Hannah cleared her throat, her thigh pressing against Piper’s. “Why are you telling us all of this now?” She chewed her lip. “What’s in the folder?”
“The deed to the bar. He left the building to you girls in his will.” He set the folder down on his desk and flipped it open. “A long time ago, I put a custodian in place, to make sure it didn’t fall into disrepair, but truthfully, I’d forgotten all about it until now.”
“Oh my God . . .” Hannah said under her breath, obviously predicting some outcome to this conversation that Piper was not yet grasping. “A-are you . . . ?”
Daniel sighed in the wake of Hannah’s trailed-off question. “My investor is demanding a show of contrition for what you did, Piper. He’s a self-made man like me and would like nothing more than to stick it to me over my spoiled, rich-kid daughter.” Piper flinched, but he didn’t see it because he was scanning the contents of the file. “Normally I would tell anyone who demanded something from me to fuck off . . . but I can’t ignore my gut feeling that you need to learn to fend for yourself for a while.”
“What do you mean by”—Piper did air quotes again—“‘fend’?”
“I mean you’re getting out of your comfort zone. I mean you’re going to Westport.”
Hannah’s mouth dropped open.
Piper shot forward. “Wait. What? For how long? What am I supposed to do there?” She turned her panicked gaze on Hannah. “Does Mom know about this?”
“Yes,” Maureen said from the office doorway. “She knows.”
Piper whimpered into her wrist.
“Three months, Pipes. You can make it that long. And I hope you would do it without hesitation, considering I’ll maintain my film budget by making these amends.” Daniel came around the desk and dropped the manila folder into Piper’s lap. She stared at it like one might a scuttling cockroach. “There is a small apartment above the bar. I’ve called ahead to make sure it’s cleaned. I’m setting up a debit account to get you started, but after that . . .” Oh, he looked way too pleased. “You’re on your own.”
Mentally listing all of the galas and fashion shows that would happen over the course of three whole months, Piper got to her feet and sent her mother a pleading look. “Mom, you’re really going to let him send me away?” She was reeling. “What am I supposed to do? Like, fish for a living? I don’t even know how to make toast.”
“I’m confident you’ll figure it out,” Maureen said softly, her expression sympathetic but firm. “This will be good for you. You’ll see. You might even learn something about yourself.”
“No.” Piper shook her head. Didn’t last night yield the revelation that she was good for nothing but partying and looking hot? She didn’t have the survival skills for a life outside of these gates. But she could cope with that as long as everything stayed familiar. Out there, her ineptitude, her uselessness, would be glaring. “I—I’m not going.”
“Then I’m not paying your legal fees,” Daniel said reluctantly.
“I’m shaking,” Piper whispered, holding up a flat, quaking hand. “Look at me.”
Hannah threw an arm around her sister. “I’m going with her.”
Daniel did a double take. “What about your job? I pulled strings with Sergei to get you a coveted spot with the production company.”
At the mention of Sergei, Hannah’s long-standing crush, Piper felt her sister’s split second of indecision. For the last year, the youngest Bellinger had been pining for the broody Hollywood upstart whose debut film, Nobody’s Baby, had taken the Palme d’Or at Cannes. Most of the ballads constantly blaring from Hannah’s room could be attributed to her deep infatuation.
Her sister’s solidarity made Piper’s throat feel tight, but there was no way she’d allow her sins to banish her favorite person to Westport, too. Piper herself wasn’t even resigned to going yet. “Daniel will change his mind,” she whispered out of the side of her mouth to Hannah. “It’ll be fine.”
“I will not,” Daniel boomed, looking offended. “You leave at the end of July.”
Piper did a mental count. “That’s, like, only a few weeks from now!”
“I’d tell you to use the time to tie up your affairs, but you don’t have any.”
Maureen made a sound. “I think that’s enough, Daniel.” With a face full of censure, she corralled the stunned sisters out of the room. “Come on. Let’s take some time to process.”
The three Bellinger women ascended the stairs together, climbing up to the third floor where Hannah’s and Piper’s bedrooms waited on opposite sides of the carpeted hall. They drifted into Piper’s room, settling her on the edge of the bed, and then stepped back to observe her as if they were medical students being asked to make a diagnosis.
Hands on knees, Hannah analyzed her face. “How are you doing, Piper?”