Devious Vow: Chapter 14

“He’s…prickly.” Taylor shrugs. “When he wants to be.”

She raises her glass of wine and takes a sip, grinning at the way Fumi snickers next to her. Then Taylor catches my pointed silence and grins.

“Go ahead, say it.”

I shake my head. “No, it’s…nothing.”

She laughs. “Eloise. We’re not at the office.”

In fact, we’re—Taylor, Fumi, and I—at Terroir et Pays, a gorgeous rooftop wine bar in Soho festooned with twinkling lights and vine arbors. I love that Taylor invited me out for after-work drinks along with Fumi Yamaguchi, Taylor’s friend and one of the top equity partners at Crown and Black. They’re both super cool, not to mention successful and confident. And I have to say, having not really had any girlfriends over the last few years at all, it feels fantastic to be included.

But all and of those thoughts do is make me feel shittier. Here Taylor is, making an effort to be my friend—which she doesn’t have to do, I mean she’s my boss—and all I can think about is how I’m not just her employee.

I’m a spy.

A reluctant one, for sure. But Massimo’s threat still hangs over me, like the sword of Damocles. A week has passed since I tried hunting through Alistair’s locked VIP files for Luca Carveli’s will.

…But instead found myself screaming into my arm with my ankles on his desk as Alistair made me come like a hurricane on his tongue. Things have…cooled since then: both my hunt for Luca’s will, and whatever sparked between Alistair and me.

With the will, I simply haven’t had another chance to sneak into Alistair’s office. I only barely managed to grab the key from the filing cabinet while he was putting his shirt back on the last time, and even then I had to wait a full day until Katerina’s next lunch break to get it back into her desk drawer.

As for Alistair and me? Well…

Massimo has, of course, been a bastard about the delay in getting what he wants, and upped his threats to me involving my sister. But those threats surrounding Camille hit me in even more ways than Massimo knows.

…Because it’s a sobering reminder that I’m not the only LeBlanc sister with a “history” involving Alistair Black.

And God, does that make me livid.

It happened a few months after he cut me out of his life. It’s as if severing all contact, blocking me everywhere, and walking away from whatever “we” might have been, all on the worst night of my life, wasn’t enough of a fuck-you from Alistair.

He also had to screw my sister.

Or, according to Camille, he took advantage of her.

However shitty it sounds, however awful it is for me not to believe my own sister…well, consider me in “camp doubt.” I love Camille, but this is what she does. She embellishes. She reconstructs stories to make herself the main character. The story you hear from her is rarely the truth.

Camille’s version of that night is that she was out drinking a bit too much with some friends. She bumped into Alistair and “gave him a piece of her mind” for blowing me off. At which point, he supposedly fed her drinks, coerced her into a car, and drove her to his apartment where he essentially took advantage her when she was barely conscious.

It’s a lot to unpack. But, and as much as I hated Alistair at the time, zero part of me believed he was that sort of man. Also, it wasn’t the first time Camille casually tossed out a rape allegation that had zero truth to it.

Actually, it was the fifth time she’d done it, and always for attention. To garner sympathy. Again, I know it sounds so unbelievably shitty to doubt my own sister’s claim of assault. But I do.

Unfortunately, that’s where the lies end.

I wanted so badly to believe that she invented the entire story of bumping into Alistair that summer, not just the bogus assault part, but that became impossible once I heard from Demi, who was randomly also at that same bar, that she’d seen my sister and Alistair climbing into a car together.

So, yeah, when Massimo threatens my sister, it makes me remember the awful reality that she and Alistair once went home together.

And that is why things have cooled since that one time in his office when I was reminded how strong a drug Alistair Black really is, and let my guard down. .

“Or…don’t?”

I blink, smiling awkwardly at Taylor. “Sorry, I was a million miles away, what?”

She laughs. “I said, we’re not in the office!”

Fumi tucks a strand of her jet-black hair back from her slender neck, raising her glass of Riesling. “No joke, Eloise. These nights out Taylor and I take are basically mandatory decompression with having to work alongside Captain Grumps.”

Taylor snickers, shrugging. “I mean, I love the guy like a brother⁠—”

“Well, that makes one of us.”

Taylor rolls her eyes at Fumi. “Fair enough. But in any case, Eloise,” she says, turning back to me. “It’s good to vent. You can say what you like about Alistair. I swear to God, I’m not HR, and I won’t repeat a thing.”

I smirk, arching a brow.

“Ooo, do the dollar bill thing,” Fumi snickers.

