The Bourbon Kings

by J. R. Ward

  No, he thought. Not now. Not this morning.

  Although would there ever be a good time?

  "Not ever" was the only acceptable timetable on this.

  From a distance, he heard himself speak. "I'll be there before noon."

  And then he hung up.

  "Lane?" Jeff got to his feet. "Oh, shit, don't you pass out on me. I've got to be at Eleven Wall in an hour and I need a shower."

  From a vast distance, Lane watched his hand reach out and pick up his wallet. He put that and the phone in the pocket of his slacks and headed for the door.

  "Lane! Where the fuck are you going?"

  "Don't wait up," he said as he opened the way out.

  "When're you going to be back? Hey, Lane--what the hell?"

  His old, dear friend was still talking at him as Lane walked off, letting the door close in his wake. At the far end of the hall, he punched through a steel door and started jogging down the concrete stairwell. As his footfalls echoed all around, and he made tight turn after tight turn, he dialed a familiar phone number.

  When the call was answered, he said, "This is Lane Baldwine. I need a jet at Teterboro now--going to Charlemont."

  There was a brief delay, and then his father's executive assistant got back on the connection. "Mr. Baldwine, there is a jet available. I have spoken directly with the pilot. Flight plans are being filed as we speak. Once you get to the airport, proceed to--"

  "I know where our terminal is." He broke out into the marble lobby, nodded to the doorman, and proceeded to the revolving doors. "Thanks."

  Just a quickie, he told himself as he hung up and hailed a cab. With any luck, he would be back in Manhattan and annoying Jeff by nightfall, twelve midnight at the very latest.

  Ten hours. Fifteen, tops.

  He had to see his momma, though. That was what Southern boys did.

  TWO

  Three hours, twenty-two minutes, and some number of seconds later, Lane looked out the oval window of one of the Bradford Bourbon Company's brand-new Embraer Lineage 1000E corporate jets. Down below, the city of Charlemont was laid out like a Lego diorama, its sections of rich and poor, of commerce and agriculture, of homesteading and highway displayed in what appeared to be only two dimensions. For a moment, he tried to picture the land as it had been when his family had first settled in the area in 1778.

  Woods. Rivers. Native Americans. Wildlife.

  His people had come from Pennsylvania through the Cumberland Gap two hundred and fifty years ago--and now, here he was, ten thousand feet up in the air, circling the city along with fifty other rich guys in their various aircraft.

  Except he was not here to bet on horses, get drunk, and find some sex.

  "May I refresh your No. Fifteen before we land, Mr. Baldwine? I'm afraid there's quite a queue. We could be a while."

  "Thank you." He drained what was in his crystal glass, the ice cubes sliding down and hitting his upper lip. "You're timing couldn't be better."

  Okay, so maybe he would be doing a little drinking.

  "My pleasure."

  As the woman in the skirt uniform walked away, she looked across her shoulder to see if he was checking her out, her big blue eyes blooming underneath her fake lashes.

  His sex life had long depended upon the kindness of such strangers. Particularly blond ones like her, with legs like that, and hips like that, and breasts like that.

  But not anymore.

  "Mr. Baldwine," the captain said from overhead. "When they found out it was you, they bumped us up, so we're landing now."

  "How kind of them," Lane murmured as the stewardess came back.

  The way she reopened the bottle gave him a clue to how she'd take down a man's fly, her full body getting into the twist of the cork and the pop free. Then she leaned into the pour, encouraging him to check out her La Perla.

  Such wasted effort.

  "That's enough." He put his hand out. "Thanks."

  "Is there anything else I can get you?"

  "No, thank you."

  Pause. Like she wasn't used to being turned down, and wanted to remind him that they were running out of time.

  After a moment, she kicked up her chin. "Very good, sir."

  Which was her way of telling him to go to hell: With a whip around of the hair, she hipped her way off, swinging what was under that skirt like she had a cat by the tail and a target to hit.

