“Not good news, huh?” Jack knew from the look on Andrew’s face he didn’t have anything but bad news.
“Sorry, Jack, but John Barton’s death put a real kink in things for us. Our plan to get enough of the share holders on our side to ensure your place as CEO may not work now. John held eight percent of the shares. Mabry holds ten percent of her own. It seems that John’s shares were left to his son, Bryan. I made some calls to try to find out more about the son so we can figure out how he’ll vote, but I can’t be certain yet. It turns out that Bryan Barton went to school with Chad. What I haven’t been able to find out is whether they were friends, enemies, or indifferent,” Andrew reported. “If he votes with Mabry and she has her shares plus control of the proxy shares, they’ll have a small majority.”Jack leaned back in his chair and let out a frustrated growl. “This is a nightmare. How is it possible that it’s all falling apart at the last minute? If we don’t have Bryan on our side, I’ll be out.” Jack frowned.“Oh hell, I know it’s wrong to talk about a man’s death like this, but the timing couldn’t be worse. Andrew, you know it’s not the money that matters to me.” Jack was silent for a long time as he stared at the wall and tried to come up with a plan that had this ending well for him.Andrew nodded. Jack’s family had been wealthy before Jack took over Sutton Capital and Andrew had helped Jack wisely invest his inheritance and the money he had earned over the years. He was well aware of Jack’s financial comfort. Jack had more than enough money to last him ten lifetimes, whether he worked another day in his life or not. This wasn’t about the money.“My dad started this company from the ground up and I was proud to take over for him. I think I’ve done a damn good job expanding it, too,” Jack said, crossing his arms as if he dared Andrew or anyone else to deny the assertion.“I know it, Jack. We all do. That’s why any of the existing board members would have voted for you. Your risky decisions pay off as if you had the Midas touch and people trust your judgment. But, Bryan Barton is a wild card. We can’t predict know what he’ll do.” Andrew shook his head. He leaned forward, his forearms resting on his thighs. He looked at his longtime friend. “I guess you’re going to have to get married, bro.”“I’m not getting married. I happen to like my life the way it is,” Jack said.But, even as he said it, he knew on some level he was lying to himself.Jack would kill to have what his mom and dad had when they were alive; hisparents shared a love so powerful, it lasted until the day they died.Andrew sat quietly and let Jack vent. The ability to do so was one of Andrew’s strengths – knowing when to be quiet and wait out a storm. Jack knew there really wasn’t anything Andrew could say for the moment but it helped to gripe for a few minutes.“I’m perfectly happy living as a bachelor. I don’t know why my mom couldn’t understand that. Just because they had a great marriage doesn’t mean that’s the only way I’ll be happy, does it? Well, does it?” Yeah, it does, thought Jack, but forced that thought out of his mind. He had never met anyone that made him feel the way he knew his mother and father felt together, so he was careful not to let those hopes surface anymore.Andrew remained silent but shook his head.Jack knew he sounded more like a toddler than the CEO of a multimillion- dollar corporation, but he had come to realize a long time ago he wasn’t cut out to have the kind of love his parents had found. Being forced to marry to save his company sent his mood into a downward spiral.“No. Marriage isn’t the only way you’ll be happy, but that’s hardly the issue now. What do you want to do? We can gamble that your aunt won’t be able to get the swing votes she needs or we can go to Chad and ask him to step in and stop her. I think it’s time to ask Chad to get involved.” Andrew suggested.Jack ran his hands through his hair and leaned back in his chair to think. He stayed that way for a few moments and then sat up and turned back toward Andrew before speaking.“I don’t want to leave things up to chance but I won’t ask Chad to step in and confront his mother over this. I know it’s hard for you to understand, but I remember what my Aunt Mabry was like before her husband walked out on her. You can’t see it now because she’s so filled with hate but she was once so happy and loving. In those days I loved her as much as I loved my own mom. When my uncle left her, she cracked.“If Chad stands up to her and sides with me, she may think he’s abandoning her too. I can’t do that to her. I know it’s crazy but I can’t.” Jack crossed to the window on the other side of his office and stared at the view of the Yale campus. His commitment to what was left of his family warred with his drive to protect his position as CEO.“I still don’t understand why she’s focused on hurting you,” Andrew said as he shook his head.Jack sighed. “She went after my dad, before me. When my uncle left her, she wasn’t able to lash out at him because he just took off. He left her almost all their money and Chad was an adult so custody wasn’t an issue. There was nofight she could throw her anger into. I think she needed to lash out at someone and my parents were happily married. That seemed to make her angry so she began to attack them. Now that they’re gone, she’s moved on to me.” Jack shrugged, knowing his aunt’s anger made no more sense than his need to protect her in the face of it.