Izzy As Is

by Tracie Banister

  “Buy the more expensive tickets,” Zane says, with an indulgent smile. “This will be our first date after all. We have to do it right.” He reaches into the back pocket of his jeans and extracts his wallet, which he then hands to me.

  “You’re the best!” I pull out Z’s Visa and hurriedly type the credit card’s info into the ticket order form before he can change his mind. A few minutes later, I look up and declare, “All done! They can scan our tickets from your cell when we get to the— Woah!” I glance around at the residential area I didn’t realize we’d driven into. It’s populated by grand houses in a variety of styles set back from the road on impeccably landscaped lawns. There’s a Jag, Benz, or Beemer parked in every driveway and I can practically smell the money wafting off each property.

  “What are we doing in this ritzy ‘hood?” I ask Z once I’ve recovered the ability to speak. “Do you know someone who lives here?”

  He opens his mouth to reply, but I cut him off as an explanation occurs to me. “Does this person own a second home in Miami where they want to throw a party, and you’re bringing me to meet him or her so that I can go out for the job?” If so, I wish he’d given me some warning because I’m not really dressed appropriately for a professional consultation. I don’t even have business cards yet!

  “Not exactly,” Z shoots down that idea as he steers the car onto a stone-paved drive at the end of a cul-de-sac, stopping in front of some snazzy wrought iron gates. He lowers his window, then leans out and presses the call button on an intercom that sits atop an iron post shaded by a large palm tree.

  “Hello?” a male voice squawks out of the intercom.

  “Hey, it’s Zane,” my newly minted boyfriend calls back.

  “Zane?” the man sounds simultaneously shocked and ecstatic. “What a wonderful surprise! I’ll buzz you in.”

  A loud noise blares out of the intercom, and the gates part in the middle, swinging open to allow us access to the property.

  “Curiouser and curiouser,” I mutter as we drive through. And no, I never read whichever Alice book that quote came from, but I did see both of the Tim Burton movies and I’d love to know what Lewis Carroll was smoking when he came up with the idea of Wonderland because that was some mierda loca.

  The driveway, which is only wide enough to accommodate one car, weaves through a great expanse of lush grass boasting all manner of leafy and/or flowering trees. As has been previously established, I’m not much into nature, but still . . . “This is beautiful,” I observe.

  “There are six acres of land here, and the property backs up to White Trout Lake where you can boat and—”

  I don’t even hear the rest of what he’s saying because a large, sprawling, Mediterranean-style house has come into view, and it is nothing short of spectacular. I’m particularly impressed by the expansive circular front porch with its big white columns that look like they were lifted from the Parthenon. Z has just braked the Fiat, which seems clown-sized next to this behemoth of a house, when the front doors burst open and a couple comes rushing out.

  I exit the car and am immediately enveloped in a hug by a tall woman in yoga pants and an eye-scorchingly bright lime green hoodie.

  “Izzy, it’s so nice to see you!” she enthuses as she pulls back and that’s when I recognize her.

  “Mrs. Harper, uh, good to see you, too. It’s been a while.” Two years, I think. The last time was when she and her husband came to Miami to visit Z on his birthday and we all went out to dinner to celebrate. Since then, he’s travelled up to them whenever he needed a family fix. How could I have forgotten that Z hails from Tampa? That’s probably what Topaz was trying to say on the phone earlier.

  “Hi, Mr. Harper.” I give him a little wave. He and Zane are standing a few feet away, looking like twinsies, except Mr. Harper’s hair is shorter and streaked with silver, and he’s got some expression lines etched into his chiseled face. At least I know Z will still be a fox when he gets older.

  “This is some place,” I say, referencing the mansion behind us. “Are you guys house-sitting for a friend or something?”

  Mrs. Harper frowns. “No, dear. We’ve lived here for twenty years. This is the house that Fizee’s built.”

  I must be slow on the uptake today because . . .

  “I don’t understand. What does frozen yogurt have to do with—” I gasp in mid-sentence as it all becomes clear. Stabbing an accusatory finger at Zane, I exclaim, “You’re the heir to a froyo fortune!”

