Page 40 of Overnight Inheritance

Her brother leaned forward, resting his arms on the table. “What are you thinking we do with it?”

“The yard would make a great playground for the local kids.” She’d spoken to a bunch of the kids from Larry’s neighborhood and realized how much she’d missed working with children. They’d been enthusiastic and creative with their ideas of what their neighborhood needed. “And if we do some alterations to the house, we could make it a community center.”

“I like that,” Heath said, running a hand over his chin as he thought.

“Thank you.” She beamed at him. “Sebastian inspired me.”

Heath and Sarah exchanged a glance.

“What?” Mae said.

“You already know what we’re going to say,” Heath said, gentling his voice as if she were a child getting bad news. “We don’t trust him. He’s been trying to influence your decisions since that first night, when you met through the hedge.”

Mae frowned. How had the conversation gone from her exciting plan to an attack on Sebastian? “He didn’t tell me to take on this project specifically. He doesn’t even know about it yet—I wanted to run it by you two first. He just helped me think about what I wanted to do with my life, and that’s when I realized I wanted to do something with the charitable trust.”

“So after all this time of having you shadow him, and then dating,” Heath said, “he’s managed to convince you that you don’t want anything to do with a business that he’s trying to get control of?”

She crossed her arms and steadied her voice. “That wasn’t his aim at all.” If they knew Sebastian the way she did, they wouldn’t be questioning his motives. “In fact, he proposed to me weeks ago and suggested I could work in the company with him if I wanted.”

Sarah was suddenly alert. “Proposed? What, exactly, did he say?”

Mae winced as she realized how that would sound to Sarah and what memories it would trigger. “I know where you’re going with this, because I met Christopher and he told me what happened between you two.”

“Oh, did he, now?” her aunt said, her voice full of disdain, though Mae knew it wasn’t for her.

“And at face value, Sebastian’s suggestion was similar, but the motivation was completely different. He loves me.” Her chest warmed as she said those words aloud for the first time.

“Christopher said he loved me too,” Sarah said, her lips tightening.

Heath watched the exchange, then jumped in. “So, let me get this straight. A man from a family that we have an intergenerational feud with...” He held up one finger. “...gets a private investigator to compile a thick dossier on you...” Another finger. “...thenaccidentallymeets you on a night when everyone knows where you would be...” A third finger. “...then convinces you to share his office for a week and gets you on-site...” A fourth finger. “Then he starts dating you and proclaiming his love...” He held up a thumb. “And then—” he held up a finger from the other hand “—uses theexact same strategyhis father used on Sarah forty years earlier to scam our family and gain control of the company that started this whole feud.”

Mae shifted her weight. “When you put it like that, it doesn’t sound great, but that’s not how things really happened. Some of those things were my decision.”

Gently, Sarah said, “Tell me you at least saw the dossier he has on you? So you know what information he’s been working with?”

Mae thought back and couldn’t remember it ever being mentioned once she’d started at the office. “I never asked to see it.”

Heath and Sarah exchanged another glance.

“I don’t know what you’re implying,” Mae said. “Sebastian and I have no secrets. I told him that secrets were a deal breaker for me.”

Sarah nodded. “Then would it hurt to take a look at the dossier?”

Mae pulled out her cell. “I’ll call him now and ask to see it.”

Heath frowned and looked down at his hands.

“What now?” Mae asked, exasperated.

Sighing, Heath met her eyes. “If there’s anything there and you give him notice, he’ll doctor the file.”

“Assuming he hasn’t already,” Sarah added.

“Okay,” Mae said, standing. She’d had enough of this questioning of Sebastian’s motives. “Let’s go.”

“Now?” Heath said, glancing around at all the pages they’d laid out.

“Right now.” Mae used the voice she saved for times her class needed to be pulled back into order.

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