Read The Year Everything Changed Online
Authors: Georgia Bockoven
Lucy swiveled in her chair, stopped, and tapped her pen on top of Jessie’s will, killing time. As anxious as she was to get the meeting with his daughters over with, she needed every advantage to succeed at what she had planned. Initially, she was going for a volatile mix of irritation and surprise that would, with a little luck, provide enough distraction to keep logic from rearing its curious head. It was important to prevent them asking questions that would feed off each other.
A fifteen-minute wait should irritate Jessie’s girls, but not anger them. She expected Rachel, with her business background, to react the strongest, Christina the least. Elizabeth was an unknown, but Ginger was easy. For all the seeming physical advantage Ginger’s beauty gave her, she lacked the confidence to confront authority.
Unable to sit still any longer, Lucy went to the sideboard and poured a cup of coffee, her fifth that morning. She was actually beginning to understand the adrenaline rush Jessie received from living on the edge. He never went as far as she was about to, at least not that he’d admitted to, but he’d had a whole lifetime to experience something she had never had the nerve to do—until now.
He’d gambled his fortune; she was risking her license to practice law. Not to mention the little matter of criminal prosecution for forgery and perhaps even fraud, depending on the zealousness of the district attorney who took on the case. The firm would suffer a devastating blow, but with her out of the picture, either in prison or disbarred and retired, it would recover in time. It was a hell of a chance she was taking, a criminal act so blatant there was no way she could begin to defend it in court.
Still, even knowing the potential consequences, once her decision was made, she hadn’t hesitated or looked back.
She sipped her coffee and stared out her office window at the traffic inching its way along Capital Mall. Finally, she was in a position to give something to Jessie instead of being on the receiving end. It felt good. Almost too good, considering the criminal element. She raised her cup in a salute.
This one is for you, Jessie Patrick Reed
.
Christina was late. She’d missed her connection in L.A., the plane sitting on the tarmac for forty-five minutes while the pilot waited for a gate to clear.
Still, she could have made it to the lawyer’s office on time if a guy in a wheelchair hadn’t crowded in front of her and snagged the last cab in line. Okay, a wheelchair was a bigger handicap than a wired jaw, but rudeness leveled the playing field. Luckily, no one around them understood what she’d shouted at the departing cab.
Arriving fifteen minutes late, she was surprised to see her “sisters” still ensconced in the waiting room. She barely had time to sit before a blond woman in a seventies-style dress that looked designer retro rather than vintage came into the waiting room and told them, “Ms. Hargreaves is ready to see you now. If you’ll follow me, please.”
Stealing a quick glance at her sisters, Christina judged them as uncomfortable about being there as she was. Even the standoffish one, Elizabeth, had come to this party. Obviously her reasons for not seeing their father hadn’t prevented her from attending the reading of his will. Or what Christina assumed was the reading of Jessie’s will.
Lucy stood to greet them, nodding to each in turn. She motioned to the four chairs in a semicircle in front of her desk. The “twins,” Rachel and Ginger, sat together leaving Christina no choice but to sit on the end next to Elizabeth.
“Is there anything you’d like before we get started?” Lucy asked. “Coffee? A soft drink? Water?”
Silence.
“All right. Do you have any questions you’d like to ask before I begin?”
Silence again.
“Well, why don’t I just get started then?” She lifted the top sheet of paper, sky blue and stiff.
Restrained as she was, Christina had to forgo asking if the firm had pink paper for the women clients who’d passed on. Maybe having her mouth wired shut was a good thing.
Lucy peered at them over her glasses. “I can read what’s here in its entirety, or summarize the salient points. Your choice.”
“Summarize, please,” Rachel said. “I have a meeting in the city this afternoon.”
“And the rest of you?” Lucy asked.
“Summarizing is fine,” Ginger said.
Christina nodded.
“Will we get copies?” Elizabeth asked.
“Yes, of course.” Lucy looked at each of them in turn before she put the will aside and leaned forward. “Basically, half of your father’s estate is designated to go to the seven charities and organizations he supported while he was alive. The other half is to be evenly divided among the four of you, his only living children.” She waited several seconds before continuing. “There are, however, conditions attached to your inheritances.”
Several heartbeats later Elizabeth asked suspiciously, “What kind of conditions?”
