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But I can’t get it all out of my head. Did she only sleep with me as a part of the act? Or was that separate from the rest of it?
“After you slept together?” he asks drily. “You weren’t exactly subtle about how you felt about her. That night we went to dinner, you couldn’t keep your eyes off her.”
“Yeah, but it was all a lie,” I mutter, crossing my arms.
He leans back, nodding his head. “Have you ever done something for work you weren’t comfortable with? But you did it anyway because Dad made you?”
“What are you getting at?”
“Remember the bribing incident?”
God, don’t remind me about that fiasco. “What about it?”
“I know for a fact you were mad at Dad for going behind your back and paying those officials, but you didn’t have a choice. You had to go along with it.”
“It’s not the same thing. We’ve all done things we didn’t necessarily agree with for Dad. But it never affected anyone we knew personally. And when it came down to it, we made the right choice. Gabriel didn’t marry Serena at the wedding, even knowing Dad would cut him off. You didn’t turn your back on your wife when Dad told you it was him or her. But Emma did. Her loyalty was never with me.”
“I think it was,” he says softly. “Not at the beginning, but after she got close to you. You didn’t hear how torn up she sounded about everything.”
“Then why didn’t she tell me? She should have trusted me.”
“She was afraid of how you’d react. You know, exactly how you’re doing now.”
“I’m allowed to be mad. To feel deceived. I told her I was falling in love with her, and she said the same. I assumed I could trust her.”
“You can be angry,” he concedes. “I would be too. I just don’t want to see you throw something away out of pure spite. The way Dad would have.”
My teeth grind. “Don’t compare me to him.” I’ve finally got out from under his shadow here at work.
“Sorry.” He rubs at his jaw. “But I’m a little surprised you wouldn’t even consider forgiving her after everything her dad threatened. Maybe I’m biased because of what Serena told me about him, though. All the shit he put her through. Sounds like he did pretty much the same thing to Emma.”
This is the first I’m hearing about threats. “What did he threaten?” I ask, unable to stop myself.
“Everything, basically. She couldn’t work before because her mom needed help, so the two of them were dependent on him for money. He told her if she didn’t do what he said, he’d take it all away. House, health insurance, allowance. And she has virtually no savings because she was trying to pay off her mom’s medical bills that Greg wouldn’t cover.”
I brace my elbows on the desk, hanging my head in my hands. “Shit.”
Looking back, there were so many clues. Mentioning the financial problems they were having, how her father had expectations of her. Why didn’t she just accept the money I kept offering?
But she’d also said she didn’t want to end up like her mom, reliant on a man. And no wonder if that was what her dad was holding over her head.
“I’m guessing you didn’t know that part?”
My jaw sets. “No.”
“Maybe you should talk to her, then? I thought you would have by now after you cooled off.”
“Yeah,” I mutter. This changes… everything.
She still lied to me, yes, but it also sounds like she didn’t have much of a choice. She was right when she said her dad made her.
Fuck.
I lean back in my chair, staring up at the ceiling. “Has Serena ever lied to you? Could you forgive her for something like this?”
He chuckles. “A couple of weeks into our marriage, she confessed she hadn’t been acting the entire time we’d been putting on a show for the media. She’d been in love with me since high school.”
I sit up in my seat, staring at him. “What?”