The Forgotten One (The Heirs #2)

Chapter Seven

Even brand-new, Max’s truck didn’t fit in on the winding streets of Beverly Hills, filled with mega-mansions, Bentleys, and Lamborghinis.

When Chase had asked him to meet at the address typed into the truck’s navigation system, Max had assumed it was for the lawyer’s office, not the man’s home.

The weekday meeting never happened since, according to the attorney, the office staff would question Max’s appearance, and rumors could fly.

These people truly seemed to think Max’s very existence was going to spread shock waves through the media and financial worlds.

Max thought they were all smoking crack.

The week had crawled along like nothing had happened.

Jeff had been shocked when Max showed up to the yard in a new truck but accepted the explanation that Max had been saving for a down payment.

After the initial inspection of the truck was over, it was back to work as per usual.

Long drives into LA with even longer drives home. And even though Max would normally drive his bike to the yard when the weather was good, he opted for the truck. Leaving it home, even safe in his garage, felt wrong. It was the nicest personal possession he’d ever owned. The thought of someone breaking into his garage and taking off with it didn’t sit well in his head.

Max continued on and ignored the traffic he had to endure.

He slowed the truck down to a crawl as he neared the address Chase gave him.

Very few of the homes were visible from the road.

Eight-foot-plus hedge-filled fences and heavy gates greeted him the moment he’d turned into the zip code for the elite.

His map said he’d made his destination several yards from the gate.

Following Chase’s instructions, Max rolled down his window and pressed a button on an intercom box.

“You made it,” Chase said when he answered.

“Yeah” was all Max replied.

The gate hummed as it slowly opened.

Perfectly manicured landscaping and trees lined the drive as he drove closer to the house.

Max took it all in, his eyes darting from one end of the property to the other.

The house looked less like a home and more like a hotel. Whatever the lawyer charged, it was too much. The place was ridiculous. Expansive columns that reached the whole two stories of the home. A detached garage that must have space for eight cars. Fountains and statues.

Homes like this only existed in movies.

Max pulled his truck alongside Chase’s and killed the engine.

He stretched his arms over his head the second he was out of the truck.

He stood there for a good minute and looked around.

Other than a little road noise and the water splashing in the fountain, Max heard nothing.

No dogs barking, children playing ... lawn mowers.

Nothing.

He moved around to the front of the house and saw that the front door was open.

At the top of the steps, he stuck his head inside. “Hello?”

“We’re back here. Come in.”

Max left the door open and walked inside.

If he thought the grounds were ridiculous, the inside was insane.

The foyer, if you could call it that, was the size of Max’s living room and kitchen combined.

Stone floors, with a circular table under a chandelier sitting in the center. The foyer opened to a massive great room that had more furniture than a department store.

Beyond that were floor to ceiling windows that overlooked the gardens in the back of the house.

Now this is what Max had expected when he’d shown up at Chase’s the week prior.

This was the home of a billionaire.

The hair on Max’s neck stood up with the thought.

“Sorry, I was in the office.” Chase strode into the room, hand extended.

“This is one hell of a place.”

Chase shrugged, looked up. “It is that.” Chase nodded toward the direction he’d just come from. “I made coffee.”

Max narrowed his eyes. “You make the coffee in your lawyer’s home?”

Chase laughed and started walking away.

Max followed.

“No, no. This isn’t Cadry’s house. It’s ours.”

Max stopped walking and turned a full circle. “You’re shitting me.”

“I shit you not.”

“This was your dad’s place.”

“Yeah. Pretentious, isn’t it?”

Max looked at the walls with a different eye, knowing his father had lived there. “Does Alex live here?”

“No. Neither of us wanted to move in.”

“Why the hell not?”

Chase sighed. “ You see real estate. We see him.”

They funneled down a hall and into a kitchen. An island to sit six, custom cabinets, double refrigerator, a stovetop that belonged in a restaurant.

Max ran a hand over his beard.

This was way out of his comfort zone.

“Black, right?” Chase asked as he removed a coffee mug from a cupboard.

“Yeah.”

“Stuart should be here in a few minutes.”

Chase had run the attorney’s name past Max in their phone conversation midweek.