“I’ll go into that in a moment,” Lucy told her. “First you need to know what’s at stake. The remainder of the estate is slightly over ten million dollars—for each of you.”
There was an instant of palpable silence followed by audible gasps from everyone but Christina, who fought to keep from choking.
“What is that after taxes?” Rachel asked.
“The tax has been taken care of,” Lucy answered.
Ten million dollars?
Christina struggled to get her mind around the figure. For the past eight years her idea of rich was to own a car that had four good tires and an unchipped windshield. Now she could buy a dealership? No way. It just wasn’t possible. Try to sell a script with that plot and the writer would be laughed out of L.A.
Ten million dollars—no a little
over
ten million. How much was a little? Ten cents? A thousand dollars? A hundred thousand?
Elizabeth, stepping into her role of eldest daughter, was the first to recover enough to ask, “How did a man like Jessie Reed get that kind of money?”
Christina turned to look at her. Elizabeth’s face had turned a pale porcelain. Twin circles of rose-colored blush stood out on her cheeks like cherry lollipops.
“Your father didn’t have a dishonest bone in his body,” Lucy said with obvious restraint. “If he had, his estate would have been ten times what it is.”
“I guess that depends on your viewpoint and how you define honest,” Rachel challenged. “There are some of us who saw another side of Jessie Reed.”
“Get over it,” Christina snapped. “He left me, too. But do you hear me whining about it?” The words came out as crisp as oatmeal and as easy to understand as Latin.
They all turned to look at her, each with the same puzzled expression. Rachel was the one who asked, “What did you say?”
Damn
. No way did she want to explain her broken jaw to them. Christina shook her head and crossed her arms, hoping they’d take the hint and leave her alone.
“There is a condition,” Lucy said, drawing their attention. “The four of you are required to meet at your father’s house once a month for six consecutive months for a minimum of four hours. During this meeting you will listen to the tapes he made the last month of his life. Realizing each of you had questions he would not live to answer, he decided on this form of communication, hoping it would help bring closure to unresolved issues between you.”
Ginger started to say something; Lucy held her hand up to stop her. “One last thing. This condition is non-negotiable. If you choose not to participate, you forfeit your portion of the inheritance and it will be equally divided between the charities your father designated. Now, if you have questions I’d be happy to answer them.”
Elizabeth stood. “There’s no way something like this will hold up in court.”
“There is one more provision I haven’t mentioned,” Lucy said to them all. “Anyone who challenges the will is automatically disinherited. When you do your research, Ms. Walker,” she said to Elizabeth, “you’ll discover this particular condition has proven binding in wills written in California.
“However, even knowing this, should one of you still decide to challenge the terms of your father’s will, I feel obligated to tell you that I will defend his final wishes with absolute conviction, diligence, and vigor. How long all of your inheritances would be tied up during this process depends, of course, on the length of the trial and appeal—should there be one. One last thing I feel you should know. The ten million you would have inherited is certain to suffer appreciably—both in attorney and court costs.”
“That sounds like a threat,” Rachel said.
“I’m sorry if that’s the way it came across. It’s certainly not what I intended. I was simply being as thorough as possible in explaining the terms and how they affect each of you. I would be remiss were I to give you the impression your father’s wishes could be circumvented without consequence.”
“Why?” Ginger asked. “Why would he stay away all of our lives and then blackmail us into doing something like this? It doesn’t make sense.”
Lucy took a moment to answer. “Above all else, your father was a pragmatist. He anticipated there would be resistance to his simple request.”
“Simple?” Elizabeth shot back.
“No, that’s not what I meant,” Ginger said. “Why would he force us to get together every month? Wouldn’t it be easier simply to make copies of the tapes and let us listen to them privately?”
“Like that’s going to happen,” Christina mumbled behind her hand, doing nothing to hide her animosity toward her sisters. She turned to Elizabeth, the sister she had taken an immediate and lingering dislike to, if for no other reason than she could tell Elizabeth didn’t like her. “Your turn, Ms. Personality.”
Elizabeth’s eyes narrowed in a slow burn. “You know, it’s getting clearer and clearer why Jessie left you. I hate to say this, but I think I might have to give him this one.”
“Ouch,” Christina managed to say, the word dripping sarcasm. She flipped her hair behind her shoulder, making sure as much of the pink showed as possible. She smiled, inadvertently showing the odd way her teeth were held together.
