by John Oakes
"You're sure he knew about those naked massages? Are you sure she was...you know, copulating with her clients?"
Cody nodded gravely.
"Oh my word," Kelly said in a lilting twang.
Cody laughed.
"Why don't you talk like a Texan more often? It's cute. You too good to throw out a y'all now and then?"
"What can I say? I'm a city girl. And I'll have you know that when I go elsewhere in the country, I'm told I have an accent. You just can't hear it. Speaking of which, you're a city boy! Rich boy too! Why do you talk like you belong in a bass tournament on TV?"
"Well gee miss Kelly," Cody pulled his mouth to one side and stuck his top teeth out like a hillbilly, "I don't talk that funny."
"You don't talk like a total hillbilly, but you aren't ever gonna read the news unless you work on your Midwestern diction."
"I dunno. Maybe it was hanging around Ricky and Grampa all summer and on weekends, and with TR when I was at school."
They walked in silence for a moment and Kelly took in her surroundings.
"This place...it's gorgeous," she said with wonder.
They continued down the soft path of earth and bark that meandered about the trees, arranged in subtle, beautiful formations.
Cody nodded somberly.
"It was my mom's favorite place. She made it."
"Your mother? Not the gardener guy?"
"Raul helped, and he of course did the heavy lifting with a crew. But my mom came up with the notion, picked out the trees, arranged them, all that."
"Are all these trees from around here?"
"Oh no. I think they came from all over the world. She made sure to pick ones that would thrive here."
"Was she a botanist or something?"
"No. Just good at whatever she put her mind to. Her job was kind of what you want to do. She spent all her time helping people that were hard up. Her charity work and such."
"How old is this place?"
"Oh...I'd say about 21, 22 years old?"
"And how old were you...when she passed?" Kelly's voice was velvety soft.
"I was 17."
"I'm so sorry, Cody."
He nodded.
A heavy silence grew, until Kelly spoke again hesitantly.
"Your grandfather, he seemed to have a very high regard for her. He talked a lot about your family. No one, not even your grandmother seemed as high in his esteem." Then she caught herself, "I mean, it's not my place, I just..."
Cody put a hand on her arm. "No, no. Kelly, you're right, more right than you know."
Cody put his hands in his pockets. He tried to breathe. He wanted to try to talk about her. He wanted to share with Kelly.
"I was too lost in myself to see just how much it impacted him, too. But it did. But Grampa was too vibrant a man to let it overtake him. He didn't let it change him, not like my dad or me."
Kelly hooked an arm through his as they walked along. The gesture was comforting, intimate in a simple, human way.
"Your father...he was different?"
"He was. I remember him getting angry often, when I was real little. And he and Grampa would fight whenever they were around each other. But early on that all stopped. Grampa and my dad had always been oil and water. But my mother, when she came into the picture, she worked her magic on those two until they even became amicable and maybe even sort of close. She convinced my grampa to sell most of his shares in the company and give it over to my dad, which I guess everyone in a hundred miles could see was the solution but them two. She had a way of making different people see things the same. She was a real classy lady. I never heard her speak a word in anger once, never raised her voice, except to laugh out loud."
"It's hard I suppose not to worship someone like that, especially if they were your mother," Kelly said.
"Worship?" Cody asked aloud. It seemed like a sarcastic way of putting it at first, but that was more or less the truth.
"All sons love their mothers, but maybe I did worship her. And I did so in the company of other believers. She was what made us all tick. She was the bedrock of all our lives, Grampa, Dad, me, the charities she worked with. And without her...well, you can see, we're a shell of a family."
"Bruce said that 1500 people showed up to her memorial service."
Cody nodded.
Kelly put her other hand on his arm and looked up at him. "I am so sorry that happened to you."
Cody looked down at her, and felt her embrace. She was only hugging his forearm, but he'd take it.
