by Joey Bush
“Please don’t say anything to anyone,” I said. “I haven’t even told my mother yet. And I don’t think I want word to get out everywhere, otherwise I’m suddenly going to start hearing from people I haven’t heard from in years.”
“Oh, god, yeah you will. I didn’t even think of that. No, don’t worry, I won’t say anything. But that doesn’t mean I still can’t be excited for you!”
I smiled. “Thanks, Soph. I’m going to give my mom a call and then head back to my hotel room. I think I just need to be alone for a little while and process all of this.”
“I’ll bet you do. Crap, your mom is going to totally flip out. Good luck with that! Okay, I’ll talk to you soon. And don’t for a second start to feel bad about what you did to Levi!” She hung up.
My mother answered on the first ring; she knew I had my appointment with the lawyer today and had probably been carrying her phone around with her, ringer on high, all day.
“How’d it go?” she asked immediately.
“Hi to you, too,” I said.
“How was the meeting?”
“It was . . . interesting.” I wasn’t sure how my mother was going to react when I told her the news. She and Alex had what I supposed you could call an amicable divorce—no one threw anything at each other, there were no insults traded, everything was handled in an adult way—but she had chosen to leave him because he was never home, always busy at work, and she felt like she was simply not a factor at all in his life. I couldn’t blame her for feeling that way, and I was proud of her—and relieved—when we were able to get out of there and come back to Maryland.
“He left me money,” I said. “Quite a lot of money.”
“How much?”
“You probably won’t even believe me.”
“At this point, Isla, I probably would.”
“A billion dollars.”
“A billion dollars,” she repeated. “Wow.”
“I know. I wasn’t expecting that either.”
“You always did get along with Alex. He used to tell me he wished that Levi had even half of your discipline and motivation when it came to school.”
“Yeah, well, a lot of good that did me.” For a second, I could feel myself sliding back into a funk over the things that had happened this past week, but then I remembered none of that mattered. I didn’t need to worry about money anymore.
“I’d say it certainly did you a lot of good,” Mom said. “Do you think Alex would have left you anything if you were slacking off and partying the way Levi was? You’re set for life. Alex left you a very generous gift.”
“You’re set for life too, Mom. I’m going to take care of you.”
“That’s kind of you to offer, sweetie, but I’m not just about to up and quit my job. I like my job, and plus, I wouldn’t quite know what to do with myself. I wouldn’t mind a vacation somewhere warm this winter, though.”
“I saw Levi,” I said. “When I was leaving the lawyer’s office, he was just getting there.”
“Oh?” I couldn’t read Mom’s tone, whether it was simply curious or disapproving. “How’d that go?”
“It was fine. We didn’t really talk for that long.” I didn’t want to get into the whole story. Mom had never specifically said anything bad about Levi, but I knew she didn’t particularly care for him, and saw him as an entitled rich kid. Which he was.
“Well, I’m really happy for you, sweetie. I was quite curious over how this meeting was going to turn out. Anyway, I’ve got to get going, I just took a quick break to take your call, but I’ve still got lots to do before I can leave this afternoon. Why don’t you give me a call before you leave New York?”
“Okay, Mom,” I said. “I will. Love you.”
“Love you too.”
My mother was not someone who you’d say wore her heart on her sleeve, but I’d thought she’d be a little more excited. Maybe she didn’t believe me? I dropped my phone in my purse and started to watch the street signs so I could figure out how to get back to my hotel.
I took a few wrong turns, but I eventually made my way back. I walked inside and was crossing the lobby to the elevators when I happened to look over to my left and see Levi, sitting there on one of the couches.
“Hey,” he said, jumping up. “Sorry to just accost you here like this.”
“How’d you even know I was staying here?”
“Daniel told me. Don’t be mad at him, though.”
I shrugged. “I’m not. I’m going up to my room, though, and you’re not.”
Levi smiled. “Fair enough. This place is a dump, though. Why don’t you come back and stay at the penthouse?”
