She Regrets Nothing

by Andrea Dunlop

  The next day, Frederick came out of surgery, and though he had reportedly regained consciousness for a brief moment, he’d lost it again by the time the Lawrences arrived en masse at the hospital. Laila’s first and last vision of her grandfather was of a piqued, pale old man with tubes emerging from his every orifice. There he was: originator of the fortune, seducer of innumerable women; the man whose decisions had misdirected her entire life. She had so frequently fantasized about brandishing the secret letters before him: proof of his wrongdoing, proof of what he had cost them all. But now it seemed she would never get the chance.

  19

  * * *

  A WEEK AFTER her grandfather’s death, Liberty returned to work. Reece had called her that morning to check on her.

  “Are you sure you’re ready?”

  “Honestly, I’ll go crazy if I spend another day at home watching Lifetime. I need my work.” Liberty leaned against the counter, lightheaded. She knew she needed to eat more but had no appetite.

  “Okay, well, do you want to meet up after? For, like, tea or something?”

  Liberty laughed. “By tea, I assume you mean cocktails.”

  Reece was relieved to hear her friend’s laughter. “For some reason I felt like that would be insensitive.”

  “Please; my opa would want it that way.”

  “He would.” Reece smiled. Given Liberty’s status as favored granddaughter and Reece’s as her best friend, she had always bathed in his good graces.

  “Let’s go to Trapdoor. It will be quiet on a Monday,” Liberty said.

  “Yes, we can stare at Bartender Sean. How could that not make you feel better?”

  Bartender Sean—never just Sean—was a source of some fascination for them. He worked in the outrageously hip bar below Liberty’s apartment, and they would often go down there to drink martinis and ogle him.

  “God, he really is painfully hot,” Reece whispered to Liberty as they settled into seats at the end of the bar later that evening. He had dark blond hair that brushed the tops of his shoulders, light blue eyes, and a smile that hit you like a punch in the stomach—partly because he didn’t use it much. He seemed to have mastered a sort of glowering half smile that he used with most customers. It wasn’t impolite, but it made you long for the real thing.

  “Right?” Liberty caught his eye as he finished with the two women at the other end of the bar whose tongues were practically wagging. “The first time I saw him here, I thought, He looks like every bad decision I’ll never let myself make.”

  “There’s still time,” Reece said. “Gah! Don’t tell Cam I said that.” Liberty stifled a giggle as Sean appeared before them.

  “What can I get you? I bet I can guess,” he said, approaching and flashing his real smile at Liberty.

  “I’m so predictable. Honey, you want the same?” She asked Reece, meaning the lychee martinis that she always ordered at Trapdoor.

  “Two, please,” Reece said.

  “You got it, gorgeous.” His voice was deep and smooth, he threw Reece a wink.

  “Don’t,” Liberty said.

  “Don’t what?” Reece feigned an innocent smile, which Liberty met with incredulity. “Fine. Why not?”

  “Because you’ll dump him after five minutes, and we won’t be able to come here anymore. Can nothing be sacred?”

  “Okay,” Reece said, putting up her hands, “but if he ever tells us he’s quitting, I’m getting his number.”

  Liberty laughed, and the sound was a delight to Reece.

  “Oh god,” she said, “I’m so happy to see you. I needed to feel normal today.”

  Bartender Sean returned with their drinks, distracting them for a moment.

  “How are you doing with everything?” Reece asked when he was again out of earshot.

  Liberty shrugged. “I know it shouldn’t be shocking; he was ninety-three. But still, I guess I’d come to think of him as eternal.”

  “Yeah.”

  Liberty opened her mouth as if to speak and then deliberately shut it, lifting her glass to her lips instead.

  “What were you going to say?” Reece pressed.

  Liberty looked at her and took a deep breath. “He left me everything.”

  Reece’s jaw dropped open.

  “He left you . . . everything, like, everything?”

  “More or less. I mean, the twins still have their trusts, there are provisions for Birdie, my dad got the business . . . but other than that, yeah.”

  “God.” Reece knew it would be too gauche to ask the dollar amount, but it was in the hundreds of millions, no question. “Did you know?”

  “Of course not! I would have talked him out of it.”

  “You would have tried,” Reece said. As the shock wore off, she realized how unsurprising this turn of events actually was. It made perfect sense: Frederick loved his family, but he’d only ever really approved of Liberty. And this gave him the added bonus of getting to die knowing he’d leave drama in his wake. He would have been delighted by that. He was a bold man, a troublemaker to his dying day and, apparently, after it.

  “The irony,” Liberty said. “You know, I’m the last person who wanted it.”

  This, Reece thought, Frederick had undoubtedly known, and it certainly contributed to the appeal of leaving it all to her. “So what are you going to do?”

  “I have an idea,” Liberty said with a smile. “You know how I love the Literacy in Motion folks. . . .”

  “Right,” Reece said.

  Liberty smiled. She took a sip of her drink and left it at that.

  “What, all of it?”