Taylor nods, and then looks back at me with a sigh.

“Okay, give me a dollar.”

I frown. “What?”

“Do you have a dollar bill on you?”

“I…think?” I pick up my bag and rifle inside for my wallet before pulling out a crumpled bill. I hand it to Taylor and she grins.

“Okay, I am now officially and legally acting in the capacity of your attorney. This is now a protected, confidential conversation.”

I laugh. “That’s how badly you want me to talk smack about Alistair?”

“Yup.”

I sigh, grinning as I look down into my wine. “You said before that he could be prickly when he wants to be. My immediate response was ‘well the mood sure does strike him a lot’.”

Taylor and Fumi both crack up.

“That it does,” Fumi giggles, standing and draining her wine. “Be right back. I gotta pee.”

When she’s gone, Taylor shakes her head as she takes another sip of wine. “If it makes you feel any better, Alistair’s been like that since I met him in law school.”

“Oh, he was like that before, too.”

The table goes quiet, awkwardly so. Taylor starts to open her mouth as if to change the subject. Then she pauses, her brow furrowing.

“Okay, screw it, I’m just going to say it so we can stop tiptoeing around the elephant in the room.” She glances over her shoulder, as if to make sure Fumi is out of earshot. Then she gives me a soft, sympathetic look. “I know you two…have a history.”

My face pales a little, and I swallow the lump that forms in my throat.

“No, hang on,” Taylor shakes her head. “I’m not interested in drama, it’s none of my business, and I don’t know any of the details. I don’t need to know. But…” Her brows knit.

“Massimo doesn’t know,” I say quietly. “If that’s what you’re getting at.”

She sighs. “Again, not trying to pry, it’s just…well, Massimo is…”

“Sure is,” I mutter.

“Eloise, if you don’t want to work with Alistair, that is completely fine. I get it. I can rearrange things—and I’m not saying that just to headhunt you for my team or anything. You could work under Gabriel, if you wanted.”

I smile wryly, shaking my head.

“It’s fine. Really. But I appreciate the offer.” My brows wrinkle. “Has he told you anything? Alistair, I mean. About⁠—”

“Your history with him?” Taylor finishes for me, shaking her head firmly. “Nothing that affects how I view you, either as an attorney or a person. That’s the truth.” She pauses. “Can I be honest, Eloise?”

“Please.”

“I’ve seen the way he is around you—yes, prickly, and I think we can both agree that that’s putting it mildly. And sure, some of it might be the history you two have from Knightsblood. But, do you think some of it might also be because of what happened with your sister?”

My stomach drops along with my jaw.

“He…he told you about that?”

She shrugs. “We’re close.”

I am not prepared for the sudden twist of…goddammit, is that jealousy swirling like venom inside? I’m still trying to shake it away when Taylor reaches across the table and places a hand on mine.

“Nothing like that, Eloise. I mean close like the brother I never had,” she says quietly. “He and Gabriel both are, actually. So, yeah, he told me about what happened. I mean, look, it’s not my place, but I really can’t help but wonder if some of the…friction you’re getting from him is because he’s now working closely with the sister of the woman who tried to assault him.”

It feels like a punch to the stomach.

Hang on, what?

I stare at Taylor, my pulse quickening.

“Sorry, what did you just say?”

Her face pales a little. “Forget it. This has nothing to do with me, and it is not my place to⁠—”

“Taylor, no, wait!”

She starts to stand, grabbing her bag and pulling out some cash to drop onto the table.

“Drinks are on me. I sincerely apologize for bringing this up⁠—”

“Please.” I grab her arm, stopping her. “Please, I need to…” I frown. “Look, I… I know they met at a bar here in the city one night and left together. I know they…” I swallow back the bile as horribly vivid images of Alistair and my sister fucking swirl through my head before focusing on Taylor again. “But why would you say she tried to…you know.”

Taylor bites her lip.

“My sister is a train wreck,” I hiss quietly. “She’s unstable, she’s a liar, and she’s a raging narcissist. And I say all that to let you know that literally nothing you say could change what I already think about her.”

Taylor exhales slowly.

“Please,” I croak. “I just want to know the truth.”

She nods, looking away as she draws in a deep breath. “Eloise, Alistair almost lost his life that night. He was extremely drunk, and it was later shown that he had Rohypnol in his system.”

My mouth falls open. “But that’s…”

“The date rape drug, yes.”

I blanch, staring at her. “What the hell happened?”

“Camille was driving him back to her place when she got pulled over for blowing through a stop sign.”

