Page 104 of Sinful Palace

“I said you’re right. I’m sorry. I should make more time for you, and I will,” she replied. “But first, would you let me explain something to you?”

“Okay,” I said, shoulders drooping. The exhaustion from my grief was seeping back in again, and my eyelids were starting to feel heavy.

Mom took a deep breath and leaned forward. “I do care that your father is gone, honey. Of course I do. I’m devastated,” she said softly. “But I know if I let myself crawl into bed and cry right now, I’ll probably never stop. I can’t do that, no matter how much I want to, because I have a country to run. That means I don’t get to mourn. I don’t get that privilege. I need to appear stoic and brave instead, and to manage that, I need to stay busy and try my best to act like I’m fine. I have to keep up that act for the rest of my term.”

“Right.”

“I know how that must sound to you. How it must look,” she went on. “But that’s how it works for people like me. We don’t get to cry. We don’t get to have more than one day off. The world keeps going on around us, and every day a new problem gets thrown at us. It’s our job to suck it up and deal with it, no matter what’s happening in our personal lives.”

I nodded slowly. “I get that.”

She let out another deep sigh. “As for Jared… you’re right about that too. I should’ve told him when it happened. The Christmas thing was just an excuse.”

“An excuse for what?”

Her lower lip quivered slightly, and she dropped her eyes to the desk. “I know a lot of things, Willow, but I don’t know how to tell my ten-year-old son that his father has committed suicide.”

“Oh.”

“You’re twenty-one. You can handle it, horrible as it is. But your brother… how do I tell him something like that? How do I even start…”

She trailed off and wiped her wet eyes, sniffing loudly as she stared up at the ceiling.

It was all extremely convincing. I almost believed that she was genuinely sad over Dad’s death.

“If Stephen died some other way, it would be easier,” she finally went on. “I could tell Jared that Daddy got sick, and then it’s no one’s fault. But that’s not how it happened, is it? So instead I have to find a diplomatic way of saying: Daddy couldn’t handle the world anymore, so he went and jumped in the river.”

I sighed. “I’m sure you can find a gentle way to word it.”

She shook her head. “Jared is ten. He won’t understand it the way we do. He’ll think it’s his fault. He’ll think that if he did something differently, maybe Stephen wouldn’t have chosen to leave him.”

“I understand what you’re saying, but the longer you keep it from him, the worse it’s going to get,” I replied. “There are people who can help with this sort of stuff. Like child psychologists. They can suggest ways of breaking the news to Jared without making him think it’s his fault in any way.”

“I know. I’m just so ashamed,” Mom murmured, wiping her eyes again. “What are people going to think of me when they find out how long I waited?”

I didn’t know how to respond to that. I simply shook my head and looked out one of the windows behind her, biting my lip.

Mom sniffed loudly, picked up the phone on her desk, and pressed a button. “Lauren, what’s the longest I can push this meeting?” she asked. She paused for a few beats, waiting for the reply. Then she looked at me and covered the mouthpiece. “She says twenty minutes.”

I nodded. “That should be fine.”

She uncovered the phone. “Lauren? Make it happen, please,” she said. She looked over at me again. “I’m sorry. It’s a very important meeting, and it has to be today.”

“It’s okay,” I said. “Twenty minutes is a lot better than five.”

She nodded slowly and took another deep breath before lifting her chin and looking me in the eye. “I want you to know that I don’t hate you, Willow.”

“You don’t?”

“Of course not.” She paused to let out a sigh. “I know you must think I’m a terrible mother for avoiding you over these last few weeks. That’s perfectly fair. I have been terrible. I realize that now.”

“Why did you do it?"

“I suppose part of me blamed you for this whole Rutherford scandal that’s been hanging over my head,” she said. “But that was unfair of me. It’s my own fault. If I didn’t have that stupid conversation with Jamie about killing Rutherford’s career, none of this would’ve happened. It’s not your fault at all.”

“Thank you for saying that,” I murmured.

“It needed to be said. I’m just sorry I waited so long and made you feel so bad.” She worried her bottom lip between her teeth before speaking up again. “Anyway, I’m here for you now. I’m ready to listen,” she said, leaning forward. “What is it you wanted to talk about?”

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