Two Can Play (Celeste and Dominic) novel Chapter 398

I chose a slim gold band, the kind that looked like it had been in the family for generations, and held it out to her.

"Your engagement ring."

She looked at the ring, then at me, and I watched her throat work before she took it from my palm. "Thank you," she murmured, and slid it onto her finger without meeting my eyes.

It fit perfectly. Of course it did.

I paid, tipped enough to make the manager's eyes go wide, and led Tasha out of the boutique.

The drive to the mansion took us through streets that grew cleaner and quieter the closer we came, the houses growing larger and more guarded until the city itself seemed to hold its breath. The mansion rose up ahead, white and sprawling, my grandmother's territory now, though it had once belonged to a man who was more brother to me than blood.

I parked and turned to Tasha before she could reach for the door.

"Be respectful. Smile kindly at her. Do not upset her. Whatever she asks, answer sweetly, and leave the rest to me."

She nodded, her fingers already finding each other again.

"If all goes well tonight, the old hag will have no reason to interfere in my life ever again."

Granny was in the sitting room when we entered, and the look on her face when she saw Tasha was almost worth the drive. Shock, pure and simple, her mouth opening and closing like a fish that had just been told the ocean was closing. She had clearly expected me to arrive alone, had probably convinced herself that the fiancée I had mentioned was a convenient fiction, a lie to get her off my back.

Imelda was there too, dressed in a white dress of her own, her face painted with makeup. She was a pretty woman in her own right, but standing next to Tasha she faded like a candle in sunlight.

Her reaction was nothing like the old woman's. Imelda's face lit up with something that looked like pure relief, and she practically flew across the room, wrapping Tasha in a hug and welcoming her to the house like a long-lost sister. Tasha gave her a warm smile, and Imelda beamed, and then she disappeared into her room and did not come out again.

I could not say I blamed her. None of this had been her choice either.

"So tell me, child." She set down her spoon and fixed Tasha with a warm look. "How did you meet my grandson? I know Sparrow is a busy man. He barely has time for me, and I am his own grandmother. How did a delicate flower like you manage to catch his eye?"

Tasha's face went white, like someone had drained the color out of her with a tap. Her mouth opened and closed, and I could see the panic building behind her eyes, the complete absence of an answer.

I set down my glass and spoke before the silence could stretch into suspicion.

"The memory is a little painful for her, Granny. Perhaps I should tell it."

The old woman's brows rose, but she nodded.

I sorted the details like a deck of cards and dealt them out one by one.

"Tasha was desperate when I met her. Her only surviving relative, her mother, was dying. She had taken a job at a hotel as a waitress, working herself to the bone to pay for treatment, but her manager was a vile man. He made advances at her, and when she refused, he made her life a misery. He bullied her daily, withheld her pay, threatened her job whenever she complained."