Rancher Daddy: A Single Dad & Nanny Romance

by Lexi Whitlow

  She slips the hefty piece of metal onto her wrist. It’s a looser, more feminine, fluid fit on her arm. Mine is perfect, snug at the wrist, un-moving.

  Now we both have something to remind us.

  Chapter 25. Chloe

  * * *

  I hate good-byes. I hate standing on the curb, watching my hope pile his bags in the back of a car, preparing to leave me. Again. I watched my father do this so many times. The last time he did it, was the last time I ever saw him.

  The cab is waiting. Max, the doorman is watching. A chilly wind has blown in from the north, crushing the balmy temperatures from just a few days ago.

  Hayes walks up, circling his arms around me, drawing me close.

  “I’ll be back in a few months,” he says. “Between now and then, we have phones, text, and email. I want to know how everything is going. I want to hear about all of it.”

  I’m not going to cry. I bite my lip allowing a small pain to distract me from the big ache in my heart.

  “I love you, Angel,” he says, his hand on my head, smoothing my hair absently. “Don’t you forget that.”

  “Then come back to me,” I whisper into his chest, fighting tears with everything I have.

  A few moments later, after a last kiss, I watch him drive away. He turns back in his seat, pressing his hand against the glass, watching me. A block down, the cab turns a corner and just like that, he’s gone. I’m alone again.

  Alone.

  “Miss Harvey, are you ready?”

  Taylor is beside me, bundled up in black leather gloves and a long wool overcoat. Hayes arranged for him to take me back to my apartment. He’s been waiting, too.

  “Yeah,” I reply, the cold wind biting my neck. “Let’s go.”

  Just as Hayes predicted, the first indication of my rise in social stock value comes in mid-January when Art F City, the most popular art blog in town, posts this on the Thursday morning before the 21 Under 21 opening reception at the Mary Boon Gallery.

  “The relentlessly unapologetic Mary Boon, purveyor of fresh meat, is serving up raw delicacies at her ‘21 Under 21’ show in Chelsea, opening Friday. We got a preview, and while 20 or so of these fresh young aspirants leave us wishing for a fiery rotisserie, one tender youngster has whet our appetite for more than just a taste. Chloe Harvey’s meticulously prepared letterpress and lithography – writ large – will require more than a few contemplative hours of study. Her ideas are dark, soul-crushing, and sadly, a pin-point accurate assessment of life in the 21st century. Luckily, she renders the darkness with such careful craft and beautiful composition, you may actually suspect a subtext of sarcasm. Is she playing with us? Time will tell. We predict Harvey has more to say than this limited exhibition offers. The good news is that Harvey’s debut solo is scheduled for April. Stay tuned, we plan to follow her.”

  A day after that’s published, a cultural scene reporter from The Times Online calls me, asking for an interview. I tell him I’m at work and will have to call him back, then I call Mary.

  “I’ll handle it,” she says. “I’ve already taken four calls about you this morning. We’re going to need to set aside some time to talk to the press. I’ll put it all together. Just relax, and if you get any more calls, refer them to me.”

  Okay. I can do that.

  I text Hayes with the mention from Art F City. He replies with balloons and fireworks, then texts,

  “Don’t let it go to your head.”

  The 21 Under 21 opening reception is buzzing, overwhelming, and more than heady. Never in my life have I had so many strangers vying for my attention. More photographs are taken of me than have been taken since my birth. Toward the end of the night, when the crowd has thinned and a few of the less popular artists have already departed, Mary sidles up beside me while a critic from the Village Voice is bending my ear about the lack of craftsmanship in contemporary art.

  She leans in. “Two of your pieces sold tonight. You’re a hit. Welcome to the big-time kid. We’re going to do wonderful things together.”

  She squeezes my hand and then she adds, “Guy would be thrilled, so proud of you.”

  That statement almost makes my knees fail me. My breath catches in my chest.

  Would he be proud? Is this what he wanted?

  I look up to the man from the Village Voice. He’s still droning on.

