Illicit Affairs by Holly Dixon

Thirteen

The negotiation meeting was long,tiring, and unresolvable. Without a prior brief, Ava had gone into the meeting blind but quickly learned that Charlotte Forbes was the wife to the late Holden Forbes, a seventy-year-old man who owned several well-known whisky distilleries across the isle and had died suddenly from a fatal heart attack. His three children—Jenson, Oliver, and Freya Forbes—were in disputes with Charlotte, accusing their stepmother of trying to steal their inheritance. Whereas Charlotte decreed that the estate was very much a part of her entitlement as much as it was Holden’s children’s.

“Yes, darling, but you can’t settle those types of demands yourself for you are not the only trustee on the will, now are you, Oliver?” Charlotte’s lips lifted into a mocking and provoking smile at her stepson, a man who couldn’t have been that much younger than her with shockingly blonde hair that was tied into a bun at the back his head.

Ava noticed then that all the Forbes children were blonde, with pale blue eyes, looking like they were made in a test tube. The only one not dressed as though they were attending a gala was Freya, a young woman who couldn’t have been much older than Ava’s youngest sister. The girl sat wearing a simple black dress, her thin lips dry and cracked as she gnawed upon them nervously.

Oliver’s face turned a perfect shade of cherry as he rose from his chair and pointed an accusing finger across the table at Charlotte. “You wretched woman! If my father were still here and saw your true colours—”

“We are in agreement that we have reached an impasse on the settlement, yes?” Nate’s voice boomed across Oliver’s as everyone’s attention snapped to him.

Ava couldn’t help but stare too. Her boss was in his element in this environment, the entire room at his disposal as he sat composed as ever at the top of the table and demanded control and order.

Oliver scoffed at Nate, “Well like hell she’s getting the bloody business! She’s already got her claws into my father’s—”

“Good, we are in agreement that this will be settled in court then,” Nate interrupted him casually, not caring for his tantrum, shut his laptop, and glanced at his watch. “We are three minutes over and I have another meeting to attend. Peter, wrap this up and we’ll reconvene in three days’ time.” He rose from his chair, carrying the same aura that a magistrate would as he left the room without so much as a look in anyone’s direction.

As the tense meeting dispersed, Oliver cursed Charlotte’s name to his sister as Peter, acting as Charlotte’s attorney, and the lawyer serving the Forbes children tried and failed to defuse the bickering across the table.

“Freya dear, do try and remember the auction this weekend,” sighed Charlotte.

“We’re still going ahead with that?” Freya squeaked like a mouse.

“You cannot be serious?! It isn’t enough to try and steal what our father wanted for us, now you’re trying to sell his possessions too?” Oliver growled.

“Holden stated it clearly in his will that he wanted to donate his possessions to charity, dear.” Charlotte tilted her chin up before rising to her feet and peering down at them. “You shall all attend and keep face.”

“Father would have wanted it…” Jenson finally broke breath, looking at his brother.

“Fine,” Oliver said as he stood up and glared at his stepmother. “But be sure that I will be accounting for every penny that goes to charity. Come on, Freya.” He motioned at the young girl before dramatically making his exit.

Ava sat there with her teeth clamped on the inside of her lip, staring at Peter’s emeralds, and trying hard not to show her amusement at the Forbes family drama. If she had known this was what usually went down in these types of meetings, she would have brought some popcorn.

“Congrats again.”Ava beamed, her arms wrapped tightly around Sam as the pair returned to the office after a cheerful lunch. “We’ll need to celebrate!”

“Thanks, my lovely— Oh!” Sam pulled back, her face lit up in excitement as she sang, “I almost forgot what is happening in a few weeks…” When Ava didn’t jump on her cue, Sam pushed her away to meet her gaze. “Your birthday, silly!”

“No.”

“Don’t you ‘no’ me! We are getting blitzed whether you like it or not, Mrs!”

“Nuh-uh.” Ava clenched her jaw and shook her head like a petulant child. “I do not wish to celebrate another nail in the coffin.”