“Did you guys spend time here growing up?” Max asked.

“Not a lot. Like I told you last week, he wasn’t much of a dad. When we were here, there were babysitters and nannies. Our mother put a stop to that, and we only came on the occasional holiday and eventually not at all.”

“Wow.”

Chase handed him the coffee. “C’mon. I’ll show you around.”

Max took a sip of the coffee, then put the mug down.

Walking in the opposite direction from where he’d come in, they moved into another expansive hallway.

“The space on this side is a high-end man cave. There’s an office.” Chase paused at a doorway.

Max looked inside.

Bookcases filled one entire wall. A desk in the middle of the room. Chairs, a sofa ...

They kept moving.

“A bathroom.” Chase pointed. “A guest bedroom. Or the ‘I’m too drunk to make it upstairs’ bedroom.”

The guest room was twice the size of his in Palmdale.

“Bar and billiards.”

This, Max liked.

A wet bar complete with barstools and a big screen on one side.

The pool table had enough room to move around and not even think about hitting the wall. “This is cool.”

Chase huffed. “I doubt he ever used it.”

“Why have it, then?”

“Status.”

Whatever that meant.

They kept walking. “Theater.”

A mini-version of an uppity screening room that, again, Max had seen in a movie.

“Tell me he used this.”

Chase kept walking. “Doubt it.”

Another bathroom. Laundry and utility room and a door that emptied to the side of the house and another that emptied onto a covered patio with a full outdoor living space, another bar ... another TV. Beyond that was a pool and what looked like a pool house beside it.

“You can check that out later.”

They strode back into the house, moved through a formal dining room, saw the door to the wine cellar. A less formal dining space and back through the main great room. The downstairs kept going ... more guest rooms, a full gym with an indoor hot tub and sauna. There was even a space dedicated to someone coming in to give you a massage.

Upstairs, all the guest rooms had full bathrooms.

Aaron Stone’s bedroom was, as expected, the largest. Fireplace, balcony ... open walk-in shower, separate tub, double sinks, although it didn’t look like a woman had anything to do with the space. The walk-in closet still held much of the dead man’s clothes.

“We’ve been sending a lot of this to charities and organizations that give young executives business suits when they’re just starting out. Hope you don’t mind.”

“Why would I mind? It’s not mine.”

“Technically, it is. Alex and I didn’t think you’d want his clothes.”

“You’re right about that.” Max ran a hand over a few jackets still hanging there. “I don’t have a lot of suits.”

Chase laughed. “Do you have any?”

“No.”

He laughed harder.

Max felt the corners of his lips pulling into a smile.

Next was the wife’s suite.

Lighter colors, same theme ... a bit smaller. “They didn’t sleep together?” Max asked.

“I’m sure Melissa dealt out sex as a tool to get what she wanted.”

“Sounds like a lot of women.”

Chase didn’t spend more than a minute in that room. “They deserved each other.”

From the way Chase talked, it became more and more apparent how much he disliked his dad ... their dad.

Max couldn’t wrap his mind around that.

His dad.

Sperm donor.

Max shook off the thought.

There were more rooms, another, smaller media room, a woman’s office. He guessed it was a woman’s only because of the light colors, a glittery chandelier. Another laundry room and a set of back stairs that they didn’t bother taking.

They both retreated down the main stairway and onto the ground floor. “There’s the garage, the pool house, a space for staff.”

“For staff?”

“Sometimes the staff stayed on-site.”

“I was wondering who kept the place up.”

“We’ve kept the basics going. Yard, pool, house. The weekends around here are quiet. We used the pool over the summer. Alex crashed here one night. Otherwise, it’s vacant.”

Nuts. The whole place was nuts.

Through the open front door, in walked a man wearing a million-dollar suit and a smile. “Hope you don’t mind. I let myself in.”

Chase shook the man’s hand. “Not at all. This is Max. Max, Stuart Cadry, our father’s estate attorney.”

“A pleasure.”

“The pleasure is all mine, Max. I had an opportunity to verify the test results. I hope you’re ready for your life to change.”

“Ready or not.”

