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“What a cluster fuck of a situation.”
She lifts a finger in the air, “But there’s more!” she exclaims. “Olive’s father was a forty-something Canadian director who worked in the film industry, traveling back and forth from LA to Toronto. Even though the cheater was married, he made Hillary big promises. She believed him. He even bought a house under his name so she would have a roof over her head for her and her daughters. She didn’t expect he’d die all of a sudden in a traffic accident while he was in London for a film premiere a few months before giving birth. Hillary tried to sue his estate because she had smartened up enough and had collected DNA, aka strands of the guy’s hair, as proof of paternity. Alas, laws are different across the border, it’s very expensive to sue rich people, and apparently the Canadian’s wife is a ballsy American boss lady who you don’t want to mess with. Translation, Hillary got squat, and she lost the place she was living in since it fell under her deceased lover’s estate.”
“What a crazy, tragic story,” I say.
“As crazy and tragic as Hillary Twatt herself,” she sneers.
“Very true,” I agree.
Finally, she tells me about her stepmother’s cunt move with her last three employees.
There’s so much weight in what she just shared, it nearly crushes the table.
“I’m probably going to be homeless by the time I figure out how to buy out Hillary,” she states.
Everything about her indicates she’s a strong woman, but that’s a shit load of stuff to handle on your own when you’re that young and over your head.
“That’s what you were trying to forget on Saturday night?” I ask.
“Yes,” she nods. “I wanted to quiet my mind. It was for a brief moment, but it was worth it. I don’t regret a thing. Unfortunately, since our time together, things went from bad to catastrophic. And here I am, swimming upstream of the Niagara Falls without a hope of survival.” Her shoulders slump in defeat.
My hand settles over hers. “Don’t say that,” I scold gently.
“It’s not looking too good for me, Levi,” she says. “I’m so utterly consumed with the fear of losing Daddy’s company.”
“Have you tried hiring someone to oversee the areas where you lack knowledge, or even hiring a CEO?”
She nods. “I have. I don’t have the budget to hire someone with the skills that would help the business take off. The two guys I hired as marketing directors didn’t last long. One quit after a week. I fired the other one after catching Petula on her knees, wearing only a g-string, sucking him off.”
“Yikes.”
“Yeah. He had zero input on the company during the two weeks he was here, but he managed to find time to fuck my good-for-nothing stepsister every chance he had.”
The Twatt women are something else.
“How many stationary bikes did your father manufacture?” I ask.
“We have a hundred CycleThonix bikes—and three extra as prototypes—but we can’t sell them until we get the app to work. That’s my Achilles heel, right now.”
“That’s a lot of bikes!”
“Daddy got a significant price break for producing that many, and he wanted to have enough merchandise for when sales kick in.”
“He didn’t believe in half measures.”
“No, he didn’t. Daddy was all in or all out.”
“The name is catchy,” I note.
She smiles. “I came up with it,” pride coats her words. “Daddy did a lot of triathlons, so Thonix is a play on marathon and tonic. The brand is Fit Thonix.”
“Clever,” I return her smile. “How about the other equipment? How many did he get produced?”
“We have a stepper (StepThonix), stairmaster (StairThonix), eliptical (ElipThonix) and a treadmill (TreadThonix). Daddy produced only three prototypes of each for testing purposes.”
“Catchy names. Very memorable.”
“That was my contribution to the business.”
