The Forgotten One (The Heirs #2)

Chapter Thirty-One

Max made it until noon on Monday before he picked up the phone and sent a text message to Chase. They hadn’t talked much the previous couple of weeks since the majority of Max’s attention was dominated by Sarah. Either from their time together in Arizona, or the many conversations they’d had over the phone once they’d gotten home.

He was enamored. Max didn’t consider himself the kind of guy who had boxes to check off when he was with a woman. Basically, there were only three. Not crazy ... check. Not married ... check. Sexually compatible ... check.

With Sarah, that list grew exponentially. Strong yet sensitive. She made him laugh and dished his shit back quicker than anyone had before. Smart and openly willing to be vulnerable. Let him be vulnerable. He felt safe around her, and never in his life had he wanted to experience that safety with anyone, especially a romantic partner. But she was more than all of that. Sarah was slowly opening his eyes to what it meant to depend on someone else, and for the first time, he wasn’t running away.

None of these attributes came into focus with other women, but now that he was experiencing them, he wanted them.

Craved them.

Twice in Max’s life he’d revealed to a lover that he was sterilized. Both told him he was crazy and reckless in his decision.

Sarah had cried.

Cried for the boy in him that made his decision so many years ago.

And for the first time ever, Max let doubt in.

The doctor that finally did the procedure tried to talk Max out of it. Three other doctors flat out refused.

At twenty-one, Max didn’t ever see a time in his life that he’d want to be a father. And if he did, there were plenty of adoptable kids that needed a home. He always came back to that.

And that’s where Max went now.

He realized that what he wanted wasn’t necessarily what Sarah would want. Somehow thoughts of Sarah being in his five-year plan felt like a foregone conclusion. And if she was there in five years, she might want a child of her own.

Max pushed the thoughts of parenthood away when he picked up the phone to call his new brother. Being someone’s dad would wait; finding an occupation needed to happen now.

Max sent a message asking Chase to call him when he had a minute.

It only took five and Max’s phone rang.

“Hey,” Max started.

“You caught me at a good time,” Chase told him.

“Good ... uhm, you know how people who win the lottery say they are going to quit their jobs and go lie on a beach somewhere sipping margaritas?”

Chase laughed. “I’ve heard that.”

Max stood on the loggia, a full-on outdoor living room complete with a television, fireplace, furniture ... an outdoor kitchen and bar. Staring across the yard, past the pool and into nothing. “I’m too young to become an alcoholic. I need a job.”

Chase laughed harder. “You have no idea how glad I am to hear that.”

“Does that mean you have something in mind?”

“No, it means I won the bet I had with Alex,” Chase told him.

“What bet?”

“The one where I said you’d be climbing the walls the second you were unpacked, and Alex suggested it would take a month.”

Max tore his blank stare away from the yard and rested his weight on a chair. “And what do people with this kind of money bet with? Property in Europe or expensive cars?”

“A hundred bucks,” Chase said.

Max smiled. “I’ve been employed since I was old enough to swing a hammer. I need something to do. It makes no sense to work for anyone else ... not when there’s a company as huge as Stone Enterprises at my fingertips.”

“Tell you what ... Alex and I have time put aside tomorrow morning. Can you be here at nine?”

“As long as a tie isn’t involved.”

“The tie is optional.”

They ended the call a couple of minutes later, leaving Max with a sense of calm he didn’t have going into the conversation.

After a few minutes of staring into nothing, it dawned on him that most of the clothes Nick had helped him acquire were in someone else’s closet.

He turned and walked back into the house and stopped short.

A middle-aged woman carrying a purse in one hand and a bag in the other jumped when she saw him.

“Who are you?” Max asked abruptly.

“My God, you scared me.” The woman swallowed. “I’m Karina.”

Max stared at her; the name meant nothing.

“The housekeeper?” she explained. “You must be Mr. Smith.”

“No one said anything about a housekeeper.” But it made sense that there was one.

“Miss Piper told me to come today. Is this a bad time?”

He shook his head. “No. It’s fine.”

