Chapter Fourteen
Holland took a few big steps toward her father.
Isla followed behind with more measure. He glanced at Isla, his dark eyes assessing her in a single sweep, then moving back up to her face to study more intently.
She tensed, wondering if she’d seen a glimmer of recognition in his appraisal.
She readied herself for him to call her out and kick her out on her ass.
But when his eyes cooled to the detached expectation of someone waiting to be told why this new person mattered, she relaxed.
Holland made the introductions. “This is my friend Isla. Isla, this is my dad, Victor Corrigan, and his right hand and go-to, Dixon.”
“Good to meet you,” Victor said politely enough, watching his daughter and her new friend with curiosity.
Dixon leaned toward his ear. “Miss Thorne is the young lady who assisted Holland last night when her car caught a flat. She helped Holland get home in a rideshare.”
Victor’s thick and commanding eyebrows rose nearly to his perfectly cut hairline. “Rideshare? When we have a fleet of cars and drivers?”
Holland rolled her eyes. “We’ve been over all this already, Dad. Earlier today when you went on and on about keeping one of the guys around and having my car checked out and not breaking phones and—”
Isla jumped in, not wanting an argument rehashed with her present. “It’s my honor to meet you, Mr. Corrigan.” She pretended not to see the way Victor and Dixon looked at each other in amusement. Had she laid it on too thick?
“What I mean is that you’re very well known around here, and I guess all over.
I mean, the Corrigan Group and all its subsidiaries and interests?
Your company portfolio is massive and varied.
You don’t just stick to a certain type. Your asset management company.
Commercial real estate like the shopping center in Los Angeles.
You have a shipping company that coincides with the trucking company.
Your research and development arm vets the ventures you’re interested in taking over.
” She’d only named a few, though that already seemed like too much.
Listing his whole portfolio too early would look too obvious, and she had to play this just right.
“And the Bennett & Corrigan Foundation as well. Can’t forget that. It’s done phenomenal work.”
Victor said, “You’ve done your homework. If only some of my employees did the same.”
“I minored in international business and public relations, so the Corrigan Group business model is something the professors referenced often.”
Victor looked to Dixon again with a raised eyebrow and a hint of amusement Isla wasn’t sure was a good thing or bad. She wasn’t easily moved, but Victor Corrigan was intimidating, and she could tell that when he wanted to be, he could even be terrifying.
“Did you know we are taught and referenced often at schools, Dixon?”
“I did not, sir.”
Isla said, “You’re making fun of me.”
Victor was surprised, and for a split second, his guard dropped.
Something softer and nostalgic slipped in when he looked at her.
“You sound like . . .” He stopped himself, shaking off whatever had just come upon him.
“No one’s called me to come speak at one of their classes.
Not even UVA. You’d think they’d ask a local. ”
Dixon asked, “Do you want me to tell them to extend you an invitation to speak?” There was a hint of a tease.
Holland rolled her eyes. “Like you’d ever agree to chatting up a bunch of college kids. You’re not the most chatty outside the boardroom, and the students would probably annoy you.”
Isla was surprised at Holland’s frankness in front of company.
She watched Victor for his reaction, expecting him to have a volcanic-size eruption because of the short fuse and no-nonsense attitude people said he had.
He didn’t meet her expectations, laughing as if Holland had delivered the funniest line.
It caught Isla off guard because she hadn’t found one photo of him where he was anything but serious.
It must be Holland who brought out his softer side, something Isla hadn’t thought he had, not if he was the unfair ogre Eden had made him out to be.
Maybe he was different with his employees than with family.
Maybe that was why the image Eden had created and the man Isla observed now with his daughter were starkly different.
Holland said, “Well, it’s true. You don’t have the patience to sit around and answer a bunch of college kids’ questions, so you’d be intolerable. Dixon, back me up.”
The three of them looked as Victor’s second weighed his words.
“Dixon,” Victor warned teasingly.
Dixon replied, “I would say Holland is accurate in her analysis of your behavior if asked to speak with students. And you have received many offers to speak, be interviewed, or be the subject of a thesis and so forth. We just don’t push them up to you.”
Victor grunted like he was unsure if he liked that. “How do you know I wouldn’t do it if you didn’t ask?”
Dixon, with all the seriousness in the world, replied, “Because I know you, sir.”
“At any rate, still let me know. I value education. Even if I say no a hundred times, I want to know what’s coming in. One day I may say yes.”
Dixon nodded, instruction received, but his expression said he had no intention of following through with that. Dixon probably knew Victor way better than he knew himself.
Victor’s attention was back on Holland, who was catching him up about the wallet and Isla bringing it. Isla only added a few responses to his questions, feeling the weight of his judgment even in his brief moments of levity.
“Good Samaritan times two,” he said, his tone back to cursory politeness. It wasn’t his daughter he was speaking to but a stranger who’d appeared in his relative orbit twice. “Sorry for your trouble.”
Isla brushed it off. “Wasn’t any,” she lied.
It was plenty. All day waiting until the right time.
The nearly hour-long drive back up the big-ass hill.
The even longer ride it would take to get back down and to her temporary housing, just to hope there would be another opportunity for her to get in and stay in.
The only person who seemed to want Isla around was Holland, and she wasn’t sure that was enough.
They were interrupted by the faint jingle of jewelry approaching as Brooke Corrigan entered.
The quick click of her designer heels on the marble floor spoke of impatience and annoyance.
She was deep in conversation with a tall man with dark hair and piercing blue eyes that looked like they didn’t miss a thing.
Isla didn’t need to search her memory too deeply to connect a name with the face.
The guy was Jackson Russell, maybe mid-fifties and the lawyer for the Bennett & Corrigan Foundation, which Brooke had founded twenty years ago.
