I had no idea what to think. Had Ethan been ashamed that he’d bought a car we really couldn’t afford and hidden it from me here? Had he taken it out sometimes and driven around town? Was that why he’d come home late so many nights saying he was at the office when I suspected he was lying? And who had been in this car with him?
I reached out and tried the trunk, figuring it would be locked, and took in a startled breath when it clicked open beneath my fingers, lifting into the air.
Three suitcases? As if in a trance, I reached forward, pulling the zipper open on the one closest to me.
It was filled to the top with cash.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Brant
“Brant Talbot, pleasant surprise.” Yeah right.
“Mr. Bruce.”
“Please, call me Edwin,” he said, turning and gesturing for me to follow. His assistant, a young blond guy wearing eye makeup winked at me as we passed him where he was sitting at a large modern desk.
Edwin Bruce’s office was a moderate-sized space with tall, open ceilings and industrial-style furnishings. Sleek, hip. Too bad he didn’t extend the same obvious knack for style to his nightclubs.
Edwin took a seat behind the wood and metal desk and I sat on one of the black leather chairs in front of it. “To what do I owe the unexpected pleasure? Our meeting isn’t scheduled for another few days.” The meeting where I had planned to make him an offer on his failing club, an offer I’d fully expected him to accept. Now though, now things had changed.
“I think we can cut the social nicety crap, don’t you? I would have come even sooner if you weren’t out of town.”
Edwin raised one dark eyebrow, running a hand over his mostly bald head, the meager hair on the sides close-cropped and sprinkled with gray. He leaned forward on his desk, lacing his fingers together. “Blunt. I like blunt.” He smiled, that famous smile I’d seen so often at parties and events, splashed across magazines and on the Internet. “You’re displeased that I made an offer on Caspian Skye.”
“That’d be one way to put it. How’d you even know my father was ill?”
“I didn’t.”
Taken aback, I frowned at him. “What does that mean?”
“I’ve been offering to purchase Caspian Skye from your father for years now. He’s always solidly rejected me. I called a couple of months ago, and suddenly he was”—he shrugged—“slightly amenable, at least. He’d always turned me down cold in the past, so I made some inquiries. I’m sorry to hear about Harrison’s diagnosis.”
I studied him. The fuck of it was, he looked sincere. And it made me feel uncomfortable. I looked away for a moment, out the window behind him that overlooked an alley and a row of businesses on the other side. “My father and I haven’t spoken for thirteen years. Not until recently.”
His expression didn’t change. He knew that too. I wondered briefly where he got his information, but realized it wouldn’t be that difficult. This industr
y was a tightknit community. Everyone gossiped so it would be easy enough to find out that I was from Kentucky and never went home. I didn’t advertise that my father and I were estranged, but I’d mentioned it to people in my close circle. Perhaps not as close as I’d thought . . .
Edwin leaned back in his chair. “I’m from a small town not too far from where you grew up. But not too far can also be a world away.” He paused, rocking slightly in his chair. “I’m from a coal mining town in Appalachia. I grew up in the type of poverty most people don’t think exists in this country. That’s where I’ve been for the past couple of weeks, actually, helping an organization with home repairs in what they call the hollers of Kentucky.”
I stared at him, not sure where this was going. Was I supposed to feel admiration for his charitable spirit and sympathy for his upbringing and say it was just fine and dandy that he’d take my mother’s legacy and make it his own? “Let me guess, you pulled yourself up by your bootstraps.”
He laughed. “Boots? I didn’t even have the audacity to dream of boots. We wore old pieces of tire, tied around our feet with twine.” He grinned, but somehow I didn’t think he was making that up, and a kernel of empathy lodged in my throat at the picture it created in my mind. I was tempted to look away but didn’t as he continued on.
“You know what I did when I bought my first club? I took my closest friends out that night and we toasted with the best bourbon in the place. Bet you can guess what it was.” His expression held a hint of tenderness.
“After that, I toasted every success with it. You know what that bourbon is to me? It’s the taste of perseverance. It’s the taste of hard work and luck and a dash of fate, and the kindness of a handful of trustworthy friends. That’s what Caspian Skye is to me.”
“Sweet story, but I hate to break it to you, Edwin. Pretty soon you’re not going to have an establishment to serve that bourbon in.”
His lips tipped up, though his eyes tightened at the corners. He sat back in his chair and watched me for a moment. “I will if I have that label.”
We engaged in a stare-off for another tense couple of beats. He was right. If my father sold that label to him, it would be just the thing he needed to make a comeback. An exclusive, coveted collector’s brand brought back to life and only served in his establishment. Maybe a small renovation . . . some marketing. Yeah, it’d do the trick. My body tensed in anger.
And yet you couldn’t be bothered with it until you knew I was dying and would be out of the picture, my father had said. Hell, he was right. I had made my own success. I had never especially wanted or needed Caspian Skye because it belonged to my father. But to think of it in some stranger’s hands? And especially this stranger? It made my blood boil.
And yet Edwin Bruce had been making offers to my dad for years. Edwin had shown a far greater interest in Caspian Skye than I had. His business plan was solid, and he might have earned the Caspian Skye label. I, on the other hand, clearly had not. A fact my father had pointed out to me.