  “I totally agree with you,” he says. “I was trained from the bottom up, attention to detail, classical instruction. No computers for shortcuts.”

  I give him a big smile while lifting my phone from my hip pocket. “Excuse me, I have a call I need to take.”

  I walk away at pace, headed toward the back of the gallery, trying to catch my breath. I’m overwhelmed, saturated, and ready to crumble. I try to breathe, centering myself, trying to focus.

  I need to go home.

  It takes almost an hour to extract myself from the late hangers-on, making apologies to the club-denizens who want me to go with them and shut down the city. Finally, I pile into a Lyft and am deposited at my building door. I kick off my boots, climbing the flights in bare feet.

  I peel out of my clothes, pulling on an oversized t-shirt, and then I dial Hayes. I promised him I’d call when I got home from the reception. He insisted, no matter how late.

  “You home?” he asks.

  “Yeah,” I breath into the phone. “And worn out, talked out, used up. I need to develop callouses for that routine. That shit was soul sucking.”

  “It is,” he agrees. “What you need is to climb into bed and sleep, and spend tomorrow being good to yourself instead of working. Go walk around the park or something. Buy some good food and make yourself a decent meal.”

  Those are all lovely ideas, but not something I’m going to do just for myself.

  “What was your week like?” I ask him.

  A long, empty pause hangs on the other end of the line before he responds.

  “It’s rough,” he admits. “I’m not going to lie to you. My boss is a psycho. The schedule is brutal. The town is pedestrian and provincial. I’m a fish out of water, caught on a hook.”

  “You can just come home,” I say weakly into the phone, knowing it’s not that simple.

  “Yeah, I really can’t” Hayes says. “There’s this whole contract thing I signed. They own me.”

  I know he’s right, but I loathe it. I also know this is how it’s going to be forever.

  “We’ll figure it out,” Hayes says. “Get some sleep. We’ll talk tomorrow.”

  But we don’t talk tomorrow. I call him, but the call goes to voicemail. When he finally returns it, Saturday night, I’m at work in the bowels of The Foundry. If it even rings, I don’t hear it.

  Such is our long-distance relationship. Hit or miss and lots of frustration between connections.

  On Monday morning Mary calls. She’s arranged some interviews with the press and prominent bloggers, and I need to come play.

  Mary Boon, to her credit, knows what she’s doing.

  “They’re going to ask you about Guy,” Mary says, “and how much of an influence he was on you. You don’t have a problem with that, do you?”

  Of course not.

  Because of Mary’s intervention, the interviews go painlessly. I’m happy to talk about my work and my background. I’m even happy to talk about my famous father, admitting that I only knew him generally, and missed a great deal by not having him in my early life.

  “Your parents split up when you were young?” the reporter from The Village Voice asks. “You mother is Tess Burgwyn, the model?”

  I nod. “That’s right.”

  “How does Tess feel about you following in Guy’s footsteps?” he poses innocently enough.

  “You’d have to ask her,” I say, leaving it at that, wondering what he’s about.

  Later, after he’s gone, Mary tells me, “He may call Tess. You should head it off, update her on everything you have going on. Asking her to mind her p’s and q’s.”

 
Seriously?

  “Mary, my mother does exactly what I don’t want her to do, just for spite. Calling her would be counter-productive.”

  Five hours later my phone rings and it’s my mother, calling for the first time since I’ve been in the city.

  “Do you have any idea where I am?” she asks me, without salutation.

  “No, Tess, I don’t.”

  “I’m in London,” she says, and I can hear the liquor in her diction. “It’s wonderful. The hotel we’re staying at is on the Thames. I think it’s an old factory they converted… Never mind though. It’s lovely. You’ve never been to London, have you?”

  “Why are you calling”

  “You’ve never been here,” she says. “I know that.”

  “Tess, why are you calling?”

