Cross My Heart

by Kris Jayne

  I’d heard all this already, but what no one had explained was how my nineteen-year-old Oklahoma-born grandmother, a young black woman in the late 1950s, got pregnant by a white wildcatter nearly ten years her senior.

  I pressed my palm to my gut. Old John Peter’s glacier blue eyes menaced the room from the giant canvas, giving me a chill to go with my queasiness. “We don’t need to go back through history.”

  “I can understand why that might be uncomfortable for you.” Theresa’s sharp tongue couldn’t be dulled by the phony sympathy in her voice.

  “And for you,” I shot back.

  However Etta and J.P. got together, it was after he and his fiancée Abigail’s engagement announcement appeared in a Houston paper. Dad was born the following April—just seven months after his marriage—and Theresa and Marie in September of the same year.

  I’d bet everyone in the room would’ve liked to tighten that bolo tie until those sharp blue eyes bugged out of the J.P.’s bony head. The memory of how the old man died hit me again, and my stomach squeezed.

  No. Descending from that old man held no appeal at all. Nevermind the money. All of these bickering, cutthroat people seemed to wish they weren’t related. However, I couldn’t argue with DNA or, likely, whatever William was clearing his throat yet again to gear up and announce.

  “William,” Theresa said the lawyer’s name like a command, and the family quieted.

  “J.P. arranged the trusts so everything is divided into thirds. Each of his children receives roughly one third of his company shares and one third of his personal estate, minus some specific set asides for family and valued staff and associates.”

  I calculated what it meant if Jasmine, Nate, and I split what could be our father’s share. The total company was valued at just over twenty-two billion. John Peter was worth an estimated fifteen billion more. My entire body hummed and burned, and my ears rang. I did well, but nowhere near a fraction of that well. Jesus.

  Jasmine would be okay with the sudden flush of money, but Nate? I’d have to make sure he didn’t blow through it all on schemes with his shitty friends.

  William plowed on. “Before we delve into the specifics of the bequests, I’d like to discuss the trust’s conditions.”

  Somehow, the air left the room without anyone breathing.

  “Conditions?” Willa finally found her high-pitched voice.

  “Yes, conditions,” the lawyer repeated, looking as grim as I felt.

  21

  Carter

  “Such as?” Reese adopted her mother’s bored tone, but her fingers had gone white gripping the edge of the table.

  “Each inheritance—even shares of the business for his children—is contingent on a few factors.” William cleared his throat and dove in.

  “For example, Willa, your inheritance will remain in a trust with me as the trustee unless you legally divorce your husband. Until that time, I must approve any requests from money out of the trust,” he said.

  Willa’s cheeks flushed. “Granddad never like Michael, but I never thought he’d do this,” she moaned. “That’s not fair. I’m thirty-three. I can’t decide for myself how to spend my money?”

  “Again, it’s not yours. It’s his. It’s always going to be his,” Quinn countered, drily. “And I suppose Granddad gave me the same conditions? He didn’t even come when Ben and I got married. Most of you didn’t. God forbid everyone didn’t fall in line with what he wanted.”

  “Well, I was going to get to that in a moment,” William said, turning a deep shade of red and starting to sweat a little. “Actually, um, you have no conditions on your inheritance, Quinn. He has set aside the Lake Tahoe house, his apartment in Tokyo, and $100 million for you. Now, this is a generation-skipping trust, so there are some particularities in transferring the deeds, but they’re yours.”

  “Why doesn’t she have conditions?” Anthony barked with indignation.

  “That’s the way your grandfather wanted it. I’m here to share the what, not the why,” William said. “Now, going back to Jude. Your grandfather owned McMurrays, the steakhouse and bar here in Dallas. He’s leaving that, his home in Bourgogne, and $100 million to Jude—contingent upon his finishing culinary school and working successfully as a chef for three years on his own.”

  Willa snickered. “Jude’s never finished anything.”

  “Don’t mock your brother’s issues,” Marie snapped.

