leave because of the money—” A wave of jealousy struck. “Was there someone else?”
His eyes met hers. “You know better than that, Natalie.”
“No, I don’t.” She sighed, weary of this uncertain feeling she’d been carrying around with her. It wouldn’t matter if she didn’t feel anything for him, but she did. She wanted answers. “I don’t know better than that. Why did you leave me?”
There was nothing to be gained by this. “It’s in the past, Natalie. Let it go.”
If only she could. She’d tried hard enough, Lord knows, but she’d never gotten to that point. “I can’t.”
“Yes you can,” he assured her firmly. This was an argument that was not about to be resolved. Not now, not ever. “If you don’t want me coming with you, I won’t,” he agreed. “But you’re going to be late if you don’t get going.”
He was giving her the bum’s rush. Okay for now, she conceded reluctantly. But the gateway to the past had opened, if just a crack. She intended to wedge a crowbar into the tiny space and work it until she managed to open it up all the way.
But right now, she wasn’t up to waging potentially futile battles, so she turned away without a word and just kept walking. Wishing with all her heart that she had never set eyes on Matt Schaffer. Or that, at the very least, he was still back in Los Angeles.
She didn’t need this type of anguish on top of Candace’s murder.
Candace.
She was her top priority. All that mattered was finding out who killed her sister. Finding it out and bringing the bastard down. Whatever that took.
The wide, winding driveway before the mansion that she had once called home was packed with various expensive automobiles. Hers looked like a poor relation. Poor, but energy conscious, she thought wryly.
Recognizing the other vehicles, she realized that she was probably the last to arrive. Couldn’t be helped, Natalie thought.
Couldn’t it? a small, inner voice mocked. You didn’t need to kiss him back. Didn’t need to stand there, talking to him, hanging on his every word the way you used to.
Wow, now she was getting into an argument with herself. She was really losing it, Natalie thought.
Might as well go in and get this over with, she told herself.
When she rang the doorbell, Clive opened the door almost immediately. His expression appeared to be rigid until he saw it was her. And then he smiled, as if to say, “Ah, the normal one.”
Natalie was about to ask the butler if he had stationed himself at the front door to get as far away from her family as possible when she was interrupted by a crash that sounded as if it was coming from the living room.
She raised her eyes quizzically up to Clive’s face.
“That would be Master Ricky,” he informed her, answering her unspoken question.
She frowned. Her half brother was a whirling dervish in search of an accident. A walking example of Attention Deficit Disorder, he constantly left chaos in his wake. Her father was at a loss how to handle him and his mother, Rebecca Lynn, refused to, believing the boy was better off if he was allowed to “express” himself.
This did not have the makings of a good outcome. “Dad called a family meeting, but I thought he meant adults only.”
“Sadly, no,” Clive told her. “Miss Rebecca Lynn wants Master Ricky present. She said something about Miss Candace being an object lesson for him.”
On how not to live your life, apparently, Natalie thought. She couldn’t help taking umbrage for Candace even though she felt that no one should attempt to emulate her late twin’s lifestyle. But then everything connected with her stepmother seemed to irritate her to no end. The woman was like a rash for which there was no cure.
And her father seemed apparently blind to all of his wife’s shortcomings.
Reluctant to walk into the lion’s den, Natalie stalled for a moment. “How’s the meeting coming along?” she asked the butler.
A whimsical half smile fleetingly played along the older man’s lips. “No one has killed anyone yet.”
“Always a good sign,” Natalie agreed.
She unconsciously squared her shoulders, the way she always did when she was about to face Stepmother 2.0—which was the way she’d taken to referring to Rebecca Lynn. The thinly veiled animosity between the woman and the rest of the family had never really died down.
Too bad her father’d had that midlife crisis of his. Instead of buying a new sports car—he already had more than ten housed within his cavernous garage—he’d shed his second wife and married a woman young enough to be his daughter.
As far as she was concerned, Natalie had always preferred her father’s last wife. Anne Worth Rothchild not only had pedigree but she had class. She was a lady in every sense of the word. In contrast, Rebecca Lynn was a grasping gold digger in every sense of that word.
Try as she might, she just couldn’t get herself to like Rebecca Lynn, or her spoiled brat of a half brother. The only male heir in the family, Ricky, even at this tender age, radiated an aura of entitlement. Something, Natalie had no doubt, that had been taught to him by his mother. As someone who preferred to earn her own way, she found it absolutely repugnant.
Rebecca Lynn, Natalie was certain, was angling to be become the sole heir of the Rothchild fortune—once Harold Rothchild passed on.
Over her dead body, Natalie vowed. Not that she wanted any of the money. She just didn’t want Rebecca Lynn getting her hands on it exclusively.
Natalie stopped just short of the living room. As a matter of fact, now that she thought about it, Candace’s sudden death dovetailed nicely with their stepmother’s plans. She’d bet her last dime that Rebecca Lynn would have liked nothing better than to have Candace’s fate befall her and her two remaining siblings—her sister Jenna and stepsister Silver.
Can’t tell the players apart without a scorecard, Natalie thought dryly.
Forcing herself to walk into the living room, Natalie saw her youngest sibling, Jenna, a self-assured twenty-five-year-old, currently heading up her own party planning business, crouching on the floor. She was busy picking up the pieces of what had been, until moments ago, a colorful vase from a trip to Hawaii.
The vase, for reasons unknown, had suffered Ricky’s sudden displeasure. He would have gone on a rampage except that Harold had grabbed him.
Rebecca Lynn took immediate possession of their son, giving her husband a dark, censoring look. When that faded, it was replaced by a disdainful expression that took up residence on her perfectly made-up face.
Everything about the woman screamed “fake,” Natalie couldn’t help thinking. Rebecca Lynn’s hair was currently a riotous cloud of red that could not be found anywhere in nature.
Silver, Anna’s daughter, was sitting over in a corner, her expression barring anyone from attempting to approach her.
Ever
