Page 12 of Never the Best

The room felt like it had tilted slightly. Sage, the girl who had been part of the gang that made my life hell, along with Josie and Dixie May, was defending me? She wasn’t smiling,wasn’t trying to soften the blow. She simply looked at Dixie May like she was tired of the entire act and wasn’t afraid to show it.

Before Dixie May could recover, Rhett moved closer to his fiancée. He glanced at Dixie May, then at me, he was clearly not pleased.

"Josie, let's go." He put his hand on her arm and began to steer her away from us.

“But—” Josie protested.

“Now,” he clipped.

It wasn’t loud, but it was enough. Josie straightened, her eyes flashing indignation. Dixie May looked cowed and, without another word, grabbed Gary’s arm and stalked to the exit.

For a moment, I was frozen, my heart hammering in my chest as I watched them leave the restaurant. I didn’t know whether to cry or laugh or just run out of the restaurant.

“You okay?” Aurora put a tentative hand on my shoulder.

I nodded, swallowing hard. “Yeah, I think so.”

But I wasn’t merelyokay. For the first time since I’d come back to Savannah, I felt supported. By Aurora and Luna, who had stood their ground without hesitation. By Sage, who had surprised me more than anyone. Even by Rhett, who, despite everything, had told his fiancée to shut up.

It wasn't enough to make me want to eat a three-course meal—but it was enough that I managed to have some pieces of smoked gouda before I went to bed that night.

CHAPTER 5

Rhett

"Yes, sir, I understand." I managed not to sigh too loudly after my father was finished lecturing me about theincidentat The Olde Pink House.

The Great George Vanderbilt was all about appearances and maintaining the family name.

I struggled with his values more now than I had growing up. I was supposed to manage the family wealth and live like he had—doing absolutely nothing but checking on stocks, bonds, and investments, spending my time in a country club, and occasionally nabbing a mistress that my wife would overlook because that was how it worked.

When I decided to use my Harvard finance degree to build a company, my father scoffed butallowedme to do it, saying everyone needed a hobby. Now that Vanderbilt Finance was a successful consulting firm, he talked about it like itwasthe family business. It wasn't.

I had done what I was supposed to do: expand thegenerational wealth, and considering I was not merely investing money but building a company gave me comfort. Vanderbilt Finance employed hundreds of people across multiple offices in several Southern states, with a portfolio that included not just wealth management but high-level financial consulting and corporate restructuring. We didn’t only handle the money of Savannah’s elite—we helped companies streamline their operations, ensure regulatory compliance, and set themselves up for long-term growth. It was about more than profit, it was about being privileged to help those who worked at my company to live fulfilling lives—that was what I was most proud of, for being the source of employment for so many.

And yet, despite all of that, my father still found ways to act as though my success washisaccomplishment, casually dropping hints at parties about how he’dencouragedme to take the initiative tosteer the family legacy into the modern age. The reality was that George Vanderbilt hadn’t lifted a finger beyond cashing his monthly trust fund distributions and ordering me around like I was some kind of PR Manager for the Vanderbilt name. The reality also was that I let him.

“Rhett, we cannot have such public scenes. Youmusttalk to Josie. She's a good girl, yeah? She just needs a little training. Tessa had the same issues with Macon, but he sorted her out."

I controlled my temper. My brother-in-law, Macon, in my opinion, emotionally abused Tessa. I had tried to talk to her about it, but she couldn’t or wouldn’t see it; after all,she’d only seen a patriarchal marriage, where love was transactional, where silence was a weapon, and where apologies were unidirectional, from the wife to the husband. Our parents’ relationship had set the bar so low that Macon’s manipulations seemed normal—acceptable, even. She mistook his control for care, his criticism for guidance, and his coldness for strength. It made me sick to watch, but no matter how I tried to open her eyes to it, she told me, “You don’t understand him like I do.”

Macon probably reminded her of our father. They were similar in how they thought about and treated women. Hadn't I been raised in the same manner? Women were ornamental and dispensable. It had taken growing up and expanding my emotional intelligence to unlearn all that crap.

I respected women—not for what they did for men or how they looked on a man's arm but for who they were.Butthere was a time when I didn't, and wasn't that the source of my endless nightmares featuring Pearl?

I snapped back to the conversation with my father, clenching my jaw to keep my irritation from showing. “Yes, sir.”

“Good." He thoughtfully leaned back in his leather chair with the kind of self-satisfied smirk that made me want to walk out of his study and never come back. “Now, I hear that Luna Steele and Aurora Rhodes were there to witness the disaster. Luna Steele is…well, let’s not get into that. But I hope you understand how important it is to smooth things over with the Rhodes family. Aurora Rhodes is married to Gabe Rhodes, and you know what that means in Savannah.”

I knew exactly what that meant. The Rhodes family wasn’t merely old money—they wereancientmoney, so entrenched in Savannah society that even my father had to tread carefully around them. Their name was on buildings, schools, and foundations all over the city. To George Vanderbilt, upsetting a Rhodes wasn’t just bad manners—it was a social catastrophe.

"Now, we all know she's just some floozy who married into the family, but it appears that she has her mother-in-law’s ear," my father continued, "and you know Atticus does whatever Betsy wants. If they hear about this, there will be hell to pay."

I doubted it. I knew Gabe Rhodes, and he didn't give a shit about societal bullshit, not since he decided to tell the world to fuck itself, and married a woman who was an architect, half-black, and not from our elite circle. Betsy cared even less; she always had, but was still a power unto herself, thanks to the backing of the Rhodes name and money.

"Aurora is not the type to go running, complaining to Betsy about every run-in she has with someone." I looked at my glass of scotch, wondering how it would feel to throw it against the wall behind my father where the portrait of my grandfather, George Vanderbilt the Second, hung.

"Now, Dixie May is an airhead, we all know that, but I thought Josie had more sense. You need to do better with her, Rhett." My father's tone took on that faux-paternal quality he used when he wasteachingme. “You need to make sure she understands how to behave,andyou need to make it right with Aurora. You make Josie send that womanflowers, write a note, whatever she needs to do. We can’t afford to have the Rhodes thinking poorly of us.”

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