  “I’m glad you’ve acknowledged those. This is progress.” Theresa patted her sister’s hand with a condescending smile.

  Her twin turned away from her sister and asked, “What about Anthony?”

  At the sound of his name, the young man jerked upright, staring across the table at William.

  “The situation with the rest of the will is more complex. Anthony has one year to get engaged, and from that point, he must marry within three months,” the lawyer paused, looking directly at his quarry. “The clock starts today now that you’ve been notified. Once you’re married, you’ll get an initial payout of five million dollars with another five million dollar payout each year for five years. After consistently cohabitating with your spouse for five years, you’ll receive three additional $25 million payouts every three years—regardless of your living situation.”

  Anthony grinned and gave a small shrug. “So I’ll get married.”

  “You have to do more than get married. For the first five years, you’re to have no periods where you two aren’t under the same roof for more than one week at a time and for no more than six weeks in a year. There will be no infidelity, no drugs, no arrests—no, well, shenanigans whatsoever during this time or you forfeit everything. Your grandfather provided the means to validate that you’re living up to your end of the bargain, including random drug screens. You will have the use of the house in the Tuscany and an apartment in New York, both of which you will inherit when you’ve been married for five years under these terms.”

  The attorney’s no-nonsense qualifications took the shine on Anthony’s smile down a notch.

  “That’s fifteen years before I inherit everything.” He scrunched up his face, then grumbled, “Fine. Whatever.”

  Still, it didn’t seem so hard. J.P. Star all but asked Willa to get a divorce. All Anthony had to do was drag some willing woman down the aisle and manage to live together without killing each other or his penis wandering away. How could he not have enough discipline to do that with $100 million on the line? If those were the conditions the old man felt the need to have for his grandkids, Jazz and I—and even Nate, who was wasn’t without his “issues”—would have no problem.

  “What about me? And Reese?” Theresa urged.

  “And for me and my sister and brother?” I asked.

  “There’s one central condition. Carter will come to work for J.P. Star Energy in operations for three years—”

  “What does ‘in operations’ mean? He works for me or Mom for three years?” Reese cut in. Her question sliced with the edged tone of a woman on the verge of burning down the building.

  “You’ll remain the CFO. Theresa will be temporary CEO. Carter will join the company as chief of operations, learning the business for three years, and after that…” The attorney turned a shade of red I’d never seen in a human being. “Carter will become CEO of J.P. Star Energy.”

  “Like Hell, William!” Theresa came out of her chair. Seemingly aware of the eyes on her, she thrust her palms out in front of her and sat back down in a huff.

  I took a deep breath, steadying myself so I didn’t sound like the rest of the old man’s whiny heirs. “I don’t want to be CEO of an oil company. I have a job, believe it or not, a lucrative one that I enjoy in commercial real estate. I don’t even live here.”

  “That would have to change, and I need you to understand that every other condition of the will hinges on this. Everyone’s inheritance—except for Quinn—depends on accepting Carter into the company.”

  “And Carter being willing,” Rees
e added. She pivoted in her chair, assessing me with narrow eyes.

  Theresa shook her head. “Well, the children will have to sacrifice. They can inherit from me and from Marie when the time comes. We’ll not have an outsider running the company.”

  William cut in. “You don’t understand, Theresa. You and Marie don’t inherit the company shares either if Carter doesn’t take the position. Your father’s shares will be split between the non-familial shareholders, and the family loses control of the company. His personal estate—aside from what he bequeathed to Quinn—will go to charity. It’s Carter, or it’s nothing.”

  “Except for Quinn. Lucky her,” Anthony snorted.

  The lucky sister paled. “If none of this matters to me, then I’ll be going,” she replied in a shaky voice and stood up.

  “You can’t leave,” Reese begged. “We have to fight this together.”

