Power Play

by Tara Lynn

  Despite how late for work we both were, I held her a moment, felt her breakneck pulse lob in sync with mine.

  “That would be amazing,” I said. “You'd be far easier to manage as a ten year old.”

  “Don't count on it,” she said. “It took a lot of discipline for my father to keep me in line. I don't think you're up for it.”

  “Oh, just say the word, darlin' and I'll unleash on you as never before.”

  It might have been a dangerous thing to say in the early days, but now, her monster was dead and buried, in real and in her heart. She just smiled and nudged my cheek with her fist.

  “Speaking of ten year olds, who's the one running off to meet their mommy?”

  I crushed my eyes shut. “Do you have to remind me?”

  “You should be at the airport by now.”

  “Good thing about a private jet is that it's not allowed to leave without you.”

  My elation was quickly dulling though. I had no idea what I'd been summoned to discuss – privately, no less. My mother was pissed about my headlong dive into my new company, but she could hardly punish me with both Stone Solar and Stone Holdings hitting record profits.

  But who knows, she didn't exactly need reason to have me step down as CEO. I'd made my peace with that for a while now. Let Jesse have Stone Holdings. I had the things that mattered to me.

  Still, I was going to see here wasn't I? Why was I dancing to her tune if I didn’t care. My peace hadn't gone more than skin deep maybe. That would take time. Hopefully, all she wanted was to hoist some more abuse on me. That'd speed the process up.

  “You shouldn't keep her waiting,” Kerry said.

  “Is she working through you, too, now?” I asked.

  “I don't think she even considers me a real person.”

  “Perhaps I should show her a tape of our morning routine. Let her see how real you are.”

  “Please don't.”

  I kissed her firmly on the lips, then sat up and gazed sadly at the sheets. Once, I'd flown the world on a whim. Now, even flying away to Dallas seemed hard. It was hard enough leaving Kerry in the morning, even when we were just going to different offices in the same building.

  “I'll be back for dinner,” I said.

  “With an appetite, I hope.” Her brown eyes glittered in the sunlight.

  “With all sorts of appetites,” I said. “That's a guarantee.”

  She grabbed my arm, her fingers gentle. “I love you, Deacon,” she said.

  I kissed her hand, and gave it a squeeze. “I know.”

  “Ugh, don't Solo me.”

  I chuckled then bent in for a kiss. “I love you, darlin',” I said solemnly. “More than anything in this life.”

  “I believe you.”

  Her eyes, warm and tender, told the truth. I couldn't see a trace of the doubt that had once been so strong there. Still, I wouldn't be satisfied until I eliminated it altogether.

  But first, I'd go take care of this.

  ****

  Mother's butler led me to her sitting room. That's what she actually called it, and certainly there was ample opportunity to live up to its name.

  Light spilled in through sheer lace curtains, dimmed and scattered. It fell across the various ornate wood and white cloth sofas laid out, not quite facing each other. An antique wooden coffee table in the center held a pot of steaming tea.

  For a woman who took pride in our Texan legacy, she took an awful lot of inspiration from Europe.

  “You're late,” my mother said.

  She sat in a wing chair, sipping at a porcelain cup. She wore a loose grey pantsuit and had her legs crossed neatly.

  “I got distracted,” I said. “New business takes up a lot of attention, you know. Or no, I suppose you wouldn't.”

  “Charming,” she said. “I imagine things are going well with your Arabs, then. You're as rude and surly as they are.”

  “Oh, how I wish I had a recording of that to play to the Saudi King the next time you broke bread together.”

  “Tea, sir?” the butler said, professionally deaf to the stormclouds moving in.

  “Bring me a coffee, if you could,” I said. “Cream, no sugar.”

  “Right away.” He whispered off against the expensive Persian carpet.

  “How are things recently with your new company?” my mother asked.

  “We've got a major new contract with Qatar.”

  I beamed. Kerry had been instrumental in selling that. It'd be a double pleasure to stick it back at my mother.

