Twenty-nine-year-old Michael was tall and dark, looking like a young Sidney Poitier. Unlike the carefully concealed fire inside Carter, Michael’s flame could be seen miles away. It drove him. It gave him immediate respect from men twice his age. It made him dangerous. It made him the mirror of his father.
Michael leaned forward with a confident smirk on his face. He was used to this game. His father made it seem like the world was falling apart to light a candle underneath him when he thought Michael was slacking, which he never was.
“We have seventeen of the twenty,” Michael offered. “It’s just taking a little longer than we expected.”
Steven stared him down. “I’m disappointed in you, Michael. I thought I raised my sons to never make excuses.”
Michael blinked, but never lost his composure. There was something about this man that ripped at him. His approval could make him feel like he was king of the world, and his disappointment made him feel like a five-year-old boy. This business deal was the chance he’d been waiting for. He would be the one to take the leading cosmetics company for women of color to the next level…a chain of high-end hair salons and that board of directors seat was his.
“You’re still on the timeline,” Carter said. “You wanted to take over twenty of the top black salons in L.A. by the first of the year. It’s only September.”
Steven turned to him, a sarcastic grin on his face. “I love how you use these phrases ‘you’ and ‘your.’”
Carter rolled his eyes, knowing what was coming next. The almost daily reaming of accusations that Carter didn’t love his father, his family and the family business because he’d decided to be his own man. It was a broken record and he didn’t have the patience for it.
Steven leaned across his desk, staring pointedly at his son. “You may not work for me, a rejection I have learned to deal with, but you are still a Chase.”
Carter felt his teeth grinding. Keep your cool, he told himself. He loves it when you let him get to you. “I know, Dad. I just meant…”
“So,” Steven continued as if Carter hadn’t spoken, “when referring to the success of Chase Beauty, ‘we’ is more appropriate.”
Carter pressed his lips together, noticing the sly grin on Michael’s face. His little brother got a lot of entertainment out of these scenes, and even though Carter loved him more than anyone on the planet, he wanted to sock him right now.
“Hate to say it,” Michael admitted, “but Carter’s right. And I wasn’t making an excuse.”
Steven wasn’t getting through to them. They were young, but they were Chases and that meant they had to act more than their ages. “Do you boys understand the point here? My vision was clear. We would buy these carefully selected salons and launch our own chain. The end of the year was the deadline to launch. Not buy the salons.”
“Dad, we’ve offered them the world,” Michael said. “Performance Salon and Essentials won’t sell. It’s time to get dirty.”
“Like you haven’t already?” Carter asked. “I’ve heard what you’ve been doing.”
Michael smiled innocently. He kept very few secrets from Carter. Only sometimes, Carter’s sensitivity to obeying the law made it necessary. “You haven’t heard anything.”
“How about Matt Leonard and those pictures you threatened to send to his wife?”
Michael laughed. “You thought that was dirty? I’m surprised at you, man. You ought to know dirty better than anyone. You’re a lawyer.”
“Michael is right,” Steven said. “We have to—”
Carter raised his hand to stop his father. “Dad, I don’t want to hear this.”
“You’re my lawyer,” Steven stressed. “So it doesn’t matter what you want to hear. Besides, I need your help with Essentials.”
“I don’t do your legwork.” Carter watched as his father’s eyes turned to slits.
“I’m your father,” he answered back. “You’ll do whatever I tell you to.” Steven’s gaze lingered a little longer on Carter to make his point before turning to Michael. “Michael, your hunger can go too far sometimes. Simple blackmail will…”
“I’m out of here.” Carter stood up.
“Sit down, boy.” Steven spoke in that tone that always got the desired result. No matter how big they got, he was bigger. He would never let them forget that, and as Carter sat back down in his chair, Steven knew they wouldn’t.
“Blackmail won’t do it, Dad,” Michael advised. “We’re gonna have to take it to a new level with them.”
Steven didn’t like it when things got this way, but this was business. He’d learned that the hard way when he started Chase Beauty twenty years ago. He looked at Michael, his expression nothing less than deadly serious. “This needs to happen. So, do what you have to do. Carter will handle Essentials.”
Michael’s competitive spirit bit at him. He couldn’t figure out why his father seemed to go out of his way to pull Carter in when he could handle this on his own.
Carter smiled, nodding. “Sure, why not? I’ve been looking for ways to lose my law license.”
“I’m asking you,” Steven said, “because we have to take the legal route with Essentials.”
Michael smirked. “You get the easy stuff, Carter, since you’re so soft.”
Carter got up, starting for Michael, who quickly stepped around the desk, ready for him. With no patience for this, Steven stood up, the mere gesture having incredible power over his sons and they both immediately stopped, turning to look at him.
“Carter,” Steven said. “Essentials has a shop in View Park and one in Baldwin Hills. They’re both owned by Avery Jackson.”
Carter shrugged. “Should that name mean something to me?”
Michael rolled his eyes. “She’s the daughter of our chief of police, idiot.”
