by Lexi Whitlow
My heart drops. This guy—he won’t even let me celebrate. “Drake, buddy. First of all, this win—it can’t be real.”
“Sit down.”
I look at the numbers again. They’re the same as before.
“Sit,” Drake says again.
“This is relevant, but—”
“Read it,” he says, his voice even, cool, and confident. Like how I am when I’m diagnosing someone’s car problem.
I scan the post. ‘First, hire an attorney... Change your phone numbers and email addresses... Do Not Tell Anyone.... Leave town…’
I hit print on the lengthy article, so I can read it after I get Drake into bed.
“You can’t tell anyone,” I say to him an hour later. “We need to keep this between you me and Mom ‘til I can get it all sorted out. Understood?”
“You can’t tell anyone,” he says. It almost sounds like he’s parroting it back to me, but he’s not. Not this time. He looks me in the eye, again. It freaks me out.
Nothing is as it’s supposed to be, as it’s been for years.
“I won’t, buddy.”
He nods, grinning. “Okay. You won. I wanna go to Disneyland. Don’t tell anyone.”
Drake is hyper, flapping, rocking back and forth in his pajamas. He glances up at me, making rare eye contact for a third time.
“Pizza with French fries and mustard. And mom won’t have to work all night anymore. And you won’t have to take shit from Joe.” He grins at me. “Joe can suck eggs. He’s a douche.”
I laugh. “He’s the biggest douche.”
Amazing what Drake picks up on. He knows far more than I ever articulate in his presence. He’s probably researched what to do if I won the lottery because he sees me obsessed with it. I sure never bothered to investigate what to do if I ever, really won. That idea never crossed my mind. Drake still surprises me, almost every day.
Mom won’t be home until seven in the morning from her call center job. In the interim, I pour over the various articles written and published online by lottery winners and those who have observed them.
What I read is sobering, and instructive.
Winning the lottery isn’t all good news. People come out of the woodwork, trying to separate you from your winnings, inventing every manner of deviousness to do so, from fake familial relationships, to terminal cancers, to investment schemes that always lose. Old friends and even family try to screw you over, sometimes even trying to murder you. Most winners wind up losing everything.
According to the small handful of lottery winners who have managed to escape the lottery curse, there are a few things that must be done correctly right from the beginning.
“Fuck,” I mumble. I crack open one of the beers from Friday night. “What a buzzkill.”
I read more, underlining and making notes in the margins. Strangely, it feels like I’m back in college. I laugh at myself.
“Using my non-degree,” I mutter.
But I determine, here and now, to follow this advice to the letter.
I’m still up, wide awake, making notes and lists, when Mom comes home from work. She takes one look at me and knows something is up.
“You need to sit down,” I say, heaving a breath, wishing for coffee.
“Is Drake okay?” She’s worried. “What’s wrong?
I make her sit down, then I sit. I lay the ticket on the table in front of her.
“We won, Mom,” I say, keeping my tone measured. “The Triple Mega-Powerball. We won.”
She blinks, then her brow furrows. She shakes her head. “No. Can’t be. You must have read it wrong.”
“I checked it. Ten times. Drake was there with me when they called it. I’ve been online to confirm it. We won.”
I’ve never seen Mom blanche so pale before.
“You can’t tell anyone,” I say. “I’m calling in sick from work today, driving to D.C., and hiring a lawyer. I’ve been reading all night about the right way to handle this, so it doesn’t screw up your life. I need to borrow your car.”
Mom blinks again, scrunching her nose. “Why D.C.? There are law firms here.”
I nod. “People who’ve been through this say to go to some city where no one knows you, where you have no connections at all. I’m going to do this by the book. But Mom, I mean it. You can’t tell anybody, and you can’t let Drake tell anybody. Keep him off the computer and phone while I’m gone. No social media. Nothing. I’ve told him, but…”
She’s nodding fast now, she understands. “Okay. Go. Go and come back.” She hands me her car keys. “Be careful.”
