Chapter 13 #2
I recognize this. It’s something John would have done, and did do, when I was younger to make sure I knew my place, to make me doubt myself, question my abilities, and to humiliate me.
I immediately stand and turn to face Andy, making sure I’m on equal footing and I get the sense that I’ve surprised him, but still, he presses on.
'There's a reason you were in an institution for ten years.
I mean, I'm sure that they've helped a little,' he says, giving me a tight smile that makes my eyes narrow.
'But let's be honest, you're not a normal girl and you don’t really belong in the real world. And then my brother,’ Andy rolls his eyes.
‘He’s filled your head with nonsense about being a scientist, or something. I mean, come on.'
He chuckles as his eyes roam my face. 'Did you think I didn't know about that?
Yes, I'm aware that you're not doing English Lit.
I'm not actually sure what you are doing, but I know that Applegate and your father were friends, so I can only assume that this is some kind of a nepotism thing. Not that I'm against that.’
'Is that why he's lost his job?' I ask.
'Applegate?’ Andy waves a hand. ‘That's just business.’
‘Like Mav losing his grant?'
Andrew shrugs. 'As I said at dinner, my father had let a few things slip past the net. I'm just getting my new house in order. Mav’s a smart guy, but there's no real market for his drug right now.'
'How can you say that?' I ask. 'People overdose and get addicted to opiate-based painkillers every year. People die.'
He lets out a light chuckle. ‘Let’s get back to the subject at hand.’
He takes hold of my wrist, tightening his grip just enough to convey a threat when I try to pull it out of his grasp.
‘You are under my guardianship, and I take that very seriously. Now, you might think that you’re equipped to handle the world, but I know you're not, and so does Jack, in reality.
I'm not sure why he's throwing out all of these fantastical ideas of—well, I don't even know what.
But the fact of the matter is, you're marrying into the Bandervilles.’
‘I’m not,’ I snort. 'Marcus is horrible. Just like his brother was.'
Andrew shakes his head, giving me a condescending smile.
'The things you come out with. He's just a businessman, Marguerite.
He'll make sure you're taken care of and safe.
You're marrying him. End of discussion. Now, I have work to do.
It would be best if you stayed here at the house instead of wherever my brother has you living.
I won't make you, but where are you staying? Just so I know.'
'The KIP House,' I lie.
'Okay. Well,' he checks his watch and goes to the door. ‘I have a call in about two minutes. I'll have Pinkers see you out. Good talk.'
He leaves the office, closing the door.
Sighing, I glance up at the camera. It’s on. There's no way that I can go through the desk again just in case I missed something before.
I stand up and make a show of looking around the room at all the encyclopedias and the books while I wait for the butler.
I note one that looks the same as the others but also different.
Not as dusty. There's no other defining characteristics, but why would John touch it all the time if it wasn’t important?
I take it down from the shelf, carefully keeping my back to the camera.
I shove it inside my coat, which Pinkers never took because he’s a sucky butler.
As I go past the other shelf, I'm struck by a sudden brainwave, and I snatch up a second item, shoving it inside my coat along with the book before I turn back toward the camera.
Pinkers enters just in time to be too late.
'I'm here to escort you out, ma'am,' he says monotonously.
'Sure,' I say, following him back through the house like I don't know my way.
I leave, trying not to run down the steps at break-neck speed while I hold the front of my coat. I get into Mav's truck and he gives me a searching look.
'Is everything okay?' he asks.
'Everything's fine.’
It’s not really a lie.
'What did Andrew say?'
'Not much,' I reply. 'It was actually a waste of time. But I may have something else.’
‘What?’ he asks.
‘I’ll show you later,’ I say. ‘Let’s just get out of here, huh? I need to be at the police station in thirty minutes.’
He doesn’t need any more prompting. We leave the Novelle estate.
Halfway back to Richmond, I open the window.
I unzip my coat and take out the horrid metronome that I swiped from the office.
I throw it into the road, watching in the side mirror as it smashes to the asphalt and splinters behind the truck.
Mav doesn't say a word as I put the window back up and smile a little to myself.
It’s a small thing, but it makes me feel better, makes me remember that this road that I'm on is my path, and I'm not going to let anyone derail me from my life and what I need again. Not Andy Novelle and not the police, either.
Though, as we pull up to the RPD station, my stomach twists. The last time I was in that building, my life was destroyed.
But I give Mav a small smile. ‘You’ll wait?’
He nods and gives me a kiss. ‘You don’t want me to come in?’
