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“You weren’t the one forced to stare at it.” Jules’s body quivers, her face contorting in disgust. “The only positive outcome from that meeting is she can’t wait to be done with me.”
“Two weeks from now, this woman will be an unpleasant, but distant memory.”
“I’m counting the days,” Jules says. “There was something nagging at me about our altercation, though.”
“What?” I ask.
“It became blatantly clear Hillary’s ultimate plan was to cheat me out of what was rightfully mine.”
“What do you mean?”
“She gave me an impossible deadline. Shy of a miracle, she knew I wouldn’t be able to come up with the money to buy her out within thirty days. She was counting on that. She was going to sue me to get the half of the house that’s mine. Without you, I would’ve ended up with nothing.”
“What a piece of shit,” I rage. “That’s exactly what a lowlife like her would do.”
“After she left my office, I was consumed by our conversation, replaying it in my head over and over again. There was something about her reaction that caused me to pause. She seemed genuinely upset I found a way out of this thorny situation—”
“How dare she talk about what your father and mother worked hard to acquire as lunch money!”
“Belittling me and making me feel inferior are her favorite pastimes,” she reveals. “This time, it didn’t work. Instead, I saw red when she spat those words in my face.”
“You’re a saint for not slapping her.”
“Trust me, I really wanted to, but I didn’t want to give her anymore ammunition. I’m sure she’d sue me like this,” she snaps her fingers together.
“Good for you for keeping a cool head.”
“She didn’t make it easy. She kept pushing my buttons, but I didn’t give my wicked stepmother the upper hand.” She lets out a dramatic sigh. “The only sad thing about all of this is I’ll never be able to see the expression of mortification on her face when everyone—and their grandmother—starts talking about the kickass CycleThonix bikes. I wonder what she’ll have to say about, and I quote, The useless piece of metal shit your loser of a father wasted years tinkering with.”
“Even if you never witness it, the day will come when she’s forced to eat her words,” I assure her. “She’s basically walking away at the eve of a major turnabout.” A diabolical smile stretches my lips. “It’s going to hurt like a motherfucker when realization hits her right smack between the eyes.”
Jules explodes in laughter.
“Let’s drink to that!” I say, snatching the bottle of champagne from the ice bucket.
“Yes!” She leans forward to grab her flute. I fill it, then, fill mine.
“Here’s to the end of your forced partnership with Ms. Hillary Twatt!”
“Hear, hear!” Jules cheers.
We chill out for a few long minutes in a comfortable silence, listening to the stillness of the night, while sipping on our champagne. From time to time, she eyes me from over the rim of her glass.
“What are you dying to ask me?” I ask, dropping my flute on the table.
She mimics me.
“I still can’t believe you bought champagne,” she says. “I would’ve been happy with wine.”
“We have a lot to celebrate,” I tell her.
She frowns her confusion. “You only found out about the warehouse on your way back to your place and you didn’t know about Hillary, yet you brought this bottle of champagne with you from New York. What am I missing?”
“A crazy thought took root in my head when I landed in New York, and I haven’t been able to shake it off.”
She shoots me a suspicious side gaze. “I’m afraid to ask.”
It was only a fleeting thought when I left LA. Five hours and twenty-three minutes of flight later, and I couldn’t shake it off, no matter how much I told myself I was nuts.
