Page 7 of Ashes of Us

The meetings with the staff went about the way Danica expected them to.

Alexander was a great boss and was loved among his employees, so there were tears and condolences.

Alex explained there would be no changes to staffing and while policies would be reviewed, there wouldn't be any changes unless he found them to be outdated, but when he announced that Danica would continue in her role as executive assistant to the CEO and to direct any inquiries to her, she saw Marcy visibly deflate and glare at her before looking away.

Danica could only assume that she expected to be rewarded for being Alex's spy and maybe that was what Alex meant when he said “for now” but she really didn't care, as far as she was concerned, Marcy wasn't trustworthy and she would make sure she treated her as such going forward, polite but distant and indifferent.

Alex finished the meeting with a stern warning not to spread rumours or misinformation to other staff members, the guests, or the media and that Danica was setting up a rotation work schedule so everyone would have a chance to pay their respects at the memorial.

“And finally, I will have a grief counsellor on site for the next three months if you need to speak to someone.”

The last part surprised Danica, and she quickly made a note to find a grief counsellor willing to come in and work for three months, feeling like Alex was testing her.

When the last meeting was finished, she stepped out of the room and quickly made a few phone calls while Alex answered questions from the staff.

By the time she saw Alex walk past to his office with a chattering Marcy close behind him, thirty minutes later, she had one arranged to start the next day.

She was working on setting up a press conference for after the meeting with the North American Hotels.

When she was done, it was past six o'clock, and she was mentally and emotionally done for the day.

She still had a bunch of things to do, like setting up Alex's American email and contacts, writing up the press release and getting in touch with the social media team to update the website's about page with Alex's bio and picture and the European team to update that website with Kieran's information, as well as having them do a memorial page for Alexander, but it was going to have to wait until tomorrow, she wanted to go home, spend time with her husband and relax for a bit.

Gathering her things, she walked out of her office just as Marcy walked out of Alex's office.

She gave Danica a smug grin as she walked by.

Danica raised her eyebrow but otherwise ignored her and knocked on Alex's door.

When he told her to come in, she opened the door but didn't move to step inside.

“I have a grief counsellor scheduled to be here tomorrow and will have them set up in one of the single rooms downstairs, and the press conference is scheduled for one-thirty tomorrow afternoon.” She informed him. “Everything else I have to do can wait until morning.”

Alex leaned back in his chair and looked at her with an impassive face for a long moment, then nodded and stood up. “Before we go home, we need to go to my parents' place and see if we can get my brother out.”

“We?” She raised her eyebrows, genuinely surprised he wanted her there. “Why we?”

“Because I said so.” He gave her a look as he passed her and headed toward the elevator, leaving Danica scrambling to keep up with his longer stride.

“Don't you think this is a family matter?” she asked as she caught up. “I've spent even less time with Craig than I have with you.” She really just wanted to go home and not think about the West's or her job for the next eight to ten hours.

“My parents trusted you to look after things, did they not?” he asked as the doors opened. He got on, pressing the button for the parking garage as Danica followed him.

“Your Dad trusted me with the hotel.” She corrected him, annoyed that he was dragging her along because if Jasper felt like she was spending too much time with Alex, she would have to deal with his jealous demands for her to quit.

“And even then, he still made the decisions; I just carried out his orders.

I haven't set foot in the house or on the property since he moved out.” Alex didn't respond and stayed silent for the entire ride down to the parking garage, watching her with no emotion whatsoever.

She was really over the way he stared her, feeling like he was waiting for her to react and do or say something he could use to fire her.

When they reached her car, she unlocked the passenger side door for him so he could get inside.

Then, she walked around and found he had leaned across the seats and unlocked her door for her.

When she was in and ready to go, she glanced at him.

“You really want me to help you get Craig out?”

“It's more that I want a witness so he can't make any false claims against me when I inevitably have to call the police to have him removed,” Alex responded after a moment.

He sighed and his whole demeanour changed again; his body slumped back in the seat, and he ran his hand over his face.

“Look, Craig has had problems with drugs, alcohol and sex addictions since high school, and since he moved to Vegas, he's added a gambling addiction, or maybe he always had it and it went unnoticed, I don't know.” He shrugged, his frustration with his younger brother evident.

“He's always been hyper-sensitive to criticism, especially if it came from me or Dad, and if I go there alone, he will lie and do everything in his power to get me in trouble with the law so I won't be able to stop him from cleaning the house out and selling everything he can.

He knows now that Dad's dead, his free ride is coming to an end because I'm not going to tolerate his bullshit.”

“Right.” Danica nodded. Alexander had told her he only wanted one child, and Cassandra had agreed until Alex turned one, when she began begging her husband for more children.

He gave in when Alex was three but made it very clear he wouldn't have a third. She got pregnant with Craig a few months later, and he was born shortly after Alex's fourth birthday. She coddled and babied him his entire life, never letting him face consequences and always coming to his rescue. Alexander told Danica he sometimes regretted not giving her more children because of the way she ruined Craig, but knew that if he gave in to her, she would be begging for another child the minute the previous one showed the slightest signs of wanting independence from her. ”She loved babies, being needed and looking after people.” She started the car and pulled out of the parking garage. “So, what do you need me to do?”

“Watch and record it on your phone.” Alex seemed to relax as Danica agreed to help him with Craig.