I sign my name to the ticket, front and back, then snap a clear photo of it with my smart phone camera. I slide the slip of paper across the table toward her. “Put this in the lock box with our birth certificates and insurance policies. Don’t let anything happen to it.”
She nods. Her hands tremble, reaching out to touch the thing.
“Please be careful on the road.”
D.C. is four hours away. If I leave now, I’ll be there before noon. I’ve already researched who to hire. I just need to get there in one piece. They’ll help me sort the rest out, so this thing doesn’t become my worst nightmare instead of my dream come true.
Chapter 3
Bryn
Claire circles her fingers tight around her mug, warming her hands with the heat from a steaming hot coffee. We’ve been best friends since middle school, and she’s a big reason I decided to come home instead of staying in New York. Law school was grueling, competitive, and intense. Once through that gauntlet, I needed some comfort, something familiar. Claire is that, and more. Since graduating from journalism school, she works for the city newspaper as a reporter on the local news beat.
“How’s the first couple weeks been?” she asks, leaning in. “Charles put the moves on you yet?”
I roll my eyes. “Before I could get my diploma hung,” I reply. “He creeps like a nasty rash.”
“Always did,” she laughs. “But hey, it could be worse. At least your dad owns the place. When I have to deal with dicks at work, I’m stuck with H.R. It’s like going to confession. You tell all, no one ever knows, and nothing ever happens. At least you can skip the middle man and go straight to God.”
“Right,” I say. “Except God likes Charles. He treats him like the only begotten son.”
Claire shakes her head. “Men. Utterly useless.”
It’s a depressing subject, and I want to change it.
“My car broke down,” I say, smirking. “And Logan Chandler fixed it.”
Claire’s eyebrows raise. She cocks her head to the side, smirking at me.
“Do tell,” she goads. “Is he still as hot as peppered brandy?”
I laugh. “I don’t even know what that is, but yeah, he’s still smoking hot. Except he’s kind of a grease monkey mechanic now.” I shrug, gulping. I hate to admit that was part of what turned me on. The whole mechanic thing. He was good at it too. “It sucks that he got hurt in school. That he didn’t finish. Charles was with me, so I couldn’t really talk to him.”
“You had a thing for him, didn’t you?” Claire asks. “I know he had a thing for you. Where’s he working?”
“Precision Auto on Hillsborough Street,” I say. “Not a bad place. They fixed my car. But he seemed—angry. Or something.”
Probably at me. But I don’t add that part.
She nods. “Yeah, well, I bet you could brighten his day.”
“Not happening,” I tell her. “He’s a mechanic and I’m an attorney. What would we talk about? He probably has no interest in what I’m doing. He works at a real job all day, and I… send emails. Not that I don’t like my job, but—”
I cut myself off when I realize that I’m rambling.
“Who cares if you talk?” Claire teases. “Girl, you need a lube job and a tune-up. If he’s half as hot as he was last time I saw him, he’s just the right man for the project.”
“You’re awful.” I laugh and throw a napk
in at her. It’s time to change the subject again before I start thinking too seriously about her proposal.
“So, what about you?” I ask. “You working on anything interesting? Please tell me some good news. I need something uplifting.”
Claire shrugs, sighing. “I got nada in the way of good news,” she says. “My editor is a corporate tool who only cares about clicks and page views. We’re supposed to be a newsroom, but in every editorial meeting, the conversation drifts to advertising revenues. I’ve missed my page-click goals two weeks in a row. The only story that’s even come close is the mystery Powerball winner. That’s been trending. The winner is around here somewhere, but no one has come forward yet.”
“I heard something about that,” I say. “Some of the admins at work were talking about it. What’s the deal?”
Claire brightens, sipping her coffee. “The deal is that someone bought the winning ticket—the only winning ticket—at the 7-Eleven on Peace Street last week, but the winner hasn’t been found. I wrote the first article a couple days after the winning numbers were announced. I talked to the State Lottery Commission yesterday, and they said no one has stepped up to claim it.”