“Drunk?”

Taylor’s mouth thins as she shakes her head side to side. “Stone cold sober. The cop gave her a breathalyzer test on the spot. She wasn’t even buzzed.” Her jaw tightens. “Alistair, on the other hand, almost fell out of the passenger seat, couldn’t obey the officer’s commands, and tried to run off before he collapsed in the street. They took him to Mt. Sinai, gave him adrenaline to get his heart going again, pumped his stomach, and found the Rohypnol in his system.” Her face is stony as she looks away. “He could have died, Eloise.”

What. The. Actual. Fuck.

“I’ve never heard a word of this,” I breathe. “Why the fuck isn’t Camille in jail?”

Taylor’s mouth twists. “Alistair didn’t want to press charges.”

I stare at her. “Why the fuck not?!”

She looks down into her wine and takes a deep breath before lifting her eyes back to mine.

“You.”

An hour later, there are two things I know for sure.

The first is that Fumi probably thinks I’m a psycho and Taylor is probably terrified of me now. Because I just all but forced the latter to take us back to the Crown and Black offices and give me a copy of the police report from that night that had been locked in her files.

The second is that I’m going to kill my sister.

I was always Papa’s favorite in terms of true affection, getting hugs and deep, bonding conversations. Camille, however, wasn’t left out, and got money and her lavish lifestyle paid for without question. Which is how a grown-ass woman who’s never worked a day in her life can live in a stunning three-story townhouse a block away from Central Park West.

Her housekeeper Betina—because of course she has a fucking housekeeper—answers my furious knocks on the front door. I blast past her, my face livid and my blood burning like nuclear fire as I storm into the house.

“CAMILLE!” I roar. “CAMILLE?!”

“Ellie?”

I look up from the foyer to see my sister up on the third floor, dressed in some ridiculous Parisian silk robe with a cocktail glass in her hand. She frowns.

“What are you⁠—”

“Don’t. Move!”

I storm up the winding staircase, and by the time I get to her, her face is pale as she backs away from me.

“Okay, first, your energy is so negative right⁠—”

“I want to talk about what the fuck happened that night!” I scream at her. “With Alistair!”

She bristles. She quickly brings the glass to her lips and takes a large gulp of her martini.

“I… I don’t like to talk about that night. You know that, Ellie.”

“Why not, Camille?!” I snarl.

Her face turns paler. “You know why! Because⁠—”

“Because everything you told me about that night is bullshit, maybe?!” I scream. “And you ‘don’t like to talk about it’ because you probably don’t even remember what your fucking story is!?”

She looks at me, aghast. “That motherfucker raped me, Eloise!!” she yells back. “He got me wasted, and⁠—”

“Really? This says you were fucking sober when you were pulled over.”

I yank the police report out of my bag and shove it against her chest, splashing her cocktail over her robe.

“I…I…” Camille stammers, looking white as she takes the paper. “I don’t know what sort of lies Alistair told you, but⁠—”

“You blew a zero-point-zero for alcohol, Camille,” I hiss. “Alistair, meanwhile, fell out of the fucking car, ran from a cop in a daze, and then collapsed in the street with his heart rate in the fucking toilet.”

She goes still—so still I almost wonder if she’s having some sort of psychotic episode. She stares through the report in her hand, a wild, manic look in her eyes. Slowly, she drags her gaze back to me, her mouth twisted in fury.

“Get out.”

“You lied to me, Camille!!” I scream. “Why the hell would you⁠—”

“Get out!!”

“And worse, it was you trying to take him home?! “I mean, what kind of a sister does that?! What the fuck is wrong with⁠—”

“GET!! OUT!!”

The room goes silent as we stare each other down, her bloodcurdling scream still hanging in the air.

“Gladly,” I hiss quietly.

I keep my shit together until I’m outside. Then it hits me like a brick in the face. I collapse onto a park bench just around the corner, sucking in air as a million thoughts explode through my head.

There are several reasons why, ten years ago, I had to force myself to stop thinking of Alistair Black the way I used to. Our tortuously enmeshed paths, and the way things went up in smoke when he cut me out is one of them. Later, my fake, unwanted marriage to Massimo become another.

But the biggest one for me was thinking for so many years that he and my sister slept together.

Now that I’ve just found out that it’s all bullshit, I have no idea what to do with myself. With my sudden proximity to Alistair again.

…Or with the dangerous notion that I may, in fact, be falling once again for the same boy I fell for before.

Come what may.