She sighed, shuffled her feet. “Very good. I was told you’ve moved in?”

“Yes, for now.”

Karina gave him a nervous smile. “I’ve been coming Monday through Thursday. No real set time. Now that you’re here, I can stick to a schedule.”

“Okay.” Max had no idea what to say. Never in his life did he have a housekeeper.

Then again, he never owned a house ... or lived in one as huge as this one.

“Mr. and Mrs. Stone required me to be available on the occasional weekend. When they had company.”

Max stared. Realized she was talking about Aaron and his trophy wife.

Karina paused.

She was waiting for him to say something.

“I’m not having company.”

That seemed to make her happy.

Karina placed her purse and bag on a nearby end table. “I like to do the shopping midweek.”

Again, Max just stared.

“Do you have a grocery list?” Karina prompted.

What?

“I can do my own grocery shopping.”

She blinked several times. “What about meals? We had a cook—”

“I can ...” Max started to interrupt her, then snapped his jaw shut. He cooked because he had to, not because he liked it or was any good at it. “Tell me a little more about this cook.”

That perked Karina right up. “Certainly. Let me put my stuff down and we can plan a schedule.”

Max had scrambled back to the stores he and Nick had spent time in and replaced a few things that were liberated from his previous home.

Now he sat in Alex’s office while both Chase and Alex worked with Max to figure out where he fit within Stone Enterprises.

“When Dad died, Chase and I walked onto this floor acting like we knew what the hell we were doing,” Alex explained.

“We didn’t,” Chase said.

“I worked in Acquisitions and Mergers at Regent. My grand plan was to help Regent grab shares from here as a big F-you to Dad.”

“Wow, you guys really didn’t like him.”

“Can you blame us?”

Max shook his head.

“Thankfully, my field gave me some insight into what running a hotel business looks like. Only Stone Enterprises has a lot more going on than hotels,” she said.

“Like what?” Max asked.

“He bought into airlines, food distribution, a national rental car company. All kinds of things.”

“Hotels weren’t enough?” Max asked.

“Dad was never happy unless he was spending or making big money,” Chase said.

“How much of this do the two of you deal with here on a daily basis?”

“Most of it is a line item. But when those lines start showing up in the red ... Stone Enterprises, the hospitality part, has been covering. And that we do have to deal with.”

Max sat back, tried to see the big picture Alex was painting. “This is why you didn’t want the Starfield hotels.”

Alex rolled her eyes. “That bit us in the ass.”

“What am I missing?”

For the next ten minutes, Chase explained the current situation with Yarros selling his shares to Melissa and Yarros buying Starfield outright.

“When did this happen?” Max asked.

“When you were in Arizona. It’s not public information yet,” Alex told him.

Max wasn’t sad to see the Yarros guy gone, but to bring in the trophy wife had to hurt.

“Bottom line here is ... we need to unload some of the debris Dad bought into. And when we do, the employees that are a part of those debris piles will be laid off.”

Max ran a hand down the hair on his face. “It’s the holidays. People expect a bonus, not a pink slip.”

“We know. We’ve held off for two reasons. You ... we couldn’t sell anything without your vote. And Black Friday or fourth-quarter P&Ls.”

“I thought Black Friday was exclusive to retail,” Max said.

Alex shook her head. “Nope. While it costs the average person an arm and a leg to fly and stay in hotels over the holidays, the real gain is the vacations people prebook for the coming year. Holiday deals, gifts. Like retail, this business can flip a profit in the last quarter much easier than in the first.”

“Then we wait to lay off anyone.” Max did not want to be responsible for anyone not being able to buy their kids something from Santa.

“Absolutely,” Chase said.

“How can I help?” Max asked. “I’ve been a blue-collar worker my entire life. The one that got the pink slip, not the one that gave it.”

Alex and Chase exchanged glances.

Chase sat forward, rested his elbows on his knees. “We need face time with the companies that are on the chopping block.”

“Explain what that looks like.”

