Chapter 15 - EDEN CHANGES EVERYTHINGAugust became a grandfather gradually.
He did not know how to change diapers.
Maris made him learn.
He bought Eden a cashmere blanket.
Maris returned it.
He bought a twenty-dollar stuffed turtle.
Eden loved it.
August looked offended by the economics.
“Apparently taste is not inherited.”
Maris laughed.
They began spending Sunday mornings together.
Sometimes at Seabrook.
Sometimes at Maris’s apartment.
August preferred her apartment more than she expected.
“It’s quiet.”
“You own forty thousand square feet.”
“Exactly.”
One Sunday, Eden fell asleep on his chest.
August did not move for forty minutes.
Maris took a photograph.
He noticed.
“Send me that.”
“No.”
“Maris.”
“I’m negotiating.”
“For what?”
“Nothing. I just enjoy the power reversal.”
August smiled.
Then looked at Eden.
His expression changed.
“I missed too much.”
Maris did not soften the truth.
“Yes.”
He nodded.
“I know.”
She did not tell him to stop this time.
Because now the words were not defense.
They were acceptance.
August looked at her.
“You were right.”
“About?”
“Money.”
“Specific.”
He smiled faintly.
“It changes how people behave.”
Maris sat across from him.
“You always knew that.”
“I knew it intellectually.”
“And now?”
“I watched Genevieve’s face change when she learned who you were.”
Maris nodded.
“I spent my entire life being the person people adjusted around.”
“Yes.”
“I never understood what that looked like from the other side.”
“Most powerful people don’t.”
August looked at his granddaughter.
“What do we do?”
Maris appreciated the we.
Not what should I do.
“We make sure Eden knows who she is before anyone tells her what her name is worth.”
August nodded.
“Good.”
The peaceful moment ended when Maris’s phone rang.
Her editor friend, Camille.
“Have you seen it?”
“Seen what?”
“Don’t open social media in front of your father.”
August immediately looked interested.
Maris opened social media.
A gossip site headline:
THE REAL REASON MARIS ELLINGTON CAME HOME?
Anonymous sources claimed Maris was drowning financially.
That Caleb left because of her “volatile behavior.”
That she prevented him from seeing Eden.
That she reappeared only after realizing August was aging.
Maris went cold.
August held out his hand.
“Give me the phone.”
“No.”
“Maris.”
“No.”
He saw enough from her face.
“Caleb.”
“And Genevieve.”
August stood.
“I’ll call—”
“No.”
He stopped.
Maris looked at him.
“This is mine.”
His jaw tightened.
“They used Eden.”
The article implied Maris used her baby as emotional leverage.
August’s fury sharpened.
Maris stood too.
“If you attack them, they get to say the billionaire father silenced critics.”
“They are lying.”
“Yes.”
“So?”
“So I prove it.”
“How?”
She looked at the article.
“I know Caleb.”
August did not like that answer.
But he remembered.
If you fix everything for me again, nothing has changed.
He sat back down.
“Fine.”
Maris blinked.
“Fine?”
“I hate this.”
“Good.”
“But I will not interfere unless you ask.”
She stared.
That might have been the hardest promise August had ever made.
“Thank you.”
Eden woke.
Looked at them.
Then laughed.
May you like
As if none of the adults’ money, grudges, or scandals mattered.
For one minute, they didn’t.
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