Estate Affair

by Sara Orwig

  “I’d just as soon she hadn’t mentioned Eli Ashton to anyone. If word of this gets back to Lilah, you know there’ll be trouble.”

  “Not too much to my way of thinking. You and your mom are too capable for Lilah to rock your boat very much. Besides, I don’t think she’ll care if Eli Ashton wants to take one of the maids to dinner. What are you wearing?”

  “I have no idea,” Lara replied.

  “At lunch let me come help you pick out something.”

  “Franci, tonight isn’t special. Eli isn’t special,” she said, but her words had a hollow ring. “I can’t afford to have him in my life, and I know that he doesn’t want to be in my life for any lasting period of time.”

  “You don’t know that. I think he’s interested in you.”

  “Temporarily, he is. I shouldn’t have agreed to go out with him. He takes charge too much to suit me.”

  “You just don’t like losing control.”

  “I guess I don’t,” Lara admitted. “He surely doesn’t want to lose it, either.”

  “Sounds to me as if he rings your bell,” Franci said smugly, and Lara frowned.

  “No. He’s arrogant and controlling and strong willed—”

  “Ms. Kettle, are you calling the pot black?” Franci interrupted. “Admit it. You gave in because you like the guy and fireworks go off when you’re around him.”

  “Sort of. He’s tough and determined. I think his abrasiveness and control go back to Spencer’s treatment of him and his family.”

  “We all knew Spencer and what a jerk he was,” Franci declared, picking up the silver tray to carry it to the sink to wash off the polish. As water poured over the tray, Lara’s thoughts were still on Eli.

  Why hadn’t she been able to stick with her refusal to go out with him? She suspected there wasn’t a simple reason. On a sexual level she responded totally to him. This morning, she had seen yet another facet of Eli—his hurt and his rage toward Spencer. Deep down, a part of her wanted to save him from his rancor and disillusionment. “Yeah, right,” she said aloud to herself. As if Eli Ashton needed saving from anything—or would let anyone else do so.

  When she and Franci were ready to return the polished silver pieces to the dining room, Franci headed toward the door. “It’s time for our lunch break. Let’s go up and pick out something for you to wear tonight. I want you to be a knockout.”

  “You don’t even know him.”

  “I know he’s what you need. Don’t tell me you didn’t enjoy being with him.”

  Lara inhaled, remembering the magical night with Eli. He carried her out of her drab routine into excitement that was difficult to resist. Giving a slight shake to her head, she clamped her lips together and pushed open the kitchen door, waiting for Franci to follow.

  “I don’t want a man intruding in my life. I’ve been there and done that, and I don’t want to go through it again. Not now, anyway.”

  “Go out and enjoy yourself.”

  “Oh, Franci, you’re a hopeless romantic! Let me introduce you to him.”

  “He would not react the same to me. From what you’ve told me, I think there’s something special between the two of you.”

  “No, there’s not. Like I said, you’re a hopeless romantic.”

  “Well, whatever I am, let’s put up this silver and go look in your closet. I want to help you pick out something.” Franci persisted.

  Lara thought about Eli on the way upstairs to her room. She thought about his kisses and how his fingers had lightly caressed her throat. She had returned his passion equally with her own, something she hadn’t intended to do.

  She needed to be firm with him tonight. Tonight might not be the last time he wanted to see her. As quickly as that thought came, she rejected it. She couldn’t imagine a man like Eli Ashton pursuing her. Not beyond tonight. She’d hurt his pride by walking out on him the other night and now he probably wanted to do his own walking. Whatever his reasons, she was going to spend another evening with Eli Ashton—her pulse raced at the thought.

  Excitement over finding Lara and anticipation of spending the evening with her drummed through Eli’s body. But as he approached The Vines, the reading of the will replayed in his mind. With every mile the car covered, Eli’s fury increased until he was in a blistering rage by the time he turned into the drive at The Vines and headed straight for the offices. Following a lifetime habit, his first inclination was to talk to his brother.

  Eli slammed the car door and stormed through the tasting room where Jillian was talking to a group of tourists, explaining points about wine to them. He shot her a glance and she blinked, momentarily faltering but then catching herself and continuing.

