“I’ll give you credit, Mom. You were pretty damn thorough, but you didn’t think it all through, did you? I mean, why would he bother to buy the cow now, when he’s getting the whole fucking farm for free!”

“Don’t be dramatic.”

“I’m being dramatic?!” I bellow, and in my peripheral, a maid scampers by.

Great. A fucking in-house maid?

“You are giving me to a man you hardly know! Leaving me across the country with no real way of being sure I’m fine, well guess what, Mother, I am not fine!!! I’m not fine!” My pulse beats out of control and I feel dizzy. “Are you seriously going to do this? All because you didn’t have a son to leave your legacy to? We both know you never wanted daughters, which is why you named us after men!”

“We don’t always get what we want, so we adapt,” she says simply, as if any of this is simple.

“You do. You’re getting all you want, and for what? For a second generation of fortune, as if the one you have isn’t enough?! As if your success in one part of the nation isn’t astronomical and more than most people could ever hope for?! Do you know how many people wish they had even just a little of what you did to help their families? To give their families what they need just to survive?” I think of Ransom and his sister, of Beretta and the fishermen on the pier, of Arsen and the young, orphan boys he lives with. “Are you really so greedy for—”

“You know nothing!” she shouts, clipping my words, and my entire body locks.

My mother never shouts.

She never loses control.

And yet, her neck is bright red, and her chest rapidly rises. Her eyes are narrowed in uproar, and her knuckles are growing white around her handbag.

I stagger back, my hand slapping over my mouth. “Holy shit,” I mumble into my skin, slowly dragging my hand down.

“That’s... not what this is about, is it? You’re not telling me everything.” I spin, my fingertips lifting to my temples as I pace. “Mom, what are you not telling me?”

“Hush.”

“Do I not deserve to know who I’m living with?!” I scream, whipping around with a glare. “What kind of mother—”

“I said SHUT UP!” she snaps, louder than before, but it knocks her back into her comfort zone.

Again, at her foreign tone, I straighten before I can stop it.

“As I said, you know nothing, and there is nothing you need to know.” She takes a calming breath, tugs her blazer down, and pushes her hair over her shoulder. “You will do as you’re told, Jameson, and you will see, you will be happy.”

Her voice grows quieter, and her eyes seem to soften as she steps toward me.