  “The Village Voice called me today, asking all about you. Saying you had some fancy Chelsea gallery representing you, a debut opening this spring. He was full of questions about Guy and how you were raised. I was very forthcoming. I told him everything he needed to know about Guy—and about you, getting kicked out of school. I got the paperwork. VCU mailed it to me. I think the Voice will have a lot to write about.”

  I bet they will.

  “Tess, who are you with in London?” I ask.

  “My new boyfriend,” she says. “Todd. He’s so much more relaxed than Mark ever was. Mark was way too uptight. A pencil pusher. Todd is… Todd gives an excellent massage.”

  Jesus, she dumped the lawyer. That’s exceedingly great news.

  “Hey Tess, you know how they say all press is good press? If anybody else calls you, speak freely. Tell them everything. Please. Hold nothing back. It all helps me. Thanks.”

  I place two calls. The first to Mary to let her know that the guy from The Voice got a raging earful from my drunk mother, and it may be useful to reach out to him and mitigate that disaster. The second call I place is to Hayes.

  “I need some advice,” I say. “I just found out that my mother dumped her lawyer boyfriend, the guy who locked down my trust and was helping her liquify everything. He may be feeling a little scorched right about now, ready to undo some of the damage he’s done.”

  “I’m all over it,” he says. “I’ll call my dad. He’ll know what to do. Take a deep breath.”

  An hour after that call, Mary calls me back.

  “Brian Salinger at The Village Voice, the reporter who spoke to Tess, said that she was so incoherent, he wouldn’t use anything she said. He asked me to convey to you that he was sorry he approached her.”

  “Damn, Mary,” I say. “Are reporters usually that empathetic?”

  “No,” she replies. “But the city reporters all knew Guy. When some drunk women who is living off the largess of his legacy starts bad-mouthing him, they draw their own conclusions.”

  That makes sense to me. Not a lot in the last few weeks has made sense, but this does.

  Three hours later, at the end of the work day, my phone rings again. I don’t recognize the number, but I answer anyway given all the drama unfolding.

  “Chloe, this is Hayes Chandler, Sr., Hayes’ father. You called him earlier today with some legal concerns, asking if we could help.”

  “Yes sir,” I say.

  “We’re on a conference call,” Mr. Chandler says. “My attorney and his associate are with us, Mr. Giles and Ms. Spence. I’d like for you to explain what you think is happening, and express how we might help. Chloe, I want you to know we’re ready to step in on your behalf and help in any way we can.”

  I give them the gist of it, telling them about my father’s will and the trust. Explaining that things were sold off and the money disappeared, including all the assets from my college fund. I tell them about the court ruling that put the trust in the care of my mother and her boyfriend, Mark E. Brown—recently dumped.

  “It’s going to take us a while to track down all the paperwork,” Loren Giles says. “But we’ll get it. If Mr. Brown is willing to help us—and we’ll make it worthwhile to do so—that will expedite things.”

  “You think you can really do anything to help me?” I ask.

  A short pause ensues. “Miss Harvey, your father’s estate was valued in excess of nineteen million dollars at the time of his death less than four years ago. Today, according to the most recent tax filings, it stands at less than nine million. There’s obvious malfeasance at work in the trust management on your behalf. We probably can’t recover the bulk of the losses, but we can stem the tide. If Mr. Brown is a smart man, he’ll work with us. If he’s not a smart man, he’ll face severe, possibly criminal, consequences.”

  Really? Wow.

  Chapter 25

  Hayes

  I’ve never been one to express overt rebelliousness, but recently I’m testing the boundaries.

  In the main hallway, just outside my office door, there’s a large cork board where people post everything from party invites and roommate wanted notices, to alumni accomplishments.

  I printed out the Art F City post the day Chloe sent it to me, and pinned it to the cork board. Following that, I’ve posted every single mention of Chloe in the NYC art scene press, as well as a half dozen Instagram photos and Twitter shares promoting her growing popularity. In the weeks that followed, those citations were joined by countless others, not all of them added by me.

  It’s taken weeks for Liza Johnson to notice the public relations campaign growing on the wall in the main corridor between the studios, but now that she’s aware, she’s livid.

