Chap. 4
"Wow. This place is huge! It looks big from the outside, but once you're inside, it takes your breath away." Jaden let go of Fox's arm as she walked through the hallway leading into the ballroom. "Look at the fine detail on the woodwork. And the paintings match the colors of the walls perfectly! Who decorated this place? I simply must get the name of your interior decorator. Mother and I have been looking for a decorator with a real sense of style, a flare for the exquisite taste of upscale living."
"Exquisite taste? More like expensive taste. My mother only has taste for the best of the overpriced décor in the world. If it isn't made in the United States, it must be exquisite." Fox took in his surroundings. The paintings his mother had had flown in from Spain were the epitome of bad taste, though Ivy would never admit to it. The statues sitting in the hall had been shipped in from Germany and were Ivy's prized possessions.
Jaden walked over to the statue of a man holding his hand out as if he were reaching out to be touched by his lover. "He looks so sad. Like he's lost his only love." Jaden peered closely at the face of the saddened statue. "What's this? It looks like he has a chip on the side of his left eye." Jaden gingerly touched the cement wound as if she were afraid she might hurt the silent figure.
Fox strode over to his date's side and focused on the small chip marring his mother's favorite piece of décor. "That is a wound he received as a result of mine and Ethan's childish antics." Fox cringed as his mind ran backwards in time to the day he and Ethan had been playing around in the house after Julian had told them both to run along and play outside while he and his business partners had a meeting in the conference room. Ethan refused to do as Julian had asked and he and Fox ended up playing in the hallway instead. "Ethan wanted to play 'King of the Statue'. He tried climbing the statue, but he ended up tipping it over instead, right on top of me. I received a small battle scare on my knee were it hit me on the way to the floor." Fox tapped his right knee.
"Oh my. Was Ethan hurt?" Jaden looked shocked.
Ethan? Was Ethan hurt? Why should she care if he was hurt? I'm her date, not Ethan.
"No. Ethan was fine. He ran to our mother and cried for an hour." Fox smiled bitterly as he recalled the way Ivy had soothed her precious Ethan and scolded Fox for playing around in the house, damaging her favorite art piece.
"Well that's good. I'm glad Ethan wasn't harmed. Oh…And I'm glad you weren't hurt either."
"I was hurt. My knee, remember?" Fox frowned, though he wasn't too surprised Jaden hadn't remembered half of what he had said.
"Oh, right. Your knee. I see you walk fine, though, so it must not have been too bad." Jaden walked on into the ballroom, not giving Fox another thought.
"This is going to be a long night." Fox followed Jaden and stepped into the ballroom.
****
Theresa looked around the room. Her party was a huge success. Couples from all over Harmony were deep in conversation, letting go of all the worries of the old year about to end and waiting to welcome the promise of a great new year ahead of them.
"This is going to be a wonderful party. A new year, a new beginning. I'm going to let Ethan go forever and start over, fresh." Theresa was determined to leave Ethan in the past. She couldn't hold on to a lost love anymore. She owed it to herself to let go.
Looking around the room, Resa spotted Jaden Coldwell with Fox close to her side.
He came. He actually brought her to the party. Jaden actually wanted to come?
Theresa made her way through the crowd and stepped behind Fox.
"Nicholas, aren't you going to introduce me to your date?" Theresa smiled as Fox turned around to face her.
"Resa, this is Miss. Jaden Coldwell of the Main Coldwells." Fox said in a mock impression of a butler introducing an important client to an upstanding business man. "Jaden, this is Resa, my step-mother. I'm sure you'll get along just smashingly." Fox grinned at Resa as she looked Jaden over.
"Aren't you a little young to be Nicky's mother?" Jaden batted her eyes as she wrapped her arm around Fox's waist.
"I'm his step-mother." Theresa wasn't surprised Miss. Coldwell had missed that little piece of information.
"Oh, right. So you're married to Julian. Daddy says Julian is a great business man. Very powerful." Jaden smiled up at Fox. "You're going to take over Crane Industries for your father, aren't you, Nicky? We're going to be the most respected family in all of Harmony, maybe even Main!" Jaden smiled as she seemed to drift off in her own little world.
We? Since when were Fox and Jaden an item? They have one date and suddenly they're picking out china?
Theresa seriously doubted Fox planed on taking over Crane Industries, not to mention the fact that Julian would never trust the Crane empire to a smooth talking con man.
Fox looked nervously at Jaden. "I have no intention of taking my father's place in Crane Industries. I'm my own man. I can make a life for myself without the Crane name."
