Chapter 7: Chapter Seven

Trenton followed the hostess over to the table where Vincent sat studying the menu.

“Tell me you have something of interest to me, Vin. I’m sure as hell in no mood to hear otherwise.” Freeing the two buttons on his suit coat, he took a seat at the dining table. The meeting with his ex-wife’s lawyer had left him in an irritable state. After learning what he had today from Baldwell, dodging Claudia’s calls some months ago had been a grave mistake. Between that and no response on his proposal from Kennedi Chase the past couple of days, Trenton was about ready to blow his stack. With little patience, he flashed a glare across the table. “Well?”

Vincent offered up a friendly smile. “Good afternoon to you too.”

The waiter approached and placed drinks before them, then prepared to take their orders, but Trenton asked for a minute, to which the man respectfully inclined his head and went on his way.

Bringing his attention back across the table, he sat back. “I won’t be staying. I have an appointment this afternoon.”

“Relax a minute. I got you a scotch, neat. Judging by your sour disposition, I see it was a smart choice. Does Devil Attorney Ben have you on edge? I told you to let me handle it.” Taking a sip of his drink, Vincent went back to studying his menu. “Let’s see, steak or fish?”

On edge was putting it mildly. “You were due in court. I’m trying to keep these asset negotiations with Claudia’s attorney private, especially now, after what I learned today. She’s pregnant.”

“What the fuck!” Vincent barked and looked around at the few quizzical stares. He leaned in. “Are you sure? You and she…”

“Just once a few months back. We were trying to work shit out, or so I thought. Who the fuck knows.” Trenton shook his head. “She’s about five months along. She tried calling me several times, but I ignored her calls and deleted messages without listening to them after discovering she was still in contact with her lover. She had some bullshit excuse for that of course. Anyway, her attorney said it’s what she wanted to tell me.”

“Yes, well, I would think so.” Vincent studied him. “Bro, are you okay? I mean, a baby, that’s some heavy shit.”

Trenton could still hear his ex’s panting breaths and drawn-out moans as her lover thrust in and out of her body. Walking in on the pair, betrayal had sliced through his chest with a serrated sharpness. Learning today of the child’s existence, he felt as though he’d been slapped in the face with a hot iron, a branded reminder of his failures from a marriage that lasted only five years. But things with Claudia had fractured long before discovering her in bed with her lover that December night a year and a half ago. He’d returned to Nevada from D.C. after nearly a month-long business trip, where he’d been buried in negotiations with investors. Building his business had been priority one, with no room to focus, to evaluate…to care about anything else.

“Vin, you have no idea what it feels like to catch your wife in bed with another man.”

“Shit, I’d chalk it up to getting gelded,” Vincent hissed. “That’s why I’m happily single.”

“Yeah, women and relationships. I don’t need the fucking migraine that comes with them. As for the child, it may not be mine. Like I said, it happened only one time. But Claudia was still involved with her lover.” He rested back, wearier than he’d been in a long time. “She wants us to do a month of counseling.”

“Come again?” Vincent sat up, head tilted. “But you two are divorced. The bifurcation order is clear—you’re officially, legally divorced. The fact that there are still financial issues to be worked through doesn’t change anything.”

“Yes, well, now she wants a month, says it’s for the sake of the child, so she and I are able to communicate without fighting. I have nothing to say to her. She’s agreed to take her invested interest in Shaw’s, not half, but expects me to do the counseling.”

“You understand there are no recourses when it’s a community property state, so it’s good that she’s compromising there at least.”

“Well, I’ve agreed to turn over to her the apartment in Paris as well as the Nevada house, but she balks and decides to change the terms every time. This counseling bullshit is just another way for her to eat away at my sanity. Baldwell will be sending you the latest version of her demands.”

“Look, I need to get on top of this. As your attorney, I advise you not to communicate with Ben Baldwell or Claudia from here on out. Trent, I’m serious. No phone calls, no emails, nothing without speaking with me first. I should’ve insisted we not file for a bifurcation of divorce and just settled the entire damn matter—the business, vacation properties, all of it. You wouldn’t be in this mess.”

