by JA Huss
“You’re crazy.” He laughs.
“No,” I say firmly. “My methods are unorthodox, yes. But so are yours. So you see, we’re perfect for each other.”
I smile, my speech complete. Not exactly how I rehearsed it, but close enough.
“The house with the friends?” he asks.
I hold my thumb and pointer fingers close together. “Teeny, tiny lie.”
“Leaving tomorrow?”
“Lie. I own that house.”
“How the fuck do you own a beach house in Malibu? And a sandwich shop?”
“My mommy and daddy are rich. Isn’t that how you got your money?” Why is he wasting time on this trivial bullshit? He should be dragging me back up into that bedroom so he can fuck me against the window.
“No,” he growls.
“Yes,” I say back. “Your father is Charlie Vance. Your mother is Mariel Hawthorne. They have billions more dollars than my family.”
“I earn my money, Cinderella.”
Oh, God. I have dreamed about him saying my name like that. “I like to earn mine too!” I squeal. “See how much we have in common?”
“You’re crazy,” he says, pointing a finger at me.
“I lick my lips and imagine myself sucking on it.”
“You just said that out loud.”
“I did?” I laugh. “Oh, well, I have a habit of that. Speaking my thoughts out loud. It’s weird at first, but you’ll get used to it. See, when you’re named after a fictional character you get all sorts of ideas about who you are. So when I was a kid I used to imagine myself as a character in a book and everything I did, I sort of narrated. I was practicing for telling stories in the future.”
“Lies, you mean?”
“No, no, no, listen. Stories. Like… I’d be walking around the farm in the winter and I’d be all, ‘Her boots made a crunching noise as she passed over the snow.’ I narrated my life. I’d be all, ‘Her father’s motorcycle sounded like the thunder of wings and the pounding of hooves.’ We had a lot of bikes at our house. And horses. So don’t judge my similes.”
“Am I dreaming right now? Am I having a stroke?”
“No,” I exclaim. “This is real, Pax. That’s what’s so great about it. This is all real. We did it,” I say, sighing with relief.
“Did what?”
“Found each other. Now we’ll be together forever.”
Chapter Four - Paxton
She’s nuts. I grab her arm again, tugging her along with me—ever careful not to be too rough, lest I get slapped with a rape charge again—and stop at the front door.
“I understand,” she says. “I get it. It’s weird coming face to face with your soulmate. So I’m going to give you some time—”
“Great,” I mumble, throwing the door open. “See ya around, sugar. Watch out for falling tiaras or dropped shoes or…” Fuck it. I got nothing for this.
I slam it closed and engage the chain lock. I haven’t used that thing in… ever. The house is wired up from top to bottom, courtesy of an alarm company Oliver recommended. And thank God for motion detectors. Because I’m making sure everything is armed tonight, boy.
Fuck.
I take a deep breath and realize she left my sandwiches here and I forgot to pay her.
Oh, well. She’s the boss, right? She can’t get fired. Besides, she owes me those two sandwiches as far as I’m concerned.
Crazy fucking girl.
I grab the paper sack and walk back to the beach side of the house, taking a seat on the terrace.
I eat, trying to get the weird girl out of my mind. Why today? After so long without a girl, why do I have to get horny and decide I’d like to fuck today?
Well, I picked the wrong girl. And isn’t that the story of my life? Jesus. Has there ever been a good one?
No.
No. I am a crazy bitch magnet. Every single one of them has been certifiable.
I tried to tell myself I’m just one of those charismatic men, the kind who attract followers and whatnot. Charming and handsome. I can’t help that a majority of women find me irresistible.
It’s why I played that game in the first place, right?
Well, isn’t that sweet. Does everything have to come back to her? That fucking bitch who tried to ruin my life?
Forget about it, Pax. Just eat your dinner, take a shower, and think about surfing tomorrow morning.
So I do.
And I don’t even wonder if the food is poisoned until I’m scarfing down the last bite of the chicken avocado ranch.
Isn’t that the preferred method of killing enemies in fairy tales?
It wasn’t. Poisoned, I mean. Because I feel fine when I wake up at dawn and grab a cup of coffee before I hit the waves. I pull my spring suit up my body and slip my arms in, flexing my muscles a little to get comfortable, then get my favorite board from the side of the house and jog down the sand. It’s not exactly cold this morning, maybe sixties. But it’s clear that summer is just about over and all the tourists have gone home because there are only about half a dozen guys out waiting on waves.
I run into the surf, drop onto the board, and start paddling.
I don’t talk to anyone, but I know all their faces. The middle-aged dude who lives a few houses down. He’s a year-round guy. Lived here when I moved in, and I’ve never said more than ten words to him at a time, so I have no idea what he does, other than surf every morning and leave his rooftop terrace hatch unlocked—even when he’s not home. Finding that out was a happy accident when I was drunk one night and decided I could jump from roof to roof. I got tired at his house and discovered he doesn’t lock his hatch. He’s got a hot wife, too. Probably some model from days gone by, because she’s attractive in that beachy California kind of way even though she’s got to be pushing fifty.
