Survival of the Richest (The Trust Fund Duet 1)

Is Sutton in LA, knocking on my mom’s condo right now?

Except she would have called me. And he would have had time to arrive if he followed me quickly. Maybe he hadn’t come for me, no matter that Christopher thought he would. He might have left for good, the way a sad little boy tried to do with a wild horse a long time ago. There would be no water’s edge to stop him this time.

Christopher studies the painting through his sunglasses. “Cleopatra?”

There’s a hardness to his jaw like it pains him to speak, and as much as I’ve fought him, I can spare him that. This painting won’t be enough to save the library. Nothing will.

“She knows what’s coming,” I say, softly so no one else hears.

He huffs a laugh. “As it turns out, Sutton was right. You do have the skills of diplomacy we need. You can convince people to do anything. Unfortunately you convinced them to hate us.”

I look away and manage a small smile. “And it turns out you were right. It doesn’t matter whether they hate you. You have the deed and a wrecking ball.”

“It didn’t have to be like this,” Christopher says, his jaw tight. There’s a muscle that works. A slight flare of his nostrils. The slightest signs that he’s upset. He had those same signs the day the will was signed, but he would not be swayed then. Not now, either.

Strange, the way I can admire his resolve even as it tears us apart. “It was always like this.”

“You can probably make them riot,” he remarks, his voice even. “An angry mob.”

“To break the windows in? To steal the books? A little counter to the purpose.” Besides the breakfast tacos were too delicious. No one could be in a rage after eating breakfast tacos.

“Or they could form a human chain around the building. It would delay construction, if nothing else.”

“And cost you money,” I say, gentle now. “If nothing else.”

“There’s that.”

“I’m not going to do that. I made my point.”

“Which is what?” He looks genuinely lost. It isn’t part of advanced economics theory, what’s happening in the streets tonight. It’s community. History. These are things he doesn’t understand.

“The protest isn’t to stop you. It isn’t even about you, not really. Protest are a voice for people who have been told not to be quiet. It’s the only way we can speak.”

I’m not so different from Mrs. Rosemont. We protest in different ways, through the historical society and connections to city hall. Through a painting and somewhat less lofty friends I’ve made in Tanglewood. Both of us overruled by bribery.

Money has the loudest voice of all.

He finally takes off his sunglasses, revealing eyes that are dark from lack of sleep. It’s been gnawing at him, this act. Even that won’t stop him. That determination of his is going to break more than the building. It’s going to break him, one of these days.

Once upon a time it broke me.

“That’s it? You tell me it’s wrong and then you leave?”

I look back at my Cleopatra with her sad eyes. She looks resolved to her fate. It’s the best art I’ve ever created. Maybe stronger because I knew it would be destroyed.

Medusa had been different. She’d been angry. Christopher had looked at all that fury and understood it. No, he’d felt it too. The hurt she felt had wrapped itself around him until he felt what she did. If he can understand her then maybe he can understand Cleopatra. It’s not rage she feels, though. It’s determination in the face of unbeatable odds.

“You could stop,” I tell him, one last attempt.

A protest may be a voice, but it’s up to him whether he listens. Up to him whether he lets her strength wrap around him. Up to him whether he looks down at me with admiration in his eyes and kisses me like the world could end around us.

He turns and speaks to the men in the construction crew. Take the day off, he could be telling them. Instead one man gets into the big yellow vehicle with a crane and a wrecking ball that’s taller than me attached. Part of me despairs that Sutton isn’t here with me.

That was him choosing you over money, in case the grand gesture wasn’t clear.

He should be standing beside me, holding me. It’s too personal, my relationship with this library. My relationship with Christopher. As if he’s going to plunge that wrecking ball through my heart, instead of the freshly painted face of an ancient Egyptian ruler.

The construction workers move the crowd back, clearing space for them