Showdown: Tech Billionaires

by Ainsley St Claire

  Several other cars stop to watch the whales just making their way through the channel. Once we don’t see any more tails, we pull back onto the highway and continue the drive north.

  “Doesn’t it look like the trees are growing out of the water?” Bex asks as she points to the islands off the coast.

  They’re covered in pine trees, which start right at the water’s edge.

  I nod. “It’s beautiful.”

  We drive through a small town, and the road narrows from four lanes to two. The snow gets deeper as we get closer to Whistler, but the roads are clear.

  “Look at all this snow,” Bex says, amazed.

  “I bet you could make a snowman,” I offer.

  Bex’s eyes grow large. “Can we?”

  I shrug. “I forgot to pack gloves, and you’ll need some snow pants, but I have to believe we’ll be able to find those things here for you.”

  Once we arrive in Whistler, I look up at the ski resort to find a few muddy spots of mountainside. Someone mentioned the ski season has ended, and the town is quiet.

  “It’s two mountains—Whistler and Blackcomb,” Nate explains. “Walker’s place was originally Landon Walsh’s place, and he lost it playing poker. It’s at the base of Blackcomb and very close to the village, which is lined with stores and restaurants. Not everything will be open right now, because they take a break between the winter and summer season, but we’ll find things to keep us busy.”

  When we arrive at the house, we pull into the circular driveway. It’s a large, gray-stone house with timber accents sitting at the base of the mountain. The warm, golden light coming from inside is welcoming. A short woman followed by a thin man step outside to greet us.

  “Hello and welcome to Canada. I’m Amy Cho and this is my husband, Eko,” she says. “We manage the property for Mr. Clifton, and he let us know you were coming.”

  “Amy and Eko, it’s good to see you again,” Nate says. “Thank you for all you’ve done last minute to prepare for our arrival.”

  Amy smiles, and her eyes sparkle. “Mr. Clifton mentioned you may be staying a while. We’re thrilled to have you. I’ve set you all up on the same floor. The girls are in a room with two twin beds, Lilly is in the adjoining room, and Mr. Lancaster, you’re in the master. Your team has four bedrooms on the third floor.”

  “Thank you,” Nate says.

  “Did you stop for any lunch?” she asks.

  “No, we didn’t. But we can just make some sandwiches, if that’s okay,” I tell her.

  “I thought you could use some comfort food, so I made macaroni and cheese, if that works.”

  “Amy, you’ll soon become a favorite,” Nate says, and she beams.

  Eko picks up some of the bags and begins to climb the curved stairway. The team brings the remaining bags.

  “Would you like me to unpack for you?” Amy asks.

  I shake my head. “I can do that for the girls, but I’m not sure about Mr. Lancaster.”

  She nods.

  Amy walks Nate and me around the house, pointing out several of the amenities. There’s a great alcove that the girls can use for their schooling, once we get that up and running, and Nate immediately takes over the home office.

  After hefty portions of macaroni and cheese in the dining room, the girls take the afternoon to get everything put away. We left several things behind in our rush, but nothing we can’t order and have delivered, so we make lists.

  Eventually, I join Amy in the kitchen to go over the food plan for the first week.

  “The house has a pizza oven,” she says. “I thought the girls might enjoy making their own pizzas for dinner tonight.”

  I want to hug her. “Amy, they’ll love that.”

  “It’s very easy. I make a quick-rise crust that was always popular with Mr. Walsh.”

  I don’t know Landon well, but I see him as a giant kid, so that doesn’t surprise me. “I’m sure whatever you’ve come up with for Mr. Walsh or Mr. Clifton will be more than appreciated by this family.”

  “I assume you’ll eat with the family?”

  I nod. “I usually eat with the girls, but Mr. Lancaster doesn’t always eat with us. His schedule can be crazy. I’m not sure how it will work while we’re all here.”

  She nods. “We have many options.”

  We plan out the dinners and some breakfasts, but I’m not sure I want to lock in lunch. “I may try to take the girls into the village each day,” I explain. “If I don’t make them get out, they may never breathe fresh air.”

