by Sarah Andre
Not the right answer, Honey. “It’ll only take a sec,” he said, mostly to reassure the gentle old man who hovered uncomfortably, clearly knowing his presence was still required by the mistress’s demands, but not wanting to be at hand for this exchange. “It’s about the hostile takeover.”
Honey blinked those long eyelashes. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“I think you do.”
“You should probably speak to your father.”
Devon stretched his lips into a wide smile. He stuck his free hand into his slacks, maintaining a relaxed stance. “I’m speaking to you. And I’m not leaving here without some answers.”
At the issued challenge, Honey tilted her head a fraction and smiled thinly. “Well then, Joseph, see that Devon gets a mattress. Evidently he’s sleeping in here tonight.”
As she glided by, fury coursed through him. She knew something. Hell, she was probably behind it! “You’ll be sorry you ever messed with my company.”
Besides Joseph’s eyebrows rising almost to his hairline, the only reaction Devon caught was the slight stiffening of her spine. At a small intake of breath, he spun around. Two housekeepers with dust rags stood out in the foyer, and from the looks on their faces, they hadn’t missed a syllable. One nudged the other and they sidled off. Seconds later, Honey began to tick orders off her fingers again as if the whole exchange hadn’t happened, and they disappeared through the swinging doors that led to the kitchen.
Christ, you just threatened a woman. What’s next? Drop-kicking a baby? His cell phone rang, and he pulled it out, answering absently.
“Darling. You never called last night.” The chiding voice of his fiancée did what the coffee and sun couldn’t—snapped him back to the powerbroker with his eye on the throne. The corporate persona slid into place. Confident, dominant, a lion among lambs.
“The night went to hell in a handbasket. It was too late to call.”
“You didn’t get your inheritance?” A cool tone threaded her words, one she’d adopted only recently.
And the question made him pause. He mentally shook himself. Of course she’d ask that; it was the sole reason he’d gotten on the plane yesterday afternoon. “No, the lawyer was busy changing my father’s will to disinherit my siblings.” When she didn’t respond, he added, “I’ll make an appointment to sign the papers this morning.”
“Wonderful. What time will you pick me up?” It took him a moment to recall the engagement party Chickie and Todd were throwing them at Daniel this evening. A party made up of pure A-list friends—a virtual who’s who of Manhattan’s wealthy elite. Nicole had insisted on authorizing Chickie’s guest list.
“I’ll stop by at six.”
“I won’t be dressed by then,” she said.
“That’s my point.” Even though they scheduled sex on Saturday afternoons, he needed to burn off some of this stress. A vision of her slim curves and perfectly spray-tanned skin on those white silk sheets rose before him.
She laughed. “Darling, I’m having a spa day. I’ll have just come from the salon; I can’t possibly mess up one of Phillipe’s creations. Come for a cocktail at seven. And wear the Armani tux, not the Hugo Boss.”
He murmured his assent, mentally replacing “black, not gray” for the designer names.
Their strength as a couple was their synergy: Devon as a major player in the Manhattan financial district and Nicole in the social scene. She added the class, her father’s cronies, and a cutthroat determination for their combined success. So even though sex had been shot down, his mood brightened. Within hours, he’d have dealt with his father, signed for his inheritance, and be on a plane, resuming life as he knew it.
They discussed the party a bit more, and he soaked in her resolve and confidence. When the call ended, he felt like himself for the first time since getting out of the car last night. He left a voicemail for George Fallow, asking to reschedule later this morning, and stuck the phone back in his pocket. Of utmost importance was not shaking the bank’s expectation of forthcoming monies while he fought this takeover.
“Sir.”
Devon swung around and again greeted Joseph, who apparently could still enter rooms without a sound. The butler’s eyes held pity and compassion, no doubt for the ass Devon had made out of himself with Honey. “Your father was called downtown for an unexpected meeting. He left instructions to notify you of the delay and has rearranged his schedule to see you in his home office at one o’clock sharp.”
How diplomatic of Joseph to make it sound like Harrison was moving heaven and earth to accommodate his son. Devon made sure not one facial muscle twitched. “Thank you, Joseph. And could you hunt down a razor? I forgot to pack mine.”
