Page 17 of Hearts of Stone

“You need—”

“To see you take a big deep breath. In…” He demonstrated how, and my lungs inflated obediently. “And out…” I blinked as he smiled at me. “You’ve inherited a fortune and the first thing you want to do is make sure everyone else is OK.” He wrapped his arm around my shoulders and gave me a squeeze. “Just enjoy the moment.”

“But Isabel…” I remembered my workmates, not expecting to feel a vicious stab of guilt, but it came anyway. “She’s got a family and George—”

“They have families and support networks to pull from. And, even if head office is short-sighted enough to sack experiencedcustomer service officers, other people are screaming for workers.”

“The desire to be altruistic is an admirable one,” Mellors said. “But providing assistance to all and sundry can bring its own problems.”

“Mel Mel has got it right.” I watched the lawyer wince as Daniel gave him a nickname. “Remember when we were obsessively putting in Lotto tickets?” God, did I ever. He was going through a low spot right when I broke up with Trevor and we’d spent way too many nights fantasising about winning the lottery, because that was the only way we could see our way out of our current shit. “Well, I watched a documentary on the lives of people who actually won it and…” He wrinkled his nose. “It can get pretty ugly. People see that massive amount of money and can’t help but think about how to get their hands on it. Maybe we should just keep a lid on it for now?”

“Right, right…”

I watched my hands turn back and forth with a growing sense of unreality, one that I carried with me, right the way up the driveway as we returned to the house.

My house.

We walked up my drive, past my neatly clipped hedges, the sweet smell of roses thick in the air. We crossed my porch and entered in through my front door, to the smell of fresh baked bread, and when we got to the kitchen, we saw an open pantry stuffed with food.

“Do rich people have house brownies?” Daniel asked, when he looked inside the fridge. “Is that how this shit works? Like you don’t need to break a nail doing the dishes or whatever. The ‘house’ just does it for you.”

“Something like that,” Mellor replied. “Now, as the question of whether or not you are the heir has been resolved, how would you like to proceed? I can take you through a very long, veryboring overview of your estate. That will need to happen at some point.”

“Or we could explore the house.”

Daniel shot me a hopeful grin and, I had to admit, his enthusiasm was infectious. This was mine. This was all mine. And I couldn’t help but want to see exactly what that entailed. We’d only seen the house at night, dark, shadowy and impressive, but right now the sun was shining.

“I think we’re just going to hang out here and get a sense of the place, Mellors,” I replied.

“Of course. I’ll give you my contact details. As the Whiteley heir is our only client, we provide a twenty-four hour service.” Did the lawyer’s eyes linger on Daniel for just a second? “Please call if you need anything.”

“I’m notsure if he wants me to call him about what I’m thinking,” my best friend muttered as Mellors left the house.

“Ohh, I dunno. I’m pretty sure he was thinking of picking up what you were laying down there,” I replied. “So, are you going to bone everyone associated with the house, because you know that shit’s gonna get messy.”

“Ugh, well, I’m not going to now…” He rolled his eyes dramatically, then laughed. “So, are we gonna plumb the depths of this mansion or what, bitch?”

“Lady of the house, thank you,” I snarked, holding up the piece of card.

“Milady…”

He performed what I thought was supposed to be a bow, holding his arm out as he rose. I shook my head and took it.

Chapter 11

“Wow…” I said. “Just…wow.”

We stood in front of yet another palatial room, this one containing a beautiful old fireplace, huge overstuffed antique chairs and a goddamn piano. Danny sprinted over, launching himself at the piano stool and then spinning around to run his fingers across the keys in a theatrical, if not especially musical, way.

“I can see it now.” He gestured to the room. “You could have killer parties in here. The champagne would be flowing. I’d be doing my best Liberace impression.”

“Can you play the piano?” I asked.

He proceeded to tap out the beginning of Chopsticks, though not particularly well.

“OK, we hire someone who can play jaunty tunes as we get tastefully wasted with the pretty and the powerful,” he replied.

“More like I’d be holding back your hair as you vomit in what is probably an antique vase.”

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