Twenty-Seven
WHAT?” KEVIN COMPLAINS.
I look over, finding him regarding us from the door, hands planted petulantly in his pockets. “You,” I rage, realizing why Lexi knows what I’m here for. Paper codes in a safe.… Unfuckingbelievable. If five seconds of overheard conversation I let happen out of momentary weakness led Kevin Webber to ruin my entire enterprise—
His concentration is on Lexi. “You want to work with Olivia? I thought we were partners,” he whines.
I recognize myself in the glance Lexi gives him. I grasp on to the opportunity. Kevin has messed enough up. I resolved I would deal with him later. Now, it seems, is later. I need him out of the way, eliminated from whatever dangerous equation Lexi is offering me.
“Sorry, Kevin,” I say with sarcasm dialed up to eleven. “It looks like no one wants to work with you. Again. You really are an atrocious businessman.”
“Dude, come on,” Kevin implores.
“Need I remind you, you did double-cross us,” Tom points out. “Dude.”
While Kevin sulks, I walk over to my dad’s desk. I sit down in his maple-and-leather chair, needing to rest my feet and also wanting to look cool. I cross my legs calmly.
“Tell me what you want for the passcodes,” I say.
Lexi’s eyes dance with delight. Her rouge lips curl. She slips the folded paper into her bra, which is gross. Can’t wait to hold it later.
Opposite me, she seats herself languidly on a chesterfield couch while Tom and Kevin remain standing near the door, our audience. Everything in the room has the same feel of unearned luxury and stately entitlement. Sitting on the soft leather, Lexi fits right in.
“When Dash and I got married, we signed a prenup,” she begins.
I stay silent. I’ve watched my dad enough to know forcing the other person to do the talking is the position of power. Nevertheless, I’m sweating. Eighteen minutes have wound down to fourteen.
“I knew I would have to sign it,” she continues. “I knew I wouldn’t get any of his money should we divorce. However, I also knew your father’s… proclivities.”
“You mean how he’s a dirtbag who cheated on my mother with… Who was it again? A real piece of work she was,” I interject. Forget the position of power. With Lexi, I can’t help indulging familiar instincts for spite. Old habits die hard, I guess.
Unlike insincere marriages.
The campaign I waged against my ex-stepmother over the months of her and Dash’s marriage was, in honesty, not only out of resentment for Lexi. It was my coping mechanism. In the early days, when I moved from the guest cottage into my mom’s new home, I would spend every dinner here racked with conflicting emotions. I felt guilty for how much I missed this house, when it represented my dad and his cushioned cruelty.
Even deeper down, I hated how much I missed him or even the idea of him. I wanted to hate him fully—I did. Driving up the winding path in Mom’s and my crappy shared car, I just knew I didn’t yet.
Lashing out at Lexi was my release. I could hide from how complicated my feelings on my father remained—from how difficult I found disentangling my heart from the parent who rejected me. If I couldn’t fully hate my dad, hating Lexi was very, very easy.
Granted, she did herself no favors. She loved playing house. Playing mom, plying me with syrupy questions whenever I was here for dinner. How’s your new school? When’s prom? Do you have your dress? Who’s Jackson?
Loathing my father got easier, of course. I no longer had need for her when my father replaced her with Maureen.
Lexi doesn’t flinch under my insults, likely leveraging muscle memory of her own. She examines her flawless manicure. “Yes,” she replies. “I suspected he would cheat again. Our sudden divorce nearly confirms it.”
I cannot fault Lexi’s logic. Cheaters never change. Not when they’re your dad. Not when they’re your ex.
“Wow. I’m so sorry,” I say dryly. “How awful. You didn’t deserve it at all.”
Lexi narrates on as if I haven’t spoken. “Like I said, I suspected he would cheat, so when he handed me the prenup,” she says, “I had him add an infidelity clause.”
Now I lean forward onto the desk. Interesting.
I remember Lexi’s persistence. I remember her vicious marital ambition, her lack of guilt for upending my parents’ relationship and ruining my life. I remember her immediate, almost-oblivious entitlement—her greatest similarity to my father. Where my mom unashamedly never entirely got used to the privilege surrounding her, and where Maureen overcompensates, preening and showing off how she feels she owns this place, Lexi acted like she simply did.
I do not, however, remember Lexi for cunning or intellect. The “infidelity clause” is worth credit I would not have assumed she deserved.
“He agreed that if I ever got proof of him cheating, I would receive five million,” she explains unceremoniously.
I feel my eyebrows rise. I’m honestly surprised my dad agreed. Yes, he’s gauche, he’s selfish, he’s cheating-inclined. He is not, historically, stupid.
