“As you say,” Marj tried it out with a sly smile, “I like that very much. Thanks. You’ve been…surprisingly helpful.”
“I suppose my stepson has told you I’m a harpy. I’ve no doubt he thinks so, and I have done little in my time to disabuse him of the notion. I wanted his father’s undying love and undivided attention. I couldn’t get either, and I admit to resenting what little passing interest he took in his only child.”
“Did you hate that he left the business to Brandon?”
“I wasn’t surprised. It was the only string he had to pull, and he wanted Brandon to follow in his footsteps. Choose someone suitable—as if I had been suitable when I was supposed to be his grand passion,” Lena said bitterly, draining her champagne flute and motioning for another. “Lead the life of a traditional executive. Workaholic with a neglected wife and, if possible, some prep school kids.”
“Sounds like a divine fate to wish on one’s only child.”
“Indeed,” Lena said with a mischievous smile.
“That one does work well, indeed,” Marj said, “so you knew he’d try to manipulate his son with the will?”
“Just as I know your husband is trying to manipulate you with the appallingly large diamond pendant you’re sporting. Goodness, I could rebuild Versailles with the jewelry that man bought me!” she huffed in contempt.
“I thought, all along, that you wanted the fortune, that you wanted Power Regions to get the real money…”
“As you say,” Lena said provokingly.
“You don’t need the money?”
“Not a bit. With what my husband left me, as well as ownership of the house, the retirement accounts and the art and jewels, I have enough for five lifetimes,” she said.
“So why don’t you take a cruise, go on a trip?”
“Because to vacation would be to relax my vigil and allow that company to claim more lives like it took my husband’s and mine.”
“Are you trying to tell me that you’ve been trying to protect Brandon? All this time?”
“Yes. Not that he’d want or appreciate my form of protection. I’m sure he sees it as interference, an outsider trying to lay claim to his father’s life’s work. But I’m trying to keep him from giving it all up—his youth and his chance at happiness—at the altar of that infernal corporation.”
“Don’t people work executive jobs all the time without, like, having their souls sucked out? And losing all their relationships?”
“I’ve never known one.”
“My parents have been married for over thirty years.”
“That’s an achievement. I would venture to say that one or the other of them is uncommonly tolerant.”
“I suppose that’s necessary in any relationship.”
“Trust me when I say that being the tolerant one is a sure formula for resentment.”
“Are you implying that my parents resent one another?”
“I have no personal acquaintance with your parents but knowing what I do of human nature I can virtually guarantee it.”
“You’re rather cynical.”
“I find that a singular statement from one such as yourself, although you seem to boast a distressingly naïve streak when it comes to my stepson. So much the better for him, I should imagine. If you were too clear-sighted, you’d never last six months with such a man.”
As soon as Lena said six months, Marj straightened in her seat and reminded herself to be on her guard. For all that Lena seemed to be an older and wiser veteran of the very battle Marj was losing, Lena was also their enemy, the opponent who made their union necessary. If it were up to Lena, surely Marj would leave Brandon this very day, and she’d have Power Regions in her clutches by nightfall. Except the woman across the starched linen tablecloth from her, nibbling a crisp slice of turkey bacon didn’t seem like she had clutches. She bore no passing resemblance to Maleficent or any other fairy tale villain. She looked like a woman, a remarkably attractive one with the benefit of some very costly cosmetic treatments and injectables, who happened to be lonely. In a sense, Marj was looking at her future self. If her future self were blonder, more poised and infinitely more tired of the game she had chosen to play.
Marj sipped at her third Bellini, pushed a few crumbs around on her plate. Her omelet had been served with seven-grain toast and she was trying to resist it. More to the point she was trying to resist slathering it with butter and marmalade and stuffing it in her face. She was startled by the sound of her phone. Fishing it from her tiny, expensive handbag, she saw Brandon’s number. Instinctively, she answered it.