I shake my head. ‘The lawyer is over there. Shade sent me a picture. He told me to just do as he says, and everything will be okay. They don’t have anything on me.’
I get out of the car and walk over to the man who’s standing close to the main entrance.
‘Mr. Burrows?’ I ask.
He looks up at me and does a doubletake. ‘Marguerite Evans?’
I nod.
He looks at a loss for words.
‘Is everything all right?’ I ask.
‘Of course. I’m sorry. It’s just that I expected… Your stepfather always spoke about you as if…’ He trails off.
I snort. ‘I’m aware of what my stepfather told people about me,’ I tell him. ‘You should know before we go inside that he greatly exaggerated my mental deficiencies.’
‘Clearly,’ the lawyer mutters, seeming perplexed. ‘Uh, inside in the interview room, don’t speak unless I say it’s alright, okay? They’re just gathering information. I doubt they have anything on you.’
I nod, and put on my fake smile, as we go inside.
***
Mav
Back at the hotel, Daisy is quiet and pretty tight-lipped about the meeting with Andy as well as the interview with the cops.
She sits on the couch and stares out the large window toward Richmond listlessly.
I make her a tea and put it on the table next to her, but it sits untouched.
I don’t want to hover around her, because I know she doesn’t like it when she’s deep in thought, which she clearly is.
I think about doing some paperwork on the non-opiate to give her some time alone, but with the lab closed to me, really, I’m having trouble remembering the point.
So, instead, I sit on the couch close by in case she needs anything or decides she wants to talk, and I open my laptop to do some classwork.
It’s not long before the guys arrive back.
They’ve been over to the club and it’s pretty much ready for us.
Shade thinks we should move in there as soon as we can, and I agree.
When he mentions it to Daisy, she looks over at us for the first time.
‘When?’ she asks.
‘As soon as you want,’ Blake says.
She sits up straighter. ‘Today?’
The other two look as relieved as I feel. I think we were all a little afraid that she might want to stay here. She loves the hotel, and she enjoys Sauvage’s company. Plus, all the desserts…
‘What about Sauvage?’ she asks.
‘I’ve told him the club is pretty much finished,’ Shade replies. ‘He’s expecting us to leave soon.’
She nods and then goes back to looking out the window.
‘We can’t stay here forever,’ she says almost to herself. ‘And I’m looking forward to going back to the club. Get back to things being a little more normal. It’s sort of been like an in-between place here.’
‘Purgatory,’ Shade grumbles.
She grins. ‘More like limbo.’
She finally grabs the mug of tea and takes a sip. I sit down, sensing she’s ready to tell us what happened today.
‘So. The police station. I met with Detective Anders, and another one from the NYPD,’ she says, right on cue.
‘What happened?’ I ask.
She shrugs. ‘Nothing, really. Richard Burrows went in pretty hard on them, told me not to answer much, so, in the end, all I was allowed to say to them was that I was injured in the club gas leak and then sick with the flu, which is why I wasn’t around for a while, and then when I was feeling better, you guys took me to the UK for an early birthday trip.
And that was it. The Novelle house is more interesting as stories go. ’
‘Ok,’ Shade says as he and Blake take the other couch. ‘How did that go?’
She gives him an unimpressed look. ‘About as well as expected. He’s such an asshole and he won’t listen to me at all. The cognitive dissonance is real. We had an entire conversation, and he still really does think that I’m…’ She taps the side of her head. ‘But I did get this.’
She picks up the book from the side of the couch that she’s been carrying around since she got here. We all stare at it in a bit of confusion.
‘One of the ones from the office?’ Blake finally asks.
She nods.
‘The Crimean War.’ Blake squints at it. ‘Volume eight.’
He quirks a brow. ‘New hobby?’
She gives him a simpering look. ‘I took it because it looked like it was handled a lot more recently than the others. They were a little bit dusty on the shelf, probably since Stevens hasn’t been around to make sure everyone’s doing their jobs properly.’
She puts the book in her lap.
‘So, I took it. I haven’t opened it yet. I wanted to wait for us all to be here because I think it might be important.’
Her fingers trace the embossed title, and she opens the cover. We all lean forward a little. She was right. The middle of every page has been cut out to make a rectangular hollow, and there’s a stack of documents inside.
‘Ha!’ she exclaims quietly with no small amount of pride.
In fact, she looks very much like the cat that got the cream.
Shade lets out a breath. ‘That’s the Marchmont & Co. insignia.’
Daisy nods and her expression is expectant.
