Page 4 of The Troublemaker
Through the glass I can make out the shapes of them—my mother’s perfect posture, Whit twisting his wedding ring, Sloane tapping her nails against the boardroom table.
I press my palm flat against the wall and pull in a slow breath, one that never truly calms me, just reminds me why I never stay home for too long.
As I assumed, the minute I step into the conference room that feels as stuffy as everything else in this office, every head turns in unison.
Edmund Mills sits at the head of the table.His hair is more silver than black since the last time I saw him, but he’s still draped in a suit that has been dry-cleaned to within an inch of its last thread.He holds that particular air of a man who has managed affluent families long enough to deem himself of the same economic stature.
My mother is to his left.
Margot Hargrove does not look like a woman who just lost her mother.She’s composed and immovable.She meets my eyes, and something moves through hers that I have spent thirty years trying to decode.
“There she is.Traffic?”Whit says, tipping his head toward the empty chair beside him.
“Yeah, and the Red Line was down and?—”
“Well, now that you’re here, we can get started.”My mom steamrolls my perfectly valid excuses.
“One would think you might leave earlier for a nine a.m.Monday morning meeting.”Sloane delivers her line without looking me in the eye.
“I did, I told you the Red Line?—”
“We’ve wasted enough of Mr.Mills’s time.”My mom’s hand lifts in a gesture that has been ending arguments our entire lives.“Please, Edmund, let’s begin.”
Whit presses his knee briefly against mine under the table in solidarity as if saying,Relax.Let it go.We both know you’ll never win.
He’s right.
Sloane and my mother have been a unified front for as long as I can remember—Mini Margot and the original share the same bone-deep certainty that I am the family liability.Pretty sure that title was officially awarded the day I dyed my hair purple at thirteen.
Mr.Mills straightens in his chair and opens the manila folder on the desk.He peeks up at me.“It’s nice to see you again, Hadley.You’ve grown up into a beautiful woman.”
I offer a polite smile.
“Now, let’s get started.”
The familiar tension that my family brings to a room bands tight around my chest, squeezing.
My grandmother was the matriarch for the past two decades, and whatever she’s leaving to us has the power to change our lives.
I’m not here for the money or the stocks, the lake house on Lake Michigan, or the penthouse in the Gold Coast.
I don’t want the jewelry or the museum-worthy art collection.
That’s not to say what I’m hoping she’s left me isn’t big.It’s her most prized possession, honestly.But at least it’s the one thing no one in this room wants.
My mind drifts as Mr.Mills goes through my grandmother’s estate in careful, methodical order.
My mom gets everything for the most part.
She leaves anything that was my grandfather’s to Whit, which isn’t surprising.
She leaves Sloane’s and Whit’s kids a sizeable trust fund they can access when they’re twenty-five, pending conditions.
Her art pieces are left to Sloane, who may look at them and love them but never, under any circumstances, sell them.
Whit gets her lake house—staff included—but if he fires anyone, he forfeits the deed.
My mom gets the condo in the city, but she must put it up for a weekend getaway silent auction for three weekends out of the year for my grandmother’s most beloved charity.