Chase patted Max on the back and led them out of the foyer and into an office.

Sarah pushed her glasses higher on her nose as, for the fifth time, she took the turn onto the street where the late Aaron Stone lived.

The gates leading into the estate were wide open. Not a regular occurrence in this neighborhood. Seeing them that way gave her hope that she could bump into someone working there and maybe get some kind of information.

The bumping part of that absolutely had to happen off the property. Stalking, trespassing ... and lots of other - ings weren’t something she wanted to do. Landing Patrick in the lawyer’s office without a juicy story would give her a pink slip faster than she could type the words “I quit.”

On one of the passes by the house, she noticed a truck pull in. And not a work truck, but one with paper plates that screamed it was brand-new.

Another pass, and she noticed a Tesla ease up the drive.

And still, the gate stayed open.

Instead of driving around a sixth time, Sarah squeezed her car onto the shoulder of the road and put it in park.

Beside her, she had a notebook where she wrote down the makes and models of the cars she noticed and then waited. She also took note of all the cars passing by. If she saw any of them twice, she’d have to vacate her spot. Media and stalking ... there were laws, and she was arguably crossing the line.

“I don’t like this,” she said to herself.

But she sat there anyway.

As the minutes ticked by, her heartbeat grew louder.

Finally, there was movement.

A truck, and not the one she saw drive in, left.

While she didn’t see the man driving very clearly, she was fairly certain it was Aaron Stone’s son, Chase.

Still, the gate stayed open.

A few minutes behind the truck, the Tesla pulled out. The older man behind the wheel had a phone in his hand as he turned onto the road.

The gate was still open.

Sarah grabbed her keys and the dime-store map that promised to show tourists where the stars lived and jumped out of her car.

She’d already circled the Stone address and written the name Pink .

Sticking to the road, she jogged to the driveway and immediately noticed a security camera. Instantly, she fiddled with the map, turned in a circle, and kept walking a few yards away.

The sound of the other truck leaving had her standing taller.

Sarah jogged to the other side of the street and started walking back to her car.

She tried not to stare when the truck stopped just beyond the gate and didn’t move.

Had they seen her?

Daring a look out of the corner of her eye, she noticed the man behind the wheel twisting in his seat, a remote in his hand.

She hesitated as the truck lurched forward a foot, and then the heavy door opened, and he jumped out.

Every nerve ending in her body jolted, and Sarah doubled her pace to her car.

“Dammit!” the man from the truck cursed.

She stopped and immediately went into defense mode. “Sorry, I was looking for—” Her words trailed off when she realized the man wasn’t yelling at her but the remote he kept banging his hand on in what looked like an attempt to get it to work.

This was her opportunity.

She seized it. “Are you having trouble?” Sarah called out from the other side of the street.

“I think the battery is dead,” he said, not looking up.

One fortifying breath later, Sarah crossed over and stood in front of the truck. “Did you try moving them around?”

The man looked up, and Sarah saw him ... really saw him for the first time.

He wore a beard, which she’d somewhat noticed at first glance but now took in. It was longish, but not lumberjack quality. His hair was short, which made her wonder if the beard had been an afterthought. Or maybe it was one of those “don’t shave in November” things. Either way, she instantly thought he’d look better without it. Or trimmed way down ... yeah, that would do the man’s face justice. His eyes were an amber brown, not gold, and not hazel ... but amber. Or maybe that was the way the light was hitting them.

They were stunning.

He wore jeans, a button-up flannel shirt, and a jacket that had some kind of logo on it she didn’t recognize.

Those amber eyes caught hers and held.

Sarah realized she was staring and cleared her throat. “The batteries, did you move them around? Sometimes that works.”

Whoever the man was, he moved his gaze from her to the remote and started to take the back off. Twice he pulled at the latch but wasn’t able to get a fingernail between the plastic ends to finish the task.

Sarah reached a hand out. “I have fingernails.”

He looked at her again. “Okay.”

Sarah tucked the map under her arm and took the remote he offered before prying the back off the device.

The batteries spun with a light touch. “Which button is it?” she asked.

“The middle one.”

Sarah lifted the remote and pressed the button, and the gate started to close.