"My senior year, right after she died, I saw less and less of my Dad. At first he tried, but then he started calling from such n' such a state or country about why he couldn't be there. And then he wasn't there for thanksgiving or Christmas anymore either. TR and I got closer in a different way then. He'd lost his dad when we were 12. Up 'til mom died, we'd been friends mostly because we got picked on at school together. And misery loves company."
"TR is the big one? No sleeves?"
"That's him."
"He went to school with you? I would have figured you went to some swanky private school."
"Oh I did and it was hell. My dad sent TR there with me in 7th grade after his dad passed. TR's dad was my dad's mechanic. But I think they were real good friends, maybe best friends."
"It doesn't look like private school rubbed off on TR much."
"Hell no, it did not. TR is TR. The mountains will crumble to dust and the oceans dry up before he changes."
"So you and your father never reconnected?"
"I remember when I knew something was forever different, when I got accepted to Cornell, but chose Brown State, where Grampa had gone. He flipped out. He told me I was going to Cornell and that was that. I'd never seen him that angry, not by half. And it just didn't make sense. It was as if me going to Cornell was gonna bring her back to life."
"You got into Cornell? Wait a sec."
"What? I was a legacy, and my dad was rich. Don't act so surprised. But thanks for reminding me what a genius you think I am."
He gave her a coy smile to show his hurt was feigned.
"I just never took you for the bookish type."
"Well, I like reading books, just not school books. I did ok at school though, mostly because my mom kept me on track, just not Cornell good."
"What are things like between you and your father now?"
"They aren't. He more or less stopped calling me two or three years ago. He came by for Christmas last year. I ain't seen him here at the house in over a year. We haven't said one word about Grampa dying. I think he stays in Houston most of the time. But if he has a real place there, I ain't seen it. Hell, last time he called me it was just to leave me a voicemail that I was an embarrassment to the family, after that reporter blabbed all that filth and ruined the Alamo bowl for us."
"Has any of that changed since you started the resort?"
"Like I said, I haven't talked to the guy. If anything's changed, he hasn't told me. But I doubt it has. Last I heard from Anita, the housekeeper, he was back and forth to China a lot, working on some big deal."
They walked arm in arm for a little while until Cody thought to be polite and ask about her family. Kelly explained that her dad was a big shot lawyer and justice, like she had mentioned before, and her mom was a "professional busybody and salon attendee."
"Why don't you work at your Dad's old firm?"
"I guess I thought it would impress him more if I made it on my own. But I don't know if that will ever happen...the impressing part. He loves me, I know that, but...I got into Rice and then Harvard Law. Then it was questions about what firm I was gonna intern for in Boston. Then it was questions about which prestigious firm I was going to sign with. It's like I'll become Chief Justice of the Supreme Court some day and he'll...he'll—
"He'll wanna know when you're gonna become a judge on American Idol."
Kelly laughed and leaned into him. "Yeah, something like that."
"So if it'll n
ever be enough, and you don't like this job, why do you keep doing it? Lawyering?"
"Oh, I like law, I do. I just...maybe I read too many John Grisham novels, but I wanted to fight for justice...not what I do now." She looked up at Cody plaintively. "Does that sound horribly naïve to you?"
"Naïve? To me?" Cody looked off and shook his head. "Gosh no. I don't know much about justice, but I figure we need a bit more of it. The world is never gonna be fully right, but we can always do with more goodness."
It was one of Cody's few philosophical positions and tentative as it was, it seemed to have the desired effect of making him seem more thoughtful than he really was. Kelly looked at him, sort of squinting as if she were suspicious, or maybe looking too close at the sun.
"You're a deep pool, you know that?" Kelly asked earnestly. "You have an awfully long shallow end, but it's there."
She opened her mouth to continue but stopped and turned her head forward. Cody wanted to pull his arm from hers and put it around her, but he was afraid of scaring her off. It killed him to be getting such a strong feeling that she wanted him to hold her close, but that she would flee if he did.