“Why would I do something like that?”
“I don’t know, for old time’s sake? And besides, there might be something you want there.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Like what? Not you.”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” he said, holding his hands up. “Easy, girl! Who said anything about that?”
My cheeks flushed. He was infuriating because I could tell, if only I let my guard down just a little, I’d be back under his spell. It wasn’t fair that someone like him should have such a power.
I clenched my jaw and pushed past him. “I’m going up to my room,” I said. “Goodbye.”
He followed me over to the elevator and stood there while I pushed the button. “Okay,” he said. “I’m not a stalker, and I can take no for an answer. So when that elevator arrives, I won’t try to follow you on or anything. But I would like to say that should you change your mind and not want to sleep at a place that is rumored to have bedbugs, then you’re more than welcome to come back to my place. You can have your old room and everything. Let me give you my phone number.”
“That’s quite all right. And how the hell do you know this place has bedbugs?” I was starting to feel itchy just thinking about it.
“Check Yelp.”
“I don’t need to check Yelp.”
The elevator dinged just then and I moved to the side to let a few people off. Then I stepped in and turned to face Levi.
He stood there, hands in the pockets of those designer jeans, his t-shirt draping over his body in such a way to suggest a chiseled, muscular torso. He grinned as though he knew exactly what I was thinking. Three women walked passed us, and they all checked Levi out, making no attempts to hide the fact they were doing so. One of them also threw a cursory glance my way, as though she couldn’t believe someone like him would be talking to me.
I pressed the button for the tenth floor and stood there silently as the door closed. At the last second, he pulled one hand out of his pocket and gave a little wave, and then he was gone, and the elevator was being lifted upward, making my stomach do a little flip.
When the elevator opened at my floor, I stepped out, half-expecting him to be there. But he wasn’t. I hurried down the hallway toward my room, noticing the worn cranberry-colored carpet, a hairline crack in the ceiling. I slid the card into the door and it unlocked; when I stepped inside, the room smelled stale, the furniture looked shabby; it seemed exactly the sort of place that would be infested with insects of all kinds.
Why hadn’t I noticed this earlier? Why had I chosen to stay in such a dumpy place?
But I wasn’t going to let Levi start playing mind games with me. I wasn’t going to allow myself to fall back into that trap of his, though that same confusion I’d felt when we’d lived together was suddenly coursing through my veins, infiltrating my thoughts. It’d been baffling to me, as teens, how he’d be so cool and nice and fun to hang out with when it was just the two of us, yet whenever any of his friends were around, it was like he turned into a completely different person. If he wasn’t doing it outright, I’d sense that he was making fun of me, that I was walking in on some private joke, that they were all laughing at me behind their expressionless faces. Just waiting for me to go away so they could really start to make fun of me.
I found my phone and called Sophie.
“I
t’s me again. I’m sorry to keep calling you.”
“Don’t be sorry,” she said. “You just received life-changing news. That’s a big deal! I can only imagine the sorts of things that are going through your mind right now. What’s up?”
“I just ran into Levi again.”
“How is it possible you keep ‘just running into him’ in Manhattan? I mean, don’t like twenty billion people live there?”
“He came to my hotel. And then he told me it was infested with bedbugs.”
“I can see he hasn’t changed one bit.”
I paced the floor in front of the window. “You’re right,” I said. “He hasn’t. He still looks incredible. And he’s all trying to get me to go back to the penthouse, under the pretense of me wanting something, like there’s some knick-knack I might want to keep.”
“You do know why he wants you to go back there,” she said. “Right?”
“Of course I do. I could tell by the way he was looking at me. I’ve lost weight and I’m no longer the chubby, unattractive slug he used to live with. Now he’s interested.”
“Because he’s a shallow, entitled piece of shit. So good for you for not giving into that. I know he’s hot, Isla, but that doesn’t mean he should just get whatever he wants.”