“Of course, sir. I’ll have it delivered to your room.”
As the butler slipped out, Devon poured more coffee down his throat, turning back to the window as he processed his father’s strategy—making himself purposely unavailable, thereby letting his adversary squirm like hooked bait. He squinted at the sunlight shimmering off the cascading water. Too bad Harrison had forgotten how much he’d taught his son. The delay was actually perfect. An afternoon meeting meant additional time to contact the board and major shareholders. It gave Eric that much more time to investigate what brought this on.
Devon called his secretary and had her switch the corporate jet to four o’clock; he’d land in Teterboro at six thirty. The engagement party started at eight. It’d be tight, but Sally assured him the weather report for New York was clear. He texted Nicole the change in plans.
“Dev,” Francine said quietly from the doorway. He looked over and suppressed a grunt as he faced a younger version of himself standing beside her. The resemblance hadn’t been as apparent in pictures or flashes of him walking past during video calls. Faced with direct eye contact, the boy glanced at the rug. “This is my son, Todd.”
“Hey, Todd.” Devon automatically stepped forward, hand outstretched.
“This is your Uncle Devon.” Small hairs rose on the back of his neck. Uncle.
The grip that shook his was apathetic at best, and the moment Devon let go, the boy stuck his palm into his jeans pocket. He had yet to look up from the rug, and Devon cast about for a subject universally interesting to eleven-year-olds. “So what’s your take on the Bears this year?”
Even as Todd shrugged, Francine rolled her eyes and shook her head. Huh. Maybe the boy was one of those nerdy, straight-A types. “What grade are you in now?”
“Fifth.”
“You go to Washburne?”
Todd nodded and shifted his weight.
“I went there too. Back in the age of dinosaurs.” Again the faint nod. Devon began to perspire. How hard could it be to engage a preteen for a few minutes? What else interested them?
“You both have something huge in common,” Frannie said, and he threw her a grateful look. “Your strawberry allergy.”
He glanced at Todd in surprise and sympathy. “Were you hospitalized too?”
The boy shook his head and finally lifted his gaze. “I just get hives everywhere.”
“My throat closes.” A nod, but no effort to continue the pragmatics of responding. Did preteens grasp the extreme awkwardness of this kind of silence? “You uh…play Grand Theft Auto?” he asked almost desperately.
A grin broke out on Todd’s face. “GTA Five, yeah. I’m at one hundred percent completion on most of the missions.”
“Sweet.” Devon hoped he sounded legitimately impressed, given he had no clue what that meant. Meaning he had no further response, which Todd seemed to realize. The glow died from his smile, and after one more poor-postured shrug, the boy wandered to the side buffet and looked under silver lids at the breakfast spread.
“Hurry, dear. You’ll be late for school.” Francine watched her son help himself to sausage. There were dark crescents under her red-rimmed eyes. It wasn’t likely any of the Wickham siblings had slept much last night. He’d spent hours on the phone with Eric, with very little
insight into how to fight a Goliath company from swallowing them whole. But, truthfully, this was even more personal for his sister. She now faced an ugly divorce, a custody standoff, and being stuck here like some fairy-tale princess in a tower.
“I’ve thought more about your situation,” he said. “The offer to Rick applies to you guys as well. New York has Grand Theft Auto too, you know.”
Her smile didn’t reach her eyes. “Brady’s shark of a lawyer made sure there’ll be hell to pay if I take Todd out of state. Even on vacation.” She sighed. “I wish you could stay longer and get to know him.”
“Chicago will never be big enou—”
“I know, I know. And after last night, I finally understand your reaction twelve years ago. I just never thought he’d…” She swallowed and blinked rapidly. Devon braced himself for the flood of tears, but after another hard swallow, her expression softened. “I heard about the takeover.”
