Chapter 6 Father’s Will
Chapter six
Father’s Will
“I’m sorry, Mr. Crawford’s in a meeting—”
Evelina pushed up on her toes in order to lean fully across the reception desk, her every exhale ruffling the other woman’s bottle-blonde hair. “Is. He. On. The. Property?”
Wendy, according to the nameplate, flicked a visibly uncomfortable glance around the small lobby. As if she were hoping someone had magically appeared in the previous two minutes.
They weren’t exactly a bustling office, though.
Evelina smacked her palm onto the counter-like surface separating them. “Answer the question, Wendy, before I forget my manners.”
Wendy’s eyes blew wide and she shrank as far back as her seat would allow. “Y-yes, upstairs. But he really is in a meeting. His schedule is—”
Evelina shoved back and spun toward the stairs. They were technically accessible so that clients could meet with their lawyers, and undoubtedly also so those lawyers could come and go more easily. But they probably should have been behind a door.
“You can’t go up there! You don’t have an appointment!” Wendy called after her.
“Turns out I do!” Evelina snapped back without breaking stride. She didn’t know for sure if Pyotr hadn’t just been bullshitting her. All she had was her instinct to go on, and her instinct said he’d been purposefully rubbing something in her face. That ‘thing’ being his presumed victory.
He always had had a bad habit of celebrating before the final verdict was in.
She turned down the hall at the top of the stairs, slowing her pace in an effort to determine her next destination.
If Crawford was in a meeting, would he be in his office or a larger room?
Crawford was only one of a few lawyers at the firm, but for whatever reason, he was the one her father had arranged to leave in charge of his estate.
That wasn’t a headache she’d wanted anyway, so really, she was just glad Pyotr hadn’t had a way to get his grubby hands into it. Or so she’d thought.
She didn’t have to go far before she found a closed door with the name she knew—Anwar Crawford—on a mounted placard.
She’d met the man before, knew he had salt-and-pepper hair with brown eyes and a patch of still-dark hair on his chin, but seeing his name spelled out gave her pause. What nationality is he, anyway?
Not that she cared. It was more that she was surprised her father might have worked with someone of ‘other’ descent. Which in itself was a strange thought, considering … well, her.
Evelina gave herself a sharp headshake and pressed an ear to the door.
Muffled voices carried through the thick wood.
Perfect.
She carefully tried the knob, found it unlocked, then threw the door open as hard as she could in a single motion.
Her gaze swept over the room as a pair of women—clearly multi-generational—let out choked shrieks.
The younger of the two leaped to her feet as Evelina spotted the man she was looking for.
He was hunched forward in a half-standing position behind his desk and staring at her wide-eyed with dawning recognition.
The woman on her feet found her voice. “Wh-who are—”
“We need to have a conversation, Crawford,” Evelina said, ignoring the unfamiliar pair. She stepped properly into the room and kept her glare on her target. “I’m hearing some very displeasing things. Things I should have been hearing from you.”
Crawford cleared his throat, straightened to his full height, and smoothed his tie. “Ms. Nikolaev, as you can see, I am with other clients. Any questions you have can wait until our scheduled meeting this afternoon.”
Evelina stomped forward at the same time as the older woman gasped, but still, she paid them no mind. Frankly, she was doing them a courtesy, revealing what kind of service the surviving family stood to receive by doing business with this ass.
If she let him live.
She pressed her knuckles onto the wood of his desk and leaned forward, not bothering to try matching his height.
She knew better than to lean on strengths she didn’t have, after all.
“Thank you, Crawford,” she purred, sarcasm dripping from her voice, “for confirming that there is an appointment today. Since neither you nor anyone else from your entire office could be bothered to call me—your deceased client’s actual legal next-of-kin—and tell me about it. ”
“Seriously?” The appalled utterance came from the younger of the two women still behind her.
Crawford’s attention flicked between them and he tugged at the top button of his shirt. “I’m sure you were notified, Ms. Nikolaev.”
Evelina stared him down. “Oh? So I’m forgetful, is that it?” She let her voice sharpen again. “Or are you calling me a liar?”
Crawford swallowed hard.
The women shuffled behind her, and an older, weaker voice spoke cautiously into the silence. “I think we’d be more comfortable taking our business elsewhere, Mr. Crawford. You understand. We’ll see ourselves out.”
