Most Eligible Bastard: an enemies-to-lovers romantic comedy Read online

  I really am pleasantly surprised Bernadette thought of Smuckers. It would be good if I could take him to the Park Avenue vet who has known him since puppyhood, and if there’s money for his fancy food, I'm all there. I’m guessing there will be some bill submittal process, which is fine with me as long as I don’t have to have to interact with these Locke heirs.

  The lawyer has moved on to real estate parcels. I pull out my phone and check Twitter.

  That takes forever, of course, and then we move onto the listing of unoriginal corporate names portion of the reading. It seems the Locke empire stretches far beyond Locke Worldwide. There is Locke Companies, Inc., Locke Holdings, Locke Capital Group, Locke Asset Management, Locke Architectural Services, and more.

  I’m in the middle of an important operation that involves me Retweeting a meme of a raccoon in a ballerina skirt when the listing of unoriginal names concludes with, “To Smuckers, whose intentions and decisions in all matters will be interpreted by Victoria Nelson.”

  I look up to find a dozen threatening glares. Except Henry. A man like Henry doesn’t need to expend energy on things like a threatening glare. He just flicks his fingers and you’re destroyed.

  The lawyer is continuing. Something about a term of Smuckers’s natural life or ten years, whichever comes first, and then something something something stipulate something.

  “Um, could you repeat the whole Smuckers part?” I ask.

  “This is ridiculous.” Henry stands. “I contest this. All of it.”

  The lawyer holds up his hand. “Henry.” He says it in a calming tone, a warning tone. “Please recall that any challenge to the will nullifies the real estate and holdings provisions. Upon any legal challenge…”

  “She can’t do this,” a woman says.

  I stand. “Please, can somebody explain…”

  “Come off it,” an older man says. “You know exactly what happened.”

  After my dad died, one of mom’s less scummy boyfriends took us to Cocoa Beach one spring, and at night we’d shine lights into holes in the sand and little crabs would pop out and scurry away. I feel the way those crabs must have felt, suffering the glares on every inch of my skin, wanting to scurry away.

  But I know not to obey that instinct. It just makes things worse. You have to stand up for yourself, or at least try.

  “Can I just get that last part repeated? Whatever came before the To Smuckers?”

  “You don’t know?” Henry asks, all steely calm. “Are you sure you didn’t help Bernadette write the will herself?”

  I’m getting a queasy sense of déjà vu. “I would never. I didn’t even know she was, you know…” I gesture at the chandelier. My protest is met with stares of derision.

  The younger, less hot Henry gets in on the action. “Maybe Smuckers helped write it. Did Smuckers dictate the will?” He gives dictate air quotes.

  Sweat trickles down my back. “Look, when she asked me to care for Smuckers, she told me she’d defray the costs of his special salon and vet. So if she left something for that…”

  Henry’s eyes twinkle coolly. “I’d imagine control of a multibillion-dollar conglomerate would defray a few costs.”

  I frown, unsure if this is a joke or what.

  “People go to jail for this kind of thing,” Henry’s young relative says.

  “Let’s dial it back, Brett,” the lawyer says.

  “Why should I dial it back?” Brett barks. “I’m not dialing back shit!” Brett wants to dial it up. Brett will be dialing it up to eleven, thank you very much.

  “This was...supposed to be about vet bills and things,” I say. And ultrapuff blowouts at the Sassy Snout salon and Baby Poochems Perfect Pawz free-range rabbit meat for dogs.

  But I don’t see those specific details improving anybody’s mood at this point.

  Henry watches my eyes. “You’re trying to steal the company my grandfather founded. How about not insulting our intelligence on top of that?”

  One of the Locke women grabs the lawyer’s arm. “A dog can’t control fifty-one percent of an international conglomerate, can he?”

  Fifty-one percent? A chill goes over me as the reality of what’s happening sinks in. Bernadette left a lot more than vet and dog food money.

  “With Ms. Nelson acting as regent?” the lawyer says. “Yes, then it’s no different than awarding control to an infant with a guardian acting in that infant’s best interests.”

  Control of a corporation?