  “Why not? I don’t need it; my family doesn’t need it. I loved my opa, but I don’t want this money; it isn’t mine. And I look at what having all of this has done to my siblings, and honestly, even my father probably would have been better off without so much. Then there’s Birdie, who, much as I adore her, has not exactly been the most productive member of society.”

  Reece cringed. “Yeah, point taken.”

  “And obviously all of them still have plenty of money from the trusts and the company and whatnot. But as for the rest of it? I think it’s time for the next generation to hit the reset button. And so maybe I don’t give all of it to the one organization, but think of everything I could do with it! I could start a scholarship fund, even build a school with a trust this size.”

  Reece nodded and took a moment to absorb what her friend was saying. Of course she saw her point, but to talk about giving away the family fortune was one thing. To actually part with it all was another.

  “Well, damn, girl,” Reece said with a smile. “My brother is a lucky man; I hope he knows that.”

  Back at the twins’ apartment, Laila and her cousins sat around the fireplace of Leo’s penthouse. Overnight, the twins had gone from superrich to merely wealthy, and they were not handling it well.

  “How could he do this? It’s just . . . so unfair! What have we ever done to deserve this?”

  Laila smiled inwardly at the unintended truth of her cousin’s words: nothing, they’d done nothing to deserve all they had, several million each in a trust and their extraordinary apartments that were technically family-owned but which they lived in rent-free.

  “He always liked Liberty best,” Leo said glumly.

  “Oh,” Nora said getting to her feet. She was wearing her long silk dressing gown, and her breasts jostled underneath it, threatening to burst free. “Well, doesn’t everyone like Liberty best? Isn’t that her whole raison d’être?”

  “Maybe she’ll share,” Laila ventured. It had been on her mind since the decision was announced. She had been thinking constantly about what to do next. She could go to Liberty and reveal what she knew, not with the intent to blackmail her—the longer Laila was in New York, the more unsavory this option had begun to seem—but simply to make her understand how Laila had been cheated, that she hadn’t had the same opportunities as her cousins and this was why. She would have hoped to quietly reconcil
e with their grandfather, without ever spoiling Liberty’s image of him, but that was no longer an option. His will had specified Liberty, not simply grandchildren. There was no way around it.

  “She thinks we should all be working,” Leo spat as if the very word hurt to say.

  “But you do work! Your column and the book . . . how will you be able to write if you have to get some awful regular job? And I’ll have to give up my charity work . . . I was this close to getting a seat on the World Wildlife Fund’s Jungle Boogie Gala committee!” At this, an idea seemed to dawn on her. “Maybe if we start a charity, then she’ll contribute,” Nora said.

  “Wouldn’t you have to then use that money on other people?” Laila asked gently.

  “But at least then we could throw a gala every year, invite all of our friends,” Nora was nearly in tears by now, “if we even have any friends by then!”

  Laila saw it fully then: how her cousins’ lives had been built around the expectation that they would inherit the vast fortune of their grandfather. And for perhaps the first time, she pitied them.

  On Monday, Laila stopped by Liberty’s office to ask if she wanted to have lunch. Though the outcome had been disastrous, the timing of Frederick’s death was serendipitous in that it made Liberty more willing to overlook the fact that Laila had broken the heart of her prized client. Tom had initially called Liberty bemoaning his fight and the resulting breakup with Laila, but with the death of Frederick—something about which everyone in New York had swiftly heard—he’d been forced to let it go, at least where Liberty was concerned.

  It was a blustery mid-April day, and with the patio closed, Laila and Liberty were given a mercifully quiet corner table at Posto. Laila was tempted to order a glass of wine to calm her nerves but feared it would somehow undermine what she was about to say. The mementos—including the necklace—burned in their leather pouch, nestled in the bottom of Laila’s oversize handbag.

  “I just still can’t believe I’ll never get to meet him,” Laila said. Liberty nodded sympathetically and reached over to squeeze her cousin’s hand.

  “I know. You would have liked him, I think. He was a true character.”

  “I think . . . I wanted to . . . ,” Laila began, and then it all felt too abrupt.

  “Go on,” Liberty said, for every millimeter of Laila’s face said she had something to say. Laila changed her mind and reached into her bag to pull out the leather pouch, unzipping it and drawing out the enamel pendant with its delicate, jewel-eyed swallows.

  “Remember you told me you thought I should have this appraised? Well, I did. . . .” Laila handed over the necklace as though it contained everything her cousin needed to know, which in its way, it did.

  Liberty gazed at the intricate pendant and found she was moved by its beauty. It was very much the kind of piece she had always loved. Though she wasn’t sure what her cousin was getting at.

  “And?” she asked.

  “You were right,” Laila said. “Nineteenth century; you’ve got a good eye. The jeweler I took it to said she thought it probably came from Fred Leighton, and it’s worth about twenty thousand dollars.”

  Liberty looked up at her cousin slowly, her eyes wide.

  “So . . . your father also had a thing for vintage jewelry?” she tried, her voice sounding small.

  Laila shook her head, and Liberty nodded, taking it in. Laila knew then that she understood.

  “Oh, Laila,” she finally said. “Frederick and your mother? That’s why your parents left?”