“I wanted out of the marriage A-sap. The bifurcation took care of that. I was stupid to sleep with her again. That shit’s on me.” Trenton swallowed down a large gulp from his glass and quickly chased it with another to try to relax. It hardly made a dent in his mood. “Now on to another pile of shit on my plate. Did we get the hold lifted to move forward with construction, or has Alan Lange drummed up another ridiculous complaint?”

“I’m afraid he has, but—”

Trenton let out a trail of mumbled curses. Could one damn thing work out in his favor today? Lange had been like a thorn in his ass. The man’s protest over the land bid had gone on for nearly six months and counting, holding up Trenton’s casino construction on the D.C. Wharf.

“What are you doing about it?” he growled. “You’d said everything was set. This has gone on long enough.”

Vincent brought up a hand, not appearing at all ruffled, and placed his menu on the table. “I’ve already prepared the appeal. Work should go on as scheduled.”

Trenton’s cell buzzed in the inside pocket of his suit coat, and a jolt of excited hope that it could be a text from Kennedi Chase had him anxiously digging out his phone. Reading the display, a mere stock update, he muttered a fierce curse, summing up his shitty day. “Kennedi Chase is another woman that I swear—” He clenched his teeth for restraint. “These damn women…”

“Has she called?”

“No.”

“I figured she wouldn’t.” Taking a swallow from his glass, Vincent relaxed back in his chair with arms crossed at his chest. “I’m thinking this aggression of yours is more about her than anything else. You said you gave her twenty-four hours, and it’s been two days. It doesn’t surprise me that she hasn’t buckled under.”

“She knows nothing about real estate. She’s in way over her head. I offered to buy that damn company—that’s losing money, I might add—and relieve her of her father’s debt. Of the burden he has stuck her with while he’s probably off enjoying life. That man robbed his own company and stuck his daughter with the problem.”

“We don’t know that for sure.”

“The investors don’t give a fuck about any of that. They want their money. I tell you, man, I don’t get this woman. I was willing to take it all off her hands.” The waiter approached with fresh drinks, and Trenton took a hefty gulp. “But what did she do? Hurled it back in my face. Bro, literally, she threw the contract at me. Can you believe that shit?”

“Actually yes.” Vincent laughed. “Even I could see it, by the way she worked tirelessly to try to stop you from buying up the land and retail space where her bakery sits. Kennedi Chase doesn’t strike me as the kind of woman who goes down quietly.” He sat forward. “You said she knows nothing about real estate. Then teach her.”

“How about it all goes to shit, then she’ll regret that she turned down my very generous offer. That’ll teach her.” Trenton tossed back his scotch and came to his feet. “Let me know the minute you get Lange off my ass.”

With that, he left.

“What do you mean you turned him down?”

Kennedi paused in setting the gum paste for the tree house base and looked at Tabitha across the metal prep table. “He wanted to buy out my father’s company and lay off all of the employees without so much as a blink. I refuse to let that happen.”

Tabitha splayed her hands upon the table. “So that I’m clear, Shaw wanted to free you of all financial burden with your father’s company, which ultimately would help our situation here, and you turned him down? That’s what you’re telling me? And you felt that was wise?”

“It’s not enough that he plans to demolish the store my mom worked hard to build, which has been in this very spot for decades. He wants to take my pop’s business from me too. And he was so damn arrogant.”

“I don’t care if he strutted in wearing a goddamn crown!” Tabitha yelled. “We didn’t get the bank loan, and you turned down the one financial opportunity that would’ve salvaged our business! Did it ever occur to you that we could’ve taken the money and built someplace else? Evie and I should’ve been consulted.”

“This is my mother’s bakery! It belongs right here!” Kennedi boomed, tears stinging the back of her eyes. Ignoring Carlos and Amy who burst into the kitchen, she slammed the icing smoother down on the table, firing off a harsh reverberation across the metal surface. “This place means nothing to you! I don’t expect you to care.”

Tabitha blinked, tears spilling down her hard-drawn face. She yanked off her apron and flung it across the table, barely missing the tree house structure. “Well you just sealed your mom’s bakery’s fate,” she said calmly as she stalked out of the room.