"But Nicky! You have to take over Crane industries! You already work there, so I don't see why you'd want to work anywhere else. Besides, Daddy says that since Ethan is now longer a Crane, he can't run the Crane business, so you'll have no choice. You're the only one that can do it." Jaden looked sullen at the mere thought of not marrying into money.
"Crane Industries will have to live without me, I'm afraid. Besides, once I've inherited everything when dear old Dad hits the dirt, I'll just hire someone else to run Crane Industries and I'll sit back and let the money roll in." Fox said with a cocky smile.
"Well, at least we'll still have plenty of money for a good life. I can't stand the thought of having to live without having all the necessities." Jaden cringed as she thought of her life without money.
"And what do you consider the necessities?" Resa asked.
"Well, for starters, I'd have to have a lots of room for my doll collection, I've got over three hundred of them you know." Jaden smiled as she thought about her beautiful dolls in their display cases.
"Three hundred dolls?" Fox cringed at the thought of having to share a house with a million curly haired baby dolls. "Haven't you ever seen 'Child's Play'? Dolls can be very vicious if you drop them."
"Dolls can't come to life, silly." Jaden play-slapped Fox's arm. " And I'd never drop one of mine. I take very good care of them."
"Alright, so plenty of room for your dolls, and what else?" Theresa wasn't impressed so far with what Miss. Coldwell considered the 'necessities'.
"I'd have to have plenty of help around the house as well. Can you imagine having only one maid? Daddy has three maids during the week and four during the weekend when he has all his parties." Jaden smiled broadly at Fox. "It's hard to find good help these days and we've had to let a few of our maids go."
"Let them go? What happened?" Theresa asked with concern.
"They talked too much and didn't get their jobs done. They felt like they should get a break every few hours, even if their work wasn't completed. The nerve of them! Thinking they deserved time off when there was important work to be done around the house before one of my father's important clients came to call." Jaden's eyes were cool as ice. "Daddy even caught one of them sitting in his office chair. Oh she tried to say she was just sitting down to tie her shoe, but Daddy threw her out of the mansion, right on her lazy, good-for-nothing butt." Jaden smiled with satisfaction.
"What? He threw her out because she sat in his chair?!?" Resa could feel herself loosing control.
"Well, of course! Wouldn't you? If you paid a maid to do a job and all she did was sit around, on your good, clean furniture, mind you, and made excuses for why she didn't have her work done, you'd throw her out, too." Jaden looked shocked that Theresa couldn't see her point of view.
"No I would not! I wouldn't care where she sat. I treat our help with respect." Theresa had had just about enough of Jaden's snooty attitude. All she wanted to do was excuse herself and get as far away from her as possible.
"Oh really? Well maybe that's why this room looks like crap. Your so called 'helpers' didn't do a very good job with the decorations. It looks like they did a half-assed job." Jaden waved her hand around the room as though she were trying to whisk away all the crape paper hanging on the walls. " Maybe it's because you let them get away with too much, what with all the respect you give them and all." Jaden glared at Theresa with cold eyes.
"No, it's because she's the maid's daughter." A cold voice from behind Resa stated.
"What?" Jaden looked shocked.
"It's true." Ivy wheeled closer towards her son and his date. "Theresa's mother used to be our maid. And Theresa was once my personal assistant. That's why she has such a soft spot for the hired help." Ivy sneered at Theresa from her chair.
"Mother, that's enough." Fox could tell that Theresa was going to lose it if he didn't think fast.
"Your step-mother is the maid's daughter?" Jaden turned to Fox with wide eyes. " I can't believe it! And you spoke so highly of her, Nicky!"
Jaden turned to Resa. "You're a personal assistant? But I thought you worked at Crane Industries?"
"She does work at Crane Industries, but…" Fox tried to explain to Jaden.
"But she says that she was a personal assistant." Jaden wined, pointing at Ivy.
"She was my personal assistant, that is before she seduced my ex-husband and got him to marry her." Ivy smiled bitterly at Theresa. "The little slut."
"I did NOT seduce Julian. He seduced ME! He got me drunk! You know that, Ivy!" Theresa's eyes flared with anger.
"What? You seduced Julian? I knew it! I knew there was something else going on here. There's no way Mr. Crane would marry a maid's daughter. So you used him to get to the Crane empire! You were sick of being a good-for-nothing maid's daughter, so you seduced Julian into marrying you so you could run Crane Industries!" Jaden smiled at the thought of just having uncovered a huge scandal.
"No! I didn't seduce anyone!" Theresa was getting desperate to make Jaden understand that she had been the one being used. "Julian got me drunk and got me to marry him. It was all him!"
