Why was I sort of looking forward to that?
As we continued to drive, it dawned on me that I’d been spending all of this time with Rush and didn’t even know his last name.
I turned to him. “Hey…I never asked, what’s your last name?”
His jaw tensed. “That’s kind of a random question…”
“Yeah, well, I just realized it’s a little weird that I don’t know.”
He let out a harsh breath. “You don’t need to know my last name.”
“You slept in my bed last night. I think the least you could do is tell me your last name. Besides, it’s not like I couldn’t just ask someone at work what it is.”
“Actually, the only one who knows is Oak. And he’s been given strict instructions not to give it out to anyone—that includes you, Gia Mirabelli.”
“Oh my God. That’s so shady.” I laughed. “Why?”
“Because people don’t need to know my fucking business.”
“It’s your name! That’s hardly private information.”
“It is to me.”
I leaned in a little. My voice was low and sexy. “Come on. Tell me.”
“No,” he spewed.
“Why?”
Silence.
More silence.
He wasn’t even answering me anymore. I was becoming more and more curious by the second. I devised a plan that I hoped would work.
When I started to wave at the driver of a big rig next to us, he yelled, “What the hell are you doing?”
“If you don’t tell me your name, I’m gonna flash that trucker.”
The driver honked at me and smiled. I really wasn’t going to go through with it, but Rush had no way of knowing that.
His Mustang swerved a little. “You wouldn’t do that…”
My eyes widened. “Oh yeah? Watch me.”
A vein in his neck popped as I began to lift my shirt. Either he was going to tell me his last name, or he was going to crash the car. Just as the material was almost all the way up, Rush blurted it out.
“My name is Heathcliff Rushmore!” He expended a breath and grumbled, “Fuck.”
Heathcliff Rushmore?
Heathcliff?
Rushmore?
I covered my mouth. “Oh my…that’s interesting.”
He looked so angry at himself. “Happy now?”
I beamed. “Yes, actually, I am.” I repeated to myself, “Heathcliff Rushmore…Heath…Heath Rushmore…hmm.”
“I was named after my grandfather.”
I snapped my finger. “So, that’s why you go by Rush…”
He feigned surprise. “Wow…you’re really smart.”
“Shut up.” I laughed then said, “Thank you for telling me.”
He flashed a hesitant smile. “You didn’t give me much of a choice, brat.”“Heathcliff. It’s good to see you, son.” My father patted my back, interrupting the conversation I was in the middle of with Gerald Horvath, my grandfather’s attorney and always the only friendly face in the room toward me.
“Edward.” I nodded.
My father and brother hated my existence, but appearances were important to them. Disdain hid under a masked smile when anyone was around. Especially when that anyone had voting power, as Gerald did.
Grandfather’s attorney had just given me the dirty details of the purpose of today’s meeting. Vanderhaus owned commercial real estate all over Manhattan, and today’s vote was to approve a large property sale without disclosing certain things to the buyer. The board was at odds. My brother, Elliott, and father held forty-nine percent of the company’s voting power and were always a united front. I held twenty-five percent, something I’m sure Grandfather had decided on strategically. Individually, my brother and father each held twenty-four-and-a-half percent, so my vote outweighed theirs. But united, they could bulldoze their way through many votes since they only needed to snag one percent to have a majority. Apparently, the vote today was David vs. Goliath, and they hadn’t been able to secure anyone’s commitment to vote with them yet.
“Your brother and I would love to catch up, if I could steal you away from Gerald for a few minutes.”
Gerald knew the blood between the three of us ran thin, but bowed out graciously as always. “Sure. No problem. I see a cheese danish calling my name over there before we start anyway.”
Once Gerald was out of earshot, my loving father’s mask slipped down just as Elliott joined us. “How much will it take for you to vote with us?”
My father had always assumed me and my mother were all about money. It was incomprehensible to him that someone without any would put their morals and self-respect ahead of making a quick buck.
I sipped a bottled water. “Let me get this straight. You bought a flailing nursing home that the community very much needed.” I pointed to my brother. “I’m guessing you’re the one who negotiated the purchase by promising the seller that you had every intention of keeping the facility open, but somehow that promise didn’t make its way into the contract. Then you demolished the place, along with a few other houses you bought surrounding it. All to make room for an eight-story mall that you could fill with a bunch of overpriced chain stores.”