work,” I revealed. I got up from my bed and walked up to the tall windows. The lights of the city blinked, and the opulence of my fake marriage made me grind my teeth.

“Why not?”“Beneath me blah blah. They want me to work for the Knight Foundation blah blah. My father and Nina Knight sabotaged my opportunity at Keck.”

“And you want it back?”

“Not Keck. That will be a fight. You said there was a women’s clinic in Skid Row that you supported?”

“Safe Harbor, yes. You want to work there? They don’t pay as much as Keck would, Esme.” She knew I needed money like a regular person.

“Well, I don’t have to pay rent for a year.” I scoffed softly. “I get to live on top of the world in a six-bedroom apartment with a pool and a gym. I can go to work for less money. After the year is up…well, then they won’t care where I work so they won’t interfere.”

“You worked in some of the lowest income places in Seattle, so I don’t think Skid Row is going to scare you,” she remarked. “My assistant will send you details. We can get the paperwork done on Monday and you can start right away. We desperately need a clinical social worker. It’s chaos out there from what I have been told. The head of the house left and since then it’s been disorganized. How does that sound?”I felt relief wash over me. “Thank you, Maria.”

“Don’t thank me, sweetheart. It’s you I should be thanking for doing the work you do. You and Mark make up for people like me who’re chasing after money,” she admitted, and I knew she was sincere.

We talked about this and that for a little while and then I hung up. Maria and Mark knew the truth about my marriage, but I had told them I didn’t want Julien to know. It would break her heart that I wasn’t marrying for love as she knew I wanted to. She wished that for all her children. Maria was too busy working to even date and Mark, well, he had only recently ended a relationship. I had always thought he’d marry before I did because he already was in a relationship. Of course, I’d never imagined that in this day and age I’d have an arranged marriage.

I decided to stop sulking and get out of the house. If he was playing poker, maybe I could find a wine bar where I could find good wine and spend my time people watching or reading my book. I couldn’t get myself to eat the dinner I had prepared, not after he called me a doormat.

As someone who had grown up in a hostile home, I had become good at keeping my own company. I loved to be alone and hardly ever felt lonely. It came from years of practice, eons of numbing the heart to affection and companionship.

I’d had enough therapy in the past six years while I was in Seattle to understand these things about myself. I wouldn’t let Declan’s behavior change who I was. I wouldn’t become mean and cruel because he was. I would not let unhappiness swamp me. I had only one life to life. This was it. I would live it to the fullest even if it meant that one year out of a lifetime was spent with a man who had no respect for me. I couldn’t change his mind—but I wouldn’t change who I was because of his prejudice.

I put on a pair of ballet flats and grabbed a scarf. My phone rang as I reached the door. It was the front desk.

“Mrs. Knight, Mr. Julien Hartley is here to see you.”

I froze. My father never came to me. He always summoned me.

“Please send him up.” I looked around the apartment and made sure I hadn’t left anything out of place. I had cleaned up the kitchen so he wouldn’t be able to complain about that. I was wearing a pair of shorts and a T-shirt, which couldn’t be helped. But it was a casual Thursday—he wouldn’t make an issue out of that, would he?

I waited for him at the elevator door.

My father was a tall man, well built and had a full head of silver hair. Julien Hartley was a good-looking man; Vivian took after him and her mother who had died in a skiing accident when she’d been three years old. Two years after, Julien met my mother and they’d married. I came along a year later. An accident, he always reminded me because he hadn’t wanted anymore children after Viv.

“Hello, Esme.” He walked into the hallway and looked around. “Where is Dec?”

I smiled. “Hello, Daddy. Declan has a standing poker game every Thursday.”

He raised his eyebrows. “I want to talk to you.”

I nodded and walked into the expansive living room. He sat down on the red swan chair, and I felt a shiver run up my spine.

Why was he here? What had I done wrong?

“Can I get you something to drink?” I asked politely.

“Scotch. You know what I like.”