  CHAPTER 41

  “Surprise.” Z makes a lame attempt at jazz hands.

  I scowl at him. “Why have you been pretending to be poor all this time when your family has this kind of bank?” I gesture at the house, which could probably fit Eduardo’s pricey pad, plus both of my sisters’ spacious cribs inside it.

  “I haven’t been pretending to be poor. I—”

  “You drive a Fiat, wear jeans from Old Navy, and live in a crap shack! Sorry,” I apologize to Mrs. Harper for my colorful language.

  “It’s okay, dear. I think crap shack is an accurate description of my son’s dwelling. I was horrified when I first saw it. He wouldn’t even let me spruce up the place with some nice throw pillows or a plant.”

  “I live where I live and drive what I drive because that’s what I can afford on my salary as a photographer’s assistant.”

  “Which I’ve always thought was very admirable.” Mr. Harper gives his son an approving clap on the back. “This boy never wanted a free ride. He won’t even touch his trust fund.”

  My jaw drops down so far it almost scrapes the pavers. “You have a trust fund?!?!?!”

  Wrapping a slender arm around my shoulders, Mrs. Harper calmly suggests, “Why don’t we go inside where it’s more comfortable and let Zane explain? I have a fresh batch of sun tea for us all to enjoy.”

  “Thank you. That sounds nice.” The iced tea part anyway because I’m hot, sticky, and getting crankier by the minute. How could Z lie to me about his financial status? And why wouldn’t that bobo want to capitalize on the wealth he was lucky enough to be born into?

  I allow Mrs. Harper to lead me into the house, which has an interior even more stunning than I could have imagined from the outside. There’s a sitting room off the foyer that has a fireplace so large it runs the length of an entire wall! The fireplace has probably never been used since we don’t have cold weather in Florida, but who cares? I bet it’s gorgeous at Christmastime when glittery stockings are hanging from a mantelpiece festooned with a fancy, fairy light-strewn garland. And the elegantly curved hardwood staircase, with its elaborate newel posts designed in a scroll shape, looks like something out of a movie. I could see myself sweeping down those stairs in a designer gown with a glass of champagne in hand.

  “Izzy?” Mrs. Harper interrupts my daydream, and I follow her through the foyer.

  “I can’t believe you grew up in this palace,” I mutter as Zane falls in beside me.

  “We moved here when I was nine, so it’s not like I spent my entire childhood in the lap of luxury.”

  “Neither of your parents came from money?”

  Hearing my question, Mrs. Harper chortles. “Oh no, dear.” She waves me into the great room, which is appropriately named as the space is huge and the whole back wall is floor-to-ceiling windows that offer a magnificent vista of the lake. “Lucas and I were both raised in middle-class families and we struggled as most couples do in the first years of our marriage, then we had two babies in a row, which put even more of a strain on our finances. We both worked full-time, but we weren’t happy or well-compensated at our jobs.”

  Zane and I take seats on one of the espresso-colored leather couches arranged on a plush area rug in the center of the room, and Mr. Harper picks up the story after he settles into a wing chair opposite us. “I had this eccentric great-uncle who made some money later in life playing the stock market. When he passed, he left me a hundred grand. Joy and I had often talked about how we’d like to own our own bus
iness, and she had the very clever idea of opening a froyo place with a beach theme. So, we decided to sink my inheritance into that.”

  “This was taken at the opening of our first store.” Mrs. Harper hands me a five-by-seven photo in a silver frame. Younger versions of her and her husband are standing outside a shop that looks to be in a strip mall, and she’s holding a toddler-sized Zane in her arms while Mr. Harper is clutching the hand of their dark-haired daughter who’s decked out in a cute, watermelon print dress. I touch the image of Z and smile because he had hair hanging in his eyes even when he was two.

  Pointing to the shop’s signage, Mrs. Harper says, “We named the store after the kids—Fi for Fiona and Zee for Zane.”

