CHAPTER 51 Charlie
CHAPTER 51
Charlie
I regain consciousness to realize Lonnie is carrying in a struggling, squirming Rowan, his mouth duct-taped and his hands tied behind his back. He’s in a tailored suit and looks like a million dollars. A billion dollars.
My heart does this thing it’s never done before, where it threatens to shatter because he’s hurt.
He looks at me with those wide blue eyes, pink hair falling into them. He’s clearly trying to convey something without words, but I’m not in tune enough to understand.
Fuck .
The asshole leaves, locking the door, and I start trying to hop the chair over to him, hoping I can get his duct tape off so we can talk to each other.
But before I move more than a few inches, Rowan’s gotten his arms released and is ripping off the duct tape himself. Then he bounds over to me.
“How the fuck did you do that?” I hiss. “Are you actually James Bond?”
“They didn’t check me for my knife,” Rowan says. “Amateurs. ”
“What the fuck?” I whisper.
“Daddy, no time. Let me get you out of here.”
He uses the knife to cut the tape on my hands, and then we both work on my legs.
“How are we going to get out of here?”
“That’s where Chet and Fabian come in.”
I hear a commotion outside the room.
“I don’t want to sit here and wait for them. I feel like that’s a bad idea. I’ve been so fucking worried,” I admit.
He holds me in his arms and kisses me. “I’ve never been more scared in my life than when I figured out that they had you.”
“You didn’t believe I’d ditch out on our wedding?”
He kisses me again. “I may have worried for a second. But I figured out pretty fast that something was wrong.”
“You St. Thomases have a deep-seated tendency toward conspiracies and machinations, don’t you,” I say.
Rowan giggles. “True. I fit in better than I ever imagined.”
“What are you going to do now? Enact a vengeance plan?”
“Perhaps.” He grins. “Or maybe I’ll take a lesson from you and call the police.”
I raise an eyebrow. “You?”
Sirens sound outside. “Xavier already did. Are you disappointed in me?” Rowan asks. “That I’m not actually going to kill my relatives?”
I smile. “I just wanted the chance to use a roundhouse kick.”
“I can’t believe there are stars from the Hollywood Walk of Fame in the concrete outside the station,” Danny says as he walks into the room Rowan and I are hanging out in in the LAPD Hollywood Station.
Despite everything, I chuckle. “It’s LA, man.”
“Yeah, I know. Still. ”
“The Walk of Fame is everywhere,” Rowan says. He’s been sitting in my lap the entire time we’ve been at the police station, refusing to move even when the officer pointed out a perfectly good chair right next to him. I wrap my arms around his middle and hold him tighter to me. We’re calmer now that we’ve updated Cam, Shelby, and everyone else and assured them that we’re all okay.
We’re in a meeting room in a midcentury modern brick building with terrazzo floors and tired furniture. I’m perfectly capable of giving a statement to the cops without legal representation, but I know I shouldn’t. Maybe there is room for the law in my life after all.
Danny came over right away when I called. Rowan won’t get off of me so I can give Danny a bro hug, so I settle for clasping his hand in a kind of high five that morphs into a handshake.
“So, what happened?” Danny asks, settling down at the table and pulling out a legal pad.
Over the course of the next few minutes, Rowan and I each tell our pieces of the story. “I’m so glad you figured out what I was saying,” I tell him.
“The moment you said love is the answer, I knew something was wrong,” he says.
Danny laughs. “Wait, Charlie said that love is the answer? He hates it when that’s the conclusion in movies or whatever.”
Rowan nods. “Exactly. So that clued me in.”
“Smart. Okay, continue,” Danny says.
When we’re done talking with Danny, he invites in the officers, who take our statements.
“What’s going to happen to Gideon and Lonnie?” Rowan asks.
“They’re being processed,” the officer says. “I’m not sure what the judge will set for bail.”
“At least we got to see them get handcuffed,” Rowan says. “That was satisfying. What happened to the other guys? The muscle?”
“Rodney Smith and Chester Brown, the limo driver and his associate, have also been booked on multiple charges,” Danny says. “Right?”
The officer nods.
It wasn’t a surprise that Lonnie held a grudge against Rowan. What we hadn’t known was that he’d developed a sort of bond with Gideon while he’d been working for the St. Thomases—birds of a feather—and they’d kept in touch after Lonnie was fired.
If Rowan hadn’t been found, the money in the trust would eventually have gone to Nana. Gideon must have been hoping that Nana would share it with Barbara, and he’d eventually get his hands on it. All of that is assuming that Anastasia and Bree didn’t litigate, which they assuredly would have, hoping for a chunk of the money in a settlement. But as it is, they all will get nothing. Gideon confessed that, after hearing Nana’s suggestion about marriage, he had hired Lonnie, as well as Rodney and Chester, who were monitoring calls as part of the security team, to bring Rowan and me to him before the wedding could take place. So far, there’s nothing tying Anastasia and Bree to Gideon’s actions, but I hope the police bring them in for questioning anyway.