  But she didn't flinch. She sipped calmly. “How big?” she asked. “Billions?”

  “Eight figures. That's major for the sector.” I frowned. “Why the sudden interest in our well-being?”

  “I didn't much care when you squandered your own money on it. But you couldn't resist naming it after our family, could you?” She shook her head. “Stone Solar.”

  “I named it after myself. I just happen to be a Stone.”

  “People still think it's part of the family company, you know.”

  “I'm not interested in the idle musings of people who can't be bothered to spend a minute researching the facts.”

  “No, you're never interested in what anyone has to think. Well, perhaps other than that woman I hear you're now cohabiting with.”

  Kerry was off limits. I'd made that clear to both her and Jesse, though for different reasons.

  “What does it matter?” I said. “Going into solar was supposed to spook the politicians. But Tarly's still dining with you and he's still crushing the polls. People weren't swayed by me.”

  “No.” Her brow finally wrinkled. “I may have misjudged that situation.”

  I snorted. If I didn't know better, that almost sounded like an apology. But she said nothing more.

  The butler swished back with the coffee. I set it down on the table, and hunched forward.

  “Why did you call me here?” I said. “What couldn't wait?”

  She met my eyes an instant, then crossed her legs the other way. “I researched your company before you arrived. Numbers are not my strong suit, but Walter tells me that you are doing extremely well.”

  She'd actually talked to our accountant? My eyes felt wide enough to drop out of my sockets.

  “We are,” I said.

  “It's still not what the Stone name has stood for, but Jesse has mentioned on one or two occasions that it could be made amenable to our family's strengths.”

  “It can.”

  “Perhaps I was wrong in vetoing its purchase.”

  “Perhaps?” I started to laugh, but it choked out as it grew clear exactly where this was headed. “Wait, you don't think you can buy the company now, right? I took the risk. It's my venture.”

  “It's already named properly to fit right in as a branch of Stone Holdings.”

  Now, I did laugh. I kicked back and crossed my legs, sipping slowly at my coffee. It was good, having something she was begging after, for once.

  “I thought Deacon Stone Solar would be a bit tacky,” I said. “But make no mistake. It's my company. I'll be running it well after you give Jesse the reins to Stone Holdings.”

  “Ah.” My mother's face went as calm as the center of a hurricane. “That.”

  “Yes, that. Always that. We all knew it was in the cards.”

  And yet my stomach clenched at the sight of the truth so naked on her face.

  “If you knew,” she said. “Then why with every step, did you fight my wishes?”

  “Mother, I've been taking the wrong steps in your eyes since I toddled over to the workshop playset instead of the dressage rocking horse. There was no chance we'd ever agree. And it worked out fine. You see that, now.”

  “I see your mind for business,” she said. “Don't mistake that for lack of flaw elsewhere.”

  “Business is all my mind cares about.” I gulped down the coffee, and beckoned the butler from the door for another. “So I'll take that as a gold star.”

  �
��I'm glad to hear that.” She set her cup and saucer down. “Because I'm giving it to you.”

  My lungs shut down. The room went still and solid.

  “What?” I said.

  “I will name you heir to Stone Holdings. You, not your brother.” Her thin lips drew tight with a smile.

  My jaw was open, I tried to shut it, but it flapped out of my control. “Why would you do that?”

  “You know how to make money,” she said. “And our future depends on the amount more than how we make it. This political campaign has shown me that quite clearly.”

  “Does Jesse know?”

  “He will, if you accept the deal.”

  “Of course, I want Stone Holdings.”

  It'd been the one thing I knew I'd never have. The thing I fought for anyway.

  “The other terms don't matter to you?” she said.

  Her smile deepened to her normal malice. Of course, there was more.

  “What are the terms?”

  “Your business sense is valuable. But I still don't approve of your personal dealings.”

  Kerry. She was talking about Kerry. I nearly choked out a laugh. “You want me to break up with my girlfriend to hand me a billion dollar company. That's nonsense.”