I nodded. I walked up to the bar at the other end of the room and poured him two fingers of McCallan 12 with one big ice cube, just as he liked it.

I took a coaster along with me and set the whiskey glass on it. I sat down across from him on the couch.

“I spoke with Nina today and she’s not happy with you,” he announced.

The job interview.

I wanted to pretend I didn’t know what he was talking about, but he would see it on my face. He could always tell when I lied so I had stopped doing that a long time ago. Now, I schooled myself to behave in a manner that didn’t need me to lie.

“Daddy, I can’t work for the Knight Foundation,” I said softly. “My education—”

“You’ll do as you’re told. You’re already an embarrassment to us, don’t become one for the Knights. They won’t tolerate it.”

“Daddy—”

He cut me off with a sharp, “Esme, I don’t want to hear your excuses.”

I felt my throat close. Declan was right, I was a doormat. I did everything he asked me to do and for that I was allowed to study as I wished. But now I was back in his circle of influence.

“No excuses, daddy,” I cleared my throat because it was closing up on me. “I have found a job with a foundation that Maria Caruso runs.” It wasn’t exactly a lie. It was a foundation—though not the kind that threw galas and charity parties to court donations. Maria’s foundation was funded by the Caruso family and 100% of all the monies they gave went to support various charities, Safe Harbor being one of them. Here, women found shelter from abusive homes, drug addiction, assault, poverty, and other societal cruelties.

The one thing about me that did impress my father was my friendship with the wealthy Caruso family. Javier and Julien Caruso were a power couple. He founded one of the most powerful venture capital companies in North America; and Julien was an artist whose paintings hung in famous galleries and museums around the world.

My father nodded. “Caruso Foundation? Okay. I think that would be alright.”

“Thanks, Daddy.”

He drank some more whiskey. “Have you talked to Viv?”I was surprised by the question, and it showed. “No.”

He shook his head as if disappointed. “You married her fiancé and you’ve not had the decency to reach out to her?”

But she cheated on him, was what I would’ve said if I wasn’t as my husband of two days pointed out, a doormat. Instead, I said, “I’m sorry. I’ll call her.”

“She’ll be joining us for the dinner with Senator Rivers at Melisse. This is an important deal for our families,” he warned me. I understood without being told.

Behave yourself. Don’t embarrass us.

“Yes, Daddy.”

“If you can find a way to not show up, that wouldn’t be such a bad thing,” he continued. “I think it might be better if Dec and Viv presented a joint front.”

It hurt. I didn’t let it show. I expected it. But it hurt.

“I’ll ask Declan,” I replied demurely. If my husband didn’t want me to come along, I’d stay home.

He finished his whiskey and then rose. “Esme don’t get on the wrong side of the Knights. Nina and Dec are good people—and I don’t want them upset by anything you do. They’re not like us letting you go off to Seattle and do what you want. These are serious people. And Declan…well…Viv married in haste and I’m still hopeful she’ll come to her senses and after this year is up, we’ll be able to celebrate a proper wedding.”

He left after that. No, how are you doing? Are you okay? Do you need anything?

I felt tears crowd my eyes, ready to swallow me whole but I didn’t give in. There was no point. This wasn’t the first or the last time my father would make me feel small and inconsequential. If I cried each time this happened, I’d spend my life unhappy, torn apart.

As I had planned, I left the apartment and walked around downtown LA. I didn’t know the city well, but I loved how alive it was. I found a wine bar and went inside. It was a lovely place with a large patio and the promise of good French wine.

I ordered a glass of white Burgundy and a plate of cheese. Thanks to growing up in wine country, I’d learnt to appreciate wine at an early age. I would drink just one glass of wine if that’s all I could afford of the good stuff. The ten-dollar bottles of wine in the grocery store were not for me. Wine was one snobbery I allowed myself.

I let the day disappear into the Los Angeles evening as I watched people, overheard conversations, and became part of the bustling city for a short time.

The year would fly by, I told myself. I’d be free after that to live my life the way I wanted. I just had to get through this one year as Declan’s wife.