CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Alan, Clare, and Nora sat in the front parlor looking around as if they’d never been in Stuart’s home before. Alan had, many times, but Clare and Nora had not.
“So Daddy lives in a penthouse,” said Clare as she looked up at the high ceiling. “Why am I not surprised that this is where the big man lives?”
“It’s not just him in this monstrosity,” said Nora. “I’m sure he has a different woman sleeping here every night.”
Alan looked at his still-beautiful mother.
They both knew Stuart wasn’t like that and that she was the one who cheated on him, and did so repeatedly.
Yet she would never cop to her blame for the destruction of their family.
But Alan, the oldest, saw it with his own two eyes.
That was why he still had a relationship with his father and managed to earn his trust enough to grow up and become CFO of his corporation.
But Clare believed their mother’s lies and didn’t want to have anything to do with their father.
But that worked out for Alan because their hatred of his father allowed them to be fully onboard with his takeover scheme.
They had no issue whatsoever combining their fourteen percent with his ten percent to get the ball rolling.
Once he convinced other stakeholders to throw their support to him, he became the boss.
At least on paper because nobody at Dellstone seemed to respect him the same way they still respected his father.
But now it was phase two. Now he wanted total control, something he would never achieve with his father still in possession of forty-nine percent. But will his father agree?
When they heard walking on the staircase, as if Stuart was coming down, all three of them felt a surge of panic.
Clare hadn’t seen her father in five or six years, Nora hadn’t seen her ex-husband in a decade, and the last time Alan saw his father he was beating the stew out of him. None of them felt any peace.
Especially when Stuart entered the parlor with Tabby at his side.
He didn’t have his arm around her the way he usually did, and his normally chill manner gave way to a kind of broodiness.
These three people she was about to meet burdened him.
That she knew. What she didn’t know was why.
Was it because he missed them and wanted to be a family again, or because they represented one of the lowest points in his life: his divorce.
But if he still wanted his ex-wife, she was glad she would find out early enough for her to get out with minimal damage to her heart. It would be still be damaged, but not nearly as bad as it would be if she found out much later in their relationship.
When Stuart saw that his son was upright and doing well, he went straight to him. Alan stood up. And Clare, who had always been her brother’s keeper, stood up as if she would be buffer should his father come at her brother again.
But Stuart was relieved to see that he was okay. Tabby remained where Stuart left her, just inside the parlor. But she noticed how his ex-wife wasn’t looking at him, but was staring at her.
Stuart looked at his daughter first when he walked up to his children. At twenty-two, and with her blonde hair and blue eyes, she was the spitting image of her mother. Stuart saw nothing of himself in her. “Hello Clare.”
“Hello Father.”
And for a few moments, they just stood there.
Both were awkward as neither knew what to say to each other.
She was five years old when he and Nora divorced, and it was a messy, contentious divorce.
Clare refused to spend time with him even though it was court-ordered.
He forced the issue, but it was always disastrous.
One time, when Clare was prompted by her mother to claim that he had thrown her across the room, he knew he had to let go.
Nora was determined to destroy him even though he did nothing but love her.
But it was a risk he wasn’t willing to take.
He let go. The had no relationship at all.
But looking at Clare now, and the hatred she still harbored for him in her eyes, made him know what he already assumed: He was wrong. He should have fought to keep a relationship with her.
But it was too late now.
That was why he turned to Alan. “How are you?” Stuart asked him when he walked up to him.
Alan nodded. “I’m holding up.”
“When did you get released?”
“A week ago.”
“I phoned you several times to check on you, but you didn’t answer any of my calls.”
“What do you expect?” Nora said. “The last time he saw you was the day you beat him to a pulp.”
Stuart ignored her. But that wasn’t good news to Tabby. Because ignoring somebody was usually a good indicator that he still had feelings for his ex and didn’t want to reveal them. “I was getting dressed to come see you,” he said to Alan instead.
But Clare wasn’t buying it. “How convenient,” she said.
“It’s true,” Tabby said, and everybody, except for Stuart, looked at her. “We were getting dressed to leave when Mr. Joshua phoned and said you were downstairs.”
“Mind your own business,” Nora said to Tabby. “This has nothing to do with you.”
“It has everything to do with her,” Stuart said as he finally turned and looked at his ex-wife.