From what Isla remembered, Jackson had started working for Brooke’s father’s company right after college, until she married Victor at twenty-three and joined the Corrigan Group.
Then he worked under the Corrigan Group, quickly rising up the ranks and eventually becoming the lawyer for the Bennett & Corrigan Foundation, which Brooke had established as a new arm beneath the corporation.
Jackson pulled out a pack of gum, slid out a foiled piece, and popped it in after he’d unwrapped it.
“Darling,” Brooke said to Victor. She moved close to him but not enough to touch. “Donna and I were trying to plan for the Man of the Year award you’re getting soon. If I could have some time to go over the details with you?”
Victor said, “Check my schedule with Dixon and Mae to see if something’s open. I don’t want a big event. They really can just mail the plaque, or whatever they’re giving me, and we can avoid wasting money on a party to show it off.”
Brooke let out a deep sigh, and in it, Isla could sense there was a lot going on. Even his wife had to make an appointment just to talk. Isla nearly felt bad for her until Brooke’s attention landed on her, her eyes narrowing in a way Isla didn’t particularly like.
“You’re the one who assisted Holland,” she stated through a polite smile that didn’t reach her eyes. Her tone dripped with skepticism. “How’d you come to be here?”
Isla kept her expression neutral, but registered the rude question as well.
She was about to answer when Victor spoke up for her, informing his wife that Holland had left her keys and Isla had been gracious enough to return them.
They should be thankful. It was a clear warning from him to her to be nice.
Brooke swallowed down whatever comment she wanted to make, her gaze flickering to Holland, then back to Isla. She managed another thin smile. “Very kind of you to return her keys.” She turned back to Holland. “Did you check that you have everything?”
Holland blinked back her surprise, stammering, “Mother?”
“Nothing’s missing, right? Donna, maybe we should have the locks changed, just in case. You understand, of course,” Brooke said, like she wasn’t making implications toward Isla.
Isla reined in her irritation, refusing to show she’d been affected by the slight in any way. She wouldn’t give Brooke Corrigan the satisfaction.
“It would be pretty dumb of me to make a copy of someone’s keys, hand deliver them to the owner in her heavily guarded home where everyone can identify me, and then break into her dorm afterward,” Isla said.
Brooke’s manicured fingers curled, and Isla believed that if she could, the woman would kick her out on her ass. She looked like she wanted to rip Isla’s face off. She was about to say something back when one of the kitchen staff called for dinner.
“Holland, honey, why don’t you call for a car to take Isla home? It’s getting late, and I’m sure she has things to do.”
Isla shook her head. “No, not really.” The way Isla had timed it, she’d hoped to arrive around this time, and most appreciative people would offer a meal to a stranger who had gone out of her way for one of theirs.
Holland was back at her side, arm looping through Isla’s. She announced that Isla would stay for dinner. “That’s fine with you, right, Dad? You’ll stay right, Isla?”
Isla agreed quickly, much to Brooke’s chagrin. She wasn’t sure how she’d offended Brooke so quickly or why Brooke was acting so territorial.
“Whatever you want, Holl,” Victor said, already down the hall with Dixon a step behind. Myles had appeared and quietly watched the scene play out, taking in all the players. Not the players—one. Isla. She’d have to be careful with him.
Again, Brooke looked like she was about to say more and override Victor, now that he was out of earshot, but Jackson coughed. When she glanced at him, he gave the slightest headshake, and she retreated.
“Guess I’ll have someone set the table,” Brooke said curtly, though Isla was sure there were always extra settings for moments like this. Surely Donna, Dixon, and Jackson were going to join, since they’d made no moves to dismiss themselves when dinner was called.
Still, Isla didn’t miss the undercurrent of anger in Brooke’s voice as she instructed another staff member to ensure there were enough settings.
Brooke watched each movement her child made with hawkish eyes.
Then those eyes slid over to Jackson, and he shook his head ever so slightly.
Isla kept her thoughts to herself, processing it all.
Had anyone else noticed how Brooke looked to Jackson for assistance or backup instead of her husband?
Or how distracted and detached Victor was as they all moved to the dining room?
A bigger person would read the room and bow out of dinner.
However, Isla was not a bigger person. Despite Brooke’s obvious and odd hostility, and the ease with which Victor had suddenly lost interest in all of them, and the small comforting smile that Jackson offered Isla as a way of easing his employer’s behavior.
He mouthed, Sorry.
Isla tensed. It felt like an odd action for Jackson. He was probably trying to be helpful, but it came across as throwing shade at the person he was supposed to be loyal to. It was as if he were trying to get into Isla’s good graces and hedge his bets for some game Isla wasn’t yet aware of.
Or maybe, Isla, the man was just trying to make you feel better.
It could just be that too.
Dinner would be awkward but a gold mine of information.
It was an opportunity to ingratiate herself while piecing together the family dynamics during a time when they should be enjoying each other’s company.
A chance to observe them up close and determine what her next steps would be.
Isla would play her role well—polite, graceful, appreciative, awestruck as if she were at Disney World, with occasional flickers of curiosity at the brooding oldest brother across from her.
Myles remained at his perch against the wall, watching everything go down, hands in the pockets of his tailored charcoal slacks. His matching vest hinted that beneath was evidence of fastidious workouts and bench presses.
Not the time, Isla.
But it might have to be. She might have to play up a crush on one of the brothers to keep them off her scent, to cozy up and dig around for any proof of Eden.
Jackson couldn’t apologize away Brooke’s unprovoked hostility toward Isla.
For some reason she didn’t want Isla there, sharing space with them.
Clearly she thought Isla wasn’t worthy. Maybe she felt Isla was some kind of threat gunning for Victor or one of his sons.
Isla absolutely had ulterior motives, but it wasn’t for the reasons Brooke Corrigan thought.