“And she’s not selling,” Steven said.
“She’s a bitch,” Michael spat. “I’ve offered her twice what her piece of shit shops are worth.”
“If they were a piece of shit, we wouldn’t be going after them, idiot.” Carter grinned while Michael gave him the finger.
Steven sat back down, focusing on the thick manila folder on his desk. “Revenue-wise, she’s probably the weakest of the whole bunch. Location-wise, I’ve got to have those stores. I need a way to make her sell, but because of who she is, we can’t use—”
“Me,” Michael proudly offered.
Steven placed his hand on the folder and slid it toward Carter. Carter looked at it, but didn’t pick it up, which he knew his father wanted him to do. “What exactly do you expect me to do?”
“You’re the Harvard lawyer. You figure it out.” Steven shared a stern look with both of his sons. “You need to understand the pressure we’re under. Chase Beauty is our family’s legacy.”
Carter and Michael both sighed, having heard this speech too many times to count. Steven had built the business from scratch, ignoring the naysayers warning that an entire corporation focused only on black women could never rival the big players. Steven had showed them all, and he never let his sons forget it. He also never let them forget that a lot of people didn’t like their success and were waiting in bushes like hungry lions for any chance to bring them down, and it was essential that they not get that chance.
“Nothing comes back to Chase Beauty,” Steven ordered. “Do you both understand?”
“We understand,” Carter and Michael answered in unison, as they had always to anything their father told them.
Janet Chase, the socialite, opened the office door without knocking, which was a sure sign she was angry. She didn’t need to wonder if she had everyone’s attention, because Janet always got everyone’s attention. She was an exceptionally beautiful, elegant and classy woman who looked at least a decade younger than she was. That she was born into money was obvious to anyone with eyes and it took only a second’s worth of time in her presence to see the best etiquette classes New York had to offer advertised in her every move and word. Including every
look, like the dangerous one currently on her face as she eyed her husband and two sons.
“I knew you were in here.” She placed delicately adorned hands on her trim, but curvy hips. She would not lose her temper. It wasn’t her style, but she would be obeyed. “What are you doing?”
“Business, Janet.” It amazed Steven that after over thirty years of marriage he still thought she was too good for him.
“Business is over.” She had been Steven’s mistress to his wife, Chase Beauty, for so long, but she wanted all the things its success gave her so she accepted it; only not today. “This is Leigh’s day. She’ll be here soon, and your guests are noticing your absence.” She pointed her finger at her men, all of whom she loved with every inch of her. “I want you all out there in five minutes, and don’t mess with me.”
You just didn’t mess with Janet Chase.
From No More Good
1
“What is this, Daddy?” Six-year-old Daniel Chase was standing over something in the hallway of his uncle’s penthouse condo in downtown L.A.
“What is what?” Thirty-year-old Michael Chase waited for Evan, Daniel’s twin brother, to get inside before closing the door behind him.
“It’s a bra!” Evan rushed to his brother, picking up the lacy pink lingerie for his father to see, his little brown hand waving it in the air.
Michael sighed, realizing it might be a mistake to bring his boys over to his brother’s place. He should have known something like this would happen. He’d been warned last month when he walked in on Carter and a Brazilian model having very loud sex hanging halfway off the dining room table.
“Put that down,” Michael ordered. “Just drop it.”
“These are panties!” Evan was reaching for the matching bottoms just a few feet away. They were lying on top of a silk cocktail dress.
“Don’t touch that.” Michael took his son’s arm.
“Mommy has these.” Evan struggled to get away from his father. “Is Mommy here?”
“All mommies have these, stupid.” Daniel rolled his eyes.
“Uncle Carter needs to do laundry.” Michael cautiously led his boys down the hallway, praying that he wouldn’t have to explain the birds and bees to them today. That really wasn’t on the schedule.
“Where is he?” Daniel asked impatiently as soon as they were at the steps to the living room of the three-thousand-square-foot, three-bedroom penthouse condo.
“He’s probably working in his office,” Michael answered. “Working hard.”
He led his boys to the living room sofa and reached for the remote control. “You boys stay here, do you understand?”
Evan was already looking antsy, eager to get out of his church clothes. They were both used to being able to run wild whenever they were here.
Michael found a suitable television station on the large plasma screen on the wall. “Just watch this and don’t move.”
“Why not?” Evan asked.
“Look at me,” Michael ordered, waiting until both of them did so. Keeping stern eye contact, he said, “Because I said so. Do you understand?”
Daniel nodded, but Evan just shrugged, always the difficult one.
As Michael made his way to the master bedroom, passing scattered pieces of clothing along the way, he wasn’t looking forward to the reason he was sent over here by their mother. He had to remind Carter to show up tonight at Chase Mansion, their parents’ fifteen-thousand-square-foot estate in View Park, to celebrate in his honor. Carter hadn’t been answering his phone for three days now, so Janet sent Michael to track him down.
