Legal Legacy (Surrendering Charlotte Chronicles) (3 page)

“Uh! How dare you young lady? I fucking knew you would turn out to be just as much of a prima-donna
as that bitch mother of yours. You’d better watch your step, I can ruin your career before it ever gets started….”

“
Mrs. Beck, I don’t know if you remember me, I’m Billy Kipling. I need to ask you not to harass Mr. Bly’s sons or Miss Hale. If you cannot stop yourself I’m sure the bartender will back me up in reporting you to security for offering to buy alcoholic beverages for these young people.”

They left Maddie
there in the casino bar ranting and raving and guzzling vodka. Holden felt terrible that she’d been so rude to Hadley, but Hadley said to forget it, she wasn’t worth ruining their party over.

*

“Hadley, Hadley Hale! Oh my God! Can we get a picture and an autograph, pleeeezzz?”

Hadley, Holden, Atticus and Billy walked out onto the Las Vegas sidewalk as the sun was setting over the tops of the high-rises and the mountains beyond. It was the end of August and heat rose up off the hot asph
alt in a shimmering haze. Hadley stopped to let the group of young women wearing glittering tiaras and microscopic dresses pose with her for pictures.

“We love
d your movie and we adore you, come party with us, Hadley!” a girl wearing a ‘Bride to be’ banner squealed and at the same time she flashed a dimpled smile at Holden and Atticus.

“I wish we could but I’m not quite old enough to hang out in the casinos, have fun and be
safe,” Hadley hugged each of the girls who were blushing and whispering about the beautiful young star and the two sexy men who were guiding her into the Venetian’s vintage Rolls Royce.

“Hadley give me a smile, please. A
re these your boyfriends?” a tabloid photographer appeared out of nowhere and snapped several shots before the car door closed.

Holden asked him to step back from the car
but before he could walk away Hadley called out to him and posed for a picture with her cheek against Holden’s. “This man is my true love, the other one is just my brother,” Hadley shouted out the window as the car pulled away. “Hey, I want everyone to know that Hadley Hale is seriously involved with Holden Bly,” she said and Holden held her face in his hands and kissed her until both Atticus and Billy cleared their throats.

“
We’d like to do some high-end shopping,” Billy said and the driver nodded his head and sneaked a peek in the rearview mirror at the hot girl whose face he’d seen in movie previews and on the internet.

“
I don’t really need a dozen Alexander McQueen dresses or twenty pairs of Jimmy Choo’s,” Hadley said, settling comfortably between Holden and her brother. “My agent gets calls from designers everyday asking if I’ll wear their clothes, why don’t you two go on without me. Seriously, I should spend some time with Mom. Besides, Holden, don’t you want to try and talk Atticus out of going to Iowa or Illinois or wherever it is he’s running off to? And now that I think of it, did I hear you say that you
planned to go with him after you graduate early
? Ugh! I cannot bear the insane choices of the men in my family any longer. Stop the car and let me out, I’ve had it, I am not kidding. First Dad decides to skip any possibly life-saving cancer treatments, now the two of you are going to play GI Joe or some shit.
Ughhhhh,
fucking testosterone
!”

“Speaking of testosterone, Hads, were you serious when you told Maddie that Spencer Beck was looking at you in an unnatural manner on the set? Because I would like nothing better than to fuck him up, I always had a feeling he was a pervert,” Holden said, his voice heavy with irritation.

“Geez, driver, pull over please I want to get out here,” she said, and she jumped out as soon as the car stopped and told them to spend or gamble the money or give it to Billy. “Don’t worry, I’m taking a cab back to the hotel, I’ve had enough fun for one day.”

*

“Fuck it all, I can’t lose! How much have I won?” Finn asked Bly as he leaned back in the sumptuously comfortable chair at the baccarat table.

“Hmm,
I’m not sure but I would imagine you’ve tripled your money by now, and you’ve had plenty to drink, that’s for sure.” Bly signaled for his casino host who hurried over, “Wes, would you cash out Mr. Hale’s chips please and have the money taken to the safe in my suite? Thank you. Let’s go, Finn, you’re drunk and I’m not so sure that’s a good thing with…. With what you’re body’s going through right now.”