“Our foot in the food distribution company looks like this. We have a company called Stone Holdings. Stone Holdings is part of Via Corporation. Via Corp manages Stone Holdings. We have virtually nothing to do with it on the daily. Alex and I agreed that I’d fly out to these companies and see what’s going on. Is there any saving them? Only Piper is close to her due date, and I’ll be damned if I’m not here when she goes into labor.” Chase ran a hand through his hair.

“I’m not qualified to look at a profit and loss statement and determine what is salvageable.” Max assumed that was what they were asking of him.

Alex shook her head. “We have accountants for that. No, we need someone to talk to management and then the employees and get a finger on the pulse of the company. I’m sure you have had enough experience in the workforce to know when management is clueless about why their employees aren’t as productive as they could be.”

“At CMS,” Chase started, “the company I built, I put on my jeans and go down to the shipping yard and talk to the guys as often as time allows. If I hear more than one of them complain about management, I listen. If they see a better way to do something, and Busa and I agree to change policy ... we do.”

Chase’s explanation made sense.

“No one expects you to go in and understand how food distribution works. Or what it takes to run a hotel, or hire a chef, or manage the casino. We don’t know that. But as an owner of Stone Enterprises, everyone in these roles is invested in talking to you.” Alex smiled and added, “You come across as a man who knows when he’s being fed bullshit.” She stopped, rolled her eyes. “Except when three strangers knock on your door and tell you you’re the son of a dead billionaire.”

Max started to laugh.

Chase tossed his head back and slapped his knee.

Alex toe-tapped the air and stared Max down without cracking a smile.

“Touché,” Max said. “You’re right, though. My bullshit barometer is fairly accurate.”

His sister tilted her head to the side. “I can’t imagine you survived how you were brought up without that talent.”

Max had street cred ... in spades. “Okay. What company is the first on the chopping block?”

Max took up space in Chase’s office on the executive floor as he studied Stone Holdings. Most of the information was completely foreign to him, but he accepted the challenge to try and find something useful he could do.

He and Chase ducked out at thirty minutes to twelve to catch an early lunch.

They grabbed a couple of sandwiches from a local deli and found an outside table where they weren’t at risk of being eavesdropped on.

Max unwrapped his sandwich, took a swig from his water. “I didn’t ask where Piper was today.”

“Home. Her doctor finally convinced her to take her leave. Not that she needs to concern herself with leave. We’re engaged, for Christ’s sake.”

Max heard the frustration in Chase’s voice.

“If Piper is anything like the rest of us, it’s hard to sit back and do nothing.”

“I’m sure the baby will add a lot to both of our plates.”

Max picked up his sandwich. “When is her due date?” He took a bite.

“Officially? Any day. As far as the staff in the office and her parents are concerned ... a few weeks.”

Max chewed slower, his mind wrapped around that puzzle. “Why the disconnect?”

Chase looked left, then right and lowered his voice. “This isn’t for publication.”

“Okay?” Max asked.

“Piper was pregnant when we met.”

Max opened his eyes even wider. He didn’t see that coming. “Wow.”

Chase shook his head. “It doesn’t matter. This child is mine ... ours. She’s getting my name and everything that comes with it. Piper’s parents are uber religious and don’t need to know any of the details.”

“Judgmental?”

“Very. Damn near made Piper put the baby up for adoption. She didn’t even want her parents to know she was pregnant.”

Max swallowed the acid in the back of his throat with that thought. “What changed? What happened?”

Chase looked him dead in the eye. “You.”

“How’s that?”

“Piper took the task of finding you to a whole new level. Alex and I were understandably divided with our time, but it was Piper who did a lot of the groundwork. She looked beyond the logistics of adoption and what happens when children end up in the system. All in an effort to find you. She couldn’t imagine her child facing the challenges you had.”

“Infants find homes.”

“She knew that. But she ‘what-iffed’ herself into a frenzy.”

“Wow.” Max hadn’t considered the angle of a woman putting her child up for adoption, now knowing how the life of that child could go wrong.

