legacy.
There was just no time for anything that didn’t involve clearing up after his father.
Max’s finger didn’t even pause as he pressed ‘delete’. He moved on, reading another and another, and—hang on a minute. His eyes flicked back up the screen as he reread one, barely able to believe the words dancing in front of his eyes.
Irregularity...
Share of the company...
Your great-aunt...
Twenty-five per cent.
Max blinked, casting a quick glance over at his father. Did he know? Could it possibly be true that his recently deceased great-aunt had kept hold of her twenty-five per cent of DL Media even after she had walked away from her work and her family? The same great-aunt who had left her house and belongings to him? This could change everything.
Maybe Miss Scott’s luck was in. A trip to Cornwall might be exactly what the lawyer ordered.
‘Sorry about that.’ His father’s expression was a discomfiting mixture of slightly sheepish and sappy. ‘Max, I would really appreciate it if you had a word with your mother.’
Here they went again. How many times had Max been asked to broker a rapprochement in the constant battlefield that was his parents’ marriage? Every time he swore never to do it again. But someone had to be the responsible one in the family, and somehow, even when he could still measure his age in single digits, that person had had to be him.
But not this time.
‘I’m sure she would rather hear from you.’
The sappy look on his dad’s face faded. He was completely sheepish now, avoiding Max’s eye and fiddling with the paperclips on his desk. ‘My attorney has told me not to speak to her directly.’
Time stopped for one long second, the office freezing like a paused scene in a movie.
‘Attorney? Dad, what on earth do you need an attorney for?’
‘You’re going to be a big brother.’
Max stopped in the middle of a breath. He was what?
‘Mandy’s pregnant and we’re engaged. The second your mother stops being unreasonable about terms and we can get a divorce I’ll be getting married. I’d like you to be my best man.’
His father beamed, as if he were conferring a huge honour on Max.
‘Divorce?’ Max shook his head as if he could magically un-hear the words, pushing the whole ‘big brother’ situation far away into a place where he didn’t have to think about it or deal with it. ‘Come on, Dad. How many times have you fallen in love, only to realise it’s Mum you need?’
Max could think of at least eight occasions without trying—but his dad had never mentioned attorneys before.
‘Max, she’s demanding fifty per cent of my share of the company. And she wants it in cash if possible. DL can’t afford that kind of settlement and I sure as hell can’t. You have to talk her down. She’ll listen to you.’
She wanted what? This was exactly what DL Media didn’t need. An expensive and very public divorce. Max had two choices: help his dad, or involve the board and wrestle control of that crucial third of the company from his dad.
Either option meant public scrutiny, gossip, tearing the family apart. Everything his grandfather had trusted Max to prevent.
A pulse was throbbing in his temple, the blood thrumming in his veins. Talk to his mother, to the board, to his dad, go over the books yet again and try and work out how to put the company back on an even keel. There were no easy answers. Hell, right now he’d settle for difficult answers.
Steven Loveday was still looking at him, appeal in his eyes, but Max couldn’t, wouldn’t meet his gaze. Instead he found himself fixated on the large watercolour on the opposite wall: the only one of his grandfather’s possessions to survive the recent office refurbishment. Blue skies smiled down on white-crested seas as green cliffs soared high above the curve of the harbour. Trengarth. The village his great-grandfather had left behind all those years ago. Max could almost smell the salt in the air, hear the waves crashing on the shore.
‘I’m away for the next two weeks. The London office is shouting out for some guidance, and I need to sort out Great-Aunt Demelza’s inheritance. You’re on your own with this one, Dad. And for goodness’ sake, don’t throw everything away for an infatuation.’
He swivelled on his heel and walked towards the door, not flinching as his father called desperately after him. ‘It’s different this time, Max. I love her. I really do.’
How many times had he heard that one? His father’s need to live up to their surname had caused more than enough problems in the Loveday family.
Love? No, thank you. Max had stopped believing in that long before his voice had broken, along with Father Christmas and life being fair. It was time his father grew up and accepted that family, position and the business came first. It was a lesson Max had learned years ago.
* * *
‘Ellie, dear, I’ve been thinking about the literary festival.’
Ellie Scott turned around from the shelf she was rearranging, managing—just—not to roll her eyes.
It wasn’t that she wanted to stifle independent thought in Trengarth. She didn’t even want to stifle it in her shop—after all, part of the joy of running a bookshop was seeing people’s worlds opening out, watching their horizons expanding. But every time her assistant—her hard-working, good-hearted and extremely able assistant, she reminded herself for the three billionth time—uttered those words she wanted to jump in a boat and sail as far out to sea as possible. Or possibly send Mrs Trelawney out in it, all the way across the ocean.
‘That’s great, Mrs Trelawney. Make sure you hold on to those thoughts. I’ll need to start planning it very soon.’
Her assistant put down her duster and sniffed. ‘So you say, Ellie...so you say. Oh, I’ve been defending you. “Yes, she’s an incomer,” I’ve said. “Yes, it’s odd that old Miss Loveday left her money to Ellie and not to somebody born and bred here. But,” I said, “she has the interests of Trengarth at heart.”’
Ellie couldn’t hold in her sigh any longer. ‘Mrs Trelawney, you know as well as I do that I can’t do anything. There are two trustees and we have to act together. My hands are tied until Miss Loveday’s nephew deigns to honour us with his presence. And, yes,’ she added as Mrs Trelawney’s mouth opened. ‘I have emailed, written and begged the solicitors to contact him. I am as keen to get started as you are.’
‘Keen to give up a small fortune?’ The older woman lifted her eyes up to the heavens, eloquently expressing just how implausible she thought that was.
Was there any point in explaining yet again that Miss Loveday hadn’t actually left her fortune to Ellie personally, and that Ellie wasn’t sitting on a big pile of cash, cackling from her high tower at the poverty stricken villagers below? The bequest’s wording was very clear: the money had been left in trust to
