All Chapters of Better In Every Way: Chapter 21 - Chapter 30

Alec She likes to say that I am a bother, but I don’t think she minds my continued presence as much as she says she says she does. She thinks I don’t notice all of the shy smiles she tries so hard to stifle behind that polite porcelain demeanour she presents to everyone else. I suppose I should be honoured, she only seems to let her mask slip slightly when she is with her friends, perhaps a little more in private settings but I wouldn’t know. I would like to, though. But I can’t. I’m supposed to be honouring her request for professionalism, not barging into her office every few days for impromptu conversation. Truthfully I don’t know why I’m doing this. A part of me feels obligated to check on both sides of this burnt bridge. Cam for obvious reasons, but I feel compelled to check on Dariana as the only one in my family who hasn’t completely written her off— aside from Rory. But Rory and Cam aren’t on speaking terms, and she’s the only person other than me who knows about

Dariana “I told you!” I yelled, getting all up in Tom’s face as he looks back in the rule book to make sure that he was reading it correctly. “Come on, banker you read it yourself now. Put that property up for auction.” “This can’t be right.” Tom mumbles to himself while reading and re-reading the same line over and over again. “Is this why you wanted to be the banker? To protect your wife’s interests?” George says, looking back and forth between Emma and Tom with a look of mock disapproval on his face. “Tsk tsk, Tom. I’m not sure what the game says about that but in the real world we call that a conspiracy, and it’s illegal.” “I never should have let you guys talk me into playing Monopoly with you, you were basically raised to be Monopoly experts. I think you’ve broken my husband.” She says as she shuffles toward Tom so she could rub his back. “You poor baby.” That just caused George and I to lose it, and we break into a fit of laughs. “This fake money changed you, Dar.”

After my discussion in the kitchen with Emma, I manage pull myself together enough to rejoin everyone for dinner without arousing any suspicion. The rest of the dinner went by relatively smoothly. The conversation was lively and the intermittent debates over random silly things served well as a distraction for the thoughts that were induced by the revelation in the kitchen. Even if it was only temporary.And it was temporary. As soon as George and I drove off, the thoughts started trickling in, little by little in the deafening silence of the ride home. I hadn’t driven to the Bennet residence myself, so George had to drop me off. “So, why did you disappear just before dinner?” He asks without taking his eyes off the road.“I told you, I just needed to clean up a spill.” I said, repeating the lie I told earlier.“When did you start lying to me?” He turns to me for a moment to look me in the eye. “I get lying in front of Tom, but you have never had to lie to me. Why start now?” He as

The rest of the week went by in a blur of meetings and final preparations for the presentation. Everything seemed to be pulling me in every direction all at once. I had to oversee the final touches on the models my team rendered for the building. If all goes well and they like them, we can begin construction while we work on the design of the interior. That would mean that this will be handed over to our design team, thus my above average involvement in this project will start to simmer down. Fingers crossed, from today on Rachel will be taking over the regular operations for this project. And not a moment too soon, seeing as the design aspect would mean that this will be in the hands of Eliza’s team. I hadn’t spoken to or interacted with her at all since that conversation in my office my first week back. Which is how I preferred it. However, these past few days, whenever I have a spare moment to myself and my brain forces me to ponder on what Emma said to me on Sunday I find myse

I honestly don’t know what I expected. Alec and Dominic showing up to Melody Line anyway is somewhat very on brand for them. And now Rachel and I are fielding questions from Emma and Rory on their half expected presence. “Did you invite your boyfriend here?” Rory asks, pointing her question in mine and Rachel’s general direction. “No, Dar?” Rachel answers rather quickly. “Nothing to say about him being your boyfriend I see.” I say, raising my eyebrow at her attempt to throw me to the wolves that were our nosey friends. A blush quickly flushes Rachel’s features as she just silently nods at her defeat and takes a sip of her virgin cocktail. “Whatever, I’m just going to invite them over.” Emma says, she scoots Rory out so she can stand up from the booth and walk over to where they are before giving any of us—particularly me— time to process what she just said she was about to do, never mind come up with a sensible objection. Very soon after she gets to their table and s