  Boiling inside, Eli strode to the stairs and took them two at time. In long steps he reached Cole’s office and barged inside.

  In a gray knit shirt, Cole sat behind his tidy desk, the one messy spot in a ruthlessly neat room. He took one look at Eli and shut off his computer.

  “So what did the bastard do—cut us off without a cent?”

  “No. He managed to make it a helluva lot more insulting than that.” Unable to sit down, Eli paced the office. As he walked he yanked off his coat to fling it on a chair. Then he tore off his tie, balling it up and giving it a toss.

  “So tell me already.”

  “He left one dollar to Mom and a dollar to each of us.”

  Cole’s face tightened. “I shouldn’t be surprised, but…hell.” He looked away. His fingers thrummed once, twice, on the arm of the chair, then clenched into a fist. “When have we ever been able to count on him for anything? That’s a rhetorical question,” he added, shoving his chair back and standing. “Don’t strain your brain trying to come up with an answer. So did he leave everything to Lilah?”

  “No. His shares of Ashton-Lattimer Corporation went to Walker Ashton.”

  “Damn,” Cole said as he rubbed the back of his head. “At the moment the stock isn’t worth all that much. That stock’s been shaky ever since the story broke about Spencer’s first marriage and baby Jack.”

  “The stock will come back,” Eli said, raking his fingers through his hair. “Twenty-thousand went to Charlotte Ashton.”

  “Considering the size of the estate, that’s not much. Guess he didn’t care for Charlotte.”

  “She probably has too much Sioux blood for him,” Eli said, grinding out the words.

  “And the rest of the estate?”

  “The land, vineyards, winery, house and money were split between Lilah and the three children.”

  “His ‘keeper’ family. Well, I’m not surprised by that. I’m surprised by the rest.”

  “Walker’s his golden-haired boy. When it was over, Walker told me I shouldn’t have come, and Trace Ashton threatened to throw me out of the place.”

  “Did you hit anyone?” Cole asked, interested.

  “I was on my best behavior. One more remark out of Trace, though, and I would have punched him. And I have to tell you, I was hoping he’d make one more remark.”

  Cole snorted. “I’m glad he didn’t. This isn’t the time to go punching people, with the cops looking for a murderer.”

  “I have an ironclad alibi, remember? I was working all night, and Randy from the bottling room was with me. Trace better leave me alone.”

  Cole shrugged. “He won’t come looking for you, and you don’t have any reason to go back to the estate.”

  “Lilah Ashton ran Mercedes and Jillian out of there, just like she tossed Anna and the baby out when they went to meet the family. Spencer and Lilah wouldn’t have anything to do with Grant. Those damn people—“ Eli spun around to place his hands on his hips and face his brother. “Cole, I’m calling our lawyer. We’re going to try to break the will.”

  “Why?”

  Eli glared at him. “What the hell do you mean, why? Do you want to let that son of a bitch get away with this?”

  “I don’t want or need a damned thing of his,” Cole said, his voice low and intense.
“We’ve done fine without him and his money. We can go right on doing fine. Go stick your hot head under some cold water. You aren’t thinking straight.”

  “Like hell I’m not,” Eli snapped. “It’s not like the press will leave us alone if we don’t sue. We’re involved in Spencer’s scandalous life no matter what we do. I let the rest of you talk me out of trying to get back Mom’s heritage when we found out that Spencer committed bigamy. His marriage to Mom wasn’t legal, so to my way of thinking, Spencer couldn’t inherit all of grandfather’s estate.”

  Cole’s lips twisted. “You know what that makes us. Mom doesn’t want to stir up more scandal.”

  “We can weather it. Now this damn will—we’re going to contest it because we’re Spencer’s family. As much as I hate it, we have his blood in our veins.”

  Cole studied him out of narrowed eyes. “We’d better discuss this as a family. If you go through with this, Mom, Dad, our sisters, all of us will be affected.”

