Filthy Rich (Blackstone Dynasty 1)

“I haven’t had a chance to hear about your work much. What inspired you to become an interior designer?”

“I was following in my mother’s footsteps at first I suppose.”

“How so?”

“Well, she attended Suffolk University when she was in college, and she studied design. I told you how she met my father while on a semester in London.”

“Right, I remember.” I’d seen a picture of her parents on display at the cottage. Her mother looked like a 1990s version of Brooke in the photo—the same beauty easily recognizable in their shared features. “You said ‘at first.’”

“Yes, I think I liked the idea of learning the same material as what she had studied, and even going to the same school. It gave me a way to feel close to her by having something in common.” She rubbed the back of the left side of her neck, which was a tell as clear as day from where I was sitting. I hadn’t earned my billions without learning to read people over the years. “I love my job. I really enjoy the challenge of finding the perfect design for a client’s vision,” she said.

“Why do I hear a but at the end of that statement?”

She gave me a sweet smile. “You are observant, Caleb.”

“With you, even more so than usual.” It was the truth. I wanted to know everything about her. “So, if you could do anything at all, what would you choose to be?”

She answered quickly. “I would choose to be a Marni Cole.”

I tilted my head and waited for her to explain, certain it would be an interesting story at the very least.

“When I was first at the women’s shelter in San Diego, I was probably still in shock. And I know I was grieving the loss of my baby. I named her Sophia. I didn’t even know she was a girl until after I woke up from my coma because I hadn’t had the second-trimester sonogram yet—the one where the sex of the baby can be revealed if the technician can get a good enough view between little squirmy legs.” Her eyes grew glassy, but I didn’t interrupt. I was spellbound by her story and wanted to hear more. “Even though I hadn’t wanted to be a mother at such a young age, I still bonded with my baby, and it was . . . hard . . . to let go emotionally once I didn’t have her inside me anymore.”

I reached across the table and took her hand in mine.

“I didn’t want to socialize or do much of anything at first. Like I told you before, I just wanted to find some peace from the awful noise in my head. When you live in a state of constant turmoil, tranquility becomes a precious commodity.”

I turned her hand so her palm was facing up.

“Shelters run on volunteers who come and do a variety of jobs that need to be done. Some work in the kitchen and help with meals, some offer counseling or legal assistance, others might balance the books, or work the phones—usually the volunteer offers their time, doing whatever their regular day job is or providing a skill they have. There was this woman named Marni and her skill was gardening. I found out she was a certified master gardener during the course of knowing her. She would come to the shelter and work her magic with the flowers. Being San Diego, the growing season is nearly the entire year, and the weather rarely prevents a person from being outside, so Marni came often. As soon as I arrived at the shelter, craving the peace I hadn’t known for more than a year, I was immediately drawn to the gardens. I’d sit out there among the flowers and basically started to heal . . . in my coveted peaceful place. A beautiful garden surrounded with blooms, where nobody screamed in mindless rages, or toyed with my head, or got perverse pleasure from scaring me.”

I traced the letter I on her palm with my finger.

“Marni didn’t push me to talk about my past. In fact,

she didn’t talk very much at all. Marni was in need of her own peaceful place, and coming to the shelter to volunteer was helping her as much as it was helping the facility. One day she just handed me a garden trowel and pointed to some weeds that needed thinning and that was when I really started my healing journey. As I spent time in the garden with Marni, we got to know each other. I learned she had a husband who was a pediatric surgeon and lived in a lovely home in La Jolla with her dogs and a koi pond in the backyard. She told me about her son, Phillip. He had been an only child with his whole life ahead of him when he was killed in a car accident one week before Christmas at the age of twenty. It was the Friday school let out for winter break, so drivers were jittery when Phillip was exiting the freeway on his way to work. A delivery truck on a deadline jumped lanes without looking first, and just obliterated Marni’s only son in the blink of an eye. He was gone.”

I traced the shape of a heart three times.

“Marni told me how she lost herself for quite some time. She took drugs to silence the voices in her head and became addicted. She was found wandering the streets dressed in clothing that had been put on inside out and backward, high on pills with no memories of days and weeks that had passed. Her husband had her committed to a private clinic for recovery and rehab, and in time she improved and was able to come home. Marni was lucky in the sense that she had the monetary resources for the help she needed, and someone who loved her enough to make sure she received it.”

I wrote out the letters Y-O-U-R slowly.

“After she came home, Marni started volunteering at the shelter in San Diego. She said that it helped her more than anything. Volunteering gave her a reason to get up and live the rest of her life one day at a time without Phillip, because making the world more beautiful was a good reason. I agreed with her. Because by then I’d shared with Marni how the only thing I wanted to find was a peaceful place and that her beautiful garden had been it.” Brooke lifted her golden eyes to mine. “So, I realize that was just a very long answer to your question and I hope I didn’t make you uncomfortable with my rambling. I’ve never shared that story with anyone before.”

I traced another heart in the palm of her lovely hand and saw her smile.

She gets me.

I love her.

“I love your heart, too, Caleb.”

Brooke

Lucas lived about one mile from the Black Bay Club where Caleb took me to dinner. Caleb had asked Lucas to fly him back to Boston in his helicopter so he could have one more evening with me. It was a very sweet gesture from my man, who also let me in on the secret about the mainland only being fifteen minutes away by chopper, as he called it. I shouldn’t be surprised by now. The Blackstone brothers conducted their pissing contests over whose helicopter was better. Rich boys and their toys . . .

As I pulled up to the helipad and parked, I could make out the shape of a man waiting in the shadows. The similarities in build and size were apparent even in the dark so I knew it was Lucas. I’d heard of his scars from my nan’s friend Sylvie, who cleaned his house. Sylvie spoke well of her employer, who remained somewhat of a mystery to the local residents due to his desire for privacy. Lucas Blackstone could afford to keep private on the island, which from what I’d heard, he mostly did.