  Fizee’s—duh! I should have put that together sooner.

  “That’s sweet,” I say, passing the picture back to her.

  “Our first store was a hit, so the next year we opened another location, then another, then another, then we started franchising. That’s where the big money ended up being,” Mr. Harper tells me.

  Z’s fondness for his parents shines in his eyes when he says, “I’ve always been very proud of my mother and father for building their own empire from the ground up and I certainly enjoyed the perk of taste-testing new flavors of froyo for the better part of a decade, but . . .”

  “It was clear from a young age that Zane was more creatively-inclined than business-oriented,” Mrs. Harper interjects as she places a hand on her husband’s shoulder, “and we did our best to support that.”

  “You guys were great. You didn’t even bat an eyelash when I told you I wanted to go to school at UM and get a Bachelor of Fine Arts instead of the business degree you were hoping for.”

  “Well,” Mr. Harper gives his wife’s hand an affectionate squeeze, “we could hardly stand in the way of our son pursuing his dream when we’d already been given that opportunity ourselves. And we knew Fizee’s would be in good hands with Fiona who does have an aptitude for business—”

  “And a desire to rule the world,” his wife adds with a smirk, which makes the men in her family chortle.

  I only met Fiona once, but I remember her being intimidatingly smart, hyper-focused, and more than a little controlling, even when she was on vacation! Now I know why, since she’s a wife, mother, and next-in-line to the Fizee’s throne. I might need to pick her brain about what it takes to be an awesome lady boss.

  Turning to Z with a frown, I ask, “Couldn’t you have worked in the art department at Fizee’s after you graduated?”

  I know that photography is his passion, but I’m having trouble wrapping my mind around him completely peacing out from his family’s multi-million dollar company. If I’d been in his Converse All-Stars, I would have plopped my butt down at a desk in one of the executive offices and collected my big paycheck every week while doing the bare minimum. That’s what trust fund kids are supposed to do!

  “That would have been rather limiting. How many different ways could I have come up with to shoot froyo?”

  I don’t have an answer for that, but I guess I see his point. There wouldn’t have been any challenge for him in that type of work, and he wouldn’t have been able to hone his craft if he’d gone the corporate route.

  “Why not use the trust fund generously provided to you by your parents to open your own studio straight out of school?”

  Zane’s expression grows serious. “I didn’t earn that money, and since I chose my own path professionally, I felt it was important to pay my dues as a photographer rather than buy my way into having a career in that field. I wanted to start at the bottom, learn everything I could from a seasoned professional like Esteban, experiment with a variety of styles and techniques in my free time, and build my portfolio.”

  I eye him thoughtfully for a moment before declaring, “I’m not sure if you’re a masochist, or a saint. Either way, you’re probably too good for me since I’ve spent my whole life looking for shortcuts to get what I wanted.”

  Z reaches for my hand, his lips turning up at the corners. “That’s why opposites attract, right? Naughty needs nice and vice versa so that they can balance each other out.”

  “So, you two are an item now?” Mrs. Harper asks, a glint of curiosity lighting her amber eyes.

  “We were before we got here,” Zane tells her, although his gaze doesn’t leave mine. “Are we still?” he asks me.

  Does he honestly think I’d kick him to the curb over this? Please! I already cut one rich guy loose this week. I’m not an idiot. I am going to let him sweat it, though.

  “TBD,” I say, taking back my hand. “There’s more that needs to be discussed.”

  “I think that’s our cue.” Mrs. Harper pats her husband on the shoulder. “Why don’t we go to the kitchen and let these two speak privately? We’ll bring back some of that sun tea I promised.”

  “Thanks, Mom, but if you don’t mind, I’d like to take Izzy out back and show her the pool area.”

  “I think that’s a wonderful idea. You’ll love the grotto,” she assures me.

  And she’s not wrong. “This is so cool!” I enthuse as I stand next to the Harpers’ large outdoor pool, peering through the waterfall at the far end of it. There’s a cave-like room behind the curtain of water that has a swim-up bar, as well as a lounge area with comfy-looking chairs and a small movie screen.