She grins at me. “I can guarantee you, if I won two billion dollars, I’d be breaking the door down.”
“Not if you knew what was good for you,” I say. “You’d do what this guy is probably doing. You’d step back, think about it, get a game plan together. It’s smart, what this guy is doing. Or girl. Whoever it is.”
“Screw that,” Claire laughs. “Give me my money!”
We both descend into giggles, drawing the attention of the quiet coffee shop patrons around us, their noses buried in books, or eyes fixed on smart phones and tablets.
A decade ago when Claire and I were in high school, Cup-a-Joe’s coffee house was a boisterous destination spot for teenaged hipsters and caffeine tweaked college students. The neighborhood has changed since then. Now this whole end of Hillsborough Street is lined with luxury high-rises and trendy restaurants. The once rusty, funky vibe has shifted to polished steel. Our old haunt has gone respectable, and very upscale. The change is a tragedy at every level.
“Anyway,” Claire begins again, dropping her tone. “I need to keep this article trending, but I’m out of ideas on how to spin it back up. There’s only so much you can say about nothing happening.”
“Why not interview a good Estate and Trust attorney,” I say grinning. “Do an article on what you should do if you win the lottery.”
Claire laughs. “That’s like doing a piece on hurricane preparation, after the Category 5 has wiped the city off the map. I should have done that story two weeks ago!”
“Next Powerball then,” I offer. “It’s still a good idea.”
“I’ll put it on my calendar,” Claire promises. “Now though, I gotta go back to work. Those airy click-bait articles aren’t going to write themselves. At least not until my editor can find an author-bot to outsource my job to. Probably won’t be long.”
I need to go too. I have a partner’s meeting to attend. Technically, I’m not a partner. But my Dad owns the firm, my last name is Beckett, and there’s no point in even trying to pretend nepotism isn’t at work in my career.
Back at the office, in a conference room surrounded by mostly older men, I spend ninety-five percent of my time listening to them talk about contracts and estates, tax shelters, and labor litigation. It’s mind-numbing.
“What about pro-bono?” my father asks, lifting his attention to Charles at the end of the table.
Charles is on the partner track, and he supervises all the pro-bono projects that come to the firm, handing off most of the work to juniors like me. Some of the cases involve personal injury claims, others are labor issues or civil rights concerns. This is where the fun work is, and where the most positive societal impact can be achieved. I’m chomping at the bit to get into as much of this work as I can, but my dad is opposed. He wants me on the big-league stuff, so I can fast-track into a partner’s seat.
Charles offers highlights on the three cases he’s managing. Then, stifling a yawn, he says, “And we just had a new one come in this week. Some special needs kid’s family wants to sue the city schools for lack of accommodation. The kid is autistic, and off the charts smart, but almost non-verbal. He can’t participate in group activities. He’s communicative via computer, loquacious even. The school refuses to provide a way for he and his classmates to interact.”
“I’ll take it!” I offer, piping up enthusiastically.
All heads turn toward me. My father lifts an eyebrow.
“Not enough work to do?” he asks, smirking. “I’m sure we can find something more important to occupy your time.”
I give him my best but please, Daddy look, cocking my head, smiling like I did when I was a kid, begging for ice cream.
I hate myself in that moment, but it’s a pattern I fall into right away. I can’t help myself. Like Charle’s can’t help being an asshole. And Logan can’t help being … completely delicious.
I cross my legs, and uncross them again.
Where did that thought even come from?
I look to my father again, and he smiles at me indulgently. I hate myself even more, but I can tell he’s about to give in.
Jeffrey Beckett—shrewd litigator, power-player, hard-nosed businessman. He folds like a bad poker hand. He waves at Charles. “Give it to her. Otherwise I’ll never hear the end of it.”
When we’re done going through the long list of open case-loads, my dad sits back with a bemused, thoughtful expression tugging his cheek. I know that look. It says he’s got a bright idea. This is rarely a good thing.
