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I take my hand away. “It’s fine. It’s Chance, Miles, and Carly.”
“Who’s Carly?”
Yes, I hear the curiosity in her voice. The one that always comes out when a woman is involved, because that’s the key to her desire for grandchildren.
“You want to ask me that now?” I pose.
I need to get Mom back on track. She wants to know about the woman in my life when a sneaky bastard is taking advantage of her and stealing our business.
Mom sighs again. “It’s done. He’s fired. Obviously.”
“Obviously.”
“But without a pilot, no flights are going up now. I had to cancel the passengers for today, which means they got their money back and went to another company.”
“Sea-Air probably,” I grumble. “I can send you money to pay bills, but without routes—without a pilot—we’re doomed. I’d say hire another one but who knows who we can trust at this point.”
Carly looks up at me and gives me a reassuring smile. It doesn’t solve anything, but it sure as fuck feels good.
I notice Chance on his cell now, pacing the length of the room.
“I’ll come back,” I say to Mom. “I’ll fly them.”
“What? No. You can’t. The will says—”
“Jonathan Bridger can’t keep controlling our lives, Mom.”
“It’s a billion dollars,” she counters. “Even if the company goes under—”
“It won’t.”
“But with that money, does it matter?”
I stiffen and Carly steps back.
“Mom, do you want Sea-Air to win? Do you want the company you started to fail now because Jonathan Bridger, the guy who abandoned you when you were pregnant, dictates me being here even when he’s dead?”
“When you put it that way,” she says with a forced laugh.
“There’s got to be a way.”
“There is,” Chance interrupts. He’s done with his phone call and comes over.
I look to him, but I speak into the cell. “Hang on a sec, Mom.”
“Shankle says you can’t go back to Seattle,” he replies. “It’ll break the will.”
I’m not sure how this is remotely helpful and I’m about to say that, but he continues.
“But we can. Remember he said there were stipulations about us leaving? You, me, and Miles. Together.” He points between the three of us. “I know it’s ridiculous, but apparently our esteemed father said we can leave in the case of an emergency, though he didn’t define what an emergency was. Shankle says as far as he’s concerned this qualifies, but we have to go together, and only for a week at a time.”
Miles widens his eyes, and he smiles. “Fuck, yeah.”
I frown at both of them. “Can either of you fly a plane?”
Chance looks at me as if I asked him if he works for a circus. “Hell, no.”
Miles shakes his head.