“All right, but let’s walk through this. Even if she gets the board to vote you out, Chad will refuse the position of CEO, won’t he? He doesn’t want the job, right?” Andrew reasoned.“Yes, but at that point the board’s confidence in me may waver. If my own aunt takes me out, they’ll question my ability, so even if Chad refuses the position, the board could go outside of the company for a new CEO instead of coming back to me. If that happens, the business my father built will be lost. And, even if none of that happens, if she has the proxy rights, she can make every decision into a battle. We have a great board right now with really sharp people. We work well together. She’d tear this board apart if she had those voting rights and the company could crumble given enough time.” Jack couldn’t see any way around the mess he was in. And he knew he didn’t want to ask Chad to confront his mother.“I told Aunt Mabry I was getting married, for God’s sake. She’ll be here at three o’clock to meet my fiancé. Hell, I thought I was just buying time. I planned to tell her there was no fiancé but that she would be powerless to oust me as CEO with the votes we had behind us. Now it doesn’t look like I have those votes. There’s got to be a way to fix this.” Jack laughed at the ridiculous situation he found himself in but there was no humor behind it. Only frustration and disbelief that something like this could have happened without him getting out ahead of it.“Well, that’s three hours from now. Let me see if I can find out more about Bryan Barton or pull some other solution out of my hat. I tried tracking down Chad earlier so I could casually mention Bryan and see if they were friends, but I haven’t been able to reach him since he left your house this morning.” Andrew said.“Okay. Let’s work the problem. We can’t exactly call Bryan Barton and ask what his vote would be since he’s burying his father tomorrow. But, let’s try to talk to other alumni we know to see if Barton and Chad were tight in school. And, keep looking for Chad to see what you can get out of him without letting him know what’s going on.”“Why not tell him what’s going on?”Jack shrugged. “Why tell him if I don’t want him to solve the problem.” “Maybe he’ll have an idea. Another way out?”“Can’t chance that.” Jack turned back to his desk. “He’ll want to go to his mom and I’m not ready for that.”“I’ll let you know what I come up with. In the meantime, start running through your little black book and figure out which of your booty calls may be looking for something more permanent,” Andrew said as he strode out of the office.“Oh man, that isn’t funny,” Jack groaned. *Jennie quickly hit the intercom button as Andrew came walking down the hallway. She ducked down and pretended to rummage for something in a drawer as he walked by. Stunned, she grabbed her purse to head out for lunch. Boy did she have a juicy story for Kelly!Kelly Bradley pulled into the parking lot of her condo complex and shut off her car. Grabbing three bags of groceries from the trunk, she headed for the stairs but went right at the top instead of toward her own condo on the left. She raised her fist and pounded. Hard.“Mr. Anders! Mr. Anders!” Kelly called loudly through the door. “It’s Kelly.From next door.”Kelly stopped and waited. And waited. She knew it would take Mr. Anders a little while to work his way to the door. His car was in the parking lot and he wasn’t much of a walker, so chances were, he was home.While she waited, Kelly propped her grocery bags against the wall next to her doorway and pulled out the cookies she’d bought for her neighbor. The door behind her opened. She turned to find the slender white haired man smiling at her with a mouth that was now fairly devoid of teeth.“Hello, dear!” The old man bellowed, but it came out more like “hewwo deah” due to the lack of teeth.His hearing had gone long before his te
Kelly arrived at Jack’s office as she and Jennie had planned, a few minutes before three o’clock. She had run home to print up the marriage license application from the New Haven Office of Vital Statistics website. She showered and dressed in black wool slacks and a fitted ivory cashmere sweater from T.J.Maxx.When Jennie saw Kelly step off the elevator her jaw dropped. “I can’t believe you’re going through with this. By the time I got back to the office, I was sure you’d chicken out.”Kelly squared her shoulders and stood up to her full height. “I’ve decided I’m not going to second-guess myself on this. I want to go to Yale and I’m going to, damn it. I think if I keep moving without stopping too long to think about it, I can go through with it, so get me in there.”Jennie raised an eyebrow and Kelly knew she’d owe her friend big time. And this scene about to play out would essentially put her job on the line. By getting Kelly in there she’d be revealing she had spied on Jack. She had
Kelly swallowed hard as she heard Jack’s answer to her ‘proposal.’ She was relieved he was going along with it, but a tight ball of nerves had been growing in her stomach since she walked in the room and she felt that ball taking over her entire being.Chad excused himself to return to his office with a look on his face that promised Jack would be grilled for details later. Kelly watched Jack out of the corner of her eye as she continued to talk to his aunt. She had seen Jack Sutton on occasion coming in and out of the building when she’d met Jennie for lunch and Jennie had told her he was handsome. But, handsome didn’t even begin to describe the man.Jack was tall, about six foot three inches. He had dark brown hair that curled up at the edge of his collar. His eyes were a rich, deep brown, almost mahogany, and his face had chiseled features with a strong jaw. There wasn’t a damn thing about the man that didn’t sizzle.He wore a suit, but even in that Kelly could see his body was har