  “Why don’t we ask Grant and Anna and our in-laws over to talk things out, too?” Eli snapped with dripping sarcasm, clenching his fists and facing Cole, his irritation radiating toward his stubborn brother. “Or maybe you’d like to put it all on a spreadsheet first. Examine the bottom line.”

  “Considering outcomes is the adult way to deal with things,” Cole said coldly. “I’m going to call them. Dixie, too. And Seth. They’ve got a stake in this.”

  “All right, dammit, ask them to be here.” Eli raked his fingers through his hair again and let out his breath, knowing Cole with his practical way of thinking was probably right. “Let’s get the family together to discuss it.”

  Cole looked at his watch. “Jillian is educating a group of tourists about wine. Mercedes is probably in her office, and Mom and Dad are at the house. I’ll get them together, but give me some time to let Jillian finish what she’s doing.”

  “Shannon can take over for her.”

  “I’ll see,” Cole said, picking up the phone. Eli strode to the window and tuned out his brother while in his mind’s eye he saw the Ashton Estate vineyards. “Damn Spencer,” he said under his breath.

  Cole made two more calls and then turned to Eli. “All right, we’re meeting at the house in the library thirty minutes from now. Jillian will be through then and the whole family will be present except Seth. That ought to suit you.”

  “You don’t agree with me, do you?”

  Cole rubbed his neck again. “I just want to give it thought before we fly off the handle and do something we’ll regret down the road. I agree with Mom—we don’t need this fight. We have a great life with Louret Vineyards now.”

  “We’d let Spencer trample us again. His damned will sets my blood boiling. I don’t see what we have to lose.”

  “I can’t see what we’d gain. I don’t think we can break the will.”

  “That’s for our lawyer and the courts to decide. And we can tie things up for a damn long time.”

  “You don’t want to do that,” Cole said. “Trace and Walker may have infuriated you, but they couldn’t help what Spencer did any more than we could. And Paige and Megan Ashton—they haven’t done a thing to hurt us.”

  “Oh, hell. Then I guess it boils down to my wrath toward Spencer. All right, I’ll be in the library in thirty minutes.”

  “Bring a cooler head with you,” Cole called after him as Eli swept up his coat and tie and left.

  Thirty minutes later Eli’s rage hadn’t abated. He couldn’t stand still so he paced the library, looking around at his family. Lucas, in jeans and a navy knit shirt, was sitting protectively beside Caroline on the sofa. Jillian and Mercedes sat with their heads together while Mercedes talked about a marketing strategy for Louret. Both sisters had light-brown hair—Mercedes’s was curly and Jillian’s wavy. Eli could see family resemblances in them, but he suspected it was only because he knew them so well.

  Cole strode into the room and closed the door behind him. Dixie sat in a wing chair, and her eyes sparkled when her husband entered the room. Eli saw the look that passed between the two and for a moment forgot the will while envy stabbed him. Since his marriage, Cole seemed happier, more relaxed, a lot less the uptight, all-business brother he had been before Dixie had come into the family.

  Eli liked both of his new in-laws, and he was glad for the happiness his brother and sister had found, but it was difficult to keep from being resentful because of his own disappointments.

  “Sorry, I had a phone call, but I’m only—” Cole glanced at his watch “—four minutes late. Jillian, any chance Seth could get away and be here?”

  Jillian looked up. “No. He’d like to, but he had an appointment he had to keep. He said to go on without him.”

  “We can wait until tonight,” Cole offered, but she shook her head.

  “No, there are enough of us to make a decision. Eli told us about the will,” she said.

  Eli faced his family. “You know what’s in Spencer’s will. What I want now is an agreement from the family to call Ridley Pollard and get him to look into contesting the will. And when we know what our legal options are, we can meet again to decide if we want to proceed or not. I still think we should have him look into whether or not Spencer could inherit from our grandfather when Spencer had committed bigamy. Sorry, Mom, but that’s the truth.”

  “I know it is, Eli. I just want all of you to remember I had no knowledge of Spencer having a wife.”

  “We all know that, Mom,” Eli said as the others added their reassurances. Jillian frowned at him, and he knew she didn’t want their mom upset.