“So, does anyone know anything about this lottery story?” he asks, raising a topic that’s the last thing I expect my dreadfully serious father to broach.
Brows furrow all around the table. No one knows where he’s going with this.
I—tentatively—raise my hand. He eyes me with suspicion.
“Speak,” he instructs, back to his hard-nosed self.
I tell them about my conversation with Claire. When I’m done, my father nods.
“I was thinking that, if perhaps for no other reason than the publicity it would generate, we reach out to the Lottery Commission, and offer the ticket holder some free consultation time with the estates and trusts team,” he says. “Maybe he hasn’t come forward because he’s not certain what to do. And on the off-chance he takes us up on it, it poses an opportunity to secure a high-net-worth client on retainer.”
That’s the worst idea I ever heard. Since when does Beckett, Burkehead & Winslow need publicity? We’re one of the top firms in the state. Plus, we don’t need to get tangled up with this mess. My gut tells me that this winner knows what he or she is doing, and we don’t need to be part of the problem. But I keep my mouth shut. I’ve had my win today, and I’ve said enough already.
“That’s brilliant,” Charles says. “Odds are the guy is clueless. It would be an easy client to manage, and we could milk a steep retainer for decades if we play it right.”
Heads nod all around. My stomach turns, and I shift uncomfortably.
Are they serious? Jesus, what a bunch of parasitic opportunists.
“Handle it, Charles,” my father says. “Sweeten the offer with whatever you can think of. See if you can get the lottery commission to issue a joint press release.”
He turns to me. “Bryn, you call your friend Claire and tell her we’ve got a spin for her story. Charles and I would be happy to talk to her.”
Oh God. I would rather eat glass, then chase it with rubbing alcohol.
But my father’s eyes don’t leave mine.
Turns out I have a Beckett trait too—I fold just the same when I’m told what I need to do.
I sigh, slumping in my seat. “Okay,” I offer, feebly.
* * *
Two Weeks Later
“Not a single bite,” Charles grumbles, folding the newspaper.
&
nbsp; He’s referring to the fact that no one has taken our law firm up on the offer for lottery related representation, allowing us to bleed them dry until the end of time.
He glares at the widescreen television on the wall where half the staff are already gathered to watch the press conference. The owner of the winning, Triple Mega-Powerball lottery ticket has, at long last, come forward. This was announced two days ago via a note on the Lottery Commission’s Facebook page. The brief statement said the winner would be identified at a news conference today.
Speculation on who it is and general anticipation of finding out, is the single most popular news story in the country right now. It’s well ahead of reporting on criminal investigations of corruption in the current presidential administration, the discovery of microbial life on one of the moons orbiting Uranus, and a kitten who fell down a well and was rescued by the family’s pet monkey (who was conveniently outfitted with a body camera for the dramatic descent into the abyss.)
I know for a fact that every media outlet in the state is present at the Lottery Commission PR event. I suspect every major cable news organization in the country is represented too. I heard something about it on the BBC early this morning, so the story even has global traction. It’s gotten crazy, way out of hand.
Whoever this poor guy is, I feel sorry for him. His life is about to become uncomfortably complicated.
“It’s starting!” Bonnie, my admin, pipes up. She’s bouncing with excitement, clapping her hands like a kid at a birthday party. This is all she’s talked about for a week.
We gather around the television screen. Even my father pops in to watch the drama unfold.
There must be twenty people behind the podium framed in the camera’s view. The commissioner speaks, explaining the delay in announcing the winner.
“The ticket owner chose to take some time to consider the ramifications of this life-changing event. We certainly understand and appreciate that…” He drones on too long with empty, official sounding words that explain precious little, but take up lots of airtime.
“…I won’t keep you waiting any longer. We’re pleased to announce that the winner of the Triple Mega-Powerball lottery, two point six-seven billion dollars, is… Mr. L. E. Chandler, native and lifelong resident of our fair capital city, Raleigh, North Carolina.”