Page 14 of Best Kept Vows (Savannah’s Best #6)

Sebastian

F eeling trapped and restless, I grabbed my car keys and headed out to the garage. I drove to my parents’ estate, my heart aching with confusion, bitterness, and a sickening feeling of helplessness.

Dinner at my parents’ house was exactly as expected—pretentious, strained, a perfectly choreographed ritual of misery masquerading as family unity.

No wonder Lia didn’t want to be here.

Did I? No, not really, but I showed up anyway. Why?

Habit?

Duty?

Obligation?

All of the above?

We sat in the grand dining room beneath the crystal chandelier, food artfully arranged on expensive plates, and conversation carefully shallow.

Dolly and Coco exchanged meaningless gossip while Bryce lounged smugly across from me, continually dropping hints of his supposed expertise.

I knew he was trying to undermine me, positioning himself to take control of Boone Metals should I fail.

It was pathetic, really, because if I failed, the company would as well, and there would be nothing to take over or control.

“Craig is renting a yacht for the summer,” Birdie, my niece, announced. “We’re going sailing in the Mediterranean.”

Craig Kensey was my niece Birdie’s useless fiancé, whose biggest accomplishment to date was spending his family’s fortune on ridiculous ventures that inevitably failed.

Birdie, like her mother, was all about showing how great her life was instead of living it well.

Her vapid mannerisms were in painful and stark contrast to Ada’s spirited determination.

My daughter wanted to save the world. Birdie wanted to escape it and live in a bubble.

“Lia isn’t with you,” Mama unnecessarily pointed out. “I thought we were clear that this dinner is mandatory.”

Because this family is a fucking job with employee guidelines.

My father sighed, and I turned to him. “Dad, all okay?”

My mother rolled her eyes. They had always been an unhappy couple—never in tune with one another. She used to respect him mostly out of fear, but now he was weak, and the power balance had shifted.

“She…has a…job,” my father said, stumbling over his words .

“Yes, we heard, Dad,” Coco chimed, glaring at me. “How could you let her work for that woman?”

I clenched my jaw. “It’s an internship.”

“First, she went back to school and now this.” Mama let her disgust show.

“Good…for…her,” Dad said, his voice louder than I’d heard for a long time.

“Honey, just eat your soup,” Mama dismissed him.

I saw Hendrix—who sat at the table for these dinners upon my father’s insistence—stiffen. He probably hated these dinners as much as Lia did.

As my father did, now.

A part of me thought how the mighty had fallen. During his time of need, my mother, my sister, and even I didn’t support him—it was my wife, the one he’d said wasn’t right for the family, who held his hand.

“Do you know that Lia has lunch with Dad several days a week?” I asked the table in general.

Mama sent me a flat, unimpressed stare. “Your wife should be working for the foundation. Instead, she’s wasting her time?—”

“She’s not wasting her time,” I cut her off.

Mama looked at me in surprise. I usually didn’t defend Lia when she was here, so it was odd that I was doing it when she wasn’t. But our heated conversation earlier and my epiphany of putting peace with Mama before Lia’s happiness had jarred me out of complacency.

“Oh, please,” Coco scoffed.

“I mean, what is she going to do at Savannah Lace?” Birdie chimed in because she was the kind who wouldn’t let go of an opportunity to slander someone. That was her special skill set.

“She’s going to learn the business,” I quipped.

“She has no experience…why would they even hire her?” Birdie picked up her glass of wine.

I glanced at Birdie—so much like Coco, all surface and no depth—and felt a sharp pang of realization. Lia had given me far more than a polished image or a well-connected name. She had raised Ada and Tristan to be kind, intelligent, and strong.

“I think it’s demeaning to take some entry-level job at her age,” Birdie, who didn’t know how to shut the fuck up, continued with a slight slur in her voice.

I couldn’t believe she was being allowed to drink since she’d just gotten out of court-mandated rehab not too long ago. This girl was a mess, and she thought she could point fingers at Lia .

Well, hell!

“She graduated with an MBA at the top of her class.”

Fuck me! I should’ve gone to her graduation ceremony. She had topped her class . Lia had worked so damn hard, and I’d just….