It was on the tip of his tongue to ask how the gossip could have reached her when Todd tilted his plate, reaching for a cinnamon roll, and a bunch of sausage links bounced onto the ancient rug. Frannie instantly headed over to diagnose the grease stains, clucking and scolding as she sank to her knees and rubbed the area with a linen napkin. So weird to see her as a mother. She’d gotten pregnant a year after he’d left. At seventeen. And the asshole who’d assured her that he’d pull out became her husband. No doubt Harrison had orchestrated the solution to that scandalous fiasco—statutory rape versus young lovers and a grandson. But if Devon had stayed in Chicago, Brady Goff would’ve never gotten to first base with his sister.
He glanced at Todd again then swigged his remaining coffee. He needed to continue exchanging ideas with Eric, conference in the corporate lawyer, maybe even hire a consultant. After refilling his cup, he headed out.
“Wait,” his sister called. “I thought you were having breakfast with us.”
He halted mid-stride. Shit. The breakfast. That promise seemed to have been made a decade ago instead of last night. It’d really hurt her if he admitted he’d completely forgotten about meeting Todd and had already eaten what amounted to a feast after surviving on two slices of cake last night. He turned. “Aw, Frannie, I’m sorry. I don’t have the time…”
“Who doesn’t have time to eat?”
“I’ve got so much work to do…” He petered out as his sister sat back, napkin dangling, lips pressed together in disappointment. “I am sorry, Frannie.”
“Where will you be?”
He ran through the multiple room options like a Las Vegas card shuffler. He only needed a place with a desk, but top priority was choosing a room that gave him silence and absolute privacy. “First editions,” he said, referring to the largest of the three libraries, the one that held his father’s rare book collection. As children, just touching one of those books had been tantamount to crayoning a priceless canvas, resulting in corporal punishment severe enough to warrant a visit from Child Protective Services today. Like touching a hot stove, avoiding that library had become visceral instinct. It’d be the last place anyone would expect to find him.
Clearly his nephew and sister thought so too, given their widening eyes. After a quick salute to Todd, Devon strode out and bolted up the grand staircase. As he wound down hall after familiar hall, he resolutely kept the childhood memories of scavenger hunts and hide-and-seek at bay. Despite his father’s strict, museum-like rules for comporting oneself throughout the mansion, his mother had encouraged whatever fanciful activity their imaginations concocted. But he needed to stay sharply focused. Reminders of his mother had no place on a Friday morning twenty-one years later, when vultures circled his company.
He turned in to the massive library and crossed to the far corner, halting at the leather-topped executive desk, a masterfully crafted piece but, to his knowledge, merely decorative. Harrison collected beautiful things; he didn’t enjoy or share them. Devon glanced around at the two-story shelves of priceless first-edition books and the brass ladder on rollers. Although both ends of the room opened into hallways leading to the east and west wings, no one would use this room as an access point. It was perfect for some private conversations, and the whir of industrial fans over in the west wing made it even more insulated.
He settled into the wide leather desk chair and scrolled through the emails on his phone. Urgent caught his attention, and he opened a note from Peter O’Callaghan, the Chicago developer for Ashby Enterprises’ newest project—the one his trust fund was guaranteeing. O’Callaghan requested a video call as soon as possible, and Devon grinned. Now that Harrison had blown him off, his morning was wide open. Besides, the developer was accepting construction bids, and Devon was eager to hear the results in person. After securing a ten o’clock appointment, he resumed scrolling through emails until a whisper of sound caught his attention.
He raised his head in time to see an ethereal form glide into the room. His lungs ceased to function. Hannah. Older, curvier, but still emanating that inner radiance. It was what had first drawn him to her their senior year, and now, even with her on the other side of this enormous room, it left him dumbstruck. Her corkscrew curls had darkened to auburn and were tightly bound into a thick ponytail that fell to mid-waist. Just like always. He’d loved unbinding that hair. Feeling those silky coils bounce free and flow across his skin.
A stabbing pain in his lungs and his heart beating too fast drew his attention inward. He still hadn’t breathed. He gulped a ragged inhale, certain she’d heard too, but no. She surveyed the floor-to-ceiling shelves, smiling like a kid facing mountains of candy. The mesmerized profile was the adult version of the cute teen curled up on her mother’s sofa, nose buried in a novel. He opened his mouth in greeting and hesitated. As much as he’d looked forward to seeing her today, an internal warning suddenly flickered, like the lights in an execution chamber. He had no business waking up the past.