Poker face or not, Jack needed to put some space between them when Kelly asked who Andrew was. He stood up and took a few steps back and schooled his expression once again. He forced himself to stay calm despite her revelation that Andrew hadn’t set this up. If she didn’t know who Andrew was, how did she come to be here, and who had he agreed to marry? All the calm that had come back to him in the last few moments fled and he felt himself floundering again. What was happening to his ordered world?“If Andrew didn’t send you, then who the hell are you?” Jack demanded. This day was getting worse and worse. Hell, it had to be a nightmare. There was no way he had just agreed to marry some complete stranger in front of his aunt and cousin. A complete stranger who happened to materialize out of thin air right when he needed a wife?Jack rubbed the heels of his hands against his eyes. He hadn’t slept much the night before after he had lied to his aunt about having a fiancé and he had been wo
Jack faced Kelly again. He was now fully back in his element. He took control of the negotiations now that he had made the decision to run with this. He didn’t really have any other option and she didn’t appear to be a lunatic. In fact, as he watched her quietly come to grips with what she had done and get her confidence back, he marveled at her. It had really taken guts to walk into the room and pull off what she had. And she’d done it with such grace and confidence. She owned his office as if it were hers and there weren’t many people who could pull that off. He found himself a little in awe of the gorgeous creature who now sat quietly on his couch.“Okay. One year of marriage. You’ll sign a prenuptial agreement. You get your law school tuition and you’ll have a credit card for expenses while we’re married. You’ll have to attend occasional dinner parties and fundraising events, that sort of thing, so you’ll need appropriate clothes. Some of them will be black tie. Put anything you n
When Mabry Thompson left Jack and Kelly she walked down the hall to her son’s office. She entered without knocking and immediately dove into a tirade.“Married, my ass. That engagement is as fake as my highlights. I don’t know how he did it or who she is, but we need to expose this marriage as a fraud.” Mabry tossed her purse down on one of the two chairs in front of Chad’s desk and lowered herself into the other.“Hello again, Mom. Long time no see,” Chad deadpanned as he turned away from his computer to face his mother. Chad didn’t know quite what was going on with Jack’s sudden marriage announcement and he agreed something didn’t smell right. But, Chad couldn’t care less if Jack had cooked up this wedding to save his position as CEO. If it meant keeping his mother out of his hair about taking over control of Sutton Capital, he was fine with whatever arrangement Jack made.His mother ignored his reply and continued her tirade. “They’re apparently going to be married by the end of the
Jack and Kelly drove to Hamden for her parents’ weekly Sunday dinner. They were in Jack’s Jaguar and she couldn’t help but appreciate the buttery softness of the leather as she melted down into the seat.“Are you close to your family, Kelly?” Jack asked as he turned off of the highway at the sign for Hamden.“Uh huh. I don’t make it for dinner every Sunday but I try to get there two or three times a month. My mom is a great cook so it’s not a hardship,” she said, with a small smile at Jack.Jack made a left turn onto a tree-lined residential street. “Tell me again how many of you there are?” Kelly had told Jack about her brothers and sisters before and she suspected that in his line of work, he remembered names and details with very little effort. Kelly had a feeling that he wanted to keep her talking to calm her nerves and she was thankful to him.“There are four of us. My sister Jessica who’s two years older than I am, and our older brothers Liam and David. My sister and my mom and
Kelly was sitting next to Jack at the dinner table but he couldn’t read her face as they all passed around bowls and platters, filling plates with her mom’s homemade chicken, macaroni and cheese, salad, and green beans. It was comfort food at its finest and Jack wouldn’t mind coming to more Sunday dinners if her mom’s cooking tasted as good as it looked.“So, Kelly, Jack tells us you met at his office?” Kelly’s father’s question sent Kelly’s iced tea down the wrong pipe so that she coughed and sputtered. Jack laughed and patted her on the back while she tried to catch her breath.“Um, yes, Dad. We met at Jack’s office,” she finally managed to spit out. “Oh, what do you do, Jack?” asked Kelly’s mother.“I’m in venture capital,” Jack answered. “My company identifies companies at various stages of development that we think are good risks to invest in. Sometimes they need seed money, sometimes growth or expansion. We invest and we get a share of the company if they’re a success.”When Kel