The next morning, Amelia awoke to someone gently shaking her. She groggily opened her eyes and saw her au pair standing over her.

"Ma chérie! You've overslept. I've already laid out your clothes for you. Your mother wants you dressed and ready to go in five minutes!" Cecilia told the girl.

"Ready to go where?" Amelia asked, getting out of bed.

"You and your mother are having breakfast with Richard this morning. They want to talk about wedding plans and thought that you should be included," Cecilia answered.

Amelia groaned loudly and rolled her eyes. She stomped over to the clothing that Cecilia had laid out on her desk.

"I know, ma petite fille. I don't like him either," Cecilia said in response to Amelia's reaction. She gave the girl a sympathetic pat on the back, then left her alone to get dressed.

Amelia grumbled to herself as she put on Annabelle's preppy light blue Oxford shirt. She rolled the sleeves up to her elbows, then she replaced her pajama shorts with spandex dance shorts. She slipped into a plaid pleated kilt and buttoned it at her waist. She put on a pair of ballet flats that matched the color of her shirt. Lastly, she accessorized with a fabric headband that matched the plaid pattern on her skirt.

She met Jade at the bottom of the stairs, and the two left the brownstone.


Amelia and Jade met Richard at a cute French café.

After the three were seated, Richard ordered orange juice for himself, coffee with cream and sugar for Jade, and water for Amelia.

Amelia remembered Annabelle telling her about how Jade only liked black coffee with two sugars. She wondered if Richard knew that. She thought of the time she caught Beck mistakenly pouring two cups of coffee, one of which he added two sugars to. Her father didn't know that she had seen him do that.

Richard ordered everyone's food for them too. He ordered himself an omelette with bacon and potatoes on the side. He ordered a slice of vegetable quiche for Jade, and finally, he ordered one plain croissant for Amelia.

It didn't take Amelia long to figure out that Richard was a total control freak. She desperately wanted to smack him as hard as she could, but she kept a smile on her face, not wanting to upset Jade.

Towards the end of their meal, Jade got up to use the restroom, leaving Richard and Amelia alone together.

"So, how do you feel about boarding school?" Richard suddenly asked Amelia.

"Excuse me?" Amelia said in response. She raised an eyebrow.

"The second your mother says 'I Do' is the second I ship you off to a boarding school in Peru," Richard informed the girl.

"My mother would never let that happen," Amelia said through gritted teeth.

"Listen up, you little brat! Your mother loves me, and soon I'll be the most important person in her life. You will be no more than an insignificant speck of dust on her radar!" Richard growled.

"You don't know the first thing about my mother!" Amelia replied angrily.

"I do not like you," Richard rudely informed his future step-daughter.

"The feeling is mutual," Amelia fired back.

Amelia and Richard were engaged in an intense stare-down as Jade returned to the table.

"What were you two talking about?" Jade asked, sitting back down.

Richard instantly reverted back to his fake friendly persona when Jade returned.

"Oh, little Annie and I were just talking about school. She told me that she wants to go to boarding school!" he said almost too happily.

Amelia gasped indignantly.

"Oh!" Jade said, clearly shocked at her fiancé's statement.


"So, boarding school?" Jade asked after all the doors of car were shut.

"He made that up!" Amelia told her mother as she buckled her seatbelt.

Jade buckled her seatbelt and started her car. She pulled away from the curb that she had parked alongside.

"Richard wouldn't do that," she told her daughter.

"Mom! He said he wanted to ship me off to a boarding school in Peru!" Amelia said.

"He was probably joking. He has a weird sense of humor," Jade said.

"If only you knew..." Amelia sadly muttered to herself.

Jade glanced at her daughter in the backseat.

"Is there something you'd like to share with me?" Jade asked sternly.

"No." Amelia answered flatly.

The two continued the rest of the car ride home in tense silence.


When Jade parked in front of the brownstone, Amelia bolted out of the car and stomped up to her room.