Chapter 46
SILAS
Knowing Eve was here in town with me made all the difference in my meetings.
I’d wanted to climb back in bed with her, do some of that multitasking pussy eating I’d done at the inn again.
The dreaded dinner with the Hyports was now going to be pleasant because I had my wife by my side.
I was eager to show her off, let them see how amazing she was.
Independent, feisty, and had the same business savvy that I did and without the CEO father or hints of nepotism to get in her way.
With June manning Steaming Hotties back in Hunter Valley, Eve had a day of leisure. So far, she’d slept in. A massage, some shopping would be relaxing. She’d earned it because she worked too hard.
I was at my desk in the office given to me to use while in the Hyport building. I wasn’t on the top floor or anywhere near a corner office, but the view of the bay was impressive. If it wasn’t so cloudy, I would be able to see the Golden Gate Bridge.
Bradley knocked on the open door, then came in. “I have the information you wanted.”
Where I was fair, with blond hair and pale eyes, my assistant’s skin was the shade of Eve’s darkest roast coffee, his black hair trimmed close to his head. He was in a crisp gray suit and had a file tucked under his arm.
I smiled grimly at what he’d uncovered. Eve had easily distracted me on the plane from the details of her ex. A man was only so strong. But I needed to know.
“Tell me.”
He flipped the folder open.
I settled into the high-backed desk chair and listened.
“Cheney Douglas IV. Thirty. Grew up outside of Hunter Valley, skipped college to return to the family business. Parents are Cheney Douglas III and Enid Custer Douglas. Only child. The Douglas’s had the original claim on the DouglasGrove Mine back in the 1800s.
Back then it was gold, but now they mine hard rock. ”
“Meaning…”
He looked up from the report, met my gaze. “Meaning they gut the land for rock which is crushed and used for commercial and construction projects around the west.”
“Right. I read something about them from the land search for the James Inn. Go on,” I prodded, grabbing a stapler and fiddling with it.
“Parents don’t work. Just like Eve Hunter’s parents. They live off the gains of their predecessors.”
Mav, Theo, Dex, and I were all descendants of James family members who made a fortune but we didn’t kick back and do nothing. I’d go apeshit if I sat around and did nothing. So would the others. That didn’t mean I wanted to work remotely all over the world for the rest of my life either.
“Douglas is listed as CFO of the corporation, but I have yet to find proof of him accomplishing anything.”
I set the stapler down, lined it up so it was parallel to the desk phone. “No college or MBA and he’s the chief financial officer of a huge mine?”
That seemed far-fetched. Or nepotism. Or both.
He nodded. “Correct.”
“You’re saving the best for last,” I guessed.
“I don’t have all the details yet, but the parents–the Douglas and Hunter families–are friends through the country club. Known each other for years. In their circles, it’s not news that Cheney Douglas and Evelyn Hunter have been an item for years.”
I nodded. “Eve mentioned that. This sounds like an arranged marriage to me. The question is… why? Especially after years. Five, six, seven years. That’s fucking ridiculous. Something’s going on.”
I hated thinking that Eve had been dealing with her parents and Douglas pestering her all alone, especially the way Douglas showed up at the coffee shop the day before with the sole intention of harassing her.
No, there was no intention. They were fucking with her and her livelihood.
Not fair and a dick move. She was too close to it, to her parents even though they got her into this, to understand the depth of their reasoning.
It wasn’t a religious thing. Or a cultural thing.
It was something else and it couldn’t be good.
“I mean, I could see her father telling her he wasn’t giving her more money from her trust, but why make Douglas executor?” I wondered. Everything he shared validated what Eve told me on the plane last night. I’d been admittedly, and amazingly, distracted.
If those fuckers were up to something, which I was sure they were, I wanted to know because they were fucking with my wife.
Her money challenges didn’t matter any longer. She had all the money she wanted. Not because she now supposedly had access to her trust fund, but because she was now Eve James. There was no prenup, so she was now a billionaire. A stupid move perhaps on my part, but I didn’t give a shit.
I knew for a fact that Dex hadn’t had a prenup with Lindy.
Sure, they’d been drunk and got hitched at a drive-thru chapel in Las Vegas, but he’d planned to marry her since the second he laid eyes on her.
Not only did he have family money, but he made millions as a pro hockey player. He didn’t give a shit either.
Bradley gave a shrug. “I’ve got investigators looking into financials. Digital paper trails. Everything.”
“Good. Thanks.”
He shut the folder and looked me in the eye. “Want to update me on why your agenda for today includes dinner with Mr. and Mrs. Hyport… and your wife?”