  “It would appear so,” she said. With this, Laila pulled the papers of all their varying sizes, the cards from floral arrangements, the hotel stationery worn soft with age. “I found these when I was going through my mother’s things. I would have told you about it, but I wanted to talk to Frederick, to our grandfather, before I said anything to anyone else.”

  Liberty’s face fell as she examined the papers. “Oh God, the Carlyle.”

  Laila raised her eyebrows.

  Liberty gave her a squeamish smile. “Yeah, let’s just say they knew him there. He was a man of routine.”

  Laila nodded. For a moment Liberty grew quiet, and Laila feared she was angry at her for keeping the letters a secret, or worse, might revert to denial about the scandal they revealed.

  “Oh, honey.” Liberty put the letters gingerly on her own lap and reached across the table once more. “God, you should have told me sooner. You must have been so angry with him.”

  Laila shrugged. “I was ashamed . . . and my mother. I wanted to give him a chance to explain; that’s why I didn’t say anything until now. . . .” Real tears bloomed in Laila’s eyes now. “I feel like he took away the opportunity to be a part of this family.” And the money, she thought, all of it kept from her.

  Liberty looked down at the table, absorbing Laila’s words. “Sweetie, I don’t know what to say other than that we’re all here for you now. Whew.” There were tears in Liberty’s eyes as well. “This is a lot to take in.”

  “I know,” Laila said, squeezing her cousin’s hands, “but you understand why I didn’t tell you sooner? I just, I knew you were so close with him.”

  “I know, honey, but you could have told me. I just want you to know that you don’t have to carry everything alone like that. Frederick was a complicated man. A bit more complicated than I realized, as it turns out. But I want you to know,” she looked into Laila’s eyes earnestly, “that we are your family, and I’m so sorry it took your mother’s death to bring us back together, but we can’t change the past, can we? I’m just so glad you’re in our lives now.”

  Laila smiled at her, trying not to let her desperation seep through. She knew better than to directly ask Liberty about the money. It wasn’t how this was done.

  “How is it being back with Leo and Nora? How are they doing?”

  Laila suspected Liberty knew that the twins were not taking the news of the inheritance terribly well.

  “They’re hanging in there,” Laila said. “Trying to figure out how to scrape by on their trust funds.”

  To Laila’s relief, Liberty laughed and rolled her eyes.

  “Those two. Between you and me, I can see why Opa didn’t want to give them any more money to fritter away. I’m kind of hoping that this will shake them up a bit, help them get motivated. They need to be more resilient. Like you,” she said, smiling.

  “Well, I see where you’re coming from.” Did Liberty think it was better to be raised with nothing? Could she really be that naive? “But I shouldn’t criticize them, really; it’s so sweet how they’ve taken me in and everything. I really should get my own place soon, though. I need to start living a real life here. Truly get settled.”

  At this, Liberty smiled approvingly.

  “I’d been meaning to talk to you about that, actually.”

  Laila’s heart jumped to her throat: Had it all been easier than she’d imagined? But of course, Liberty had always been the cousin who truly cared about her, who’d come all that way to find her. It made sense that she wasn’t sharing the money with the twins; they’d had everything. But especially in the light of what she’d revealed, she’d want to help her, wouldn’t she?

  “Daphne is leaving to go to graduate school,” Liberty continued, “and I could speak to Gerard about hiring you to replace her. I’m sure he’d agree; he always prefers to hire from within.”

  It took a moment for Laila’s head to clear, to understand what she was being offered: a job. She felt like she’d been punched in the stomach but smiled sweetly. An internship was one thing; she could pretty much come and go as she pleased. But the agents’ assistants worked long hours and read manuscripts on the weekends. It was a real, all-consuming job. Being a star agent like Liberty was one thing: she had power and prestige. But an assistant? This was something else entirely.

  “I’ve been thinking of going back to school, actually . . . ,” Laila said.

  “Really? Well, of course, we’ll cover it if you do. There’s
no reason you couldn’t do both! The New School has an amazing program.”

  “Oh wow, that’s really sweet of you. I’m just . . . can I think about it?” Laila asked.

  “Sure,” Liberty said, looking a little taken aback at Laila’s lack of enthusiasm. “But not for too long; we’ve got a stack of résumés a mile high.”

  Laila knew that there were girls who would kill for a job like the one Liberty was offering her—and her education paid for to boot—but she cringed to think of them, living in apartments out in the far reaches of Bed-Stuy and Queens, crammed on top of each other, standing in line for rush tickets to a Broadway show when their college friends came to visit. Laila had just come back from Mustique, for God’s sake! Maybe there was a time when the life Liberty was offering her would have been enough. But she knew that now it would not be. Having been given carte blanche at Bergdorf’s, living with the twins in their penthouse, having the worst vacation of her life in the most beautiful place she’d ever seen, she could not go live on the other side of the city, the striving, clawing side that she could see glimpses of everywhere when she looked closely enough: the wearied faces of people coming in and out of Manhattan. The doormen and security guards and bodega workers who lived God knew where. If the money was not to come from Liberty, she had to find another way.