  “The trail behind the house can take you into the main village. Some of the shops that cater to tourists will be closed, but you can see the Olympic rings and a few remnants from the 2010 Olympics. Eko walked over to the Four Seasons, which is next door, and picked up information on some of the activities he thought might be of interest to the girls.” She points me to a stack of brochures.

  “This is fantastic. Thank you. I think I’ll have to take the girls into the village for some winter wear, too. They were excited about the snow when we drove in.”

  “There’s a hot tub in the backyard that’s secluded, so the girls can do that too.”

  “Great thinking,” I say. “We’ll look for bathing suits, too.”

  “I spoke with Mr. Adelson and Trevor, and we’ll keep our eyes out for anything out of place,” Amy adds. “This is a great time to be here and keep a low profile. We call it shoulder season because it’s between ski and summer seasons, and once most of the snow melts and it begins to warm, a lot of mountain bikers descend on us.”

  “Thank you for all your help.”

  She nods. “We love visitors. It keeps us busy, so we don’t mind.”

  I’m headed back up to check on the girls when Nate pulls me into the home office and shuts the door behind me.

  His lips crash down on mine, and I lean in and push my body against him. When we break, his eyes darken, but I can see immediately that it’s not lust.

  “Mason and Caroline just called,” he says in a low voice. “They were going to cut that spectacular three-month honeymoon short and join us here.”

  “Oh no. I hope you told them to enjoy their time and come later.”

  “I did. But Caroline urged me to open Katrina’s phone and look at the messages.”

  He hands it to me, and I see a string of texts.

  Your mom was a tramp and a whore spick who deserved to die.

  I look up at Nate, horrified.

  “Keep reading,” he says.

  I hope you’re not going to use this as an excuse to get out of doing what you promised, you cunt.

  If I was you, I’d cut my wrists and end my life.

  I look up at Nate. “She can’t go back to that school ever, and we need to report this to the authorities in Sausalito.”

  “I’ll get my attorney to do that after Jim and Walker figure out who these people are. This could be more than just kids at school. The second one seemed to be someone targeting her.”

  “We need to talk to her,” I urge.

  Nate looks at me. “I think she may open up to you before me because she knows I’ll get Jim on this.”

  “I’m not sure if she’ll talk to me, either, but we can’t give her phone back. I want to make sure the school sees this, and I want to demand that the girls saying this are expelled.” I’m shaking with rage.

  He pulls me into a hug just as Katrina swings the door open. “What are you doing?” she demands.

  Nate lets me go, and I reach for Katrina. She sees her phone in my hand as I wipe my tears of frustration away. “Katrina, can you sit with me?”

  Nate leaves the two of us to talk.

  “Are you and my dad dating now?” Katrina looks panicked, so rather than answer her, I move the topic to her phone.

  “Your dad opened your cell phone, and we began reading the messages you received this morning.”

  “That is an invasion of my privacy,” she argues.

  I begin to tear up. “Ka
trina, I love you so very much. These people are awful. You’ve told me before that sometimes girls at school are mean, but has it always been like this?”

  Katrina sits on a bench at the window and looks at the snow outside. “Ever since Honey Petrov and I got into a fight at the beginning of the year. Jenny is part of her crowd.”

  That explains at least some of Katrina’s emotional swings. I was targeted by the mean girls when I was in school, and I know it’s not fun.

  “We’re going to send these messages to the school and the police and have your Uncle Jim investigate them,” I tell her.

  She turns and her eyes are wide. “You can’t,” she whispers.

  I sit down next to her. “What they’re doing is against the law. They can’t bully you like this.”

  She begins to cry. “Please don’t do anything. It’ll get worse. Jenny has pictures of my mom doing drugs, and she’s threatening to sell them to the media.”

  “What?” I didn’t spend much time with Cecelia, but I know her from her journals and from the way she raised her girls, that’s not something she would do. “No way.”