"Why do you keep working at your firm then? Why not leave and do more what you wanna do?"
"Oh and leave the fun of inheritance law? How could I stand it?" she joked. "It's complicated. There are some things I have to see through."
"Like what?"
Kelly didn't answer at first. Then, as if he hadn't asked the question, she turned, let his arm go and looked up at him. "So what are you going to do about this Tagg guy?"
Cody sighed deeply. "I think the business is over in a way. The beginning of the end at least. I could duke it out with him, and he would keep finding ways to outsmart me."
"Don't say that, you—
"Listen, it's ok. I'm not being a sad sack, I promise. I'm just new to business. Why wouldn't he beat me at the game he's been studying for a decade? I thought having 51% of the company under my control would be enough to basically have my way with it." Cody laughed and leaned in dramatically.
"So, don't talk to me about naïve." He shook his head in resignation.
"Nah, it's over. Plus, Jason says that, even with our profitability, we aren't on track to win Grampa's challenge. So, he thinks we should bail, take the money and try to do something bold in the three months or more we have left."
"Well, you do bold pretty well. I wouldn't be surprised if you thought up something."
It was Cody's turn to look at her skeptically.
"What?" she said. "Maybe I don't have to be such a spoil sport all the time."
As much as he liked Kelly, she kept finding ways to make him like her more. It was awful.
"I wish that was the only problem. I can't help but think of all the folks I might hurt by letting Tagg take Midget Island 3000."
"Do you really call it that?"
"Yeah."
"Isn't that kind of offensive?"
Cody thought about how Winton would answer that.
"It's not offensive to the people that matter. Everyone else can eat a bag of di—
Cody stopped himself. "I mean, everyone else can go...fly a kite."
They rounded the last turn, and far ahead, Cody could see the green grass at the end of the walking path.
"All your worry here...this isn't really a legal question, is it?" Kelly asked.
Cody stopped, ran a hand through his hair and then pressed the heel of his hand against his eye.
"This is really tearing you up," she said.
Kelly turned toward Cody. She pushed her hair back behind her ear with her free hand.
She took Cody's left hand in hers and looked up at him. "You poor thing."
If she was trying to make him not kiss her, she was doing a terrible job of it. He opened his eyes and leaned in, slowly diving like a Kamikaze pilot to his nearly assured destruction. His free hand found the nape of her neck, and his lips paused a centimeter from hers.
She fell forward into him.
Their lips met in an electric grip for one perfect moment of astounding relief, like getting to breathe after a long dive. Then another moment passed, and another, and just when he thought she was pulling away, she pressed back into him, exhaling heavily through her nose.
Then it was over. Kelly was turning and running her hands through her soft blonde hair, looking like she had just killed someone and was thinking of how to dispose of the body.
He was too overwhelmed to try and make sense of her odd reaction. She had kissed him back. He'd felt something from her. For just an instant she was his. It was enough to send joy through him, enough that it could have spilled over into laughter. Like those criminals in the movies who just laugh when the cops finally catch them, he was most assuredly dead in the water, but felt a reckless abandon about it.
As they walked back in silence, Cody had the urge to apologize but resisted. He wasn't sorry. He felt a hundred feet tall. He didn't try to talk to her as they crossed the lawn and passed through a space in the forty-foot-high spruce shrubs. He shot a couple of sidelong glances at her, but didn't stare long enough to read her expression.
When they got to her car, Kelly turned to him after she opened her car door. Her eyes darted around the gravel, and she stepped one foot inside. Then, without saying anything, she lurched into the seat, started the car, reverse turned, and sped off.
Chapter Forty
The Broken Bathroom
"We're happy that you've seen sense in this," Tagg said after shaking Cody's hand. Tagg had arrived early and so welcomed Cody into his own office. Winton was already seated in Cody's chair across the cherry wood desk, and on the couch, across the room from Winton, was a man in a fine silvery suit. He stood with Tagg to greet Cody. He was tall and handsome with broad, shallow cheekbones and a fine, straight nose. His skin was a perfect bronze tone.