  Lane lifted his glass and circled the No. 15. He'd never been particularly involved with the family business--that was the purview of his older brother Edward. Or at least, it had been. But even as a company outsider, Lane knew the nickname of the Bradford Bourbon Company's bestseller: No. 15, the staple of the product line, sold in such tremendous numbers that it was called The Great Eraser--because its profit was so enormous, the money could eclipse the loss from any internal or external corporate misstep, miscalculation, or market share downshift.

  As the jet rounded the airstrips for the approach, a ray of sunshine pierced the oval window, falling over the burled walnut folding table, the cream leather of the seat, the deep blue of his jeans, the brass buckle of his Gucci loafers.

  And then it hit the No. 15 in his glass, pulling out the ruby highlights in the amber liquor. As he took another pull from the crystal rim, he felt the warmth of the sun on the outside of his hand and the coolness from the ice on the pads of his fingers.

  Some study that had been done recently put the bourbon business at three billion dollars in annual sales. Of that pie, the BBC was probably upward of a quarter to a third. There was one company in the state that was bigger--the dreaded Sutton Distillery Corporation, and then there were eight to ten other producers--but BBC was the diamond among semi-precious stones, the choice of the most discriminating drinkers.

  As a loyal consumer, he had to concur with the zeitgeist.

  A shift in the level of the bourbon in his glass announced the descent to the landing, and he thought back to the first time he had tried his family's product.

  Considering how it had gone, he should have been a teetotaller for life.

  *

  "It's New Year's, come on. Don't be a wuss."

  As usual, Maxwell was the one who started the ball rolling. Out of the four siblings, Max was the troublemaker, with Gin, their little sister, coming in at a close second on the recalcitrant Richter scale. Edward, the oldest and the most strait-laced of them, had not been invited to this party--and Lane, who was somewhere in the middle, both in terms of birth order and likelihood to get arrested at any early age, had been forced into the excursion because Max hated to do bad without an audience--and girls didn't count.

  Lane knew this was a really poor idea. If they were going to hit the alcohol, they should take a bottle from the pantry and go up to their rooms where there was zero chance of being busted. But to drink out in the open here, in the parlor? Under the disapproving glare of Elijah Bradford's portrait over the fireplace?

  Dumb--

  "So y'all saying you aren't going to have any, Lame?"

  Ah, yes. Max's favorite nickname for him.

  In the peachy glow from the exterior security lights, Max looked over with an expression of such challenge, the stare might as well have come with sprinter blocks and a starting gun.

  Lane glanced at the bottle in his brother's hand. The label was one of the fancy ones, with the words "Family Reserve" in important lettering on it.

  If he didn't do this, he was never going to hear the end of it.

  "I just want it in a glass," he said. "A proper glass. With ice."

  Because that was how his father drank it. And it was the only manly out he had for his delay.

  Max frowned as if he hadn't considered the whole presentation thing. "Well, yeah."

  "I don't need a glass." Gin, who was seven, had her hands on her hips and her eyes on Max. In her little lace nightie, she was like Wendy in Peter Pan; with that aggressive expression on her face, she was a straight-up pro-wrestler. "I need a spoon."

>   "A spoon?" Max demanded. "What are you talking about?"

  "It's medicine, isn't it."

  Max threw his head back and laughed. "What are you--"

  Lane slapped a palm on his brother's mouth. "Shut up! Do you want to get caught?"

  Max ripped the hold away. "What are they going to do to me? Whip me?"

  Well, yes, if their father found them or found out about this: Although the great William Baldwine delegated the vast majority of fatherly duties to other people, the belt was one he saved for himself.

  "Wait a minute, you want to be found out," Lane said softly. "Don't you."

  Max turned to the brass and glass beverage cart. The ornate server was an antique, as most everything in Easterly was, and the family crest was etched into each of its four corners. With big, spindly wheels and a crystal top, it was the hostess with the mostest, carrying four different kinds of Bradford bourbons, half a dozen crystal glasses, and a sterling-silver ice bucket that was constantly refreshed by the butler.

  "Here's your glass." Max shoved one at him. "I'm drinking from the bottle."

  "Where's my spoon?" Gin said.

  "You can have a sip off mine," Lane whispered.

