The Billionaire's Gamble
I take her by the arm, pulling her away from Nolan and any photographers that might be hanging around, into an alley next to the theatre. Derek takes up his station a little ways away—in sight but out of earshot. “Kelly, what’s going on?”
She’s crying so hard that she can barely speak. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t apologize, just tell me what’s going on.”
I put my arms around her, and she holds onto me like she’s drowning. “Jacob took the money.”
“What?” I go still and quiet. I’m not sure what I expected, but it wasn’t this.
“He took the money from that company for the house. He sold it without telling me.” She breaks off into a sob, unable to control her voice.
I’m trying to keep my voice even, trying to keep the fiery rage that’s building inside me from lashing out. “Why would he do that?”
“Because he can,” she says. “The house is in his name.”
“But—”
She pulls back, pulling herself upright, wiping some of the tears that are on her face. “The house is in both our names. Either one of us could have signed those papers. Plus, it gets worse.”
“How on earth could it get worse?”
She wraps her arms around herself. “He’s leaving me.” Her voice is so quiet that I barely hear it. “He’s got a place ready to move to, and he’s made it clear that I won’t be going with him. In a month, I’ll be homeless.” She starts to cry again, and I hug her. I don’t know what to say. What do you say when your little sister tells you that her entire life is falling apart?
“Come on,” I say. “Let’s get back to the penthouse. And don’t worry, as long as I’m alive you’ll never be homeless, understand?”
She nods, and I lead her back to Derek and Nolan. I put Kelly in the car and Nolan catches my arm. “Is she all right?”
“No. I’ll explain later.”
He looks concerned, but doesn’t argue, and soon we’re driving off into the night.
When Kelly is finally asleep I come down to the living room of the penthouse. It’s a comfortable room in shades of white with some of the most comfortable couches I’ve ever felt, and of course, Nolan’s amazing views. Nolan himself is nursing a glass of whiskey. There’s a fire lit in the fireplace, and he’s staring into it like it contains the answers of the universe. I know it doesn’t. Now that Kelly is taken care of for the moment, the rage that sparked when she told me what happened has now become an inferno. It’s only a matter of time before I explode.
I sit across from Nolan, and he looks up. “Is she asleep?”
“Yeah.”
His face darkens. “What happened?”
I grit my teeth—I’m so angry at this point that I don’t even know if I can say it. “He sold it.” I manage to force out, and the words break the damn. “Kelly’s jackass of a husband sold their house to that developer—took the money without asking or consulting her. On top of that, he announced that he’s moving away and leaving her. So essentially he just made her homeless.” I get up, feeling the need to pace.
“She could sue him for sole ownership of the house,” he says. “She might have a case against him if his intent in signing away the house was to damage her.”
“That will take too long. In the meantime her house is going to be bulldozed.”
He doesn’t say anything, instead takes a drink of his whiskey.
“How is it that companies can just come in and destroy neighborhoods like this? Why is that allowed?”
“It’s legal,” Nolan shrugs. “They’re not stealing the houses from people.”
“But they’re manipulating them. Forcing them to leave their homes by making them an offer they know that they can’t refuse.”
“Yes.”
I’m pacing faster now. “There has to be a way to fight back. There has to be a way to find the company that’s doing this deal and stop them.”
“You can’t do that—”
“I can!” I yell at him. “I can and I will. You just watch me do it. They’re going to ruin what’s left of my hometown, and I can’t let it happen.”
Nolan sighs, getting up off the couch and comes to me, “Dani—”
“You can help me do this, right? You can help me stop them? You’re the CEO of Coldwater, I don’t doubt that you have a few tricks up your sleeve that could stop a company like this in its tracks.”
He tries to reach for me and I take a step back. “Dani, it doesn’t work like that.”
“It has to. You have to know how to do something. Don’t you understand, I have to fix this.” My rage and grief are mixing now, anger at this company and at Jacob, sadness that Angelica—the only town I’ve ever called home, is going to be torn up, and pure, raw, grief that I’m not able to do the one thing an older sister is supposed to—protect her younger one.