When we’re finally free to go, we say goodbye to Danny and return to Nana’s house. Apparently she and Barbara had been away for the day at a garden called Lotusland in Montecito. When she found out what had happened, Nana called Rowan and asked him to come up immediately.
So now we’re back in Nana’s funky living room, eating her shortbread and looking between her and Barbara. It feels particularly surreal after being imprisoned in one of the secret rooms in the same house.
“I really don’t understand,” Nana is saying, her face drained of its usual color. “Explain it to me again. ”
Barbara has her head in her hands. “The police are talking to Gideon.”
“Actually, ma’am, they took him into custody,” I correct.
“He had some belief that since Remi had no children, he’d get some of the money?” Nana asks. Her chin trembles.
Rowan nods.
“This feels like a betrayal,” Nana says, her eyes wide and brows furrowed.
“That’s because it is,” Barbara says.
They give each other a significant look. Nana reaches over and squeezes Barbara’s hand.
“And Lonnie was in on it, too?” Nana asks. I nod. She sighs. “We all have weak spots that we can’t see. Lonnie’s uncle was a very good man who helped Remi for years. I imagine Remi felt indebted to him.”
“That’s what he told me,” Rowan says. “I wasn’t particularly pleased when Lonnie kidnapped me.”
Nana gasps, and she spreads her fingers out in a fan against her breastbone. “He what?”
“That’s how this whole thing started,” Rowan says. “My father wanted to find out whether I was really his son, and Lonnie’s answer to that was to stick a gun in my face and drug me.” He shrugs. “Okay, I wasn’t particularly receptive when Lonnie first approached me without the gun. But still, escalate much?”
“I had no idea. All I knew is that the long-lost heir was finally found.” Nana rubs her cheeks. “So what do we do now?”
“I’m utterly torn,” Barbara says, her eyes shiny with tears. “What Gideon did was inexcusable, but he is my son. He shouldn’t be rewarded for his actions, and I don’t want to pay for his legal defense. But …” She wrings her hands and repeats, “He’s my son. I don’t know what to do.”
“You don’t want to pay for his defense,” Nana says, “because you know he did it. Maybe he can enter into a plea deal. ”
“I don’t think I’ll feel safe when he and Lonnie get out on bail,” Rowan admits. “What if they come after me again?”
“Well, maybe in the short term, you and Charlie can be sure to be far away when he’s released. And in the long term, Nana and I will have a discussion with him about what he can and cannot reasonably expect from this family.” Barbara shakes her head.
Nana looks harried. “I feel like so many problems could be resolved with just a little more communication.”
“And a little less greed,” I say. Although I feel like a jackass saying it, since my boyfriend is going to be one of the richest people on the planet in a year or so.
“Make no mistake: When Gideon is released, he is not receiving any of my money, either,” Nana says. Barbara nods. She turns to Rowan. “I’ll talk with my lawyers and make sure of that. Is that satisfactory? Or do you want more retribution?”
“It’s not really okay, but it’s probably the best we can do,” he says. “I don’t want Barbara to have her son rot in jail. I just want him to change and not be the way he is.”
“And that’s probably not possible,” Nana says.
Rowan looks up at the ceiling. “Maybe he won’t care as much if Charlie and I get a little distance from him and don’t see him often.”
“Leave him to us,” Barbara says. She turns to both of us, her face serious. “I want to apologize to both of you. I’m sorry for what Gideon did to you. You didn’t need to go through that. I don’t know where he went wrong, but clearly he did, and I’m so sorry I didn’t see it sooner.”
“It’s not your fault,” Rowan says, and I nod. As Rowan said, it’s not really a satisfactory outcome, but I don’t see a better alternative. Still, Barbara’s regret seems sincere, and it feels good to have our fear and discomfort acknowledged.
A week later, Rowan and I are in our swim trunks, lounging on the deck of a superyacht he chartered in the south of France.
The sun is setting, and we’re wet from a dive in the Med. The breeze is warm on our faces, the scent of flowers wafting over us.
A uniformed crew member brings us each a crystal flute of champagne with a strawberry in it. Rowan and I take them and clink our glasses to each other.
Then we sip. The champagne is dry, but the sweetness of the fruit balances it out. It’s pretty perfect, actually.
“Is this a honeymoon without the wedding?” I ask Rowan.
He shrugs. “Eh, sure. Or it’s just time to enjoy being with you in a swimsuit.” He leers at me, and I laugh.
He sets down his drink, gets off his deck chair, and prances over to mine. Straddling me, he produces his switchblade from thin air, opening it and holding it to my neck. He grins. “For old time’s sake.”
“Quit it and kiss me, baby boy,” I growl.
He does as Daddy asks.