  “The worst is she has pictures of my mom with other men, and it’ll kill my dad.”

  My brain is reeling. Cecelia never even mentioned other men being attractive in her journals. How is that possible? “Have you seen them?”

  She nods.

  “Are they on your phone?”

  She continues to cry.

  I reach for her shoulders so I can look her in the eye. “Sweetheart, don’t you worry about it. Jim and your dad will protect you.”

  “My dad has been so sad about my mom already. You can’t let him see those pictures,” she says desperately.

  I don’t believe they’re real, but she needs some reassurance right now. “Okay, I’ll get them to Jim without showing your dad.”

  She nods. “I hate them all.” She balls her fists and hits her legs in frustration.

  “Mean girls suck.” I pull her in for a hug. “But I promise, you have friends who love you as much as your dad and I do. We’re going to get through this.”

  She cries for quite a while, and I just let her. She’s been cut deeply and has held onto the pain alone for a long time.

  Once her tears dry, we sit and watch the snow fall outside. I look at the clock, and it’s after five. “Did you know we have a pizza oven here at the house?”

  She shakes her head, and despite the red eyes, she’s beautiful, and I know she’s strong.

  I reach for her hand and give it a squeeze. “Let’s go make some great pizzas for dinner. We can do a competition to see who makes the best one.”

  She smiles.

  “Sweetie, there’s a light at the end of this tunnel.” I give her a side hug as we walk toward the kitchen. “Don’t you worry.”

  “Thank you for being here.” She hugs me back, and in that moment, all that I’ve put on hold from my previous life, all the late-night hours trying to keep my career afloat, means nothing.

  “Always. Now, go get your sister, wash your hands, and meet me in the kitchen.”

  She nods and runs up the stairs. I walk into the kitchen and find Nate. He’s talking to Rod, but they stop as soon as I enter the room.

  I hand Rod Katrina’s phone. “This needs to get to Clear’s offices as fast as possible. There are some doctored photos of Cecelia in here. We need to verify the source and make sure they aren’t leaked to the media by the girls threatening Katrina with them. I also want a list of who sent the awful text messages to her. Some of these are threatening, and I want them prosecuted.”

  Rod looks at Nate for confirmation.

  He nods. “You heard her.”

  Rod turns and leaves with the phone.

  “Doctored photos of Cecelia?”

  “That’s what has Katrina so upset. She’s worried about you and how you’ll respond to seeing them. But they can’t be real. I know the photos have been doctored.”

  He crosses his arms, and I can see the vein in his neck pulsing. He’s angry. “I take it you don’t want me to see these pictures?”

  “I haven’t seen them either, but I promised Katrina I wouldn’t show them to you. Once Jim’s team has analyzed them, we’ll take a look.”

  I know he’s fighting the urge to get the phone from Rod so he can see what could be so bad. “I’m not sure I’m comfortable with that.”

  I take a deep breath and let it all go. “They have Katrina worried about your mental health.”

  That knocks the wind out of Nate’s anger. He sits down hard on a stool at the island. “I can’t believe my baby has had to deal with this on her own. What the hell is that therapist doing with her?”

  I don’t want to wind Nate up too much, but he does need to know the truth. “My guess is she hasn’t said anything because she worries the pictures will be released to the media if she does.”

  “I’ll spend every penny I have to drive these assholes into the ground,” he grinds out.

  I see Amy in my periphery, but she backs away. “Amy, please come back,” I call. “The girls will be down any second to make their pizzas. We’re going to have a bit of a contest to see who makes the best one.”

  She grins. “Sounds good. The dough should be ready.”

  The girls come in laughing, and while Katrina’s eyes are red-rimmed, she’s smiling. Surely we’re all going to make it through this.

  “Canada’s famous for the Hawaiian pizza,” Amy shares.

  Bex’s eyes grow large. “I love Hawaiian pizza.”

  Nate groans. “Pineapple does not belong on a pizza.”

  “I’m going straight cheese,” Katrina announces.