She was a beauty queen when he married her, and although she was eight years older than he was, she still looked beautiful.
The only downside was those duck-looking, plastic surgery-enhanced lips she was sporting.
Wholly unnecessary in his view. And this was the woman he used to love?
He knew why he married her: She put on the performance of the century to get him.
But he didn’t know why he stuck around as long as he did because she revealed her true colors almost immediately.
He went to Tabby, placed his hand around her small waist, and pushed her forward. “This is my lady, Tabitha Morgan.”
Tabby was inwardly overjoyed to hear him refer to her as his lady. And in front of his children and ex-wife. It warmed her heart.
But Nora and her children were shocked to hear him claim her as his lady.
Especially Alan, who knew his father made no commitments to anybody.
Not even Jennifer. But this person who looked to be right around his age was his father’s lady?
Her? When the biggest movie stars in Hollywood wanted to date him, or the number one streaming artist, or the number one supermodel had voiced an interest in him.
But he chose her? Some unknown gold digger? It seemed absurd to him.
But Stuart wasn’t in the business of caring what Alan found absurd. “Tabby, this is my ex-wife Nora.”
“That’s Mrs. Jacobs to you,” Nora said.
“It’s Nora or Bitch or whatever name you wish to call her,” Stuart said to Tabby. “That’s what it is to you.”
Nora looked at Stuart with pure hatred in her eyes. But Tabby wasn’t going to play their game. “Hello, Mrs. Jacobs,” she said respectfully.
But Nora wasn’t the type to accept a curtesy and move on. “What do you think I am? A fool? Do you think if you curry favor with me it will help your situation with Stuart? You can forget that, little girl.”
But Stuart stood up for Tabby. “She has no interest in currying favor with any of you. She’s a decent human being who gives everybody the benefit of the doubt. Which is more than I can say for anybody else in this room. So watch yourself, Nora.”
Nora gave him a harsh look. “I see you’re still a bastard.”
He gave her a harsher look. “I see you’re still a bitch.”
“At least I’m a bitch who dates age-appropriately.” She looked at Tabby’s above-the-knee lavender dress that highlighted her slender frame, and at her flawless dark-brown skin and beautiful eyes. “At least I date culturally-appropriately.”
Then she looked at Tabby. “What plot of mud did you come out of?” she asked as her children grinned.
“The same plot you came out of,” Tabby fired right back. “But I was able to clean up.”
Stuart laughed. “That’s right, Tabby,” he said. “Don’t you let anybody disrespect you.”
Nora and his children were shocked that he would stand up for her so firmly. It was so not like Stuart.
“In any event,” Alan said, “I don’t have much time. We’re here for one reason and one reason only, Father.”
Stuart looked at his son. “Have a seat.”
“I don’t have time.”
Stuart was staring at Alan as if he was sizing him up. “Why are you here?”
“I’m here because I want to buy you out,” Alan said.
Stuart was floored. “Excuse me?”
“I want to buy you out. You heard me. I want your shares.”
But even Tabby was offended, and she blurted out before she realized it: “Why would he give you his shares when you stole his company?”
“You again?” Nora asked.
“What’s wrong with you?” Clare asked. “Don’t you know how to keep your mouth shut when it doesn’t concern you?”
“It concerns her,” Stuart said. “Answer her question, Alan.”
His children and ex were amazed. This wasn’t the Stuart they remembered!
But Alan kept on. “I want to buy you out of Dellstone Watersports, Incorporated.”
Stuart studied his son as if he was sizing him up. “What percentage of my shares are you looking to purchase?”
Tabby looked at Stuart. She was amazed that he would even entertain such a transaction.
But Stuart knew what he was doing. “Answer the question, Alan. What percentage of my shares are you looking to buy?”
“All of them,” Alan said.
Stuart and Tabby both were floored. “You want me to give up all of my shares?”
“That’s exactly what I want you to do.”
“And why would I do that?”
“Because you’re already nursing a public relations disaster that will only get worse.”
Even Stuart didn’t catch that reference. “What are you talking about? What public relations disaster?”
“You were arrested for the attempted murder of your own son.”
“You mean the son who stole the company from his father?” Tabby asked.
“Yeah that son,” said Clare in a snippy tone. She seemed to despise Tabby already.