“In order to collect, I need proof,” Lexi continues. “And I want to collect. Here, tonight. At his wedding.”
Folding my fingers in front of me, I stare. “You think I have proof my father—who kicked me out of the house for telling my mother I caught him cheating on her with you—is cheating again?” I recap, my insinuation clear. I’m the least likely person Dash would let evidence of his adultery reach.
The point doesn’t perturb my former stepmom. “I think you can get it,” she says. “Everyone in Dash’s life is here tonight. His office is empty. I know you have… sticky fingers.” Her smile sparkles without warmth. “Find it,” she orders me.
I grit my teeth, not pleased she’s mentioned my shoplifting in front of Tom and Kevin. I was only ever caught once. The convenience store called my mom, who I guess felt obligated to relay the news of my unconsummated lipstick larceny over to Dash. While Mom, who picked me up from where the store detained me, was upset, she let me off easy punishment-wise. I know she understood what I was dealing with, how confused and on edge I was.
When I came here for weekly dinner, Dash yelled at me, obviously. It was easy to ignore—I knew he just wanted to feel dominant and warn me against messing with his reputation.
Lexi, however—Lexi was worse. She wanted to mother me about it. Even while I gave her nothing, her questions sharpened into scalpels, probing how I must’ve needed to act out with everything I was facing at home.
With her expectant eyes on me now, I push aside the resentment. I can’t let it interfere with solving the very serious problem I’m facing. I need to figure out a faster way to obtain the codes from Lexi. I can’t just interrogate every guest and ask if they’ve slept with my father.
“Look, Lexi,” I say, exhausted. “The codes in your bra will get us into Dash’s offshore accounts. How about I just give you five million and skip the recon into my dad’s sex life? Everyone wins. Except him, I guess.”
Lexi grimaces. “It’s not about the money, Olivia,” she replies. It’s small comfort she’s dropped “Livy” for the moment. “I thought you would understand better than most. It’s about him. I want him to pay me because he has to. Because I was his wife.”
My head hurts; my heart pounds. I’m glad the emotion painting my cheeks isn’t visible under my foundation. I stand sharply. “I’m sorry, but I can’t help you.”
Lexi rises, startled. “Why? You would just give up the little heist you planned over something this simple?”
I nod. “I’m not helping you. Ever.”
Heading for the door, I ignore the look on Tom’s face. I understand his deep alarm, I do. I’ll need to explain our defeat to the rest of the crew or reconfigure The Plan or I don’t know what. It’s ninety-nine percent certain the day will end with our phones in the ocean.
“What about Mr. Peter McCoy?”
Lexi’s question halts me immediately.
The next moment, my gaze flies to Kevin. He shuffles his feet defensively. “I mean, come on,” he offers. “You didn’t really think I wouldn’t recognize a teacher, did you?”
I glare—no, glower, hot indignation filling me up. Dealing with Lexi, I felt resentment. I understood her despite the world of inconvenience she’s caused me. Knowing Kevin’s put my co-conspirator and friend on the line, what I feel is rage. “You’re desperate for people to like you,” I seethe. “But have you ever done anything worth liking?”
His face falls. It earns him no sympathy from me.
I turn back to Lexi, recovering my composure. “McCoy did nothing illegal,” I inform her.
When Lexi frowns, I recognize finally the stepmother I once knew. Gone is the voluptuous negotiator holding my heist in her hands. Instead, her concern is coated on heavily. She’s not mad, just disappointed.
“He planned to, though, didn’t he?” She shakes her head mournfully. “Kevin here was just so chatty when I was searching the office. Kidnapping, Olivia? I know you’ve had your indiscretions, but this is really bleak.”
“Olivia,” Tom interjects, the wavering note in his voice impossible to ignore, “who knows what else Kevin has said?”
Unfortunately, he’s very right. Deonte. Tom. Cass. McCoy. I won’t let them go down for this, not when I’m the one who brought them into it. The chess club code names feel ominous now. I’ve just realized the fundamental danger they imply. In chess, you play an opponent who’s out to knock each of your pieces from the board. Right now, the queen in front of me is poised to claim all of mine.
Except it isn’t checkmate. Not yet.
“Proof Dash cheated on you,” I say slowly, “and you’ll give us the codes and not say a word about what we’ve done?”
“You’ll never hear from me again, sweet stepdaughter,” Lexi confirms. “I guarantee it.”
I chew my lip. What she’s demanding of me is near impossible—like stealing millions from one of the most prominent men in media, like doing it while in high school. Like surviving half the shit I’ve dealt with. Impossible is my brand.
I hold out my hand.
When Lexi smiles, Kevin storms from the study, cut out once again.
With manicured fingers, my ex-stepmother shakes my hand on our deal.