Regret constricted his chest again. He stayed perfectly still, deep in the corner of the vast room, capturing every gliding step she took toward the west wing like the f-stop shutter mode on a camera. Three more steps and she’d leave his life all over again, only this time she’d never even know it. Goose bumps pebbled his skin as a renewed need to blurt a greeting bubbled up. He couldn’t just let her go like this.
Ringing pierced the air, as jarring as a scream. They jumped simultaneously, and she spun around. Her deep green eyes widened. Even this far, their expressiveness was like a sucker punch. He’d forgotten how she could hold whole conversations with her eyes alone.
His cell phone rang again. He rose slowly from the chair, unsure his knees would hold him. She squinted as if he were a mirage, and then her mouth fell open. He had to speak, yet his vocal cords locked up, and his lips were unable to form a single, stupid syllable. A third ring. If it was Eric, he had to take the call. He should really glance at caller ID.
“Devon?” She spoke his name breathlessly, and his mind flew back to the erotic things he’d done to make her call out his name like that. He gripped the desk. “H—happy belated birthday,” she said. Even from over here, her trembling was visible.
“Thank you.” He cleared the gruffness from his voice. A fourth ring. If he ignored it, there was no fifth. The caller would roll into voicemail. Instinctively he glanced at the screen. Eric. Shit. Maybe he had information on how Ashby Enterprises could survive, how to save the trust fund, how to ensure the development… “I, uh—I have to take this.” His words sounded genuinely regretful but lame nonetheless. “I’ll catch up with you in a bit.”
He tapped the green Talk icon but never got the phone to his ear, because something flashed across her face. Sadness? Regret? Utter lack of surprise that the first sentence out of his mouth after twelve years was a blow-off? Whatever it was squeezed the oxygen right back out of his lungs. She disappeared into the west hall without a backward glance.
“Seriously,” he called after her. “I’ll be right there.” So fucking lame. He cringed and forced his though
ts back to his crisis. “Hey,” he said curtly into the phone. “What’d you find out?”
“There’s definitely been some stealthy stock movement over the last quarter.”
“How did we not pick this up?” he asked sharply, his emphasis on we—meaning solely his cousin, the damn CFO. The guru who’d taught him everything there was to know about being a financial genius.
“It was stealthy, Dev. The accumulation of shares was small enough and over such a long duration, it didn’t trigger anything on our radar.”
“Why not?”
“If someone bought a huge chunk of our stock all at once, it would set off alarm bells. We’d check into who’s behind it and what their motivation is for the buy. But small day-to-day buying and selling—hell, we don’t bat an eye.”
“So you’re saying my father isn’t behind this accumulation?”
“I’m saying the stock wasn’t bought by the Wickham Corporation. The purchasing company is Bryant Incorporated. Ever heard of them?”
Devon thought hard. Something about the word Bryant poked him. Something long ago. Maybe the name of a high school friend? A Cubs outfielder when he was Todd’s age? Damn. Anxiety kept his mind blank. “No,” he said, “but it’s obviously an offshoot of my father’s.”
“I can’t trace it back to Wickham Corp. The business address is the Cayman Islands, but the area code is local, two-one-two. Goes to”—a keyboard tapped—“Greenspan and Schmidt, LLP.”
Devon glanced at his watch. Just after nine on the East Coast. “Did you call?”
“Yep. Secretary’s evasive enough for the FBI, and bitchy enough to be my ex. I doubt I’ll get any returned calls.”
“Did you sell to Bryant?”
“Hell no. I sold to Allison Corporation, who agreed to sell them back next week. Besides, Bryant doesn’t have nearly enough to take us out. Between the shares you, me, and the board still own, I don’t see how a hostile offer could go through.”
Harrison’s words flitted through Devon’s mind. Your friends are quite unhappy with your leadership. Who had sold to Bryant? He rubbed his jaw. “All right. Keep trying. I’ll call you as soon as I meet with my father.”