Chapter Fourteen
CHAPTER
Fourteen
As soon as we landed, Nicholas texted me that I was grounded.
I would’ve been tempted to respond with something like, You’re not my dad, except that I knew he meant it literally, as in, I was stuck on the ground because I was no longer allowed to use the jet.
That didn’t mean I was trapped, though—I could still fly commercial if I really wanted to go somewhere.
I announced that to Gabe as we disembarked, feeling proud of myself for stooping to that level.
Surely that was proof I hadn’t been warped by money.
He did not look overly impressed.
My parents had texted me too. My mom: What were you doing on Kevin’s island?
I was surprised the two of them hadn’t been there, honestly.
I mean, it would have been the most unpleasant surprise, to be working on an interrogation and see my mom’s face pop up over Cora’s shoulder like the world’s worst jack-in-the-box.
But they were fairly tight with Kevin and Jack and all of their crowd (which, yes, was hypocritical given my mom’s attitude toward Jessica and Gabe the money-grubbers, but my mom loved an opportunity to be a hypocrite), so it was strange they didn’t show for his big birthday bash.
I texted back, Had a party! The best time! Too bad you weren’t there.
The second thing I did—well, third, after booking a spa sesh for the next morning, because, after the stress of this plane ride, I really needed a Himalayan pink salt soak and one of those face masks made out of eel slime—was call Vienna.
“I’m back,” I said as soon as she picked up in lieu of a hello.
Time was too precious to allow for hellos. “Let’s talk.”
“When are you free?” she said, voice flat. My instincts had been correct; I couldn’t rely on getting real answers out of her with just a face-to-face conversation. I had to show her I still valued her. Get her distracted by doing some kind of work.
“Can you meet me at the Chelsea building tomorrow after lunch?” I asked.
“I want to keep working on it. My kids shouldn’t have to wait until this investigation is done for their refuge.
” I hadn’t heard back from Bibi about whether my foundation could still use the building, which was hopefully a good sign.
Surely if she was going to take it from me, she would’ve made that clear already.
In the meantime, maybe continuing to work on it would show her how important it was to me.
“Sure,” Vienna said. She sounded tired. A little depressed. Not that surprising, I supposed. “What will we be doing?”
“I don’t know, exactly,” I said. Whatever Lina had left for me. “Appraising the site. Some interior design. Cleaning out some files.”
“You’re going to clean?”
“Of course,” I said, trying to sound breezy. “I’ve cleaned up trash plenty of times before.” If you counted the hours it was court-mandated (I’d actually looked great in orange).
“And the building still belongs to you? Even after—”
“Of course,” I chirped, even though I had no idea. “See you then!”
I hung up before she could interrogate me further. “Okay,” I told Gabe. “We’re on for tomorrow. You ready?”
He gave me a funny look. “No, Pom. I’m not ready. Tomorrow’s Monday. I have to work.”
“Oh,” I said. “Well, can’t you call out sick or something?
” I could certainly text Ellie and Sage to let them know I wouldn’t be at the bakery, though I understood that was because I owned the bakery and could do whatever I wanted, unlike Gabe.
Surely solving a murder took precedence over tutoring kids, though.
No matter how important teaching was! Teachers are important!
They should get paid more! Like, a lot more.
Then maybe Gabe and I wouldn’t have this weird money-related tension between us.
“No, Pom. I’m not going to call out sick.”
“But you were going to call out sick if we got stuck on the island.”
“We’re not stuck on the island,” he said. “And that would’ve been an emergency situation. My AP kids have their test coming up soon, and I have to help fine-tune some bonus college essays for kids hoping to get off the wait list. I need to be there for them.”
He’d always been a stickler about not calling out of work, even for investigating a murder. Back when we’d done our very first interrogation together (of Fred, the Afton CFO), he’d called out of work for me. I guess it had been charming, then.
Or maybe this was what he’d been talking about.
Because I’d gone ahead and made my spa appointment for the morning without consulting him.
He had his tutoring sessions in the afternoon.
If I’d planned my chat with Vienna for the morning, he probably would’ve been able to come, but instead I’d just steamrolled ahead without even asking.
“Of course,” I said. “Your job is so important. The kids need you. I can handle this on my own.”
Far from his eyes welling with tears of love at what a kind and compassionate girlfriend he had, he tensed his jaw. “I don’t need your sarcasm.”
For a moment I was oddly touched that he thought I was being sarcastic, considering that the New York Post had once said I thought sarcasm was a new perfume.
Then I just felt bad that he’d misinterpreted what I was trying to say.
“I’m not being sarcastic, I swear. Go be there for your kids. I know that what you do is important.”
He stared at me warily for a moment, as if not quite sure I meant it. He turned away before I could be sure he was.
As far as I was concerned, the Chelsea building was ours until someone in a uniform or with the last name Phlume told us it wasn’t. I mean, I still had the key, and the security code for the alarm still worked. I didn’t realize I’d been holding my breath on that until the keypad beeped green.
Our building had once been a grand Chelsea town house.
It had housed some presumably very wealthy, prominent families for years after it was built in the 1800s before being subdivided into apartments in the seventies or eighties and then falling into disrepair in the nineties.
The building had to be worth millions and millions now, but the state of the inside was, to put it mildly, not great.
I was pretty sure Conrad’s plan had been to let us clean it out and do basic renovations on it while collecting generous tax breaks and then, in ten years or so, use that money for a gut renovation before putting it on the market and profiting handsomely.
But who knew what Bibi would want to do?
As soon as the door shut behind me, leaving me in the slightly musty-smelling, dusty foyer, my phone buzzed and buzzed and buzzed. Someone calling me—hopefully not Vienna telling me she couldn’t make it, not after I’d come all the way down here.
Nope. It was Nicholas. I picked up. “I know, I know, I’m grounded, and I’m a terrible person for stealing the jet,” I said, hopefully preempting any yelling. “Is that it?”
He was quiet on the other side. I loved it when I got to shock people by showing them I understood more about the world than they thought. “No,” he finally grumbled. “It’s not it. I wanted to talk about your… building.”
“My building? The one Conrad gave me?” He grunted assent. I turned in a little circle around the foyer. Better not mention that I was here right now, just in case. What if I wasn’t supposed to be and he told Bibi out of revenge for me stealing the jet? “What about it?”
He gave a disgruntled-sounding cough. “I was thinking that it would make an excellent little boutique hotel. You know that we don’t have anything in the Chelsea area, and a big building right now might be… well. Too much. But a small, exclusive hotel…”
“You know when I said Conrad was giving me the building, he wasn’t really giving me the building, right?
” I said. “It’s an exaggeration, like if someone said I stole a jet when really I just borrowed it from a family member for a couple of days without authorization.
” I paused to let that sink in. “He was going to lease it to me for a very low rate for a long period of time.”
“Yeah, but you can do whatever you want with it once you sign the contract, right?” Nicholas said.
“Yes, because accepting a building for use as a hub for my nonprofit and then immediately turning around and using it as a for-profit hotel for the family business would be fantastic for my image,” I said.
Weird that two people in two days had mentioned doing the same thing with Conrad’s building.
Greedy vultures. “I’m not signing it over to you for a hotel.
If it’s even going to be mine now that Conrad’s dead.
The whole thing’s up in the air. Okay? I have to go. ”
Like a coward, I hung up before he could argue with me. Took a deep breath. Shook myself out a little. Like I would jeopardize my nonprofit, the thing I was investigating a murder to save, for anything, but especially for the family business. Come on, Nicholas.
Now. Where was I?