Chapter 5 - BRITTANY HAD SIGNED FOR MORE THAN MONEY
Brittany came to Clara that evening.
Alone.
No parents.
No Trent.
Clara nearly refused to let her upstairs.
Naomi had lent Clara her small Tribeca apartment while Naomi stayed with her girlfriend in Brooklyn.
Brittany stood outside wearing jeans, a sweatshirt and no makeup.
She looked younger than twenty-nine.
Clara hated that her first instinct was still to protect her.
“Five minutes.”
Brittany entered.
She did not sit.
“I knew about the trust loan.”
Clara waited.
“I didn’t know it was almost twelve million.”
“How much did you think?”
“Five.”
“That makes it better?”
“No.”
Brittany swallowed.
“Dad said it was temporary.”
Clara laughed.
“Did he also tell you Grandpa built that trust specifically so Whitmore Hospitality could never swallow everything?”
Brittany looked down.
She knew.
Walter Bennett had watched two family-owned businesses fail during his lifetime.
He believed family wealth needed walls between it.
Charles had always quoted him:
Never put the same roof over every dollar.
“Why did you sign?”
Brittany’s voice became defensive.
“Because I don’t work at the company. Dad said if Whitmore collapsed, Mom would lose everything tied to it.”
“Mom has separate assets.”
“I didn’t know that.”
Clara stared.
“You never asked.”
Brittany’s eyes filled.
“No.”
“And Trent?”
Brittany flinched.
“What about him?”
“Did he ask you to sign?”
“He explained it.”
Clara studied her.
“Before or after you started sleeping with him?”
Brittany started crying.
“Before.”
Clara’s stomach twisted.
“So he was managing family money with you privately before the affair.”
“Yes.”
“How long before?”
“Two months.”
Clara sat down.
Something about the sequence bothered her.
Trent gained access.
Brittany signed.
Then the affair began.
“Did he pursue you?”
Brittany looked offended.
“I’m not a child.”
“I didn’t say you were.”
“It wasn’t some manipulation.”
“Then answer.”
Brittany wiped her eyes.
“It happened after a dinner. Dad had been screaming at me because I’d spent too much on the foundation gala. Trent drove me home.”
“And?”
“I complained about you.”
Clara almost smiled despite herself.
“Naturally.”
Brittany’s mouth twisted.
“I said everybody thinks you’re the competent one and I’m decorative.”
“Do you?”
Brittany looked at her.
“Sometimes.”
There it was.
Not a mastermind.
Not a seduction plot.
An old wound, alcohol, validation and two selfish adults.
Brittany said, “He told me you never really saw him.”
Clara’s expression hardened.
“And you believed that?”
“I wanted to.”
Clara looked away.
That was more honest than she expected.
“Why was he still marrying me?”
Brittany went quiet.
“He said the wedding couldn’t be canceled until the financing closed.”
Clara looked back at her.
“And after?”
Brittany’s face crumpled.
“He said we’d figure it out.”
Clara stared.
“You thought he would marry me Sunday and leave me later?”
“I didn’t let myself think that far.”
“That is an extraordinary luxury.”
Brittany cried.
Clara did not comfort her.
After a minute, Brittany whispered, “There’s something else.”
Clara almost laughed.
“Of course.”
Brittany opened her phone.
She showed Clara several transfers.
Smaller than the trust facility.
$190,000.
$240,000.
$175,000.
All labeled as advisory or restructuring fees.
Recipient:
Lawson Strategic Partners LLC.
Clara looked up.
“Trent’s?”
Brittany nodded.
“I asked him once.”
“What did he say?”
“That Charles approved the fees.”
“Did Dad?”
Brittany looked toward the dark window.
“I don’t know.”
Clara stared at the transfers.
May you like
The trust loan might have been Charles’s betrayal.
These payments looked like Trent’s.
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