  Amy points to the various toppings she’s assembled. “For meats I have salami, pepperoni, capocollo, Italian sausage, bacon crumbles, roasted chicken, anchovies, and ground beef. For vegetables I have mushrooms, peppers, jalapenos, olives, roma tomato cubes, spinach, artichoke, and sweet purple onion.” She takes a deep breath and continues. “For sauces I have spicy barbeque, tomato, and an alfredo cream. I also have fresh mozzarella slices, grated mozzarella, a mix of cheddar and mozzarella, and grated parmesan cheese.”

  “Wow, there are about six pizzas I wouldn’t mind making,” I say.

  “Jalapeno on pizza sounds fantastic.” Nate rubs his hands together in anticipation.

  Bex and Katrina both cringe.

  “So much for a competition,” I snark.

  “The crust is very easy, so if you decide you want to do this for a few lunches this week, we can do that, too.”

  We all make our pizzas. I go with chicken, bacon, artichoke hearts, and spinach with mozzarella and red sauce.

  The girls and I trade slices as the pizzas come out, but Nate can’t get anyone to try his all-meat pizza with mushrooms, onions, and jalapenos. When he finally talks me into a bite, I need to drink a glass of milk to chase it down. Between the capocollo and the jalapeno, my mouth is burning. But the girls are laughing, and we’ve forgotten, if only for a moment, why we’re here and everything about ugly texts and emails with fake pictures.

  “Amy showed us a media room. I bet we can find a good movie to watch,” I offer.

  “A princess movie?” Bex asks, already heading out of the kitchen.

  “What about something that isn’t a cartoon?” I call after her. When we’ve all settled in, I pull up Artemis Fowl. “What about this?”

  The girls hesitantly agree, but then they sit in the front row. With some finagling I figure out how to make popcorn in the popcorn machine, and we locate soft drinks. Once everyone has snacks, I join Nate in the last row.

  “Can we make out?” he whispers as he nuzzles my neck.

  I wink. “Let’s see how long the girls last.”

  Just a few minutes in, the girls seem riveted to the movie. But then Bex wanders back and sits next to Nate, practically in his lap. He welcomes her sweetly, but when he looks over at me, he seems pained.

  Sorry, I mouth.

  Ch
apter 16

  Nate

  After a couple weeks in Whistler, we’ve fallen into a good rhythm. The girls spend the mornings doing their assignments from school and sending them in before enjoying the house and the activities Whistler has to offer in the afternoons.

  I’m feeling good about the fact that none of the media has located us here, but then during one of my daily calls with Jim, he drops the bomb. “Katrina keeps getting disturbing messages on her phone.”

  “Lilly wants me to call the school and tell them,” I say.

  “We have some information, but not everything yet. However, it may be time. These are pretty ugly.”

  I look out at the muddy streets. The edges where they’ve been plowed are black and ugly. I’ve been ready to make this call for some time. Now that Jim says go, I’m on it.

  When I hang up with Jim, I call the headmaster at Katrina’s school and explain my concerns. I give a general idea of the content of the text messages but not specifics.

  “Mr. Lancaster, I understand the girls are going through a challenging time, but kids will be kids.”

  Wow. I’m blown away. I thought as an educator, he’d be more in tune with bullying.

  “These messages are encouraging her to kill herself,” I counter. “How is that kids will be kids?”

  “There are two sides to every story,” he reminds me.

  “I can see why that might be your perspective, but Katrina is being bullied. I have my security team going through the text messages to verify authenticity. You should see them shortly.”

  “Your daughter has been implicated in bullying Jennifer Daniels after her mother was arrested,” he informs me. “We may be looking at expulsion for her behavior.”

  My mind works quickly, and I take a few deep breaths so I can answer without showing too much emotion. “She hasn’t had her cell phone or access to any texts or email since we left town, less than two hours after the arrest. I find that hard to believe.”

  “Mr. Lancaster, I understand Katrina has been through a lot, but she seems to have moved from sorrow to rage. We’re going to need a lot of contrition on her part in order for her to return to Stratton.”