“Yeah well I’m dying man, if I want to
abuse my body it really isn’t going to make any difference, is it?” Finn said. “Hey, um, Wes? Don’t take the chips just yet. What game in the casino has the absolute worst odds? Where can I lose all this money on a single bet?”

“Well, sir, roulette has the highest house advantage. It’s purely a game of speculation, it pays well but it’s not likely that you would win by choosing a single number.”

“Good, great, I like the sound of that and I need to be the biggest loser. Would you guide me and my chips to your most unlucky roulette table?”

“Finn, why don’t you just give the money to your ki
ds or Charlotte? I’m sure you have your affairs in order but a little extra money is never a bad thing.” Bly said casually and the casino host held his breath and waited to see what was about to happen with more than a million dollars in chips.

“My kids will be fine and so will Charlotte, besides
, you’ll take care of her. She’s going to have plenty of mad money as soon as she marries you, Bly. Come on, you can’t argue with that. Hey, casino host, Wes, let’s go,” Finn said and then he laughed at the stunned look on Bly’s face.

“I’ll have to get
an okay from upstairs if you intend to bet a million and a half on one spin of the wheel,” Wes said, he was fidgety and sweating profusely and his behavior flipped a switch in Finn’s brain.

Suddenly the casino was the enemy, a foe to be taken down and beaten into submission
. Finn felt it in his bones,
he knew it in his soul
! The neurotransmitters in his brain were in complete disarray sending out conflicting signals and exaggerated feelings of euphoria, dread and invincibility one right after the other.

“Tell your boss or your boss’s boss or your wife, mother and children that I am betting all this money in one bet or three or fifty. Your casino has lost a lot of money to me tonight, if you’re smart you’ll jump at the chance to win it back. I can be across the street giving all that profit to the Mirage in
under five minutes,” Finn said and the casino host made a quick phone call and a pair of armed guards arrived to carry his winnings to a roulette table.

“
Mr. Hale, you can place three bets of five hundred thousand at this table, but you will have to pick one number only and let it ride. Is that agreeable? You can take any winnings immediately but you must place three consecutive bets of half a million dollars…” Wes rattled off like the lackey he was.

“Right, got it, have a drink Wes, looks like you could use one,” Finn laughed a
nd shook his head as he pushed one third of the chips onto the number twenty. He raised his eyebrows dramatically at Bly and threw several hundred dollar bills on the tray of the cocktail server who brought their drinks.

“Number twenty, why? Does it feel particularly unlucky, Finn?” Bly asked, he was ready to
go upstairs to bed although he wouldn’t sleep well with Charlotte in a bedroom so close to his. And heaven forbid if Finn’s euphoria continued, hell, he might make wild noisy love to Charlotte and not give a damn who heard.

“The twentieth day of August;
that was my supremely lucky day, the luckiest day of my existence. It was the day I met Charlotte and she spoke to me and put her hands on my arms to try and remove me from her dorm room. Of course I had no intention of leaving or ever letting her slip away, but time changes all things.”

“So if twenty is your lucky number why are you betting on it to lose?” Bly asked, although he figured any answer Finn gave would be convoluted at best.

“I’ve decided to win. Here,” he said handing Bly an envelope, “read it if you’d like, but wait until after I’m gone. It’s a letter for you to give Charlotte after a reasonable amount of time has passed. She’ll be sad forever if you don’t rescue her from grief. But she’ll want it to be her decision, not mine, the letter is in case she gets stuck and loses her way. I’m going to win all three of these bets, and then she’ll have so damned much money she’ll be free to choose you without regard for your ridiculous wealth.”

Bly was speechless, he stared down at t
he envelope in his hand and he knew for sure that Finn was crazy
and
brilliant. But his words were lost in the roar of the crowd that had gathered to cheer when the roulette ball landed on twenty and Finn won an astronomical amount of money on one spin of the wheel. Finn just shrugged and flashed a crooked smile at Wes who was literally pouring sweat, then he moved his winnings aside and placed two more bets on number twenty. He won each bet, but Charlotte was the real winner, the total win was fifty-two million dollars. After taxes were taken out the casino issued a check to Charlotte Hale for thirty million and change and Finn gave it to Bly to deposit for her since they both knew she was in no mood to consider herself as lucky.