Elizabeth frowned. “What happened to you?”
“My guess would be that someone slugged her,” Rachel supplied.
“No way,” Ginger said.
Shit
.
“It . . . isn’t . . . what . . . you . . . think,” Christina carefully mouthed, pausing at each word.
But it was. Rachel could see it in her eyes, the same look of embarrassment she’d seen in her mother’s eyes when one of her boyfriends left evidence of abuse and someone noticed. God, what was it with women who in their shame protected the men who hit them? If Jeff had ever—no, it wasn’t possible. It simply wasn’t in Jeff to hit a woman. She’d known men who could and did, and Jeff was nothing like them.
She could push Christina or give her the lie. “Car wreck?” Rachel offered.
Christina nodded and flashed Rachel a look acknowledging the unexpected kindness.
“That’s terrible,” Ginger said. “Are you okay? Was anyone else hurt?”
Christina waved her off, pointed to her mouth, and shrugged.
Something bothered Rachel about the will, but she couldn’t decide whether it was the idea of being under Jessie’s control—even if only for six months—or whether it was the will itself. Making tapes and manipulating the four of them into getting together to listen to them didn’t fit with the little she knew about Jessie Reed. Or maybe it was not what she knew about him as much as what she imagined. He hadn’t cared what they thought when he was alive—why would it matter after he was dead? It didn’t make sense.
Whatever the motivation, he’d found the method. Ten million dollars was a hell of an enticement. Especially when seemingly so little was asked in exchange. Twenty-four hours total in the company of three women, one of whom Rachel actually liked, listening to an old man try to justify his reprehensible behavior. She could do that. Hell, she’d lived eighteen years with a woman who hated her, listening to her complain how Rachel had ruined her life. Tuning out Jessie Reed would be nothing compared to tuning out her mother.
“I assume Jessie’s house is in Sacramento?” Elizabeth asked.
“Actually it’s not very far from here,” Ginger said. “It’s nice. Not what you’d expect from someone who had this kind of money, but better than I’ve ever lived in.”
The surprised looks coming from Elizabeth and Christina amused Rachel. It was almost as if they were jealous, possessive of someone neither of them had wanted anything to do with an hour ago.
“You’ve been there?” Elizabeth asked.
“Twice.”
“Why?” Christina mouthed.
“Why not?” Ginger said defensively.
Lucy gathered the papers on her desk, drawing attention to herself. “Am I to assume none of you intend to challenge the terms of the will? Or do you need more time to consider?”
“I don’t like it, but unless my attorney tells me something different, I’m willing to go along,” Rachel said.
Ginger said, “Me, too.”
Christina nodded.
They looked at Elizabeth. “It appears I can be bought,” she said with obvious reluctance. She glanced at Lucy. “Will you be there?”
“Only for as long as it takes to drop off the tapes and answer any questions you might have. I’ve arranged for your father’s housekeeper, Rhona McDowell, to stay on for the next six months, so she’ll be at the house when you’re there.”
“Don’t trust us to actually listen—or to stay the full four hours?” Elizabeth asked.
Lucy nodded, acknowledging Elizabeth’s question. “I’ve asked her to report to me after each meeting to let me know the conditions of your father’s will have been met. Depending on the time you choose to meet, lunch or dinner will be provided.”
It was everything Rachel could do to keep from laughing out loud at the bizarre normalcy of the minor details. The four of them were being confined for four hours once a month for six months—but not to worry, they wouldn’t go hungry.
“Do we pick the days, or do you?” Rachel asked. “If at all possible, I’d like to leave my weekends free.”
“Actually, the weekends are best for me,” Elizabeth said.
“She has her kids then,” Ginger said before Rachel could answer. “I think if at all possible the rest of us should try to work around—”
“Sundays are okay,” Rachel said, compromising. “It’s only once a month, and Jeff won’t mind.”
“How does the third Sunday each month sound?” Lucy asked. “Does that work for you, Christina?”
Christina shrugged and seconds later nodded.
“I’ll let Rhona know when to expect you, then,” Lucy said, pausing to give them time to object. When no one did, she went on. “There are directions to your father’s house along with copies of the will in an envelope my assistant has for each of you. Now, do any of you have any more questions?” Again she waited. “No? Then there isn’t any reason to keep you any longer.”