The Angels' Share (The Bourbon Kings #2) - J. R. Ward Page 0,25
his 911 and parked next to his attorney’s classic maroon Jaguar.
“What a view,” he said as he got out.
Lizzie looked up from the ivy bed she was on her knees in front of. Wiping her brow with her forearm, she smiled. “I just started about five minutes ago. Things will look even better in an hour.”
He walked onto the cropped grass. Off in the distance, he heard the hum of a lawn mower, the chatter of electronic clippers, a low whir from a leaf blower.
“I wasn’t talking about the horticulture.” Bending down, he kissed her on the mouth. “Where is—”
“Guten Morgen.”
Lane straightened and hid his grimace. “Greta. How are you?”
As Lizzie’s partner came around the magnolia tree, he braced himself for the German woman’s presence. With her short blond hair, her tortoiseshell glasses, and her no-nonsense attitude, Greta von Schlieber was capable of great feats of gardening—and deep, abiding grudges.
As a string of German came back at him, he was pretty sure she was wishing him a good day in such a way that a piano ended up falling on him.
“I’m going to meet with Samuel T.,” he said to Lizzie.
“Good luck.” Lizzie kissed him again. “I’m here if you need me.”
“I need you—”
Greta’s snort was part quarter horse, part mother hen … part bazooka pointed at his head, and he took the sound as his cue to leave. As much as this was his family’s house, he wasn’t about to mess with the German—and he couldn’t say that he hadn’t earned her disregard.
But it was also time to start setting the record straight.
“It’s about the divorce,” he muttered to Greta. “My divorce. From Chantal.”
Icy blue eyes shot daggers at him. “About time. And you talk vis me ink is dry, ja?”
“Greta.” Lizzie cursed. “He’s—”
“You got it.” Lane pointed a finger in the other woman’s face. “You just watch.”
Heading for Easterly’s front entrance, he counted himself lucky he didn’t get a trowel in the back of his skull. But he’d meant what he’d said. He was taking care of this bad baggage of his.
As the grand door opened, he was prepared to steam by the butler. “I’ve got a meeting—”
But Samuel T., not the dreaded Mr. Harris, had done the honors.
His lawyer smiled like the Tom Ford model he could have been. “Timeliness is next to godliness.”
“Which explains why I’m always late.”
“Personally, it’s the only religion I’ve got.”
The two clapped hands and went in for a shoulder slap. “I need a drink, Sam.”
“This is why I love representing friends. Particularly ones with liquor businesses.”
Lane led the way into the parlor. “Friends? We’re almost family.”
“No, she’s marrying someone else.” As he looked back, Samuel T. waved the words away. “Not what I meant.”
Bullcrap, Lane thought. But he left his sister Gin’s torturous relationship with Samuel T. well enough alone. The pair were Scarlett and Rhett, just take away the mustache and add a couple of cell phones. And hell, with the way the finances were going, maybe Gin would even end up making a dress out of the ball gown drapes in this room. They were pale yellow, a color she liked.
Picking up a bottle of Family Reserve, Lane poured two bourbons into a pair of Waterford rocks glasses and shared one half of the load. Both of them drank the liquor on a single swallow, so the refill was quick.
And Lane took the bottle with him as he collapsed onto a silk-covered sofa. “So what have we got, Samuel T. How bad is it going to get—how much is this going to cost me.”
His lawyer sat across from him, on the other side of the marble fireplace. Over the mantel, the second Elijah Bradford, the ancestor who had built Easterly as a way to prove the family’s net worth, seemed to glare down at them.
“Have you listened to the radio yet this morning?” Samuel T. asked.
“No.”
“It’s out.” Samuel T. held up his palm. “Your father’s suicide. Not Chantal being pregnant. I heard it on the NPR affiliate on the way here. I’m sorry—and I have to imagine that it’s going to be in all the papers tomorrow. The Internet has got to be rife with it already.”
Lane rubbed his eyes. “Goddamn it. Was it Chantal who leaked the news?”
“I don’t know. The sources quoted were ‘anonymous.’ I’ll talk to Deputy Ramsey and see what I can find out.”
“It wasn’t one of Mitch’s boys, I’ll tell you that. He’d kill them.”