"Oh, Theresa! Stop blaming Julian for your treachery! You knew what you were doing. You'll stop at nothing to hurt our family." Ivy tried to look hurt as she thought of her family being hurt by Theresa's antics.
"Mother, that's enough! I mean it!" Fox had had enough of his mother's little 'poor me' act. "Leave Theresa alone. You've said enough for one night."
"Fox, I'm only speaking the truth. If Theresa can't handle the fact that she's ruining our lives, then that's her own fault." Ivy smiled weakly at her son.
"The truth, Ivy? You wouldn't know how to tell the truth if it was handed to you on paper by GOD himself." Resa was so upset she could barely think straight.
Ivy's eyes narrowed as she faced Theresa. "Speak for yourself, Theresa. Telling lies is what got you in this mess in the first place! You could never tell the truth. Even when you lied, you convinced yourself that it was the right thing to do, that you were sparing Ethan's feelings so it was alright to lie."
" I said that's enough!" Fox turned on Ivy with such anger it made her jump.
"Fox.." Ivy looked shocked.
"Why don't you do us all a favor and leave, Mother?" Fox leaned down and rested his hands on the arm rests of Ivy's chair. "Run along and find someone else to torture for a while, O.K.?"
"Fine." Ivy said as Fox let go of her chair and stood back up. "I've got better things to do besides hang around arguing with yesterday's trash!" Ivy glared at Resa before she wheeled around and left the room.
"Yesterday's trash?!? I'll show her trash!" Theresa started after Ivy, but Fox caught her arm.
"Let her go, Resa. Just leave her be." Fox looked after his mother. "She's only trying to get to you, you know that. Going after her won't win you any battles."
Theresa ripped her arm away from Fox's grip. "Don't tell me what to do, Fox! I'm the parent, and you're the child, remember? Children don't tell their parents what they can and can't do." Theresa's face was hot and she was on the verge of tears.
"Well, then. If you're the parent, you'd better stop acting like the child and grow up, Resa. Because unlike you, I didn't get a childhood, and I'd kind of like to be the child instead of the adult for once." Fox walked away, leaving Theresa to stew in her thoughts.
Theresa watched as Fox made his way to the other side of the ballroom, feeling like she had just been smacked. Taking her eyes off Fox, Resa turned to find Jaden glaring at her with hatred in her eyes.
"I can't believe Julian married you. He could do so much better than the likes of you." Jaden smiled, satisfied in kicking Resa while she was down.
"Right." Theresa looked down and caught sight of something that made her smile. "You know, you're right. Julian could do so much better than me. I mean after all, he could have you. What with your ability to dress yourself and all. Oops…I think I may have spoken too soon." Resa smiled bitterly and pointed at Jaden's feet.
"What?" Jaden looked confused and looked at her feet.
"You have two different shoes on, Miss. Coldwell. Sorry to say, but even Julian has his limits, and color blindness isn't something he would tolerate in a wife." Resa smiles sweetly and walked away from Jaden who was still trying to figure out why she had two different colored shoes on.
****
Fox leaned against the far wall of the ballroom in the Crane Mansion. Slowly sipping the brandy in his hand, he reflected on what had just happened.
Mother never did know when to give it up. If she's not careful, Theresa will get the better of her. Not that she wouldn't deserve it. I can't say that I'd be sorry to she dear old Mum get what's coming to her.
A smile played at the corners of Fox's lips as he thought about his mother's demise at the hands of his young step-mother.
Yes, things are going well. Theresa will make Mother pay for her deceitfulness, but only after Mother finishes stripping Resa of all that she has gained from marrying Julian, along with the Crane name.
Fox's smile widened as he thought of who Resa would run to after Ivy was done with her, seeing how she had already lost Ethan to Gwen for good. Fox knew Resa would need someone to confide in before too long, and he was going to make sure that it was his arms that caught her when she finally took her fatal fall.
"What are you smiling about?"
Fox nearly dropped his brandy as Jaden came up behind him. "Nothing. Just a private joke." Fox grinned and tried to look casual.
"A private joke, hum?" Jaden smiled and ran her index finger down Fox's arm. "Want to share it with me?"
"No. That's why they call it a private joke. It's private." Fox turned away from Jaden and took another swallow from his almost empty glass.
"Well, then why don't we dance?" Jaden took Fox by the arm and started to pull him to the dance floor.
"I don't dance." Fox pried Jaden's hands away from his arm and took another swallow.
"Please, Nicky" Jaden wined.
"Stop calling me that, and what happened to your shoes?" Fox nodded towards Jaden's bare feet.