The two teen actors. I only know they’re actors because I did background checks on those hoodlums last year. They have a house in Burbank—not too far from Mr. Corporate, now that I think about it—and don’t live here full-time.
Then there’s the three twenty-somethings who wear suits during the day, just like me, and all drive cliché cars, just like mine. They live next to old dude with hot wife. They share that house and throw a lot of parties. I had to check them out too because the police came once and that is the kind of shit I need to know about.
But that was last year and since then, no more problems.
They all nod at me when I turn around and sit up on my board to take a look around and admire my house.
I love this place. It’s more home than home.
And that’s when I spot another surfer. Even though it’s barely dawn and the morning haze is cluttering up the visibility, I know who the newcomer is immediately.
Her.
Bakery girl. I wonder if she smells like sugar covered in ocean salt water?
Her dark hair is pulled back into a long ponytail and her spring suit is white with black stripes on the arms.
She paddles straight for me.
I look around, weigh all my options and decide not to make a big deal about it when I’ve got six witnesses who probably wonder on a regular basis who I am and why I’m so mysterious.
No way. If this bitch thinks I’ll put on a show for the locals, she’s got another thing coming.
“Good morning,” she yells—so fucking loud—when she gets over the breakers.
I glance at the other guys, notice they’re noticing us, and take a deep breath when one of them paddles closer.
“Hey,” he says, once he knows I can hear him. “Do you know that chick?”
“Why?” I growl.
“I’ve seen her around the neighborhood. Fucking fine, man. You dating her?”
“I don’t do dates.” I snort.
“Good,” he says, turning himself around in the water. “Because I’m hitting that shit right the fuck now, bro. This was just a courtesy call.”
I narrow my eyes at his back as he paddles to his friends. He’s one o
f the party-house guys.
“She’s all yours,” I call after him. He doesn’t answer. Asshole.
“Pax!” the sugar princess yells.
I have to take a deep breath and count to ten so I don’t bark, Shut the fuck up. I paddle towards her so she won’t announce my goddamned name to all these strangers again and when we’re about twenty feet apart, I say, “Keep your voice down.”
“Sorry,” she says, sitting up on her board and swiping the long strands of black hair out of her eyes. “Forgot. You’ve got that whole Mr. Mysterious thing going on.”
“Jesus fuck. Will you shut up?”
“They can’t hear me,” she says, waving a hand over towards the party-house guys. “I saw him talking to you and I didn’t hear a thing. What did he say, anyway? You both looked over at me after.”
“He says he wants to fuck you.”
“Oh.” She laughs. “Did you tell him I’m taken?”
“No,” I growl. “I don’t give a shit who you fuck. I don’t even know you.”
“Yet.”
“Not yet, princess. I’m not going to know you ever. In fact, I know too much about you already. Don’t tell me any more details because I’m not interested.”
“You sure about that?” she says, looking over her shoulder at an incoming wave. “And don’t call me princess.” She frowns for a moment before turning it back into a smile. “My oldest sister claimed that nickname.”
“Aurora?” I laugh, trying to decide if I should take this wave just to get away from her. But party guy number one looks like he’s getting ready, and it’s cutting away from me, so I don’t.
“You remembered!” Sugar says. “Yes. See, we’re gonna get along so well, you and I. So, so well.”
“Look, Cinderella.” I have to shake my head at her name. I can’t even take this conversation seriously calling her that. “I’m a private kind of guy, as you know.” I stress that last word, just to make sure she understands I’m pissed off about this bullshit. “So you’re gonna go your way and I’m gonna go my way, and we’re both gonna forget any of this ever happened. I’m not interested.”
But just as the last of my words are coming out of my mouth, she starts furiously paddling, her attention on an incoming wave. The swell lifts me, carries me forward a little, and then I bob back down. But Cinderella is already up, weaving back and forth, riding it out.
She’s good. Better than I thought she’d be. I kinda figured she was just playing out here. Trying to get my attention, but no. The girl surfs.
And owns a sandwich shop. And a house. In Malibu.
I don’t know. Something about this is all kinds of wrong. All the little red flags are waving at me. All the little alarm bells are going off.
Hmmm.
She ditches the wave near the beach, and she’s getting ready to paddle back when the party-house guy who wants to make a move surfs right up next to her and falls into the water. When he comes up, they are both laughing. Talking. Smiling.
Oh, is that how she’s gonna play this? Get me jealous?
I don’t do jealous.
They paddle back together and she hangs out with all three party guys after that, completely ignoring me.
I catch a few waves, then head back to the house.
Games, man.
I can play with the best of them. But I just don’t do it anymore.
Chapter Five - Cindy
Paxton Vance was born Paxton Nathaniel Vance to Mariel Hawthorne and Charles Vance thirty-one years ago. His parents never married, but his mother did give him his father’s last name—against his father’s wishes.
After all the snooping I’ve done on him over the years, that one little tidbit says more about Paxton’s family life than anything else. More than the non-existent child support payments, more than the lack of summer vacations with the paternal side of the family, more than the occasional visits Charles Vance took back to Kentucky every few years.