“
Wes, you’re a good man,” Finn said handing him a packet of hundred dollar bills as gratuity for his service as casino host. “I’m not sure what time it is but I need buy pearls for my wife, can you point me in the right direction?”

“Thank you, sir, certainly, certainly! I can have a representative from Mikimoto come to your suite first thing in the morning. There’s also Tiffany and Company at the Via Bellagio, they’re open until midnight and
its eleven forty-five now, I’d be glad to give them a call and have them wait for you to arrive.”

“Sounds good, Tiffany’s it is. Let’s go, Bly, I’m sure you know more about jewels than I do. Charlotte’s not one for expensive jewelry, but no matter, pearls look lovely against her skin,
and I’d like to leave something tangible to remember me by.”

“Something tangible?”
Bly said. “Do even imagine that she could ever forget you, Finn?”

*

Atticus found his mother lounging by the pool in her bathrobe the next morning. It made him smile to think she must be wearing plenty of sunscreen because she wasn’t wearing her usual broad brimmed hat. He stood over her blocking the sun for a moment and she melted his heart with her timeless beauty and immensely sad eyes.

“Hey sweetie,” she said softly
and the sound of her voice was so heavy with defeat he could feel the sting of tears in his own eyes. “Atti, sit down please. You look
so
much like your father, do you know that? So incredibly tall and handsome. I want you to understand that it’s alright to go on loving Bly when Finn isn’t here anymore. Don’t feel guilt over the truth of how you began, I know you don’t want to hear this so I’ll only say it this once. Atticus, you were conceived in love, the time I spent with Bly wasn’t trivial, it wasn’t just an affair. And just like you, I have lived my life under the crushing burden of loving two men.”

“Mom,
” he said taking her hand in his and noticing for the first time how delicate it was. The indomitable Charlotte was just a woman who loved and suffered in equal measure and her spirit was about to be sorely tested. “You know I’m leaving for a while, right?”

Charlotte nodded and looked past him toward the mountains in the west. The rising sun painted them pink and orange and they shone with an unearthly glow. Maybe it was the majesty of those
unyielding mountains dressed in shimmering light, or maybe it was Finn’s determination to leave the planet as easily as if he were making a trip to the corner store that made her life seem surreal. But mostly it was the disastrous knowledge that her son, her little boy, had chosen the most dangerous career known to civilized man and his mind would not be changed. 

“
I won’t be gone for long, Mom, and I’ll be nearby, just a phone call away. I can’t just sit by and watch… I’ll follow in Dad’s footsteps now and eventually I’ll follow in Alex’s. I have to be free, I need to cheat death and feel my life rush through me like… like a hurricane, before I take on the weight of the world.”

“Atticus don’t go
yet, I have something for you. Here, these pearls are for Skyler. Your dad gave them to me last night, and not just these, strands and strands of perfect pearls. What do I need them for, why would I need
things
?” Charlotte said, bowing her head as she removed the longest strand of lustrous white pearls from her pale, smooth neck.

“Mom, no… he must have had a reason for buying you jewelry… now.”

“I’m sure he meant for them to bring me happiness, and they will. When I see them on Sky at your graduation it will make me very, very happy.” Charlotte reached up then to smooth the lock of hair from his forehead and she couldn’t stop the silent tears from washing over her cheeks, “I love you, my beautiful son, don’t forget to say your prayers, promise me that.”

*

Finn slept in the next morning, he was either sleeping off a hangover or maybe he had worn himself out over the last few days when his mind was in overdrive. Bly wanted to fly with Atticus to New York so they could discuss what he considered “a hasty decision to leave school and become a killer,” but Atticus wouldn’t have it. Sadly, Bly was met with yet another rude awakening when Holden informed him that he too would be reporting for SEAL training and Bly might as well save his breath, a lecture would be a waste of time. Bly walked out onto the terrace and sat next to Charlotte as she lay on a chaise lounge with her eyes closed. He couldn’t say a word, he just breathed an exhausted sigh and Charlotte whispered, “I know, I know.”