  Quinn shook her head. “I don’t have to fight anything. This is why I left. He always did this—playing us against one another, setting up Olympic tasks to gain his favor. It’s bullshit, Reese, and you know it. Mom and Dad do the same thing. They scheme and scratch over money and claim it’s about family, but it’s not. It’s about power.”

  “I’ve never—” Theresa literally clutched the pearls around her neck.

  “Save it, Mother.” Quinn pressed her fingers to her temples, then opened her eyes wide and turned to me. “Do you like your life as it is?”

  I swallowed hard. “Yes.”

  “And you already have enough to provide for your family?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do yourself a favor and get the fuck out of here.”

  Then, with her mother and her aunt gasping, Quinn grabbed her purse and did exactly that.

  The attorney waited for the door to click shut before he continued. “There is more to your family’s share, Carter. Each of you inherits one third of what would have been your father’s share of John Peter’s personal estate. You’ll inherit a house in London. Your sister will inherit the house in Big Sur. Your brother will inherit Love’s Crossing.”

  “What’s Love’s Crossing?” I asked.

  “A ranch northwest of Horsehoe Bay in Rudel, Texas,” Reese answered.

  “It’s our homestead,” Theresa snapped.

  “Starwood is our homestead,” Marie said with irritation. “Daddy only bought Love’s Crossing because it was part of the land he acquired when he bought Canfield Petrol. He liked being near Lake Buchanan.”

  She turned to me, eyes glistening and a haunted smile on her face. It was the first reminder that this should be a family grieving.

  “He loved heading out to the ranch. We used to ride out there as children and go boating in the summer. Starwood was dusty and unforgiving. He was always happier at Love’s Crossing. He bought it right before he married our mother.”

  Her voice fell off into nostalgia.

  Jazz would love living in Big Sur. She was outdoorsy and very California with her love of all things crystals, tarot, and woo. But Nate on a horse ranch called Love’s Crossing? I chuckled under my breath.

  “Is this amusing to you? The dismantling of our family legacy?” Reese asked through gritted teeth.

  “It’s not my legacy, so yes, seeing you all crumble under the weight of your privilege and snipe at each other like assassins is strangely entertaining,” I replied.

  “It’s your legacy, too. That’s all John Peter wanted,” William said. “It pained him that he couldn’t play a larger part in your father’s life. Carter Sr. was his eldest and his only son. You’re his oldest grandchild. By his count, what he built should be yours to share with the rest of the family.”

  Well, his count was way off. All J.P. had done was spark trouble—back when Dad was born and now.

  “It’s obscene.” Marie shook her head and blanched, her lips trembling as she spoke. “What he did was obscene. How he died was obscene. How dare he?”

  Theresa still had her hand at her throat. Her ruffled collar rose and fell in a steady rhythm. “He always wanted a son.”

  “And so did you,” Reese ground out, glaring at her brother. “Pity we all disappointed him. Maybe he wouldn’t have done this to us.”

  “Always the bitch,” Anthony shot back.

  Reese’s voice rose. “Well, it’s not fair. Just because we’re women, we get cut out. We get screwed.” The company’s current head of finance and operations pressed her fingers to the ridge between her brows, then dropped her hand and sighed. “Mom ran this place—”

  “Dad—” her brother started.

  Reese waved a hand. “Dad was Mom’s proxy, and everyone knows it. Women have kept this place going, and now, everything we’ve worked for gets tossed out because we don’t have a useless appendage swinging between our legs.”

  “Vulgarity isn’t becoming,” Marie interjected.

  “Give it up, Aunt Marie. You’re not more righteous than the rest of us. You’re just as angry as we are,” Reese shouted.

  Everything about her screamed CEO-in-waiting. Her brother had a meaningless title but did little but land in the society papers. Now, she had to turn her lifeblood over to a cousin she’d never heard of.

  Sympathy bloomed in my chest. Then, she spoke.

  “Before we accept any of this, we need a DNA test. I need proof.”

  Perhaps that was inevitable, but still, my conciliatory feelings congealed into indignation.