"Hello, Mr. Latour. It is a pleasure to meet you." He spoke in a resonant Japanese accent.
They shook hands.
"Cody, this here is Tanaka," Tagg said.
"Tanaka?" Cody asked. "Japanese?"
"I am Japanese, yes."
"Have we met before?"
"No, we have not. A pity. My business takes me far from Houston much of the time."
"Well, nice to meet you."
Cody motioned for them to sit on the couch and Jason pulled up chairs for him and Cody.
If Cody did get his Grampa's millions, he would buy some ridiculously fancy suit and wear it to some fancy bar, just one time, just once to look as dashing as Tagg and Tanaka looked on that couch – like something out of a James Bond movie. They looked like they should be selling watches in a magazine ad.
"Please, here is our contract. You may begin your inspection of it, before your lawyer arrives." Tanaka handed the long, legal-sized pages to Cody.
"Oh, our lawyer will be along in a minute."
Cody tried to analyze the overwrought wording, but it was no use.
Kevin appeared at the door in a small suit that was perfectly tailored to his frame. Behind him stood another black man in a suit, but who was so large, he filled the doorframe. Kevin made the introductions.
"Oh my God!" Winton said when the huge man bent to shake Winton's hand. "Murray Childers? Kevin is this your brother? As in first team all-American defensive end, Murray Childers?"
Murray laughed, and stood up straight. "That was a long time ago, man. Now it's counselor Childers." Kevin had said he was bringing them a highly competent lawyer, but failed to mention it was his brother.
"Well, hot damn. Pleased to meet you," Winton said with a boyish grin.
Cody didn't enjoy sitting with Tagg in the same room, so he excused himself while Kevin and Murray, professional brothers apparently, examined the contract.
"How you doing?" a voice said from behind him, in the hallway.
Cody turned to face Winton, limping down the hallway after him.
"Not great. I feel like I should be asking you the same
thing."
"I've been better," Winton admitted. He shrugged diplomatically. "But I land on my feet."
A pained expression washed over Cody's face. "I couldn't think of a better way, Winton. This guy, he can run circles around me...any of us."
Winton just nodded mournfully. "No good thing lasts forever, right?" He asked trying to sound upbeat. Cody knew Winton well enough now to see sadness in his eyes, despite his stoicism. "I guess I was just hoping this place would be the exception...to that rule and so many others."
"Me too, man," Cody said. "More than you'll ever know."
Cody moved off, unable to look Winton in the eye anymore.
All last evening, Cody had wrestled with the decision. There was no good option. He had to pick the least bad option. What was more likely, he'd asked himself. That he could turn a few hundred thousand dollars into a million in time to win Grampa's challenge? Or that he could keep Midget Island 3000 and keep it pure, away from Tagg's clutches? The second option seemed less likely to happen and nearly assured he would fail his Grampa's challenge to boot. The Island was profitable, but not enough to win by November. And then Monica would get all that money.
Cody stepped into the bathroom. He relieved himself, and then stood at the sink washing his hands for far too long. He scrubbed his hands together again, rinsed them and then added more soap. He went for the soap a fourth time when he realized his chest was feeling tight and he wasn't breathing normally.
He tried to relax, breathing slow, intentional breaths.
He washed the soap off of his trembling hands and ran them wet through his hair. He leaned forward on the sink and hung his damp head over it. Cody raised his head slowly and looked at his face in the mirror.
He didn't like what he saw.
It was a different Cody than he had known in recent months. Same brown hair, brown eyes, same cheekbones, same straight nose, same ears, but different, weary, drawn. He felt ill and tried to breathe.
He looked back and saw in that face what sickened him.
"I'm not going back," he said to convince the mirror. "That isn't what this is. This is smart. This is just...business."