  Brett gets in the lawyer’s face about his incompetence and disloyalty to the family, handing the company to a grifter.

  Brett has unlocked full-blast freak-out mode—so much so that Henry has to pull Brett back and physically restrain him until he calms down. Another lawyer, the estate attorney, takes questions, too. They’re arguing about some point of Locke Worldwide bylaws. Everybody has the bylaws up on their phones.

  I smooth my dress, the simple, demure dress designed to say I’m innocent, I’m not the bad person you say I am. I really didn’t lie! Please believe me. Somebody. Anybody.

  Needless to say, it’s not having the desired effect.

  Carly is forever on a quest to get me to buy something colorful—pastels, jewel tones. Anything not gray or black or brown. I say I don’t want to, but the truth is, I can’t.

  My court clothes from when I was sixteen are like the ridges of the Grand Canyon, violent gashes etched by infinite splashes of hatred and derision. It’s seven years later and the onslaught is long gone, but the clothes stay.

  A room of angry people. How am I in this position again?

  Henry has that dangerous sparkle again. “Explains why you wanted custody of the dog so badly.”

  “I wanted custody because I gave my word to Bernadette, and Smuckers needed a nice home.” I say. “I really just expected money for fancy food and vet bills.”

  Henry pulls out his phone. “I’m calling the police.”

  “What? What did I do?”

  “You defrauded a vulnerable individual,” he says. “You pretended you could read the dog’s thoughts.” He turns his attention back to the phone. “Harry Van Horn, please.” That last he says into the phone. Because men like this have friends in the police department.

  Just like Denny Woodruff and his family upstate in Deerville. The Lockes might even know the Woodruffs, or travel in the same circles at least.

  Frantically I review the reading in my mind. The endless list of companies. Fifty-one percent. Which suggests Smuckers either owns or controls all of them. Or both.

  And I control Smuckers.

  Henry pockets his phone.

  I take a centering breath. “Look, you guys. I’m not here to take anybody to the cleaners. Honestly? I came here because it was Bernadette’s deepest wish that Smuckers maintain his same lifestyle after her death…”

  “And that’s all you want? And you’re you willing to sign a piece of paper to that effect?” Brett barks.

  “Only Smuckers can designate a new heir,” the lawyer says.

  “The police are on their way,” Henry says.

  The police. Smuckers starts fussing in my arms. I loosen up on the death grip of distress.

  “How about you have Smuckers designate a new heir, then?” Brett rakes his eyes up and down me. “Then again, you’d look okay in orange. Malcomb, what does the will say about Smuckers’s regent reading his mind from a jail cell?”

  Everybody’s talking at me or about me. “Make her sign something…affidavit…criminal background check…” Only Henry is silent, apart from the crowd, just like in that toddler picture, but his glittering gaze speaks volumes.

  I cling to Smuckers, feeling like it’s us against the world. Even Smuckers is upset, though I suspect that’s more about being surrounded by strangers who are clearly aware of him yet who mysteriously have all failed to rush over to pet him.

  “Let’s all take a breath.” The main lawyer, Mr. Malcomb, is next to me now. “This is all getting a little close to dure
ss for my comfort. A contract created under duress isn’t valid.”

  Everyone looks at Henry.

  “I am an officer of the court, Henry,” Malcomb adds.

  “Yeah, you’re an officer of the court who stood by while Mom was getting soaked by a scam artist,” Henry says. “That’s the problem I’m having here, Malcomb.”

  “She was of sound mind, Henry,” Malcomb retorts. “It’s what she wanted.”

  Malcomb and Henry go on to debate the concept of sound mind.

  I have to admit that Henry has a point. A toy dog whose head fur is frequently groomed to resemble a large marshmallow seems a very poor choice to run an international corporation.

  Lawyer Malcomb turns to me. “In the decade prior to her death Bernadette assigned a longtime officer of the company, Kaleb Rowland, to cast the vote of her late husband’s fifty-one percent along with his own twenty percent, with her son Henry acting as CEO. Kaleb and Henry have been excellent stewards of Locke Worldwide. Under their guidance, the firm has expanded enormously and created a massive amount of wealth. While we’re working all of this out, I'm going to suggest that Smuckers might see his way clear to allow Kaleb to retain his proxy while Henry continues on as operational CEO. You’ll stay on, Kaleb?”