“I know. Which is why I’m standing here in my bug-infested hotel room. Which I only got because I was trying not to spend too much money.”
“Well, duh! You can check into someplace else. You could stay at the Four Seasons if you wanted.”
“I don’t have access to the money yet. It’s not instantaneous.”
Sophie was quiet for a minute. “You know what you could do?” she said slowly, as if a great idea was just dawning on her. “You could actually take Levi up on his offer. Go back over to his place, start to seduce him, and then leave him high and dry. I can all but guarantee something like that has never happened to him before. Tell him he has a small dick right before you leave.”
“I’m not doing that.”
“Why not? You don’t always have to be the bigger person, Isla.”
I grimaced. “Ha, ha, no pun intended, right?”
“Okay, maybe not the right choice of phrase. But he was such an ass to you! He really was. And you’ve worked hard and you look amazing and you can now use that to get back at him. Yes, I know it sounds a little juvenile, but people like him . . . there’s never any consequences for their actions, because they think they can use their money and good looks to get out of anything.”
“Because they can.”
“Mostly, yeah. But you have a chance now to at least make him feel bad for a day. I think you should go for it. You just inherited a billion dollars! You can do anything.”
I stopped pacing and looked out the window, down at the street below where people were walking by, the tops of their heads like tiny little circles moving along the sidewalk. “Right—I can do anything, so wouldn’t it be kind of pathetic if in my moment to do anything I decide to take revenge on my former stepbrother?”
“No,” Sophie said firmly. “It wouldn’t. If anything, it’ll bring you some closure. Then you can get on with whatever it is you want to do with your newfound wealth.”
I started to pace again, and as I walked by the end of the bed, I caught sight of myself in the mirror that sat atop the dresser. I wasn’t unrecognizable from the girl I’d been at fifteen, but I did look a lot different. On the outside. On the inside, I still felt the same, and I think that was what infuriated me the most about Levi. I knew he liked me for who I was, because we got along so well when it was just the two of us, but back then, he couldn’t let his friends think that he’d be friends with someone who wasn’t physically impeccable. I was as close to physically impeccable as I would ever be, I knew this, and maybe Sophie was right. If I just left town after the funeral and never spoke to Levi again, he wouldn’t give me a second thought. Except to maybe be pissed that his father had left me a bunch of money, but he’d forget about that eventually.
No. I wanted him to remember me, I wanted him to regret that he’d been such as asshole to me in the first place.
13.
Levi
I didn’t recognize most of the faces at Dad’s funeral. The church was packed, though; there wasn’t an empty pew, and there were sounds of sniffles and even a sob or two. I was in the front row, next to Cal and his wife, Colleen. Cal got up and made a speech my father would have been proud of. When it was over, I was one of the six pallbearers, and I had no clue who three of the other guys were. The casket was heavy. It was huge, made of gleaming mahogany; it reminded me of Dad’s office, actually. The few times I’d ever stepped foot in there. It was strange and surreal to think of him inside this box, about to be put in the ground forever.
As I walked down the aisle out to the hearse, I saw Isla amongst the sea of faces. She was wearing a modest black dress, her brown hair was pulled back in a ponytail. She caught my eye and gave a little nod. The look on her face was different than it had been yesterday; her expression now was one of compassion, as though she truly felt bad for me. I held her gaze and gave her a quick nod, then looked forward again and kept walking.
Cal had the reception at his penthouse, located on the top floor of the Arthur C. Winchell building, not far from the church. I shook hands, accepted condolences, and managed to dodge any questions about just what it was I planned to do with my father’s company, now that I owned the majority of shares in it.
I could sense people watching me, and it made me uncomfortable. Not that I wasn’t used to being looked at; I knew women checked me out, I knew once people learned who my father was and how much money I had, they were always interested in hanging around, but this was different. Now I had power, too, power in a way that I didn’t before, and people wanted to see what it was I was going to do with it.
I was starting to feel like some exotic animal in a zoo exhibit or something.
