House Of Memories [CEO!Luke]

Chapter 10

Barging into a conference room in his own office building, Luke was met with the same two pairs of eyes from yesterday. His mother was slightly leaning over a folder the lawyer had just presented her, a smirk on her lips appearing almost immediately, when her eyes settled on Luke.

"This better be you two working on stopping this nonsense," Luke's voice was threatening and his eyes just as tired, if not more, as they were yesterday night.

He may not have slept throughout the night, but he sure as hell did some thinking.

"Luke, darling," Liz's voice was anything if not pleasant. A little too pleasant. And Luke knew by now not to trust the smile or the pleasant tone of her voice, no matter how familiar it was to him.

"Please, take a seat. We have some things to discuss," Liz's calm tone only irritated Luke even more. He knew to expect some hidden plan, some unspoken meaning, something he should read between the lines of. Frankly, he was beginning to grow tired of it and it was barely day two of this... war.

Nonetheless, he sat down, keeping his eyes wary and fixed on the woman across the table.

"What is this?" He nodded towards the file spread out on the table - the first thing he'd noticed the moment he stepped into the room.

No, actually, the second. The first one was his mother's bright red lipstick she only wore on 'special occasions'. Luke would be lying it didn't scare the hell out of him, as he tried to think of such an occasion, terrified it may have something to do with you.

Liz looked over at him with the most serious expression, her lips pressing just enough to signal Luke she was not here to play games. "We weren't kidding yesterday, Luke. You and Y/N cannot come into any sort of contact whatsoever. All ties must be cut, Luke."

Liz saw Luke's lips twitch as he hurried to answer.

"I will not get into detail about this, you'll just have to trust me," she spoke with a firm tone, her hand coming up to signal just how serious she was.

"You know, I've been finding that hard to do lately," Luke couldn't hold back a comment, even though his brain was screaming at him to just shut up and listen, trying to catch his mother in her own lies.

"Fair enough. If you're so interested to hear this out loud, I'll say it. She's ruining your company and your career, as well as her own. I'm sure you're aware of her past and her dealings, which I would rather not talk about. She does not deserve the praise, nor the recognition. Now unfortunately," Liz didn't miss Luke's snicker, "there is nothing we can do about her losses, but we can lessen our own. And that is exactly what I'm trying to do."

Luke felt his blood start to boil again. It might've been the exhaustion or just his mother being her own self (he couldn't really tell), but he did clench his jaw and take a deep breath in attempts to try and control himself from lashing out on her.

It's not that he hated his mother suddenly, it's just... he didn't like her that much right then.

"Why don't you just end this unnecessary shit and let me deal with her nicely? I'm sure she'll be willing to discuss this, as long as we're being civil and reasonable."

"I've been trying to deal with her nicely for years. It does not work on women like Y/N."

Liz wished for Luke to just ask 'Women like what?', oh how much easier that would have made this. But it never came, so instead Liz watched as Luke's eyebrows furrowed, the leg under the table that's been jumping up and down since the moment he sat down finally stilling in place, Luke's mind focusing.