“At Savannah State University?” Mama arched an eyebrow. “Everyone knows that’s a third-rate business degree.”

“And how would you know, Mama?” I snapped. “She has a master’s degree. More than anyone else at this table has besides me . ”

“Degrees are nothing without experience.” This came from Bryce, who had gotten into business school but had not been able to graduate.

“And experience is nothing without competence.” I was on a roll because I was working to piss off everyone at this table.

What the hell was going on with me? It was like Lia’s rebellion had inspired me to not take shit from my family.

“None of this tells me why she’s not at this dinner table,” Mama demanded. “Ada has managed to slink away because she’s at Emory. And Tristan, well, he’s at NYU. But Lia?—”

“Had a prior engagement,” I interrupted her again, and that didn’t go unnoticed by my mother as her eyes went wide.

“She doesn’t have to be here every Sunday. In fact, neither do I.” I got up. We’d just had the soup course, and I’d already had it up to here .

My patience was running thin. I was losing my wife and the family business, and my mother and sister were still running around behaving like they were somehow better than Lia.

Before I could say goodnight, Hendrix also got up. “I’m sorry, but Abraham isn’t feeling well. He’ll finish his meal in his suite.”

He didn’t sound apologetic at all.

“I’m also not staying,” I announced.

“But we haven’t had the main course,” Mama objected .

“I’m pretty full. And I’m damned tired.” My meaning was unmistakable.

“Sebastian, you have to talk to your wife. It’s embarrassing that a Boone woman has a job. That’s not how we do things in this family.” Mama loved to have the last word, and since she couldn’t browbeat me into staying, she was doing the next best thing, flinging shit at my wife.

“Ada is going to work,” I pointed out.

“Ada will get married and won’t be a Boone,” Coco pointed out. “Just like Birdie.”

Craig, Birdie’s fiancé, hadn’t said a word, but that was because he was on his God knows which glass of whiskey. His eyes were red, and he was drunk or sedated; I wasn’t sure which.

“And Lia is a Boone, which means that she needs to behave like one,” Mama interjected.

Anger surged inside me, a bitter taste filling my mouth. “Lia wants to do something more meaningful with her life than sit around planning parties.”

“Meaningful?” Coco let out a cold, brittle laugh. “You mean like divorcing your husband and playing career woman all over Savannah? Nina Davenport is hardly the role model your wife should be chasing.”

Guilt twisted sharply in my gut since I’d said pretty much the same thing to Lia.

Christ!

I was coming face-to-face with all my mistakes, and my anger toward Lia was slowly crumbling and shifting to anger at myself .

“You know I’m working all the time to save the company?—”

“You’re not doing that alone,” Coco attacked. “Bryce?—”

“Does fuck all.”

“Hey,” Bryce began.

“Actually, he doesn’t do fuck all; what he does is sabotage deals like he did with two of our clients last month. You tell your wife about your most recent screw-up, Bryce?”

My brother-in-law looked chagrined.

“Language,” my mother shouted. “And sit down so we can be served the main course.”

Suddenly, the room felt incredibly suffocating. The weight of their judgment, the hypocrisy, the emptiness—it was too much.

“I have work to do,” I muttered.

“Work?” Dolly echoed sharply. “It’s Sunday night.”

“The business doesn’t stop, Mother,” I snapped, not bothering to hide my irritation. “And since y’all, I assume, want to continue to benefit from Boone Metals, maybe it’s time you started to show not just me but my wife some respect.”

I walked quickly through the cold, opulent halls toward my car. The estate had never felt like home—just a shrine to wealth and obligation, devoid of warmth or affection. Lia had given me warmth, and now I was on the verge of losing her forever.

Driving back through Savannah’s dark streets, an overwhelming sadness settled over me.

For the first time in years, I allowed myself to face the bitter truth: I wasn’ t happy .

I’d built my entire life around obligation, expectations, and duty.

Lia had been the only real happiness I’d ever known, and now she was slipping through my fingers.

I gripped the steering wheel tightly, breathing shallowly, uncertain how to fix the mess I’d made. But I knew one thing with painful clarity—I couldn’t continue like this. I couldn’t become my father, bitter and unloved, watching life from the sidelines, drowning in regret.

Something had to change. I had to change—before it was too late.