In Love Again (36 page)

“May I see?” Devon asked Max, pointing to the paperwork.

Claire squeezed Ben’s hand, feeling the bittersweet satisfaction that—one way or another—the end of her loveless first marriage was in sight. Perhaps she could confront Freddy directly, let him know that she knew what he’d done, and give him the chance to walk away. No need to involve the courts and a civil suit that would drag them all through the papers. Especially given Lydia’s precarious loyalties, Claire wanted to avoid anything public. “I’d rather not pursue anything that would be in the papers…for the sake of my daughter…and my family.” She squeezed Ben’s hand again under the table.

Devon spoke up. “I might have a few—” He looked at Stembridge and stopped speaking. “May we have a few moments alone?”

“Yes, of course.”

Claire watched as her brothers behaved in ways she’d never seen. She marveled at how she’d pigeonholed them into their juvenile stereotypes—Max the little band leader, Devon the imp. Instead, she looked across at two accomplished, grown men. While Stembridge was out of the room, Devon whispered something to Max and then they both looked at Claire.

“We can solve this, Claire, but you probably shouldn’t be a part of it.”

“I don’t think it’s right for me to be in the dark,” she protested. “I’m sick of being rescued.”

“How are you at breaking through World Bank firewalls?” Devon asked.

Claire smiled. “Are they plaster or drywall? Wood construction or masonry?”

Devon winked. “Leave it to me. Think of it as delegating, not rescuing. I’d actually love to do it. Freddy deserves a bit of his own medicine, don’t you think?”

Stembridge came back just then, and Claire nodded at Devon to show she agreed wholeheartedly.

“Very well,” Julian said as he sat down and opened a small laptop computer. “Here’s the recording of the conversation. I can’t advise you in any way, but once you know the nature of the situation, perhaps you can proceed…in a new direction.”

They all listened as he clicked on a digital recording of a telephone ringing. The ringtones were distinctly European. Freddy answered the call with a cheery
hel-LO
.
The cheery bastard
, thought Claire. He always maintained that jaunty nonchalance while everyone around him suffered miserably. The conversation was a professional exchange, with Stembridge explaining the nature of the call, to touch base personally with all of their clients in light of the new higher security measures being implemented at the bank. When Julian asked to speak to Lady Wick, Freddy didn’t even hesitate.

“She’s right here. Happy to chat.” The phone was passed and a plummy-accented English woman said, “This is Claire.”

Claire stared at the back of the laptop, narrowing her eyes and feeling the last bit of tenuous hope slip away. Up until that moment, some tiny thread of optimism had held on. Perhaps Freddy was a compulsive gambler who could get help? Perhaps he was investing with a dangerous group of Mafiosi who were blackmailing him?

But the second Claire heard that voice—and pictured the arrogant redhead that went with it—all of that vanished. Freddy was a greedy little beast. Nothing more. He didn’t deserve an ounce of her attention, much less her compassion.

The conversation continued, the imposter hitting her stride. She even laughed at one point, slightly deeper than Claire’s, but a pretty good approximation.

“Turn it off!” Claire snapped.

Julian hit the pause button immediately. “You think you know her?”

“We’re done here, Julian.” Claire stood up quickly, all four men jumping to their feet as soon as she did. “I don’t want to say anything that would put you in an uncomfortable position, Julian. As far as I’m concerned, we never had this meeting. I”—she pointed at her chest—“may be making some changes to my account. It’s been a pleasure doing business with you
all these years
, but for personal reasons, I may be transferring the bulk of my assets at some point. Please don’t be alarmed. And please don’t make any notes to the records or any changes to
our
account.”

Stembridge smiled and reached out to shake her hand. “Very well, Lady Wick. It’s been a pleasure.”

She smiled. “I don’t know about that, but there may be a bit of justice yet.”

Devon was reaching down to take a few documents from the files. Julian turned to him. “Unfortunately, none of the documents can leave the bank.”

Devon looked slightly disappointed, but Claire had the strange impression her youngest brother had already committed much of the necessary information to memory.

“Oh that’s a shame—” Devon started.

“On the other hand”—Julian looked at his watch meaningfully—“I have a meeting starting just now and hate to leave, but you are all welcome to use this conference room for the next half hour. Do you happen to have a phone with a camera?”

Devon nodded and smiled, and Julian nodded once. “Very well. Lady Wick. Gentlemen. Thank you for taking time to come to the bank this morning. Happy New Year.”

With that, the older man left the room with his laptop tucked under one arm and shut the door quietly behind him.

Ben whispered, “Do you know what just happened?”

“I’ve got an idea or two,” Claire whispered back.

Max was flipping through the sheets and handing them to Devon. “This one…this…these two…god damn it…this one…these four…” After about fifteen minutes of Max’s culling and Devon’s snapping images with his smartphone, her brothers reorganized the papers into the neat stacks, exactly as they’d been when they first entered the room.

“All right, then.” Devon looked excited.

“You don’t have to be quite so happy about it,” Claire joked, but she hugged him to her. It was a bit awkward, what with Devon trying to repress his smile. “Okay, fine then. Be happy about it.”

His grin spread. “Excellent. This is going to be
fun
.”

The four of them rode back to Lyford in Devon’s sports car and spent the rest of the holiday never once mentioning the mysterious trip to the bank. Devon told everyone he had an important work project that had come up unexpectedly and spent a few hours on his computer in the mornings and at night. In the following days, Claire felt as though the walls within her family were finally coming down.

Claire burst into tears when Lydia came to tell her she’d accepted a job with Sarah James in New York City.

“Mum?” Lydia pulled her into an awkward hug.

“Oh darling.” Claire held her tight. “I’m so pleased.”

