I don’t give a fuck about the house, though. Or its tennis court. Or its swimming pool. I’m not here for the modern art coveted by collectors throughout the world. I’ll sell all of it, eventually. Just not yet. That’s the difference between reciprocity and revenge. Reciprocity evens the score. Revenge, when done correctly, is slow, like lovemaking. It lingers. It builds. It lacquers pain, coat by coat, until you crack.
I’m in the business of vengeance.
The inside of Windfall is more extravagant. MacLaine was unfamiliar with the concept of too much. Most American homes could be parked on the marble floor inside the foyer. The ground floor boasts all the standard rooms—the dining room, a sitting room, the kitchen—and then some: a ballroom, the staff kitchen, the breakfast room, a gentlemen’s parlor, and God knows what else. I stare for a moment at the split staircase that curves toward the upper rooms, remembering the first time I set foot in this hellhole. Adjusting my tie, I swallow the thought into the pit I use for past memories.
MacLaine would be pleased at the turnout, even if half the people here despised the bastard. People you’d recognize from Forbes magazine covers or television, if anyone still watches it, mill throughout the ground floor. It’s a sea of black, groups moving in surges from one empty conversation to the next as easily as they run through the canapés.
A man near the bar glances in my direction, his face blanching paper-white. I’ve been recognized. Not that he’ll tell anyone who I am. Then he’d have to admit that he knew me—that he knows what I do. I move past him without a second glance. He won’t be any trouble—and I have bigger prey to hunt.
“I don’t believe we’ve met,” an older gentleman says when I pause in the dining room.
I know who he is, but I feign ignorance. He wouldn’t appreciate it if I told him we were acquainted. Not Mr. Moneybags who paid to have the barrier to his takeover of his largest competitor permanently removed last year. No, he wouldn’t want me to tell him that we’ve worked together distantly. Not in such a public gathering of self-proclaimed people of importance. Instead, I shake his hand, locking my grip firmly. Statement enough.
“Sterling.” I’m not listening when he introduces himself. My thoughts are elsewhere in this house, memories warring with desire as I wait for her to make an appearance.
“What do you do?” he asks.
“Asset management.” I snag toast with caviar off a passing tray and pop it into my mouth.
“What firm? My man is retiring…” he continues on and I resist the urge to walk away. Death can’t stop networking. Not with people like this.
“I’m a private contractor.”
He waits for more information—maybe a business card. I don’t offer any. So like a good member of the greatest generation he fills the void between us with mindless market chatter. I nod enough to look like I’m listening—and then I feel it—feel her—approaching. The room is electric, humming with the undercurrent of static building toward a strike—and the inevitable crash.
2
Adair
This isn’t happening.
My mother once told me that having MacLaine blood running through your veins meant being able to walk through fire like you set it on purpose. Given how often MacLaines start shit, it’s a valuable skill to have. Today, though, even in the pouring rain, I felt the heat the moment he touched me. It burned through me like wildfire. That’s how it had always been with us. No one was responsible for the devastation. It was an act of God, some natural force that couldn’t be prevented once it started. There was no controlling it. No denying it. All I could do the moment our eyes met was turn away and hope I made it out unscathed. Unlike last time.
That’s the thing about being a MacLaine, we may walk through fire but that means we’re all hiding scars.
The moment the limousine pulls into the drive, I’m out and up the steps. I don’t have to go far to find a bottle of Scotch. Not at Windfall, the family estate my father built. My finger traces the label. West Tennessee Whiskey. My father’s favorite. I pour a glass with unsteady hands, hoping to wash the memories away.
“It’s been five years,” I remind myself quietly. But while five years might be long enough to bury secrets, it can’t erase mistakes.
The house will be full of people soon. Mourners come to pay their respects, or rather gossip about my father and his fortune. They’re here to play the guessing game torturing the rest of us: who gets the money? The land? The company? What will happen to the MacLaine legacy? It’s all I’ve thought about for months. Years, if I’m being honest. Ever since daddy got sick. Ever since…
And then? Sterling Ford shows up at the funeral.
Which can only mean one thing: a reckoning.
I tried to play off the encounter. Five years had passed. Neither of us were kids anymore. I’m not certain I’ve changed much. At least, not as much as him. When I first met him, Sterling was a lean but wiry six feet. At the time I’d wondered if he was an athlete, but his physique then had come from a very different source.
“Maybe it wasn’t him,” I say to the empty room, even it doesn’t believe me. I know it was him like I know I’m breathing.
A shiver rolls through me as the memory of his skin, slick and hot against mine,