“I'd rather not call the police on him. I'm hoping you being there will make him behave, and he'll just let me get him a taxi to the hotel without making a fuss, but it's not in his nature.” She saw him pull out his phone from the corner of her eye as she drove toward the West's house in Beacon Hill.

“He's been sending me increasingly frustrated texts about the security guards outside all afternoon, saying they won't let his 'friends' in. I told him no one was supposed to be in the house, including him, and if he wanted to see his “friends,” he could do it at the hotel, which he ignored and just told me to call off my guard dogs.”

They reached the house fifteen minutes later.

When they got out of the car and walked up to the front door, an armed security guard stopped them.

Alex showed him his ID, explained who he was, and after a short conversation with his boss, the security guard stepped aside and let them through.

Alex unlocked the door with what Danica recognized as his father's keys and figured he must have gotten them out of his desk.

He nodded at her phone, and she quickly opened the camera app and began filming.

They walked into the front entrance, and Danica couldn't help the gasp that left her lips.

When Alexander had moved out, he'd left everything behind, just paid to have someone come in and cover things.

It looked like a tornado had gone through the place.

Art had been pulled down and was leaning against the walls in stacks five and six deep; dishes were sitting in boxes haphazardly, furniture had been moved, and everything had post it notes with prices on them.

Shaking his head and letting out a low grumble of disgust, Alex headed to the stairs.

Danica could hear thumps and thuds overhead and quickly followed him.

“If he starts to get aggressive, leave and call the cops.” Alex's voice was firm as he climbed the stairs.

Danica smirked. She could handle herself.

Growing up as a foster child in a relatively low-income area of Boston meant she learned to defend herself at a young age and had gotten a blue belt in Krav Maga in university, but she murmured a low sound of agreement to keep him happy.

She followed him down the hall toward the noises.

Filming inside each of the rooms they passed, all of them showing signs of having been rifled through.

In the second last room, they found Craig going through the closet, pulling things out, looking them over and muttering to himself before tossing them aside.

Alex stepped in, and Danica lowered the phone as she stood in the doorway, keeping the camera pointed toward Craig, but trying not to make it look obvious that she was filming.

Craig looked up, and she saw a flicker of fear cross his face when he saw his older brother watching him with his arms folded and a disapproving frown on his face.

Alex and Craig looked like one another enough that you could mistake them for twins, despite being four years apart.

They both had their father's curly black hair and their mother's grey eyes, and they had less than an inch of difference in height, around six feet tall, but Craig had let himself go in a rather spectacular manner.

Where Alex was still slender and muscular at forty, Craig was soft and.

.. poofy. Danica didn't know how else to describe it.

Her husband was a bigger guy, but he wasn't soft; he was a muscular man who enjoyed his food more than he enjoyed working out.

Craig looked like a partially deflated balloon.

“Looking for something in particular?” Alex asked, his voice dry and disgusted, which made Danica wince a little inside.

It was almost like Alex wanted a fight, and sure enough, she saw Craig's fear immediately morph into defensiveness and what she thought might have been a hint of shame.

Alex didn't let him respond, though, and kept talking.

'You can't be here. We have to have someone come in and make an inventory of everything so it can be divided properly.”

Craig's eyes narrowed suspiciously, and he let out a sarcastic laugh.

“Yes, because I'm sure dear old dad has divided things equally between the two of us.” He dropped what he was holding and folded his arms across his chest, puffing it up in a poor attempt to look intimidating.

“You get the hotels, it's only fair that I get the house.”

Alex shrugged. “Unfortunately, Dad's will has specific instructions about how everything will be handled, which I'm happy to go over with you after his memorial. Until then, you need to behave.” He paused, and Danica watched as he gave Craig a once-over.

“And be as sober as possible for a few days.” She looked him over too and saw he was starting to show signs of coming down off something.

His eyes were darting around, and there was an obvious sheen of sweat on his forehead and upper lip.

Craig let out a huff and rolled his eyes, clearly annoyed by the sober comment, but made no move to leave, instead it seemed like he was going to dig in his heels and tell Alex to go fuck himself.

“Okay, here's the deal.” Alex had clearly run out of his limited patience with Craig.

His voice was hard and cold, and he was standing stiffly.

“There is a suite waiting for you at the hotel, and Danica will call a car to take you there, or I will call the cops and have you forcibly removed from the property and charged with attempted theft.”

Craig seemed to notice Danica was standing behind Alex for the first time, and he blinked in surprise.

“Danica?” He squinted as Alex shifted slightly, allowing Craig to see her fully.

To her surprise, he looked completely disappointed in her.

“You're seriously on his side with this? You know he still thinks you were fucking Daddy Dearest, right?”

Danica managed to keep her face blank, despite the disappointment that welled up inside her.

She had suspected as much, especially after the comment on the plane, but having it confirmed hurt her more than she wanted to admit.

“His opinion on my relationship with your father means nothing to me.” She somehow kept her voice firm and calm.

“I know what it was and what it wasn't, and right now, that's besides the point because he is right, Craig, you can't be here. When your father died, his estate went into probate, and until that is settled, no one can do anything with his belongings.” She noted that Alex didn't deny what his brother said and filed that away to deal with later.

Craig slowly nodded, his eyes flicking back and forth between her and Alex before coming to rest on his brother.

A satisfied smirk crossed his face. Danica couldn't see Alex's expression, but Craig seemed to enjoy the fact that he had just sown some discord into his brother's life. “Call me that car, please.”