  Everyone looks at an older man with a thick pelt of shiny gray hair. Kaleb, I’m guessing. He crosses his arms and grunts.

  I scratch Smuckers’s neck, trying to think when he last peed.

  Breathe. Think.

  Another thing I learned while a pariah is to understand things fully before making big decisions, because one of the ways people push you around is to make you think you don’t have time.

  “Can you please explain the terms in a way I’ll understand?” I say to Malcomb.

  “Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Henry sighs. “Do we have to go through this charade?”

  I turn to him. “Okay, I’m getting a little tired of your attitude.” I pull Smuckers’s little face closer to mine. It comforts Smuckers, but I kind of think it makes me harder to yell at. “Here’s the situation—an old woman who felt utterly alone in life left things in her will to her dog. You want somebody to feel angry at? Go look in a mirror.”

  The room seems to still. Henry regards me coolly, like he’s totally in control, but a vein in his neck has become more defined, like a violin string tightened beyond factory specs. “You don’t know anything about this family,” he finally says.

  “I know you’re all…a bit unpleasant.” Even Bernadette was unpleasant, but I don’t say that.

  Henry undoes his one suit-jacket button, wristwatch glinting in the dazzle of the chandelier. And then it’s gone, back under his perfect sleeve. He says nothing, just undoes the button. I don’t know, maybe it’s the wealthy man’s version of rolling up his sleeves. He then turns and huddles up with Brett and Kaleb. Talking about me, of course.

  Talking about charging me with a crime. Maybe paying me off. That’s how rich guys control poor women. Young women. Me.

  Been there. Done that. Vowed never to do it again.

  Back in Deerville, Denny Woodruff’s family went with paying me off—half a million dollars for my silence about what Denny did. My life would have been half a million percent better if I’d taken that money, but I was sixteen and idealistic. I wanted to make sure other women would steer clear of Denny.

  I sometimes miss that brave, strong girl who wanted justice. That girl who believed if she stood up for herself and told the truth, nothing could hurt her.

  We’ll bury you, Mr. Woodruff said when I refused to take the money.

  We’ll bury you.

  And they did it.

  Or, at least, they buried brave, carefree, teenaged me. The brave girl named Vonda who wore bright, pretty things and wouldn’t back down from a fight. The one who didn’t have to fake a backbone.

  They made me regret not taking the money. They made me regret standing up. The regret’s almost worse than having been dragged through the mud of real life and social media hatred.

  Regret for doing the right thing is a kind of poison your veins.

  And standing there in the middle of that lavish room of Lockes, I want to rage at the world.

  Three

  Henry

  Perfect. Just fucking perfect.

  Every part of her is perfect. The whole sexy librarian look she has going, all big brown eyes behind smart-girl glasses. Glossy hair caught up in a pretty ponytail. Determined frown, clutching the dog in her arms, angry about Mom being alone.

  Hollywood’s top casting professionals couldn’t have done better if they tried. So innocent and lovely, with a fun dash of wit.

  The clever candlestick comment?

  Slow clap.

  And she’s right about one thing—it’s Mom I should be angry at.

  I close my eyes, trying to shake the image of her, frail in that hospital bed, so diminished from the woman I knew. Managing to depart this earth without uttering a word to me. Her last words were to a scam artist. And a dog.

  When I open my eyes, my cousin Brett is looking at me, waiting to see what I say. Everyone is always waiting to see what I say.

  “Fucking grifter,” Brett says when I don’t speak. “Fuck me.”

  I gaze over his shoulder at her with all of her innocent allure. “We got this,” I say.

  He wants me to say more. He’s waiting. He knows I’ll do anything to protect this company, to protect the people whose livelihoods depend on us. He’s nervous.

  I give him my smile. I really turn it on for him. “Don’t worry. She’ll be crawling on her knees before this is over. Gratefully,” I add.

