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“He told me that you were leaving in a few days and as soon as you were out, the house would be on the market. Mom and dad were ecstatic when I told them.”
“What makes you think you can outbid everyone interested in this property?” I knew Brenton had a larger fortune than them.
“Well, we were concerned about this. Especially about that sexy apple man next door. The one that I met the other day. Mr. McLean, was it?”
I held my stifled breath as my sister continued.
“Well, I did some research on him and Wally assured me that Dudley would never let his sworn enemy purchase his home. He has a clause specifically prohibiting it in his will.”
“But he’d letyoufilthy liarspurchase it? He hated you all.”
“He tried to prevent that too in his will, of course. I guess we really offended him a while back. Yeesh, talk about holding a grudge, am I right? No worries though. We’ve pulled off larger…deals than this in the past. Mommy and daddy are already working with our lawyer.”
I knew what she meant by deals. She meant schemes. Illegal schemes.
“What exactly are you planning on doing?” I asked.
“Now, why would I tell you that, sis?”
“Why did you call at all? You could have done it all while leaving me in the dark.”
“Because that’s no fun, Helen. Obviously.” I could tell she was rolling her eyes on the other end. So was I.
I hung up before she could taunt me with one more word and threw my phone across the room.
“Ugh!”
I had no idea how my family was going to get around Dudley’s will. Wally said it was ironclad, but if I knew my crooked family, they’d find a way – and it wasn’t necessarily going to be lawful. I stopped to ponder if I even cared anymore. They could have the house and I could still be with Brenton. I could leave the stress of it all behind and let him support me like he told me he’d do, but then he’d be forever living in the shadow of my horrid family next door. And I’d be Brenton’s poor charity case. At the very least, I could destroy the journal before they got the house. But even then, Brenton wouldn’t get that damn apple tree and he’d have new, even worse Washingtons as neighbors.Shit. I need to find a way to keep this house.
My stomach began to knot and twist. I couldn’t shake the heavy weight of guilt still riding on me. I couldn’t stay here for long. I couldn’t get my money, not without hurting Brenton. I kept telling myself that I’d never steal Brenton’s idea to make my “inheritance”, that I wouldn’t stoop that low. I was not my family, nor had I ever wanted to be. But something in me couldn’t shake the idea of it either. If it was really the only way to keep my family from this house, if it would set a successful future in stone for me, how wrong was it?
I kept fantasizing about my life with the stack of cash that apple tree could give me. I could bake in Dudley’s state of the art kitchen every day. I could purchase a second home in the city to escape to; a trendy, downtown apartment that I could decorate to the nines. I could spend every day sipping coffee and writing. Most importantly, I could be close to Brenton. I could stay. It would be a dream come true, but that was all it was: a dream. I didn’t have the guts to follow through with Dudley’s plan, did I? Something in me wasn’t too sure I could turn down such an opportunity, the selfish part of me that felt I deserved more than this. I deserved more than mourning a lousy job that didn’t fulfill me in the first place. I deserved more than being consistently tricked and robbed and one-upped by my family.
Besides, I had spent years watching my family pull off worse crimes than what I’d have to do. All I was doing was breeding one species of apple. It wasn’t like I was going to steal all of TruFruit’s market. But then I thought of Brenton, and how much this betrayal would hurt him. I never wanted to be the reason for his pain, but wouldn’t he want me to be happy too? He said he’d do anything to make me stay.
Tears welled in my eyes again. I wanted Brenton to come back, so I could feel his touch one more time and remind myself why I’d never steal his patent. But I also wanted internal happiness, something to fulfill me beyond romance. Ugh, I needed to snap out of this. What was wrong with me? When had I become so self-centered and so emotionally unstable?