‘You were right,’ I say dutifully, and she gives us a superior look.
‘I know.’
‘Fussell and Meyer, too. My father must have cut out the middle and stashed them there,’ Shade murmurs as he stands and walks over. He takes them from her hand and lays them out on the coffee table.
‘Does Andy know you have this?’
She shakes her head. ‘No. I was careful. I was alone in the office when I took it. I had my back to the camera. It didn’t see me. I moved the books a little as well, so there wasn’t an obvious hole on the shelf where it had been. I snuck it out under my coat.’
I pick up one of the papers. ‘This is a copy of the marriage contract signed by Joseph and John.’
She takes the legal document from me and looks it over, her eyes widening.
‘This can’t be right.’
‘What can’t?’ Blake asks.
She points at a line and shows us.
‘The amount of money that’s being exchanged. Three hundred million dollars.’
Shade takes it back and stares at it.
‘The Bandervilles were going to pay my father three hundred million for Daisy to marry Joe.’
‘Well, I guess that explains why John wasn’t letting it go,’ I say with a frown.
Blake opens his computer and starts typing. The rest of us look through the other documents, but there are only some preliminary ones from prior to the signing. The marriage contract seems to be the only thing that’s important to us.
‘The Bandervilles can’t pay that,’ Blake says absently.
‘How do you know?’ Daisy asks.
‘Because I’m looking at their business financial statements. The ones that are public record. I can also see their accounts in real time. Even if they liquidated everything they own, there wouldn’t be enough to pay that kind of money.’
‘Then how are they going to keep to the deal they made?’ I ask, and glance at Daisy. ‘And, no offense, but why?’
‘Pop must have had something on them, why else would they pay for her? No offense,’ Shade says.
‘Shut up,’ Daisy says with a roll of her eyes. ‘Just because you say ‘no offense’ doesn't make it any less offensive. And I’m totally worth three hundred million.’
‘To us you are,’ I admit, taking her hand and kissing her palm. ‘But the Bandervilles—’
‘We just mean that it’s not normal for the groom’s family to pay the bride’s.’
‘But if the Novelles are blackmailing the Bandervilles somehow, and for that kind of money, that would explain why even Andy is so adamant that a marriage still goes ahead.’
‘Holy shit!’ Blake exclaims.
He turns his computer around so that we can all see the screen and gives Shade an apologetic look.
‘Sorry, dude, but by these numbers, the Novelles are flat broke. Their holdings are pretty much zero. Looks like your dad started selling stuff off years ago. The Novelles are a sinking ship. Andy needs that money from the Bandervilles.’
His eyes bore into Daisy and his brow furrows. ‘It’s you.’
We all give him varying looks of puzzlement.
‘What do you mean?’ Daisy asks. ‘What’s me?’
‘You have the money?’
She barks out a laugh.
‘I think I’d know if I had money, Blake,’ she scoffs.
‘Think about it. That’s the only explanation,’ he says.
‘The lawyers in New York. The Winters name on the paper we found. Your mom came from money. We know that because she wasn’t at Birchmore on a scholarship like Applegate was, and because she was engaged to John.
His family wouldn’t have made those kinds of plans if the Winters weren’t on par with the Novelles socially. ’
‘You know life isn’t actually like Pride and Prejudice, right?’ Shade asks him, quirking a brow.
Blake gives him an incredulous look. ‘In your circles? Are you serious? It’s more similar than you think, my friend.’
‘So, where did it all go?’ Daisy asks, crossing her arms over her chest. ‘My mom had nothing.’
Blake shrugs. ‘Maybe it’s not gone. Maybe it was just never hers.’
‘Because they cut April off when she married Mark Evans!’ I exclaim.
He points at me, snapping his fingers. ‘Yes! Gorgeous, if you have money left to you, say, in a Trust…’
‘She might not know about it,’ I finish.
‘And it might not be hers until she marries,’ Blake says, smacking his palm to his forehead, ‘Fuck, this is old school. I feel like I’m in a period drama right now. This is just like a Regency Era plot to steal an heiress’s fortune!’
‘And, while a guardian wouldn’t be able to touch the money directly,’ Shade continues with the line of reasoning as he paces around the room, ‘he could keep the knowledge from you until you were an adult, make you marry, wait for your husband to control it, and then get his cut from the Bandervilles for making it happen. Everyone wins, Daisy.’
He closes his eyes, looking as disgusted by his family and the Bandervilles as I think we all are.
‘Everyone except you.’