  Kaleb comes up, balancing on his cane. He, too, wants to see what I’ll do. He’s seventy. He gets that this isn’t his fight. “Girl could do a lot of damage,” he warns. “Especially if she has people.”

  “We got this,” I say again. “The little scammer has no idea what she’s stepped into.”

  “You can’t contest the will,” he points out unhelpfully.

  “Doesn’t matter.” So like Bernadette to put a self-destruct provision into her will. Preventing challenge of any kind. It’s how she was in life. If you argued with her, even about something as objective as the air temperature, she’d shut down the whole discussion. That’s enough, Henry!

  Until she finally ghosted on me and the rest of the clan nearly ten years ago. Over a missed dinner, as it happened. A calendar fuckup. On her part.

  With a simple command I can cause skyscrapers to rise up from brownfield lots or send buildings crashing to the ground, but I couldn’t get a frail old woman to answer the phone. Or the door. Go out to brunch at the Gramercy.

  I’m done thinking about her, though. She doesn’t matter anymore.

  I turn to the window and try to collect my thoughts. My next moves will have lasting implications for the people in this room as well as the legions of employees and vendors of Locke Worldwide who trust me. They need me strong and smart.

  Early on, Brett and I bribed a doorman to let us in to see Bernadette—she preferred the name Bernadette over Mom. We even engaged a therapist to help us bring her back into the family fold. No go.

  From our descriptions, the therapist speculated that she might have mild dementia, possibly paranoia; he couldn’t say for sure, and you can’t force somebody to accept help or be treated.

  One of the little known facts about extreme wealth is how stunningly long you can go with untreated mental illness if that’s what you want.

  You can believe in bizarre things and rave and go out to restaurants and order foods not on the menu, and they’ll call you eccentric and smile and thank you for the huge tips.

  And obsequious lawyers on your payroll won’t push back when you decide to leave everything to your dog, in care of a woman who claims to sense that dog’s thoughts or whatever it is, because the checks you write are good.

  The checks you write are so very fucking good.

  We had no clue she was dying, of cours
e.

  I shove my hands in my pockets.

  I glare over at Malcomb, sitting there with his colleagues, hiding behind confidentiality. I get it about the confidentiality. Still. He could’ve found a way to alert me.

  Years ago, back when Dad died, Bernadette assigned Dad’s share of the voting rights to Kaleb, Dad’s second in command. It made sense at the time—I was in high school, too young to run things.

  But then I graduated with my architectural degree and took over as CEO. I started to build and acquire other companies, turbocharging our growth.

  Still my mother kept Kaleb holding ultimate veto power. She and I would argue about it, back when she was still talking to me.

  Kaleb didn’t use his veto power a lot. He was happy to let me make Locke into the powerhouse it is, happy for my excellent ideas, but he’d veto the shit out of the things I cared most about.

  I was CEO, but Kaleb was a roadblock to the real change I wanted to see.

  Kaleb’s a decent guy, but he’s stuck in the legacy way of building. Cost per square foot.

  It was bad enough having my hands tied by Kaleb, unable to fully run the company as I wanted. And now?

  Now it’s controlled by a dog and a scammer.

  Brett’s talking about Malcomb. “…probably an extensive competency determination he and his estate people put Bernadette through before allowing this…enough not to get disbarred.”

  I nod. Malcomb’s good. He would’ve ensured she was of sound mind—sound enough, anyway, for the will to hold up in a court of law.

  “So. Not the straight line to control I envisioned.” I say it lightly, like it doesn’t matter. Good old Bernadette, lashing out one last time for making her life miserable. My rap sheet for that stretches clear back to infancy.

  Again the crafty little scammer asks what things mean. What exactly Mom stipulated. She’s a good actress, I’ll give her that. With her glasses and glossy ponytail and demure dress. A simple string of dark beads.

  This is the woman my mother favored over her own son?

  “I’ve prepared extracts,” Malcolm says, leading her to the table. I follow along.

  Malcomb hands her a stapled sheet. “Bernadette divided her assets three ways. Henry and Brett have inherited a number of properties and a share of liquid assets save what she distributed to the five second cousins. Smuckers’s inheritance is listed here. He’s in control of the family business, Ms. Nelson.”