Page 32 of Best Offer Wins
Now I’m left with no choice. I have to find another path to the house. And Amazon may have just supplied one possible route: Blackmail. (Guess Bezos didn’t call it the Everything Store for nothing.)
DO NOT TRUST CURTIS BRADSHAW.
The one-star review that could lead to my five-star life. Because if Curt really is hiding something, and it’s juicy enough, I might be able to use it to pressure him into selling the dream home to me and Ian.
So, I spend the rest of the afternoon Googling varying combinations of his name with possible misdeeds.
“Curtis Bradshaw harassment”
“Curtis Bradshaw cheating”
“Curtis Bradshaw fraud”
“Curtis Bradshaw theft”
“Curtis Bradshaw disorderly conduct”
“Curtis Bradshaw disorderly conduct Sagrada Familia”
“Curtis Bradshaw pretentious dickhead”
I run his name through PACER, the electronic database of federal court records. I try in every jurisdiction where I know he has a connection: Connecticut, where he grew up; New York, where he worked at his dad’s hedge fund; Maryland, where he lives now; DC, where he lived previously and where his employer, Georgetown University, is located; and New Hampshire and Pennsylvania because he has degrees from Dartmouth and Penn.
Then I do the same thing with the local courts in all those places—both county and state level.
But after hours of digging, the only hit that comes up is a twenty-year-old civil suit against his dad, Curtis Bradshaw, Sr. According to the complaint, an analyst at his hedge fund accused him of forcing his tongue down her throat in the office one night, then withholding a promotion after she rejected him. Curtis Senior settled with her for an undisclosed amount before the case got to trial.
Imagine being so rich that you could throw money at a problem like that and make it vanish.
This is embarrassing—and gross. But I need something that incriminates Curt, not his dad. Something damning enough that he’d sooner sell to us than have it come out. And so far, I can’t even find a lousy DUI.
By the time I hear Ian’s key in the door, it’s after six thirty and my eyes feel like sandpaper. I’m also starving. Did I ever break for lunch?
I peer over my shoulder at him from my desk. “Hey, let’s go out to eat tonight. Maybe the Royal?”
He inspects me from the doorway, probably debating whether I’m setting a trap. It’s true we haven’t been speaking much. But if we’re still going to find a way to make a run at the house, I need to coax him back onto my team.
“Okay…” He sets his brown leather backpack on the floor and puts his keys on the shelf. “Are you, um, doing all right?”
I look down and take in that I’m still in my robe. Only when he flips the switch in the kitchen do I realize that the apartment had been nearly dark.
I’ve always been like this. In college, and later, when I was trying to prove myself at thePost, I’d get so wrapped up in a story that I could lose hours and hours tracking down a single phone number. Last year, when I was deep into researching fertility options, Ian came home from a work trip to find me glued to my computer screen, barely having eaten in two days.
“Yep, I’m all good,” I say, standing from my desk. “Just hungry.” But my legs betray me. They nearly give out, both asleep.
“Whoa, careful.” Ian hurries over, grabbing hold of my elbow. The gesture startles me. It’s the first time he’s touched me on purpose since the night of the dinner.
“I’m fine. Really.” A warm buzzing fills them now. “I had a break this afternoon so I worked out downstairs. I just haven’t had a chance to get dressed since I showered.”
He eyes me warily, rakes a hand back through his hair. “When do you want to leave, then?”
“Just give me twenty.”
I pat on some tinted moisturizer and pull on some jeans and a top, and we’re out the door. The sky is cloudless, and the air bites now that the sun is disappearing. Late commuters and other people in search of dinner snake around each other, everyone well rehearsed in the clipped choreography of the after-work rush.
The Royal, a neighborhood spot with great coffee during the day and even better cocktails at night, is only three blocks from our building. But this walk seems to grind on forever—Ian staring at the ground as he cuts down my attempts at a conversation.
“How was the office today?” I ask.