  "No. I want my own--"

  The debate was cut short as Max yanked the cork out and the projectile went flying, pinging into the chandelier in the center of the room. As crystal chattered and twinkled, the three of them froze.

  "Shut up," Max said before there was any commentary. "And no ice for you."

  The bourbon made a glugging noise as his brother dumped it into Lane's glass, not stopping until things were filled as high as the milk was at the dining table.

  "Now drink up," Max told him as he put the bottle to his mouth and tilted his head back.

  The tough-guy show didn't last but a single swallow as Max barked out a series of coughs that were loud enough to wake the dead. Leaving his brother to choke up or die trying, Lane stared down into his glass.

  Bringing the crystal lip to his mouth, he took a careful pull.

  Fire. It was like drinking fire, a trail blazing to his gut--and as he exhaled a curse, he half expected to see flames come out of his face as if he were a dragon.

  "My turn," Gin spoke up.

  He held onto the glass, not letting her take it when she wanted to. Meanwhile, Max was having a second and a third go of it.

  Gin barely drew from the glass, doing nothing more than get her lips wet and recoil in disgust--

  "What are you doing!"

  As the chandelier was turned on, the three of them jumped, Lane catching the bourbon that splashed out of his glass down the front of his monogrammed PJs.

  Edward stood just inside the parlor, a look of absolute fury on his face.

  "What the hell is wrong with you," he said, marching forward, grabbing the glass out of Lane's hands and the bottle out of Max's.

  "We were just playing," Gin muttered.

  "Go to bed, Gin." He put the glass down on the cart and pointed with the bottle to the archway. "You go to bed right now."

  "Aw, why?"

  "Unless you want me to kick your ass, too?"

  Even Gin could respect that logic.

  As she headed for the archway, shoulders hunched, slippers sloppy over the Oriental, Edward hissed, "And use the staff stairs. If Father hears anything, he'll come down the front."

  Lane's heart went into full-thunder. And his gut churned--although whether it was the getting caught or the bourbon, he wasn't sure.

  "She's seven," Edward said when Gin was out of earshot. "Seven!"

  "We know how old she is--"

  "Shut up, Maxwell. Just shut up." He stared down Max. "If you want to corrupt yourself, I don't care. But don't contaminate the pair of them with your bullshit."

  Big words. Cusses. And the demeanor of somebody who could ground the both of them.

  Then again, Edward had always seemed like a grown-up, even before he'd made the leap into the teenage world.

  "I don't have to listen to you," Max shot back. But the fight was already leaving him, his tone going weak, his eyes dropping to the rug.

  "Yes, you do."

  Things got quiet at that point.

  "I'm sorry," Lane said.

  "I'm not worried about you." Edward shook his head. "It's him I worry about."

  "Say you're sorry," Lane whispered. "Max, come on."

  "No."

  "He's not Father, you know."

  Max glared at Edward. "But you act like it."

  "Only because you're out of control."

  Lane took Max by the hand. "He's sorry, too, Edward. Come on, let's go before anyone hears us."

  It took some tugging, but eventually Max followed along without further comment, the fight over, the bid for independence dashed. They were halfway across the black and white marble floor of the dim foyer when Lane caught sight of something way down at the end of the hall.

  Someone was moving in the shadows.

  Too big to be Gin.

  Lane yanked his brother into the total darkness of the ballroom across the way. "Shh."

  Through the archways into the parlor, he watched as Edward turned to the cart to try to find the cork, and he wanted to yell out a warning for his brother--

  As their father entered, William Baldwine's tall body blocked the view of Edward.

  "What are you doing?"

  Same words, same tone, deeper bass.

  Edward turned around calmly. With the liquor bottle in his hand and Lane's nearly full glass front and center on the cart.

  "Answer me," their father said. "What are you doing?"

  He and Max were dead, Lane thought. As soon as Edward told the man what had been going on down here, William was going to go on a rampage.

  Next to Lane, Maxwell's body trembled. "I shouldn't have done this," he whispered--

  "Where's your belt," Edward countered.

  "Answer me."