“I agree. Truth was, she didn’t think it was an option to keep the baby because of her parents, being single ... all those things. She was still hell-bent on giving her up after we started dating. It took everything in me to not influence her to change her mind. I knew early on that Piper was the woman for me. I told her that if we’d met a year from now and she was a single mom, I’d be just as in.”

“That’s amazing.” Max didn’t think of himself as much of a sentimental guy, but Chase and Piper’s story caught a bit in the back of his fractured heart.

“I have only one regret.”

“Which is?”

“That I couldn’t talk her into going to the justice of the peace before the baby Stone arrives. We obtained the marriage license just in case she changes her mind. So far, she hasn’t. I know in this day and age, it doesn’t mean anything, and we have every intention of having a proper wedding in the spring ... but yeah. I don’t want her to worry about anything. And women ... they worry about everything . At least she does.”

Max laughed at that. “Alex doesn’t.”

“Oh yes, she does. She’s just better at hiding it.”

Max continued with his lunch.

Chase finally took a bite of his.

“We were talking about Thanksgiving,” Chase said.

“What about it?” Max swallowed the last of the sandwich down, followed it with water.

“Alex and I normally go to our mom’s.”

Max saw where this was going. “You don’t have to invite me. I’m good.”

“It’s not that. It is that, but ... Mom moved in with her boyfriend last month.”

“The hotel guy?” Max asked.

“Gaylord Morrison. They’re in Texas. Piper’s doctor is adamant that we don’t fly ... especially to Texas, this close to Piper’s due date. Too many unknowns on what the doctors can legally do if there’s an issue.”

“Even this close to the baby being due?” Max knew the climate of women’s rights to their bodies in conservative states was a growing concern. But he hadn’t put a lot of thought into how it affected women who planned on keeping their babies.

“We’re not risking it. We were in Texas last month and both agreed we wouldn’t go back until after the baby is here.”

“What does that have to do with Thanksgiving.”

“Gaylord and Mom are coming here. At first, we were going to have it at my place, but that puts stress on Piper. Alex, God love her, can’t cook. Fine, we could order dinner delivered, but her place is tiny. Mom said she wanted to cook, but again ... tiny. The plan was to have it at the estate. Now that you’re there, we don’t want to assume—”

Max just started laughing. “It’s your house.”

“Ours. And we’ve only used it a few times. But you’re there now, and we want to respect that.”

Max ran a hand over his face, shook his head. “The house is bigger than many of the apartment complexes I’ve lived in. I’m in one bedroom. The place has what ... eight ... no, ten beds. I’m pretty sure two still have price tags on them. And you don’t have to ask my permission. Be there anytime you want. A heads-up is nice only to avoid any awkwardness if Sarah is over and we’re naked in the living room.”

Chase chuckled. “Okay, then. Thanksgiving at the estate. We were really hoping you’d say that. Mom and Gaylord are looking forward to meeting you.”

Max wasn’t exactly in a position to duck out of dinner. “You sure that won’t be weird for your mom? Considering her husband was cheating on her with my birth mother at the time I was conceived?”

Chase wadded up the wrapper from his sandwich and tossed it in the paper bag that it came in. “How is any of that your fault?”

True.

Max let his concerns fade.

They stood and started back to Chase’s truck. “How are things with Sarah?”

“We’re good.” The image of her flooded his head. He smiled. “She gets me. I’m not used to that.”

“We like her. Not that you need us to.”

Max wasn’t used to anyone passing appraisal of who he dated. But it was damn nice to have it now.

“My guess is my mother will want to be there early on Thursday to start cooking. She might even have groceries sent over.”

The thought of groceries had Max pushing at Chase’s shoulder. “Thanks for the heads-up about Karina, by the way.”

Chase tugged on the door to the truck. “Oh shit. That’s right. Sorry.”

“Is there any other ‘staff’ I need to know about?” Max climbed in the passenger seat, laughing.

“Just the landscape guys. Oh ... and the pool guys. They take care of the fountains, too.”

Max slammed his door with a shake of his head. “How is this my life?”