When I saw Isla, I breathed a sigh of relief. She had just come in and was talking with Daniel, Dad’s lawyer. I waited a minute before I went over.
“Hey,” I said.
Daniel had already expressed his condolences, so he excused himself and left me and Isla standing there.
“I’m really sorry,” she said. “About your dad, of course, but also about yesterday, in the hotel. You were just trying to be nice.”
I smiled. “Thanks. And thanks for making the trip up here. I know I already said that, but it means a lot. Dad always liked you. You were the daughter he never had.” I paused. “Really, you were the child he never had; trust me when I say he would’ve traded me in a heartbeat, if he could have.”
“Levi.” She reached over and touched my hand, her palm cool and a little clammy against my skin. She looked uncomfortable, but then again, who could blame her, being in a room with all these people. “I know for a fact how much your father loved you, so I hope you honestly don’t believe that he would’ve traded you for anything. I guess he did think of me as a daughter, though.” She glanced around, making sure no one was too close. “He did leave me some money,” she said in a low voice. I heard her perfectly fine, but I leaned closer. “I didn’t know if you knew that or not.”
“He did the same for me,” I said.
“Well of course he would have. You’re his son.”
“You were like his daughter. He was always going on about how I could learn a thing or two about your work ethic.”
She frowned, as though this whole thing were rather perplexing. Around us, the buzz of conversation continued, people shooting looks our way. Who were these people, anyway? Friends, associates, strangers who admired my father? It suddenly felt like the whole room was closing in on me, even though we were standing under twenty-foot ceilings and the entire east side wall was made of glass.
Isla looked at me closely. “Are you all right?”
“I have to get out of here.” I grabbed her hand. “Come on.”
14.
Isla
&
nbsp; We left the reception.
Levi didn’t bother to say anything to anyone; he just grabbed my hand and we were out the door. We took the elevator down to the lobby and then we were outside, the day warm and inviting. It didn’t seem like the sort of day you would have a funeral on.
“Sorry,” he said, as we walked. “It’s just been an intense couple of days. I haven’t been sleeping well, and I think it’s all starting to catch up to me.”
He did look pale. “You’ve been through a lot,” I said. “And you know what? If you want to go back to your place, we can. It’s been so long since I was last there, I wouldn’t mind seeing it again.”
That hadn’t been what I’d been planning to say. It sounded awkward, contrived, and I thought he’d probably see right through it. But then I realized there was nothing for him to see through. He was supposed to think I wanted him; that was the whole point. Really, the more I could make him want me, the better it would be when I finally rebuked him. I reached out and looped my arm through his.
“You sure?” he asked. “You want to go there?”
I nodded. “Yeah,” I said. “I really do.”
15.
Levi
I knew she’d have a change of heart. This made me feel better as we walked back to my place, but something odd happened when we went inside. When I closed the door behind us, it really hit me that my father was dead. That might sound strange, considering I was just coming from the funeral, and I’d been one of the ones to carry his fucking casket in and out of the church, but being back here, in our home—the place I’d spent the most time with him, even if he was in his office and I was in my room—that really drove the point home that Dad was gone and I was never going to see or talk to him again.
I was vaguely aware of Isla next to me, gazing around the place, taking it all back in. She and her mom had lived here for almost five years. The décor hadn’t changed much, and I knew it was probably a bit of a mind fuck for her to be back here. I walked through the foyer and into the library, where my dad kept his good, single-malt scotch in an antique bird’s eye maple cabinet. I grabbed the first bottle my fingers touched, opened it, and took a big swig. I hated alcohol and rarely drank it, but the burning taste seemed appropriate. I didn’t have an aficionado’s appreciation for such things, but right now, I could admire the burning sensation all the way down my esophagus. My eyes watered and my tongue felt like it was trying to detach itself from my body and run as far away as it possibly could. I took another swig and brought the bottle with me when I went back out to find Isla.