  "I did. Where is your belt."

  No! Lane thought. No, it was us!

  Their father strode forward, his monogrammed silk robe gleaming in the light, the color of fresh blood. "Goddamn it, boy, you're going to tell me what you're doing here with my liquor."

  "It's called Bradford Bourbon, Father. You married into the family, remember?"

  As their father lifted his arm across his chest, the heavy gold signet ring he wore on his left hand glinted like it was anticpating the strike--and looked forward to making contact with skin. Then, with an elegant, powerful slice, Edward was struck with a backhanded slap that was so violent, the cracking sound ricocheted all the way out into the ballroom.

  "Now, I'll ask you again--what are you doing with my liquor," William demanded as Edward stumbled to the side, clutching his face.

  After a moment of heavy breathing, Edward straightened. His pajamas were alive from his body's shaking, but he remained on his feet.

  Clearing his throat, he said thickly, "I was celebrating the New Year."

  A trail of blood seeped down the side of his face, staining his pale skin.

  "Then do not let me ruin your enjoyment." Their father pointed to Lane's full glass. "Drink it."

  Lane closed his eyes and wanted to vomit.

  "Drink it."

  The sounds of choking and gagging went on for a lifetime as Edward consumed nearly a quarter of a bottle of bourbon.

  "Don't you throw that up, boy," their father barked. "Don't you dare . . ."

  *

  As the jet bumped down on the tarmac, Lane jolted out of the past. He was not surprised to find that the glass he was holding was shaking, and not because of the landing.

  Putting the No. 15 on the tray table, he wiped his brow.

  That hadn't been the only time Edward had suffered for them.

  And it wasn't even the worst. No, the worst one had come later as an adult, and had finally done what all the lousy parenting had failed to do.

  Edward was ruined now, and not just physically.

  God, there w
ere so many reasons Lane didn't want to go back to Easterly. And not all of them were because of the woman he loved but had lost.

  He had to say, however . . . that Lizzie King remained at the top of that very long list.

  THREE

  The Bradford Family Estate, Charlemont

  The Amdega Machin Conservatory was an extension of Easterly's southern flank, and as such, no cost had been spared when it had been added back in 1956. The construction was a Gothic-style masterpiece, its delicate skeleton of white-painted bones supporting hundreds of panes and panels of glass, creating an interior that was bigger and more finished than the farmhouse Lizzie lived in. With a slate floor and a sitting area with sofas and armchairs done in Colefax and Fowler, there were hip-height beds of specimen flowers down the long sides and potted greenery in each of the corners--but that was all just for show. The true horticultural work, the germination and the rehabilitation, the nurturing and pruning, was done far from the family's eyes in the greenhouses.

  "Wo sind die Rosen? Wir brauchen mehr Rosen . . ."

  "I don't know." Lizzie popped the top off another cardboard box that was long as a basketball player's leg. Inside, two dozen white hydrangea stalks were wrapped individually in plastic, their heads protected with collars of delicate cardboard. "This is the whole delivery, so they've got to be in here."

  "Ich bestellte zehn weitere Dutzend. Wo sind sie--?"

  "Okay, you need to switch to English."

  "This can't be everything." Greta von Schlieber held up a bundle of tiny, pale pink blooms that was wrapped up in a page of Colombian newspaper. "We're not going to make it."

  "You say that every year."

  "This time I'm right." Greta pushed her heavy tortoiseshell glasses up higher on her nose and eyed the stack of twenty-five more boxes. "I'm telling you, we're in trouble."

  Annnnnd this was the essence of her and her work partner's relationship.

  Starting with the whole pessimism/optimism routine, Greta was pretty much everything Lizzie wasn't. For one, the woman was European, not American, her German accent cutting into her pronunciation in spite of the fact that she'd been in the States for thirty years. She was also married to a great man, the mother of three fantastic children in their twenties, and had enough money that not only did she not have to work, but those two boys and a girl of hers didn't have to, either.

  No Yaris for her. Her ride was a black Mercedes station wagon. And the diamond ring she wore with her wedding band was big enough to rival a Bradford's.