  “What do you mean by this?” she hisses at me, her claw-like hand clutching a rumpled piece of paper bearing Chloe’s name. “Are you trying to spit in my eye?”

  “No Liza,” I say, smiling. “I don’t give you that much consideration. I’m proud of Chloe, and wanted her classmates to see she landed on her feet, and they can too.”

  She balls the paper up, tossing it in the trash can beside my desk.

  “Take all that down,” she commands, pointing at the hallway. “Now.”

  “No,” I reply coolly. “I won’t. And if you do, I’ll just put it all right back up.” I absently fondle the cool metal of my bracelet as I peer up at her, grinning.

  I’ve never behaved with such open defiance toward a superior. It feels good.

  She’s outraged.

  “Hayes, you forget yourself. You’re on probation. One word from me, and you’re done here. You’re skating on thin ice.”

  It’s become increasingly clear to me since last semester that I’m done here, no matter what.

  “What do you want from me, Liza?” I ask, my position softening.

  Her eyes narrow. “I want you to behave,” she says, as if she’s speaking to a wayward child. “I want you to treat me with some respect.”

  “Like the respect you showed me all last semester, asking me out, hitting on me, suggesting it’s my best interest if I fuck you? Threatening me if I continued to refuse?”

  She rolls her eyes, huffing. “Hayes, you’re a good-looking young man. You should take it as a compliment if I pay you extra attention. You should also have sense enough to know that I’m able to help you—or hurt you. I’m head of the department. If you continue to piss me off, I may not punish you directly. I may start punishing your favorite students, making their lives hard, causing them grief. I can take any one of them down, just like I took Chloe down. So. Get with the program—or let your precious kids pay the price for your insolence.”

  “Liza, you really are a soulless bitch,” I observe.

  She cocks her head, smiling coldly at me. “I really am. That’s how I got to be Chairman, and that’s how I’m going to make Dean before it’s all said and done.”

  Screw Liza Johnson and her lies, manipulation, and her threats. She’s not the only one who can put together a conspiracy, or go to the administration with complaints.

  I’ve got two witnesses, both graduate students, who were at my party last semester, who have already gone on the record saying they saw
Liza in my office on my computer—after I left the house. I have five more, including a couple of faculty members, who have signed statements saying that they’ve personally witnessed Liza behaving inappropriately, making advances. And, best of all, I have this conversation recorded.

  My cell phone is laying on my desk between us, the voice record app running transparently in the background. I’ve been trying to capture her admission of guilt for more than a month, patiently recording every interaction between us, cautiously trying to lead her into my web. It took making her angry, showing her Chloe’s success, to catch her with her guard down.

  She is caught. Now all that’s left to do is wind her up.

  When Liza is gone, I pop in my headphones to have a quick listen, making sure the audio is clear and every word captured. I download the file to my cloud backup, then another to my laptop.

  I’ve had a letter prepared since before Christmas with a lengthy list of recipients. I’ve spoken to an attorney here in Richmond, the same one my father hired to handle Chloe’s trust dispute. He’s advised me that the best course of action to ensure the University doesn’t sweep this under the rug, is to go straight to the press and social media.

  My resignation letter recounts everything that happened last semester; how Chloe and I were set up, and how the Dean cooperated with Liza to drum her out of school and put me on a leash. It documents the witnessed instances of sexual harassment and the hostile work environment Liza’s behavior created. The final paragraph, which I type up quickly, calls attention to the audio file with Liza’s admission of her various intrigues and further threats.

  I add my digital signature to the letter, attach it with the audio file, load in the recipient’s email addresses—which includes the editor of the VCU student newspaper, the college radio station news editor, and the Richmond Times Dispatch local news editor—along with the Dean, the Chancellor and his minions, the university attorney, and my attorney.

  I hit send without a second’s hesitation.

  The next email I compose is a request for an emergency meeting with all my sophomores, juniors, and seniors, today, in the senior studio at four—just one hour from now.