My Family Wants Me Gone, I Take Their Luck With Me novel · Chapter 3 of 32

Chapter 3: The Press Conference

Noelle watches from the back as her family cuts her off on camera, and the Harbor Tower deal dies mid-speech.

I stared at the word rehab until the screen dimmed.

Then I typed my reply.

Coming.

I wasn't going for them.

If I stayed away, they'd tell the city whatever story they wanted, and I'd be the only one not in the room.

The Harbor Grand was the hotel where Damon had proposed.

The doorman knew my face. He looked at my sweater and my sneakers and opened the door a beat too late.

The ballroom was set for a hundred reporters. There were more than that.

A podium stood at the front with the Penhurst crest on a blue banner behind it.

The banner was new. I knew because I'd ordered the old one.

I took a chair in the last row, by the coffee urns.

A cameraman glanced at me, then away. Nobody expects the disowned daughter to bring her own coffee.

At two o'clock exactly, the side doors opened.

My father came in first, gray suit, chin up. My mother walked one step behind him in pearls, holding a handkerchief she didn't need yet.

Then Damon.

Clarissa was on his arm.

She wore white. Long sleeves, a high neck, a skirt to the floor.

It wasn't a wedding dress. It was close enough that a reporter in front of me said "Oh, wow" under her breath.

Clarissa lowered herself into a chair beside the podium.

Damon stood behind her with both hands on her shoulders.

His watch caught the lights. I'd bought him that watch for our third canceled date. He'd said it was the nicest thing anyone had ever given him.

My father tapped the microphone.

"Thank you all for coming. This won't take long."

He didn't look at his notes. He'd never needed notes. I'd always written them anyway.

"As of today, my daughter Noelle is no longer a member of this family."

The cameras clicked.

"She has chosen to walk away from her obligations, her fiancé and the people who raised her. We have tried for years to help her. We can't anymore."

My mother pressed the handkerchief to her eyes.

"Noelle is no longer a beneficiary of any Penhurst trust or company. She doesn't speak for us. Anything she says from now on is her own."

He was right about that part.

He nodded toward Clarissa.

"We're grateful we still have one daughter who knows what family means."

Clarissa stood up slowly. Damon kept a hand under her elbow.

She leaned into the microphone.

"I love my sister. I'm going to keep praying for her."

Her voice cracked in the right place.

Two reporters actually said "Aw."

"Mr. Kessington," someone called. "Is the engagement over?"

Damon looked at the crowd.

"Kessington Global stands with the Penhurst family. My personal life is private."

Then his eyes moved to the back of the room.

He found me by the coffee urns.

His jaw went tight. He'd expected me to beg in the hallway, maybe. Or cry on camera.

I lifted my paper cup an inch.

He looked away first.

A woman two rows up turned in her seat. Then the man beside her. Then a lens.

"That's her. That's Noelle."

Within seconds half the cameras were pointing backward.

"Noelle, do you want to respond?"

"Noelle, is it true you're in treatment?"

"Noelle, were you violent with your sister?"

I sat still.

I'd spent six years telling reporters what the Penhursts wanted said. I knew every trick for getting a quote.

I gave them nothing.

My father raised his voice over the noise.

"She's welcome to sit there. It changes nothing."

But he was gripping both sides of the podium.

His phone lay face down beside his water glass.

It buzzed.

He ignored it.

It buzzed again, rattling the glass.

My mother's eyes went to it.

Clarissa's hand found Damon's wrist.

"We'll take three questions," my father said. "Then we're done."

A reporter from the business channel stood.

"Mr. Penhurst, there are reports this morning that your Harbor Tower lenders want out. Is this press conference meant to distract from that?"

My father smiled at her. It was the smile he used on people he planned to ruin.

"Harbor Tower is the most secure project in this city. I'd stake my name on it."

The phone buzzed a third time and slid half an inch.

At the back of the ballroom, behind me, the double doors banged open.

My father's chief of staff came down the aisle at a run. Fifty-something, never ran anywhere. His tie was over his shoulder.

He reached the podium and leaned in to whisper.

He was out of breath, and he forgot where he was standing.

The microphone caught every word.

"Sir. The lenders just pulled out. Harbor Tower is dead."

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