  “That's not what I want.” Her crystal eyes sharpened to diamonds. “You can be with whoever you feel like. Be with a man, for all I care. But if you want control of the company, you will not tarnish the Stone name by marrying below it.”

  My mirth faded. “What are you saying?”

  “I'll announce your takeover right now. I'll write it into my will. All so long as you promise not to marry.”

  “Marry Kerry?”

  “Anyone.”

  A thick block formed quickly in my throat, but I managed to throw her a line. “Even one of your handpicked high-class ditzes?”

  “We can talk about revising the terms if your situation improves,” she said. “I'm not dying quite yet, after all.”

  She couldn't stop me from marrying – that violated almost every human rights treaty. But placing a conditional status in her will for the shares? With another son in the picture, that’d be very easy.

  I could wait her out, wait to marry till the shares passed to me. But she was a spry old thing, and flexible. It’d be decades before the will mattered.

  “So I stay single officially?” I said. “That's all you want.”

  “It's hardly my preferred outcome, but I'll take what I can.” She smiled. “And as for you, you'll still have the company. That's all you've wanted right?”

  It had been once. And even now, it wouldn't keep me and Kerry apart.

  But it kept her from being mine as completely as I needed.

  The sunlight fell cold on me, and even the coffee felt chill. I had no idea what Kerry would make of it? She was no ordinary girl, but this was far from an ordinary request.

  But before that was the bigger question. The one that I still couldn't answer:

  What did I make of it?

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  Kerry

  “You're scum,” the lawyer yelled at me. “You don’t deserve to walk free>’

  “What do you know about scum?” I muttered.

  My improv scene partner paced around my chair, glowering down like I was a pedophile on deposition. What exactly was I? My brain was too muddled to keep track. Spending the whole week thinking about Deacon had worn me down. Cause he was off thinking about our future.

  Was it our future anymore, or just his?

  “I'm actually also a professor of biology at Rice,” the lawyer said. “Specializing in pond scum. Of which, you are the worst.”

  There might have been some laughs. I barely heard. The lawyer was waiting for me. I struggled for something.

  “Prove it,” I said.

  “I'm not on trial here,” he said.

  “Why not?” Words suddenly found me. “You never made a bad decision in your life?”

  “Hmm, I guess I pay too much for car insurance.”

  “You never got too close to the wrong people?”

  “Every Saturday night, sweetheart.”

  The crowd made noises, but I was on a roll.

  “Did these people ever leave you drifting in the wind, wondering what you'd done to deserve the burden you carried?”

  “Oh I know exactly what I did to earn what the doctors say I’ve got,” he said.

  The crowd laughed another slender laugh. This was supposed to be building to something, but if I had an answer, I wouldn't have asked those questions. The silence lingered.

  “Come on,” the lawyer said. “I've admitted to some stuff. Why don't you just admit to what you did, too?”

  “I did nothing,” I blurted out.

  That was the problem. I shouldn't have sat silently while Deacon thought through his future with and without me. I should have acted not waited for a reaction.

  “Uh, nothing at all?” the lawyer asked.

  I glared up. He was giving me a concerned look. I shouldn't have come today, but that didn't justify shutting him down like I did.

  “All I did was say yes to the wrong guy,” I said.

  “Uh-huh. And he left you to take the hit, huh? Cause I don't see him around this courtroom.”

  “That's right.”

  There was no hit yet, but waiting was worse. Sure, he could say he had to travel for business, but none of it was necessary. He was just avoiding me.

  “So give him up.” The lawyer walked up and slammed my imaginary deposition stand. “Confess it all. The jury will go easy on you.”

  My mouth filled with stupid words, though not dishonest ones. “The only thing I did wrong was love too deep.”

  The crowd laughed hard at that for some reason. They were desperate. I blew back the fog clouding my thoughts. I should at least give them something.