“I’m glad you’re glad”—Lydia chuffed a small laugh—“but I wasn’t even sure you’d be glad. I felt like you were sort of inviting me to come visit because you felt like you had to. And that time I called you when you were riding on the bus, I wasn’t even sure if you wanted me there at all.”

Claire smiled a watery smile and wiped her eyes with a tissue she pulled from the bedside table in the villa. “I didn’t know what to expect or what was best for you. I wanted it to be your decision and not me telling you how desperately I wanted us all to be together, making it some kind of emotional obligation, but I’m so happy, sweetheart. You’re going to love New York.”

“I think I am.” Lydia’s smile held more than a tourist’s interest.

“Wait.” Claire cleared her throat. “What else are you not telling me?”

Lydia looked like she was having to relearn how
not
to be paranoid, always hearing the suspicious undertones of her mother’s voice from her drug days.

“I didn’t mean it like that!” Claire backpedaled.

“I know you didn’t. I’m trying.”

“So? Other than my lovely company, what are you looking forward to in New York?”

Lydia looked at the floor. “Turns out…”

“What is it? This is so unlike you to hesitate. Usually you just blurt everything out and demand I accept it.”

Laughing at herself and at the joy of her mother’s newfound honesty, Lydia began to appreciate the possibility that her future might not be a total disaster after all. “Well. It looks as though handsome Alistair is taking a new job at a hotel in New York.”

“Really?” Claire smiled in a conspiratorial way she’d always dreamt of sharing with her daughter, but had lost hope they ever would. “How interesting.”

Smiling in return, Lydia flopped on her mother’s bed. “He’s so adorable, isn’t he?”

“He is.”

They talked for the rest of the afternoon, about Alistair and New York and what Lydia was hoping to do at the Sarah James store, maybe eventually working on some of her own designs for belts and bags. If Claire had been a praying woman, she would have believed nearly all of hers had finally been answered.

Nearly all.

By the middle of January, Claire had officially moved in with Ben. She only had her suitcases, so it wasn’t much of a monumental event, but it
felt
monumental. Devon and Max assured her that she would be getting great news from Freddy’s lawyers before the month was up. They never spoke of the particulars, but she trusted her brothers so much more than her former attorneys, so she was finally beginning to accept that her life would soon be her own. Freddy’s hold on her would be over in a matter of weeks.

Lydia had moved into Sarah’s small apartment on Sixty-Seventh Street and was loving her job at the shop. They’d even had Sunday dinner together last weekend, at the noodle place down in the Village where she and Ben had gone that first night. Alistair and Lydia had come to hear Ben’s band, and then the four of them had walked the few blocks to the restaurant.

Claire had spent the whole meal gripping Ben’s hand beneath the table as the two of them listened to Lydia and Alistair talk animatedly about each of their new jobs. Something about the way her twenty-year-old daughter rattled on about “possibilities” and “new ideas” made Claire’s heart feel like it was going to burst out of her chest.

“Apparently pigs really do fly,” Bronte said on a laugh, when they were speaking on the phone a few days later. “Lydia has a paying job and Abby has fallen in love with a man.”

“What? Abby’s in love? When did that happen? I’m so out of it.”

“You’ve been a bit preoccupied the past few months,” Bronte agreed. “But we’re all pretty much clueless. It seems she’s been secretly pining for this guy, Eliot Cranbrook, ever since Devon and Sarah’s wedding last year.” Bronte’s voice turned thoughtful. “Or maybe even since Wolf’s christening way before that, now that I think about it.”

“Really? They’ve been dating this whole time and no one knew?”

“Not dating exactly.”

“Sounds complicated.”

“I don’t know the details.” Bronte became more pragmatic. “Sarah just called me and we’re all meeting over at her and Devon’s place to have dinner with Abby in a little while.”

Claire was sitting in her favorite coffee shop on Third Avenue, having a cup of soup for lunch. She listened to Bronte talk while she pictured them all together at Devon and Sarah’s lofty apartment in Mayfair. “Oh, I miss you all even more when I think of you having dinner together.”

“Me too. Would you and Ben ever consider moving back?”

Claire looked out to the avenue and the bustle of people walking by with their winter coats and hats and all that American purpose. She was starting to feel like this was where she belonged. At first it had felt like she was unmoored. Now it felt like freedom. “I don’t know, Bron. I think I’m falling in love with New York almost as much as I’ve fallen in love with Ben.”

“I miss it too. I totally know what you mean.”

Claire took another sip of soup, then asked, “So when did Abby get back from Africa?”

“After the New Year, I think. Apparently she’s been in Paris for a few days visiting your mother and trying to get some professors to back one of her projects or something. We’re just all excited to see her and…catch up.”

“Oh, sure. So what you really mean is that you and Sarah are going to gang up on her.”

Bronte barked a laugh. “Just being helpful. It worked for you, didn’t it?”

“I suppose it did,” Claire agreed happily.

“For some reason, you Heyworth women are big into postponing your joy. Sarah and I are just here to give you a little push in the right direction.”

Claire smiled into the phone and shivered slightly. “Speaking of joy…”

“Oh my god…don’t even tell me…”

“Okay, then. I won’t tell you I’m preg—” Claire teased.

Bronte screamed a wild flood of ecstatic obscenities across the transatlantic phone line.

When Bronte had worn herself out, Claire asked, “Are you quite finished?”

Bronte began swearing again. Then she started crying. “I’m just so fucking happy for you. You’re going to have a baby! Oh my god, we’re both going to have babies this year. I’m so excited!”

“I know, me too. I was dying to tell you in the Bahamas, but it was all so new and there were all these stupid complications with Freddy and his lawsuit.”

“I understand.” Bronte was still catching her breath. “It’s just the
best
news.”

“I want to tell Sarah and Abby myself,” Claire said in a more serious tone. “Do you think you can keep it quiet a little while longer?”