Why did his father even bother, I wonder? It was clear from the beginning he was never interested in his unexpected progeny. Charles Vance has a huge family. Seven brothers and sisters, although four of them are only half-siblings. His own father was a known serial philanderer. So it’s almost fate that he had the same inclination.
But unlike Paxton’s father, his grandfather could afford the bastard children he spawned. A hit movie in the late Seventies secured his place in Hollywood history. He had several greater roles after that, until the early two thousands, when he was just too old to pull off that bad-boy leading man character anymore.
Since then he’s been quiet, out of the public eye, and from what I can gather, a full-fledged alcoholic. Just like his son, Charles.
Mariel Hawthorne, on the other hand, has never been a casual relationship kind of woman. Which is why it never made sense that she allowed known deadbeat playboy Charles to seduce her in her early twenties.
I got her school records—Mariel was an overachiever at the very best all-girls’ boarding school in New England—and every teacher made remarks on her private nature, standoffish attitude, and serious goal-setting.
Her family comes from a long line of Kentucky thoroughbred breeders. They don’t train them, they just buy and breed them. And Mariel seemed determined to keep her father’s legacy as a producer of some of the most famous racehorses in American history alive.
Limitless Farms, under the management of Mariel, has produced eleven Breeders’ Cup winners and nine Kentucky Derby winners, just to name a few. Last year at the spring sale, she bought four mares and six yearling colts with purer bloodlines than the Queen of England. She spent eleven million dollars at that sale.
But she also sold ten pregnant brood mares and six fillies and she came out ahead more than ten million.
Her net worth places her among the very richest and powerful women in the world, if not history.
And ninety-nine point nine-nine percent of the population of people on this planet has no idea who she is. She is not a one-percenter. She is so much richer than any hipster label can describe.
And she got it all from horses.
I checked. That woman is as clean as Charles Vance is dirty. Limitless Farms prides itself on its one-hundred-percent transparency policy. Publishing her yearly earnings even though it is not a publicly traded firm.
I’m not sure what to make of that, honestly. Why would such a private woman publish her net worth so openly? Every sale and purchase is public. She goes to the spring and fall auctions at Keeneland as herself. She does not hire someone to appraise the horses and bid for her via internet or phone. She sits her ass in that pavilion and raises her numbered paddle like everyone else. And she meets with prospective buyers in person. I know, I got a meeting with her at the on-site stables at Belmont last year, feigning interest in a breeding contract.
She’s quick though. She took one look at me—I was using a false name of course—and deduced I was a nobody not worth her time. And although she was pleasant and smiled the entire time, she was very clear that her services were out of my budget.
But those were some of the most interesting five minutes of my life.
That is Paxton’s mother.
Someone he cares very deeply for. In fact, I don’t think it would be presumptuous of me to say that Mariel Hawthorne is the most influential person in my Paxton’s life.
He’s a mama’s boy.
God, that is so damn cute. I want to squeeze him, it’s so cute.
It also explains a lot about his behavior over the past ten years. His demeanor, as well.
Imagine being twenty-one-year-old Paxton Vance. Senior year at Brown University. Majoring in business and at the top of his class. And having to make that phone call home to explain that he is one of the infamous Mister Browns.
I don’t like imagining that conversation actually. I don’t think it involved tears, or anything so dramatic as that. I don’t think it was filled with screaming or accusations. Or even apologies.
I think it involved the words, “I will fix this. I will make it right.”
Fix it.
The words are in my thoughts before I even realize their implication.
That’s what he does now. For money. He fixes things. He hides the dirt, sweeps it under the rug, and makes everything go away.
But his own problem has never been fixed. Never cleaned up. And he hates the fact that he has put that smudge on his mother’s pristine family name.
When people hire me to find things, the very first thing I do is find a motive for the contract. Why do they need me? What are they after?
Most of the time I get hired to spy on a spouse. One party thinks the other is cheating. They want answers, they want confirmation, they want proof.
So when I decided to spy on Paxton, I needed to assign myself a motivation. Why do I need to know about him? Why does he intrigue me?
It was my brother, Oliver, who got me interested in Pax. They weren’t friends when they were accused. Not even close. Oli was a first-year, fresh out of pledge week, and had only been living in the house for two weeks when the accusation happened.
He didn’t tell me, of course. No one told me anything. I’m the baby of the family. Five years younger than Oliver and fifteen years younger than my oldest sister Aurora—Rory, as we call her.
But I was the only one still living at home when it all happened. Oliver came back to the farm, called my parents into the office, and closed the door. I had that office wired for years by that time. My father and his secret life have always intrigued me. And even though I learned absolutely nothing about my father and his past with that wire-tap, I did learn the truth about Oliver and some of what happened that night at Brown.
I watched the news relentlessly over the next several months. People showed up—people like Ford Aston, and his son, Five. Ford ducked out of this little problem at Five’s insistence, but then Five and Oliver went away, came back, went away again. I snooped into every public record I could find about each of the Misters, and when I came up with Paxton Vance’s biography, well… color me obsessed.