Crawford’s focus slipped to them again and his mouth opened like he might try to call them back.
Evelina watched silently. Waiting. Unmoving. The anger she felt when Pyotr had first dropped the news of the coming meeting had risen to the surface inside her once more and felt like it was vibrating just beneath her skin. It was so much worse that the prick hadn’t been lying.
Seconds passed before Crawford took a large step back from his desk, his leg bumping his chair out of the way in the process.
“Ms. Nikolaev,” he finally said, “there’s no need for hostilities.
I can’t say I’m thrilled that you just cost me a client, but I’m willing to overlook that if you’ll just take this down a notch so we can have a civil conversation. ”
She gave him her best ‘you have got to be kidding me’ look. “Gee, I feel so bad for saving one of those women the secondary heartache of having their loved one’s estate lawyer fuck them over while the grief is still fresh. Let me just run right out and rectify that for you.”
His nostrils flared. “I am not in the business of—”
“Crime?” Her lips twitched. “Theft? Collusion? Fraud?” She straightened and cocked a hip. “What would you call it, then, Anwar? I’m very curious.”
He stomped forward and smacked his own palm onto the desk, outrage burning in his eyes. “We both know who the real criminal is here!”
Her smile broadened. “Funny. I’m starting to think it’s you.
” She tipped herself forward again, just at the shoulders, and lowered her voice.
“You’re being very presumptuous about me, don’t you think?
Just because of my name. You know, my father tossed me out of his house when I was still a teenager. ”
He huffed. “Yet here you are, demanding his legacy.”
Her faux amusement evaporated and her arm fell back to her side. “I’m demanding what’s mine,” she snapped. “And you”—she shoved a finger into his chest—“are supposed to be checking in with me. That is what we agreed on. That is what you promised. That is the goddamn point.”
Crawford smacked her hand away. “I never worked for you, you spoiled brat. I worked for your father, and I work for his successor. Now get out of my office.”
Evelina reared back and folded her arms across her chest. “So, you admit you’re betraying my father’s Will.”
“I will read his Will to the letter,” Crawford said through gritted teeth. He pointed sharply to the side, toward his door, even as she registered the sound of heavy steps. “Now leave, before security hauls you out by the armpits and dumps you on the street.”
She narrowed her eyes back at him. “The next man who lays a finger on me is a dead man.” Granted, her gun was tucked into her purse, so extracting it and keeping her promise would probably cause more of a scene. But hell, she wasn’t of a mood to care at this point.
“Entitled bitch.” He jerked his chin at her, the caution he’d shown earlier entirely gone. “Throw her out. Ms. Nikolaev is no longer welcome here. She’s just going to have to miss the reading of her daddy’s will.”
That does it. Evelina shrugged her purse down to her elbow, well aware she was going to have to get a little messy as the first lumbering shadow fell over her. Had there been two security guys, or three?
A meaty hand clamped over her bicep, squeezing too tight. “Don’t try anything stupid, sweetheart.” The words were barely past his lips before a brief, high-pitched whistle cut through the air and the hand on her arm went slack, then fell away altogether.
Even as Evelina turned her head, she noted the color drain from Crawford’s face. She knew what she’d see. One muscle-bound male in a too-tight, black tee emblazoned with generic lettering identifying him as security, dead on the floor. Blood still oozing from a hole in his head.
Another whistle preceded another heavy thud just behind her.
“You should’ve listened,” Otto said, a dangerous rumble in his voice. “Now your men are dead.”
Her heart leaped and Evelina turned the rest of the way around, unsurprised to find Otto kicking aside the nearer dead man’s corpse in order to position himself at her side. He still held his gun drawn, but he’d adjusted the sight to Crawford.
It was unhealthy how relieved she felt to see him. She actually had to fight her smile.
“You”—Crawford’s voice choked—“you fucking killed them!”
“She warned you.”
Evelina faced the bastard lawyer again, her confidence boosted as inappropriate warmth bloomed in her chest. “Please pay attention, Anwar,” she said, keeping her tone calm and unaffected.
“All I want from you is my father’s Will.
I don’t even care if you tell my repulsive cousin I came asking for it after I leave.
” In fact, she very much hoped he did. It was the entire reason she was going to leave him alive.
“I want a full copy, in writing, so there’s no disputing the facts. That’s not so disagreeable, is it?”