  “That's not what the video footage seems to show,” the lawyer said. “Just tell us the truth and do your time. Why do you even want your freedom anyway?”

  Freedom. Yeah I could have it. My resume was ironclad. I had a title I couldn't dream about six months ago. And I'd seen more of the world, enough to know all that I was missing out on. I could go anywhere and do anything, almost.

  But I didn't want to. The thought of it all ending just made me want to explode.

  That was it.

  “Ok, I'll tell you exactly what's gonna happen,” I said to the fake lawyer. “I'm not going to tell you what I did. But I'll tell you what I'm gonna do. See I came in here prepared for if things went wrong.”

  I even had a vest on over my shirt for the cold room. I threw it open.

  “Very nice.” The lawyer clicked his tongue and eyed my breasts wolfishly. Even I smiled.

  “That's C4 you're looking at,” I said.

  “Oh, I know. I love looking at well-contoured...plastique.”

  “See,” I said. “This is my freedom. And I'm liberating you all with me.”

  The lawyer's eyes went fake-wide. “Baliff!” he shouted.

  I gripped a fake detonator in my hands. “Dead woman's switch,” I said. “You're not escaping the fallout from this mess. I was innocent, but I sure won't be for long. Any last words?”

  “Let's be reasonable, here,” he said staying me with a hand.

  Maybe he wanted this to go on a bit longer. We still had time. Too bad.

  “Ooh, those are the wrong words to say to a mad woman,” I said, and mashed down my fake thumb.

  I threw myself off my seat, and my partner sighed and toppled over. We rose to scattered applause. I avoided him as we got off stage.

  At least it was over. Now time to go contemplate a real life version.

  “Interesting conclusion,” Antoine said shifting over and adjusting his jeans as I sat down. “Not very funny, but you really drew on some interesting stuff there. I wonder where it all came from.”

  “Creativity is very mysterious.”

  “Mmm-hmm.”

  He knew ev
erything. I'd been more open with him and Mira since moving in with Deacon since we had much less time together. They knew the details of the past week.

  Somehow Mira was taking all the wrong lessons from my mess, as if I’d chosen it instead of fallen into it. She was out tonight seeing the guy her parents wanted to set her up with, which hardly helped my mood.

  But Antoine was a steady shoulder. Generally.

  “Did he drop another bomb on you?” he said. “Is that what you passed on to us up there?”

  “I can handle bombs,” I said. “My dad put me through so much worse. The silence is what's suffocating.”

  “Silence? You said you two talked yesterday.”

  I dipped my voice as the next group started. “Yeah, but it was all business.”

  “He didn't say he loved you?”

  “Well, he did, but it was so distant.”

  “He was distant. Isn't he in Qatar?”

  Antoine cocked an eyebrow at me. How could I make him see? I knew Deacon's voice. I knew what his love sounded like. How it felt like. Heck, it wasn't like I'd asked him for anything but that.

  Sure, his mother’s deal had been painful to hear. What had I done to that old bat to make her hate me so much?

  But I hadn't pressed Deacon to turn her down. He'd fought for Stone Holdings his whole life. He deserved it.

  Deacon's eyes had been flat a slate though. He was the one who couldn't abide the agreement. Being told he could never possess me completely? It went against his very essence.

  It was one thing when his mother had used me as an excuse to keep him from buying a new company. But now she was making him choose between me and the company he already possessed. It was easy to let it go when he thought he’d lost it, but now it dangled within reach.

  Maybe he was working hard on a way to outmaneuver her. Maybe that's what his silence was covering up.

  Or maybe he'd just arrived at a more simple solution. There were plenty of women his mother would accept. And after all, we’d only been together three months.

  It almost made me want to choke out a laugh. I wasn't the one standing in the way of us anymore. I might even be the one holding us together. But it was getting hard with his voice so diminished, with him drifting away with each day.

  Marriage didn't even matter to me. We could still be together in every way that counted. Even if not officially or religiously. I didn't believe in that stuff, right?