The House of Wolves (House of Wolves #1)(7)

Mercifully, the office door opened then, and Harris Crawford walked in. He had been my father’s lawyer and best friend for all my time on earth. Tall, flowing white hair, one of the three-piece suits that I knew he had made in London. I’d always thought that if Morgan Freeman hadn’t played God, Harris Crawford could easily have gotten the part.

He sat behind his desk, made a sweeping gesture with one hand that took in the room, and said, “Still one big happy dysfunctional family, I see.”

My mother sighed with such force that I was surprised it didn’t send ripples through the curtains behind him.

“You have no idea.”

“Why do we even have to do it this way?” Danny asked.

“Because that’s the way Joe wanted it,” Harris Crawford said.

“He still won’t let go,” Danny muttered.

“Shall we begin?” Crawford inquired, looking out at us over his reading glasses.

“The sooner we do,” Danny said, “the sooner we get this over with.”

Harris Crawford started reading. Mom got the Nob Hill house on Jones Street in which we’d all grown up along with an extremely generous amount of money, which I knew was guilt money from my father because of the way he’d hurt her. I looked for a change of expression. But there wasn’t one. She’d always been the toughest one of all of us. The real alpha Wolf.

Rachel Wolf got the house in which she was living, the one in Presidio Heights she’d sold to Dad before they began the affair that became his second marriage, a marriage that included a prenup that my dad once said would have survived the earthquake of ’89 far better than the Bay Bridge had.

She smiled, waiting for Harris Crawford to say something else. But he didn’t.

“That’s it?” she said.

I was watching her.

Rachel Wolf began to color slightly.

“Just this additional note from Joe, directed at you, Rachel,” Crawford said, reading now. “‘If you’re looking for more, sell the place to another sucker. Or your boyfriend the tennis pro.’”

At this point Rachel Wolf looked as if she might have just swallowed a hamster.

“This is bullshit,” she said.

And walked out of the room.

“Nevertheless,” Harris Crawford said in a voice as dry as the papers on his desk.

My mother was always a lady, no matter what the circumstances, with an almost regal bearing. She turned to me now, smiling, and said, “I wasn’t watching, sweetheart. Did the door hit her in that remade ass on the way out?”

Thomas Wolf II was the next order of business. He retained his position as vice president of the Wolves and inherited a modest amount of money. According to Mr. Crawford, there was a lot more set up in a trust if he made it to the age of forty.

Thomas had just turned thirty-five. We all knew that our uncle Tommy, his namesake, had died at thirty-nine in a drunk-driving accident.

Thomas nodded.

“Everyone needs goals. Guess Dad missed the memo that I’m clean and sober now.”

Harris Crawford told Danny the amount of money he was receiving.

“You’re kidding, right?”

Crawford peered at Danny over his reading glasses.

“Have I ever struck you as a big kidder, son?”

“It’s not enough,” Danny said.

“Nevertheless.”

Crawford looked out at Danny and said, “But you maintain your quarter share of the Wolves, as do all Joe’s children. I’m sure you saw that Forbes recently established the value of the team at three billion dollars. Do the math on what your shares are worth.”

“What about being president of the team?”

“You retain that title,” Crawford said, “as Jack maintains his title as publisher of the San Francisco Tribune.”

Jack nodded.

“So are we done here?”

“Not quite,” Harris Crawford said.

He looked at me over the reading glasses now.

“As for Jenny.”

Crawford took a deep breath.

“I’ll read this as it’s written. ‘It is so stipulated that my only daughter, Jennifer Elise Wolf, assumes the role of chairman of the board of Wolf, Inc.’”

As that news sunk in, the air suddenly changed in the office even as I felt most of the air leaving my body. “The majority of the voting shares on the board are now transferred to her,” Crawford continued.

Not everyone immediately processed what he’d just said.

As someone who’d briefly practiced law myself, I certainly did. When my father and I were still on speaking terms, he explained to me one time that voting shares are what give you the hammer in business.

A hammer he had just handed to me, even as I honestly did struggle to catch my breath.

Nobody spoke until Danny Wolf said, “Wait…what?”

“Chairman of the board?” Jack said. “She’s barely still a member of the family.”

Danny was shaking his head, like a horse being bothered by a fly.

“What’s he saying here? The only vote on the goddamn board that mattered was his.”

Crawford took his glasses off, placed them on the desk in front of him, and stared at my older brother.

“Was there something in there that you didn’t understand, Daniel? I feel as if the language is self-explanatory.”