  “Yeah, that was my favorite place to hang out with friends when I was a teenager.”

  “Did you get your Hugh Hefner on and take girls in there?” I query, a teasing lilt to my voice.

  “Uh, well . . .” Z drops his eyes to the ground and kicks a stray pebble. “I didn’t make a habit out of it or anything, but there might have been one or two special—”

  “Ha! You got your blueberries popped in that grotto, with your parents just a few hundred feet away. Way to go, stud!” I hold up my hand for a high five.

  He shakes his head in disbelief before smacking his palm against mine. “It’s ridiculous the way you can read between the lines with me.”

  “Except I’m not as perceptive about you as I always prided myself on being, am I?” I cross my arms over my chest and give him the stink eye. “I totally bought into this whole struggling artist persona of yours.” Before he can protest, I say, “Yes, I know the struggle was real since you weren’t taking money from your parents, but why hide how well-off your family is?”

  He shoves his hand in his jeans’ pockets and rocks back on his heels. “When I went off to college, I just wanted to be me—accepted or rejected on my own merits. All through my teen years, I was never sure if people wanted to be friends with me or girls wanted to date me because they had dollar signs in their eyes or not. It was a shitty way to live, never trusting anyone and feeling like I wasn’t enough without the money. Think about how different our relationship would have been if you’d known right from the start that I had access to all this.” He gestures at the house.

  “Hmmmmm . . .” I gnaw on my lower lip while I ponder that scenario. “I guess we never would have gotten to know each other or developed real feelings because I would have been completely enamored by your trust fund, and I probably would have manipulated you into spending most of it on me. Speaking of all those millions . . . we are talking about millions, right?”

  He bobs his head in the affirmative, and I feel a little lightheaded at the thought of all that cash just sitting in a bank somewhere. Such a waste!

  “If you won’t use that money to further your own interests, what do you plan to do with it?”

  He shrugs. “I don’t know. Maybe I could set up some sort of scholarship fund for underprivileged kids with artistic talent.”

  I groan. “Now you’re helping underprivileged kids? You do remember I like bad boys, right?”

  “I can be bad,” Z murmurs huskily, pulling me close. “Come with me into the grotto and I’ll show you.” He slides the strap of my dress down and places a series of warm, openmouthed kisses along the slope of my shoulder.

>   “I’d love to, but . . .” Pressing my palms against his chest, I give him a forceful shove and he teeters precariously on the edge of the pool for a few seconds, his arms flailing wildly in the air before gravity (or would it be momentum? Whatever—one of those scientific words) gets the better of him and he topples backwards into the pool, hitting the water with a cannonball-like splash. He immediately pops back up, spitting out water and brushing wet clumps of hair out of his eyes.

  “That’s for keeping me in the dark about your true identity and putting me through months of torturous soul-searching while I was trying to decide if I loved you enough to give up everything I thought I wanted.”

  “Months?” Zane looks dubious. “It was more like a week, wasn’t it?”

  I stomp my foot. “It felt like months!”

  “All right! I’m sorry.” He holds out his hands in a placating fashion. “It wasn’t fair of me to test you like that, but the end result was positive, right? You’ve experienced some personal growth, you’ve got a new career you’re excited about, and you’ve got me, a guy who adores your mind and heart just as much as your body. Plus, there’s a very good chance we’ll be happy together over the long haul because we love each other and love is worth a lot more than money or material possessions.”

  I purse my Candy Yum Yum-coated lips with disapproval. “You had to get mushy on me, didn’t you?”

  A grin spreads across his face. “Yep. Get used to it.”

  “I actually think I could,” I admit, then take a few steps toward the pool and jump in. I resurface right in front of Zane who gathers me in his arms, which conveniently brings me deliciously close to his mouth. I plant a passionate kiss on him, which he returns with equal fervor, and we’re both breathless when we pull apart several minutes later.

  “Sun’s setting,” I observe when I see all the vibrant colors streaking the sky behind Z’s back.