Kelley Armstrong - Otherworld Chills

“For me, yes. The only reason I haven’t told my father is that I want Paige to pass the initial trimester to ensure all is well.”

“But it’s good news. So congratulations are in order.”

“Thank you. I will warn, however, that Paige may not be as open to those congratulations. This …” He cleared his throat. “This is the sensitive part of the discussion. My wife did not wish to have children. I was not as decided on the matter.”

“I see.”

“Which is complicated. If a man wants children and his wife does not, there’s little he can do if he loves his wife and wants to respect her wishes.”

Daly smiled. “It’s a happy accident, then.”

“It’s not actually an accident. Paige’s birth control was tampered with at her doctor’s office. Naturally, I investigated. That is what I do for a living. I investigate.”

Sweat beaded on Daly’s wide forehead.

Lucas met Daly’s gaze and said, evenly, “I have tracked the sabotage to its source.”

Silence.

“And I would like to thank the man responsible.”

Daly exhaled.

“I take it I tracked the source successfully?” Lucas said.

Daly managed a wry smile. “You are the investigator, as you said. It seems we underestimated your powers of deduction. But if you aren’t angry …”

“As I said, I’m grateful. I will remember your intervention when I become heir. Which will be easier now, with Paige pregnant, robbing my brother of his advantage.”

“It will indeed,” Daly said, relaxing. “I knew this no-baby thing wasn’t your choice. Otherwise, I’d never have cooked up the plan.”

“I appreciate that. As I appreciate your assistance in this matter.”

“Oh, you’re going to get lots of assistance once you become CEO, Lucas. Don’t you ever worry about that.” Daly leaned forward. “You should have come to us with this, and we’d have made this right. We’re here for you. I know you’re worried about becoming CEO, but once you are, you won’t have to do a thing. We know how to run a company.”

“And I am learning.”

“Sure, sure. Everyone appreciates the effort. It looks good for those in the lower ranks. But no one at the top will actually expect you to lead. You don’t need to worry about that. We’ll handle it.”

“By ‘we,’ you mean …”

Daly rhymed off a list of nearly every board member on Lucas’s side. Then he said, “You’ll get all the perks of being CEO and none of the responsibilities. Of course, you will need to do a few things, to make it look good. Some of your pet projects—reforms or whatnot—are excellent ideas, and we’ll give you everything you need to institute those. Unlimited resources and unwavering support.”

“While you and the others handle the business end.”

Daly grinned. “It’s what we do. And when your father finally steps down, we can do it right.”

“I am as much a straw man as Carlos,” Lucas said.

We sat in our condo living room. Lucas sat upright, staring across the room, me twisted sideways, knees pulled up, watching him, my heart breaking.

“I’ve spent my life fighting my father’s plan,” he said. “Then I grudgingly inched toward it and then finally threw myself in, because if I was going to do this, I was going to do it right.” He looked at me. “They don’t want me to do it right. They never did.”

I could point out that, below the board level, Lucas had far more support than Carlos—real support from real employees who expected him to be a real leader. But that wouldn’t help right now. Instead, I said, “Your father expects you to be that leader. This has nothing to do with him.”

“Which makes it worse. He’s given his life to this company. He made it the most powerful Cabal in the country. How do they repay him? By biding their time, waiting to feast on the spoils.”

“Jackals.”

“I knew they were businessmen first, but they’ve always said they support my reforms. They were humoring me. Nothing more. When Hector and William died, they only saw it as their chance to truly run the Cortez Cabal.”

“They’ll destroy it.”

He nodded. “They’ll choose meaningless reforms for me to pursue, and in my way, I’ll be no different than Carlos. He would use his position and money to pursue his hobbies; I’d use it to pursue mine. It’s not even about which of us they’d prefer nominally in charge—each side has its own agenda, and they’ve each chosen a brother to push forward.”

He turned to face me. “I should say it doesn’t matter, shouldn’t I? If I was as strong as my father wants me to be, I would use them to gain the position and then strip them of their power and pursue my own agenda.”

“You can’t just fire a board of directors.”

“My father could find a way to do it. Deceit, trickery, manipulation, blackmail …”

“That isn’t you.”

“It should be, though, shouldn’t it? If I was the man he expects me to be?”

“Then you wouldn’t be the man I expect you to be. More importantly, you wouldn’t be the man you expect to be.”

He dipped his chin, his gaze dipping with it. “But walking away feels like more than failure. It feels like abandonment. Am I leaving employees to their fate under Carlos?”

“I have another idea.”

Lucas took the next day off. No excuses made. He just canceled his meetings. After five years of moving the Cabal up in his priority list—always aware of how it would look to the board if he “shirked” his duties—he no longer had to care. As much as I wished it could have happened in any other way, I saw a weight lifting already. I’d been holding this solution in my back pocket, watching and waiting for the right moment to broach it. Now I realized that “right moment” should have been “as soon as I thought of it.”

We drove to Orlando along back roads so Lucas could pull over whenever I needed, while he fretted and fussed and insisted we didn’t need to do this today. But we did. This meeting could change our lives. All of our lives.

My stomach was much better by the time we arrived. After a five-hour meeting, we returned to Miami, on the highway now, as I teleconferenced with a caterer and Savannah, who was making sure dinner would be ready when we pulled into the drive. It was … and our guest followed less than ten minutes later.

We had dinner with Benicio. Then, over post-dinner coffee, Lucas said, “I am withdrawing as your heir, Papá.”

Benicio winced and put down his mug. “If this is about my mistake the other night—”

“It’s not. That is, it’s not directly connected, and it is not about you at all.”

He told Benicio what had happened. Not the entire story. He fudged the pregnancy part, saying instead that, after our dinner that night and our conversation, we decided to check my birth control and discovered the sabotage. From there, he followed the story accurately, ending with his meeting with Daly and offering to show the video of Daly admitting their plans.

“Then they’re gone,” Benicio said, getting to his feet. “By Friday, every last person on his damned list is out. I know a way.”

“I’m sure you do, Papá,” Lucas said gently. “But then Carlos has the predominance of support.”

“I’ll get replacements. Men I know who are loyal.”

“You thought Daly was. We both did.”

“Then I’ll—”

“No, Papá. Even if we win, the moment you step down, the Cortez Cabal would split, just as the Nast one did. I would be left with half a Cabal, and a tenuous hold on even that.”

“I’ll—”

“No, Papá,” Lucas said, firmer now. “I am not asking you to do anything. We both know nothing can be done. You had two viable heirs. They are dead.”