  “That’s not necessary,” William piped in. “John Peter knew Carter Sr. was his. I assure you.”

  Now even I wondered how he’d been sure. William had said my father knew nothing about him.

  “But we don’t know that he,” Reese pushed her finger toward Carter, “is his grandson. We don’t know anything about his family.”

  “Are you saying my mother doesn’t know the father of her children?” The control I’d maintained since arriving in the lobby of the Star building started to slip.

  Theresa’s right shoulder lifted in a lazy shrug. “I wouldn’t impugn your mother. I don’t know her, dear, but Reese raises a valid point. We need to dot our Is, if you will.”

  The easy way she called my mother a slut while her own father died in a sexcapade with a prostitute dredged up strains of of old DMX rap lyrics in my head. I felt on the verge of losing my mind up in this monstrous place.

  But I wouldn’t. I couldn’t turn into everything these people probably thought I’d be. They already thought my mother and my grandmother were whores. Acid crept into my throat.

  I leaned forward, hands clasped, with my heart thumping like bass.

  “I understand you want to formalize everything. But you can do that without impugning my mother. You act like we’re all tainted by what my ancestor did, but she did it with yours. So let’s get real. Do you really want to start comparing family dramas?” I asked and glared at each face around the table.

  “This is all off topic.” William’s voice rose with a thunderous impatience. “I know, and John Peter knew, that Carter is his grandson. You can dither and dicker about it, but it changes nothing. He set specific conditions, and this kind of talk isn’t going to get you what you want. Carter’s participation in the company is a condition of inheritance. For him. For all of you. That’s not negotiable, and it doesn’t even matter why. He will inherit. He will come to work for the company for three years, and unless there’s some intervening factor that renders him incapable, he will take over as CEO. These were John Peter’s terms.”

  I sighed, both weary and wary. “For how long? What if I say no?”

  “For at least six years to fulfill the terms of the will. And anyone who quote, ‘interferes, sabotages, plots, or schemes’—those are John Peter’s words—against him will be disinherited, and their portion forfeited to either charity or to the non-familial shareholders. It depends on who we’re talking about.”

  Theresa reached the end of her tolerance. “Was father out of his mind? He can’t expect to enforce these ridiculous requ
irements!”

  She grabbed her daughter’s hand, but Reese yanked it away. “All you have to do, Mother, is not kill Carter, and you’re in no different a place than you were. You were going to step aside in a few years anyway. I lose my future. Grandfather never liked a woman in charge. He always wanted a man to run the company. Anthony’s such a lost cause, he went out and dragged in this, this…interloper!”

  I held my breath, waiting to see where Reese’s outburst would dock. As far as destinations went, “interloper” wasn’t so bad. I ignored her and focused on William.

  “I’ll have to think about this.”

  Theresa’s eyes went wide. “There’s nothing to think about.” The panic in her voice swelled then abated. “You have to do it. Think about your family and what this could mean for them.”

  “I don’t need you to tell me about my family. And we’ve been doing fine without you,” I said without even looking at her and stood. “I’ll be in touch.”

  Reese spoke. “I get that you have to think about this, but can you do us a favor?”

  Theresa jerked her head toward her daughter, who held up a hand to keep her mother silent.

  “What?” I asked.

  “Can we keep all of this inside the family for now? The publicity is out of hand already, and it’s best that we settle in and see how this goes before adding more fuel to that fire,” she said.

  On one hand, my joining the company was bound to raise questions. On the other, since J.P. was gone, there would be changes, and I could slide in, maybe unquestioned, and get a feel for things. It probably would be easier to do that without the spotlight of a questionable family history.

  “Define ‘for now,’” I said.

  Reese paused. “I don’t know. We can play it by ear. Six months or a year. Just not now.”

  “And if I don’t want to join?”

  “Then, you’ll be doing whatever the hell you want,” Reese answered with a grim smile. “So I don’t expect we’ll have any say.”

  “True. I’ll let you know my decision before the end of the week,” I said and headed for the door.