"My feet were starting to hurt, so I took them off." Jaden lied, not wanting to admit that she had put two different shoes on before leaving for the party earlier that day.
"I see."
"Fox, why don't we go somewhere and talk?"
"Talk about what?" Jaden had her looks, but she had little more than that, and Fox knew it. He seriously doubted her ability to carry on a normal conversation for longer than five minutes.
"I don't know. How about the fact that you failed to mention that that your new step-mother is the maid's daughter! And that she seduced your father into marrying her!" Jaden said coolly.
Fox placed his empty glass on the table next to them and took a hold of Jaden's arm. "You need to get your facts straight!" Fox held Jaden's arm tight as he pulled her through the crowded room towards the hallway.
"Fox, stop!" Jaden pleaded as Fox continued to drag her through the hall and up the stairs. "What are you doing?"
Fox ignored Jaden's pleas and pulled her up the mansion stairs, only stopping shortly to open a door before insisting she enter the room and have a seat on the bed.
"Now," Fox said as he quietly shut the door behind them. "I'm going to tell you the truth about Therea, and you're going to listen to every last word I have to say."
"I already know everything there is to know about your slut of a step-mother!" Jaden shot angrily at Fox.
"You don't know anything about Resa. She's not who you think she is." Fox looked wearily at Jaden as he tried to explain.
"Oh, so you mean she didn't use your father to get the Crane name and the power that comes with it?"
"No. Resa wouldn't use Julian like that." Fox shifted his weight from one leg to the other.
"Really? So Theresa loves Julian then. She married him because she was in love with him." Jaden tilled her head to one side and looked skeptically at Fox with her green eyes.
Fox ran his fingers through his short spiked hair. He knew Theresa didn't love Julian, but Julian wasn't exactly in love, himself. "No, Resa doesn't love my father, but.."
"But nothing! If she doesn't love him, than what other reason would she have for marrying him if not for the Crane name and money?" Jaden got to her feet. "Theresa married Julian for one reason and one reason only! All she cares about is the Crane money and the power that comes with it!"
****
Theresa finished the drink in her hands and looked around the room. Why couldn't she be as carefree as the other couples at the party. Everywhere she looked she saw happiness. Couples laughing and carrying on without a care in the world.
Resa decided she had had enough for one night. Silently she made her way through the crowd and up the stairs towards her room. As she slowly trudged her way through the hall, Theresa thought she heard voices.
Slowly inching along, Theresa made her way towards the other end of the hall towards the voices.
Who could be up here? I didn't see anyone come up here?
Theresa silently moved forward as she tried to decipher who the voices belonged to. There were two, that she could tell for sure. One male and one female. It sounded like they were arguing.
"Is that what you really think? That she married him for money?"
"Well, it makes more sense than her marrying him for love!"
"Julian took advantage of her. It wasn't her fault."
Julian? Are they arguing about me?
Theresa inched closer towards the door to get a better listen. She wanted to know who was talking about her and what they were saying.
"Wasn't her fault? Oh, I suppose Julian MADE her drink the wine and then hog-tied her into marrying him!"
"NO, but it wasn't all her fault. Julian knew what he was doing when he got her drunk."
"Why do you continue to defend her, Fox? Is there something you're not telling me? Is there a reason you feel so attached to her?"
Fox! Theresa had to clap her hand over her mouth to keep herself from gasping when she realized that the voices belonged to Fox and Jaden. They were fighting over her! But why?
"I'm not defending her! I'm only telling you the truth. Theresa is no angel, but Julian is the devil himself."
"You are defending her! You've been defending her all night! You even had harsh words for your mother, but said nothing when Theresa was the one slinging mud." Jaden sounded angry.
"Maybe it's because Theresa has shown me more affection in a few weeks than my own mother has shown me in a whole lifetime!" Fox was loosing his temper.
"Is that it? Are you so attention deprived that you have to turn to Theresa for the love you feel you never got from Ivy? Are you looking for love from your step-mother?"
Theresa couldn't believe what she was hearing. Fox and Jaden were going at each other like two children on a playground.
"Ivy never was a mother to me or any of my brothers or sisters. The only one she ever cared about was Ethan. Theresa cares about the people in her life. She doesn't just use them and then toss them aside when she's through with them, like a piece of trash."
"Theresa is your step-mother, Fox. She may care about you, but she can't replace your own flesh and blood!"
"Flesh and blood? If you cut Ivy, I doubt she'd even give you the satisfaction of seeing her bleed. No, the only thing running through her veins is ice cold water. As far as I'm concerned, Theresa is more flesh and blood than my mother will ever be! And let's not forget, blood is thicker than water."