This wasn’t the first time in the last six months Carter had “disappeared.” Ever since his fiancée, Avery Jackson, left him, Carter would leave for long periods of time. Avery not only left Carter, but left L.A. and didn’t want to be found. He’d gone ballistic when he realized she had no intention of coming back.
He had become a Jekyll and Hyde, moving between two states of being. One was an obsessed psycho desperate to find Avery, who he swore on the Bible was the only love of his life, using the considerable means at his disposal whether legal or not. The other was a reckless drunk who didn’t care about Avery, swore he was better off without her, and wanted to prove it by nailing every woman he could get his hands on.
And the bra and panties in the hallway suggested Carter had been doing just that. This was the Carter that their parents were concerned about, the one who could get the family in real trouble.
And trouble for this family meant more than it did for others. The Chase family was American black royalty. They were not part of the entertainment or sports worlds, which high society looked down on. Those people didn’t belong to, nor were they invited into, the world the Chase family ran in. No, the Chases were a cut above that. Filthy rich was where the Chase family stood—or stood out depending on how you looked at it.
The family was led by Steven Chase, a man from humble beginnings who built his cosmetics company, Chase Beauty, into a multibillion-dollar corporation. He had become an American titan and used the family’s billions to influence business and politics all the way to Capitol Hill. His money was invested in several industries, including real estate in some of the most exclusive areas in the western United States.
Meanwhile, his wife, Janet, brought social standing to the family as the daughter of high-society East Coast lawyers with a strong heritage and several generations of wealth and community leadership. From their gated palace in the mostly black, affluent suburb of View Park, she single-handedly took over L.A.’s society scene, black and white, and created an empire envied by even the best East Coast families. Together, no one could rival what they had created.
And although it was Steven’s money, influence, and power that put out the fires his children started, it was Janet who was the architect of the Chase family image and publicity. With the recent family scandals still lingering, she couldn’t allow Carter to throw the family into another one. Especially not one of a sexual nature, which of course is what Carter was known for. He not only slept with lots of women, but he also treated them badly when he was through. Word was starting to get around, and that can be dangerous.
Michael stood in the doorway to Carter’s bedroom and observed the mess in front of him. He could only smile because Carter was such a neat freak, almost to the point of obsessive, and here he was, living like a frat boy complete with a naked woman sprawled facedown on the bed.
Carter Chase’s light brown eyes flew open as he heard a loud bang. Had something just happened or was it the awful pounding in his head again?
“Wake up!” Michael yelled, closing the door behind him. “It’s afternoon, boy.”
Carter struggled to sit up on his bed with his hand pressing against his forehead. He felt like shit. “What the fuck are you doing here, man?”
His younger brother, dressed in a sharp gray suit, sat down on the bed looking at him with a smirk on his face. At least Carter thought it was a smirk. Things were a little blurry.
“You know I brought my boys here,” Michael said. “You got her thong in the hallway. They don’t need to see that.”
“Don’t come by uninvited, then.” Carter cleared his throat.
Michael nodded to the naked, chocolate body next to Carter. “She is?”
Carter turned his head slowly, because that was all he could do to keep it from exploding. Nice ass, was all he could think of. “I don’t know.”
“That’s smart.” Michael was envious of his brother’s wanton freedom. With his having been married seven years himself, things were a bit more complicated. “This is what Mom is talking about.”
“Can you not mention her right now?” Carter asked. He leaned back against the headboard. “What day is it?”
“She’s afraid you’re going to get some strange girl pregnant.”
“Like you did?” Carter asked, reminding Michael of how he had introduced his current wife to the family seven years ago.
“Touché.” M
ichael made a fist and socked Carter in the arm.
“Stop.” Carter pointed to the half-empty condom box on the dresser. “I’m not stupid.”
“But you don’t know her name.”
“Her name doesn’t matter,” Carter said. “She’s getting out of here as soon as she wakes up.”
The woman made a sound as if she’d heard Carter, but didn’t move. It wouldn’t matter to him if she sat up and started a scene. She was just some hot chick who had offered to buy him a drink at Level Three Nightclub. They moved on to one of the club’s infamous beds with the curtains closed. Less than twenty minutes later, he took her home. In these matters, he preferred to go to the woman’s place, so he could leave as soon as he was done, but this one had a kid and a mother at home and…well, a very nice ass.
“Mom sent you here?” Carter asked.
“No one has been able to reach you for days. I thought you’d gone off to chase after Avery again.”
Carter felt his temperature boil at the mention of her name. “She’s not in Tampa.”
“Last month it was Atlanta.”
“It was never Atlanta!” Carter swung around on the bed, feeling the room move around him. “I told you she was never in Atlanta. Her stupid sister used to go to school there, so I—”
“Hey!” Michael stood up. “Don’t yell at me. I don’t give a shit where Avery is. And last week you said you didn’t either.”
“I didn’t,” Carter lied. “I don’t. She can be in hell for all I care.”
“Who do you think you’re talking to?” Michael asked. “I’ve seen you break down and all…this. Like it’s not all about her.”
“So you’re my therapist now?”
Gone Too Far Page 27