“It just needed a little help.”

“Thanks.”

“No problem.”

The man looked up the street. “Do you live around here?” he asked.

“No. I’m just a ...” She waved the map around. “I was told that Pink lives here. Does she?”

His eyes narrowed. “You’re a tourist?”

“Kinda.”

“Pink doesn’t live here,” he said as he turned his palm for the remote she still held.

“Sorry.” She handed it to him and, at the same time, tried to make out the logo on his shirt. The multitasking resulted in her dropping the remote on the ground and not his palm.

They both bent to get it at the same time.

Her glasses slid from her face.

She stood up as he took one step forward.

The sound of her glasses crushing beneath his feet had her lunging forward one second too late.

“No, no, no.” Her world blurred, and she started to panic.

“Oh man, I’m sorry.”

Her hand found her glasses, or what was left of them, and she moaned.

“It’s okay.” It wasn’t. She couldn’t drive without her glasses, and she didn’t have another pair on her.

“Can you see without them?” he asked.

She glanced up, squinting in an attempt to make out his expression. “Yup. You’re right there.” She purposely pointed to his right and laughed.

He chuckled. “Seriously . . .”

“I’ll be fine. I have a spare pair of glasses at home.”

“Can you drive?”

“Sure ...” She put what was left of her glasses on her nose.

There were chunks still sticking to the rims, but not enough to make anything out. “I’ll call an Uber.”

“Do you live close by?”

“Northridge.”

“That’s not close.”

“It’s the weekend. Traffic is light.”

Was he frowning? Smiling?

Her mother’s voice echoed in her ear. “Embrace your contacts. Stop hiding behind your glasses.”

“Stay here.”

The man moved around her and got back into his truck. Next thing she knew, the gate had opened again and he was backing up into the driveway he’d just left.

Teri said she had to work ... but was it early or late? Sarah cursed herself for not paying attention.

Moments later, he returned on foot. “Are your keys in the car?”

Sarah reached in her pocket, pulled them out. “I have them.”

“We’ll pull your car inside the gate, and I’ll drive you to get your glasses.” He grasped the keys from her hand.

“You don’t have to do that. I can call an Uber.”

He was already crossing the street. “I’m the one that broke them. It’s the least I can do.”

“I don’t even know your name.”

“It’s Max. What’s yours?”

Her brain short-circuited.

“Sarah.”

He was Max?

“Nice to meet you, Sarah.”

How could she be this lucky?

Things like this didn’t happen to her. She always had to dig for a story, for the people involved ... and Max was getting into her car to—

“Oh shit.”

Sarah rushed across and up the street.

He was already behind the wheel.

And her notebook was open on the passenger seat.

“I can move it.”

The sound of her engine starting was quickly followed by it turning off.

Max stepped out with something in his hand.

“I can—”

“What the hell is this?”

She swallowed, stepped back.

“I can’t see—”

“You’re looking for a celebrity house?” His voice had lost the lift it had a moment before, replaced with surprised anger.

“Uhm ...” She was screwed. Caught before she could write the first line in a story she had yet to uncover. “I’m—”

“You’re a reporter.” It wasn’t a question.

She didn’t have to see Max’s face clearly to know he was pissed.

Sarah closed her eyes. “I can explain.”

He slammed the car door and walked past her. “Save it, lady.”

“Please, Max . . . Mr. Smith.”

He stopped, turned. “They told me to expect you. I thought they were shitting me. Yet here you are. Who do you work for?”

“I freelance.” Which wasn’t exactly a lie ... Who was she kidding? She hadn’t freelanced since she took the job at RMI .

“How did you get my name?”

“It was a tip.”

“From who?”

“I don’t know.”

“Man or woman?”

“I don’t know.”

“What do you know?”

She shook her head.

A car drove around them at much too high of a speed.

“Nothing,” Sarah admitted.

“Good. Let’s keep it that way.”

Another car darted around the corner; this time, they blew the horn.

Sarah jumped back and nearly lost her footing.

Max stormed away.

All she could do was watch as he appeared again, this time in his truck.

The gate closed behind him, and he sped off down the road.

“Damn.”