“You’re bleeding twenty-eight, not sixty-eight!” Sam scoffed, rolling her eyes and crossing her arms before settling it once and for all. “It’s happening either way because we need to celebrate my happy news anyway, so like it or not, you’re coming out and getting blitzed on bubbles with me.”

“Are all Scottish people alcoholics?” Ava teased.

“Eh, lass, I’ll have yeken I drank whisky before I drank my maw’sti—” Sam began to rant but Ava quickly clamped her hand over her friend’s mouth before any more Scottish atrocities came out in the middle of the busy department.

“I have spent way too much time with you; I understood everything that just came out of your mouth just then,” Ava laughed and lowered her hand. “Okay look, I have to get back to work, but yes, I’ll go out with you and get ‘blitzed’, happy?”

“Yup, elated!” Sam beamed, mocking Ava’s English accent and slowly walking backwards away from her. “Just remember to wear your red coat”—she winked, causing Ava to ask her what the hell she was talking about—“so that I can warn everyone that ‘the red coats are coming’ and yell ‘freedom’, of course!” Sam disappeared around the corner dramatically waving her hand like the Queen, leaving Ava stood there shaking her head in laughter.

It reminded Ava of the day she met Samantha at St Mary’s Boarding School for young ladies. Ava had been stood outside the head mistress’s office pinning flyers to the noticeboard when she saw a young girl, who struggled to follow the strict uniform guidelines, flip off the headmistress as she rounded the corner and bumped straight into an amused Ava. If not for the large sum of inheritance money that Sam’s parents left behind, she doubted that St Mary’s would have put up with years’ worth of Eastley mischief. It was from that moment on that Sam became part of the Archer family, always around at Ava’s family home for Saturday brunch and Sunday roast dinner.

From then on, the duo were inseparable.

Sam was perhaps the craziest and most unhinged person she had ever met, but Ava would be lost without her bringing light and colour into her life. They had the type of friendship where they would look at each other and burst out laughing at absolutely nothing, the type of laughter that made your ribs ache and filled your soul with love.

Samantha Eastley wasn’t just a friend to Ava; she was her soul sister.

It was wellpast finishing time as Ava slumped into her seat and stared at her screen. After her lunch with Sam, she had worked flat out all afternoon and was still no closer to clearing the mammoth pile of work needing to be done. However, she couldn’t blame the increased workload on Nate anymore as she had seen him hunched over his desk all day in the same manner she had been. It was starting to dawn on Ava that her old man had perhaps been holding back a tsunami of stress from her. She didn’t know what bothered her more: the fact that her father had done this in the first place or the fact that if he hadn’t, Ava could have potentially stopped his stroke from happening if she had just taken on more work. The thought made her feel accountable and sick to her stomach.

Looking through the blinds into Nate’s office she saw him sat there looking utterly spent and exhausted as he dragged his hands down over his face. She hadn’t seen such a vulnerable side to him before and knew if he saw her looking, he’d likely act as though he were in control and coping.

Everyone has two hands: one to help yourself and one to help others, her grandmother had always told her. For some reason, looking at Nate just then, she couldn’t shake the thought from her head.

With a small sigh, she made her way to his office and leaned her hip against his door frame, a sympathetic smile on her lips when he hadn’t noticed her presence and continued yawning and rubbing his eyes.

“Need a hand with anything…boss?” Ava asked with a delicate smile, pushing the last word of that sentence out of her mouth and reminding herself to play nice.

“Ava.” Nate’s heavy eyes sprung up from his desk for the first time in over an hour. “You’re still here?” He knew it was past finishing time but as he glanced down at his clock and saw just how far past home time it was, he couldn’t help but feel bad that the young woman had stayed back as well. “You should head home and get something to eat, Ms. Archer.”

“My name is Ava,” she corrected with a pixie-like smile teasing her features as she pushed off of his door and padded towards the front of his desk, “and you need something to eat also.”

Nate chuffed through his nose, a small appreciative smile on his lips as he sat back in his chair scratching his beard contemplatively and asked, “Do you like Thai?”