  “First things first,” Eli said. “If our lawyer says it’s feasible to contest Spencer’s will and that legally we have just cause, I want him to pursue the matter.”

  “I think we should hold off,” Cole remarked, leaning forward and placing his elbows on his knees. “Mom doesn’t want to fight the will. We all have a great life here at Louret. Besides, I don’t think it will benefit us to contest the will. When Spencer made his will, he had a perfectly sound mind. He cut himself off from us years ago. Why should he have left us anything?”

  “Because it was ours to begin with,” Eli said. “And because he was our blood father.”

  “None of that meant a thing to him,” Cole stated. “What do the rest of you think? Mom, let’s hear from you.”

  Caroline glanced at Lucas and then looked at each of her children, her gaze returning to Eli. “I willingly gave up my father’s inheritance years ago for my children. Thanks to all of you, Louret is successful beyond anything I could have imagined. Why stir up more anguish and turmoil? It would be a bitter, hateful battle and I would dread it,” she said, worry clouding her hazel-green eyes.

  “Dad?” Cole asked.

  Lucas rubbed his jaw and was silent a moment as if he were still thinking about what to do. He turned his blue-eyed gaze on Eli. “I personally don’t think you’ll get anywhere if you do contest it,” Lucas said. “I also think we all should give a lot of consideration to what your mother wants.”

  “Jillie,” Cole said. “What do you think?”

  “I don’t think we should try to break the will. It’ll just create more ill will between the families—”

  “So who’s going to care if it does?” Eli snapped.

  “When Mercedes and I called on Paige and Megan, they were friendly. It was only Lilah Ashton who wasn’t. I don’t see any point continuing a feud that was Spencer’s doing,” Jillian argued.

  “Dixie?” Cole asked his wife, and she shrugged.

  “I’m too new to the family.”

  “You can have an opinion,” Cole said. “This affects you as much as it will me.”

  “Sorry, Eli, but if it were left up to me, I’d leave it alone,” Dixie said and Eli nodded. He liked Cole’s wife and respected her opinion whether it agreed with his or not.

  “I see Eli’s side, but I see the other side, too,” Mercedes said.

  “I’m definitely in the minority,” Eli
admitted and raked his fingers through his hair.

  “Eli, let’s all think about it,” Caroline suggested. “For another couple of weeks we’ll consider talking to Ridley Pollard and the possibilities if we contest the will. We can get together again. That way there won’t be a hasty decision to go ahead or to drop it.

  “Can Cole at least ask Ridley whether we legally would stand any chance if we contest it?”

  “Let’s wait a couple of weeks,” Cole replied before Caroline could answer.

  Eli glared at his brother. “Spencer committed bigamy. Our grandfather’s will referred to Spencer as ‘my son-in-law’ and Spencer was not our grandfather’s son-in-law. This could mean we could legally contest the will and possibly revert Ashton Estate and Spencer’s Ashton-Lattimer Corporation shares of stock back to Mom. You can’t just walk away from all of Grandfather’s holdings without giving it a lot of serious thought.”

  “We can if that’s what makes Mom happy!” Cole snapped.

  “Cole, Eli,” Caroline said in a calm voice. “We’ll think about it, but I don’t want to pursue a course based on revenge,” she said, looking at Eli, and he knew she was directing her remarks to him now.

  He clamped his jaw closed and nodded. “All right,” he said. “Just think about it.”

  “And that concludes our discussion,” Lucas said, standing and offering his hand to Caroline. “Mom and I need to adjourn. We’re having a party tomorrow night, and your mother says there’s a lot to do to get ready.”

  “I want to get back to the office. I have a phone appointment in twenty minutes,” Cole said, taking Dixie’s hand while Eli merely nodded. He sat with his long legs stretched out in front of him, his arms crossed over his middle while he thought about the will.

  As they left the room, Jillian caught up with Caroline. “I can help you get ready for the party,” she said.

  “I’ve got just the job for you,” Caroline said, and their voices faded as they left the room and walked down the hall.

  “Stop brooding over Spencer’s will,” Mercedes told Eli. “Besides, I have special news.”