Don't Step Aside, This Photo Needs You In It

Chapter 2: The Signature

I returned to Vale House the next morning with a lawyer's card in my pocket and no intention of signing anything.

The breakfast room smelled like coffee and warm cinnamon rolls. Dad sat at the head of the table with two phones, a legal pad, and a copy of the proxy. He'd changed the subject of the photocopy to "Old Shareholder Records" and set it beneath a newspaper.

"You're early," he said.

"I'm not early. You're trying to make breakfast feel like a board meeting."

Graham Pike stood beside the windows with a mug in hand. "I didn't know you'd be joining us."

"I didn't know you'd be at my sister's wedding."

June sat opposite Dad, already dressed for a hair appointment. Ben had gone to town to pick up a cufflink he'd left with the tailor. She looked between Graham and me.

"Can we keep this calm?" she asked.

"I'm calm," I said.

Dad tapped the proxy. "Maeve, this is a preliminary document. No one has used it to change the ownership."

"Then withdraw it."

"It gives the board confidence that the family is aligned."

"It gives the board a fake signature."

Graham set his mug down. "The sale agreement includes a condition that all owners approve. If there's a dispute about the proxy, the closing pauses."

"Good," I said.

Dad's look could have cut paper. "You're putting everyone's jobs at risk."

"I'm asking you not to lie about my vote."

He turned to June. "Your sister's always been very good at finding the problem and leaving someone else to deal with it."

The remark landed exactly where he aimed it. I felt it in the old place behind my ribs. I had left Vale House after my mother's death, when Dad hired a consultant to "simplify" the hotel and removed all her name plaques from the guest rooms. I'd said I couldn't work for someone who erased her. He'd called me dramatic. I'd called him a coward. Then I'd driven away and let June stay behind.

I didn't correct him now. I had been good at leaving.

"I'm here now," I said. "Show me the actual financials."

Dad closed the binder. "They're not yours."

"My shares make them my business."

"Your shares make you an owner. They don't make you an expert."

"Then let me read the records and see."

Graham nodded. "That's reasonable."

Dad looked at him. "The board has already reviewed them."

"Not the other owners," Graham said. His voice stayed polite. "A clean process protects the company."

That was the first thing Graham had said that I liked. It didn't make us friends, but it made me pay attention.

Dad's mouth tightened. "Fine. We'll make the files available after the wedding."

"Tomorrow," I said.

"After the wedding."

"Before the vote."

He stood. "You'll have access before the vote."

That was not a promise. It was a performance of one.

*****

I found June in the small glass conservatory, where the wedding flowers waited in buckets. She was pinning a loose piece of hair into place while her stylist answered a call outside.

"Do you think he copied my signature?" I asked.

"I don't know."

"Did you see it before today?"

"No."

"Did Dad tell you he planned to submit it?"

"No."

"Then what did you know?"

She turned to the window. Outside, the tide had pulled back from the rocks, leaving dark bands of seaweed on the shore.

"I knew he needed a majority for the sale," she said. "I knew he was trying to get everyone on board. I knew he said you'd agreed."

"You believed him?"

"I wanted to."

That was more honest than I expected.

"Why didn't you call me?"

"Because we don't call each other anymore." She looked back at me. "You left, Maeve. Not just the hotel. Me."

"I didn't know you wanted me to stay."

"You didn't ask."

"I thought you were choosing him."

"I was twenty-four. I was trying to keep the hotel open and not lose the only family I had left."

"You had me."

"Did I?"

I had no answer that didn't sound like a defense.

She sat on a wooden bench between the flower buckets. "I'm not asking you to vote yes. I'm asking you to understand what the sale means to me. I've spent my whole life hearing that the hotel is our inheritance, as if I can pay a mortgage with a memory of Mom."

"I understand the mortgage."

"Do you? You haven't been here."

The stylist returned. June took a breath and wiped at her cheek before the woman could notice. I stepped aside to let them pass.

"Don't disappear," June said as I reached the door.

"I'm trying not to."

That evening, I called Celia Marr, the lawyer who had handled my mother's trust. I told her about the proxy. She went quiet when I read the date.

"Where did you see the original?" she asked.

"I saw a copy."

"Did you ever sign a proxy in the last year?"

"No."

"Then don't confront your father without preserving the record. Take photographs of every page you can access. Send me the copy. I'll check the corporate filings."

"Can you stop the sale?"

"I can stop a vote that relies on an invalid proxy. I can't tell you what the company should do with a legitimate offer."

"What if the company's in trouble?"

"Then we need the books, not your father's summary."

I sent her the photographs. She called back before I'd finished packing away my phone.

"Your mother left a provision," she said. "You may have a consent right that doesn't appear on the ownership schedule."

"What kind of provision?"

"I need to review the signed agreement. I don't want to guess."

"Can you come to the board meeting?"

"I can. But Maeve, if we challenge the proxy, your father may claim you're acting out of spite."

"He can claim whatever he likes."

"People may believe him. You need to be prepared for that."

I looked across the hall to the framed photographs: Dad cutting a ribbon, June at twelve with a fishing net, me at nineteen with Mom's old camera pressed to my chest. There were a hundred pictures in the hotel. I knew which ones Dad had kept because they made the family look whole.

"I'm prepared," I said.

I wasn't. But I had stopped mistaking fear for a reason to leave.