The face of the man behind Fait was a familiar one.
Although Chance had never seen Fait before, he had seen this man in countless meetings and at business dinners with Mack Lovewell.
The man was tall, bald, and built. He had an intimidating no nonsense look on his face as per usual. The mysterious scar on his forehead didn't make him anymore approachable.
At first glance, one might assume that he was a bouncer or bodyguard or even a criminal. But assumptions are not always correct and may not even come close to reality.
Chance stood up and extended his hand. The scary man smiled and accepted the handshake.
"Nice to see you again Mr. Griffin." Chance returned his smile.
"The pleasure is all mine. And please just call me Roy." He replied in his deep contrabass voice and followed up with a light chuckle.
Roy Griffin was Mack's lawyer. In spite of his off-putting appearance he was actually more like a teddy bear. Especially around his five year old daughter.
Little Genevieve had her daddy wrapped around her finger at least twice. If she said jump, he didn't need to ask how high. He would find a way to exceed her expectations every time.
Of course when it came to business matters, he was a ruthless full size grizzly and never went easy on anyone. Not even his own boss.
Roy pointed his thumb in Fait's direction.
"Fay says you're going to be the new boss."
"Yeah, sorry about that. Seems like there's nothing I can do to stop it."
"Have you read over everything?"
"I've only had an hour or so and I just finished going over the will." Chance threw an accusing glance at Roy. "Did you have to write everything in legalese?"
Roy put his hands up in mock surrender.
"Hey, you know how contracts and such are. If they were easy to understand, how could we trick people?"
"Psh, lawyers." Chance rolled his eyes and pretended to be annoyed. Meanwhile, Fait was actually becoming slightly annoyed.
She had busied herself with arranging the food she had brought back but the two men seemed to have forgotten she was there. She knew she was somewhat lacking when it came to being noticeable but she had food!
Fait cleared her throat to remind them of her presence.
"If the two of you are willing to pause for a moment then we can eat something. We can also start settling Mack's will and the transfer agreements." A sly smile crept up on her face. "And if you still are in the mood after that, you can resume flirting with each other for as long as your little hearts desire."
The faces of the two men darkened and Roy stepped away from Chance.
He looked apologetic as he explained, "Not that I have anything against you but I don't want any misunderstandings with my wife."
"But we are both men with a preference for women." Chance never thought Roy could be afraid of anyone. Much less a woman.
"Doesn't matter if it's a man or a woman. She even gets jealous of our dog." The big man shuddered. "And I am not sleeping at my sister's place again!"
He turned to Fait with his big brown eyes and pleaded with her. "Fay, please don't blackmail me like this."
She just shrugged and smiled as she fixed herself a plate and sat down.
"You can always come stay with me since I won't be homeless anymore." Chance gave Roy a sympathetic look and went to join Fait. It had been a good while since he had eaten anything and he couldn't put off his hunger anymore.
Roy let out a distressed sigh and acted like he was reading the documents. Mack had him start drafting the agreements a year ago and he had long memorized the contents.
At first he didn't sense anything was off with the old man. At his advanced age it was strange that he didn't already have a will. He figured it was a just in case kind of thing. But as time passed he noticed Mack was slowing down. He rested more and didn't attend as many meetings. When he started talking more and more about death, Roy finally asked him about it.
"I'm dying, Roy." That was it. Mack wouldn't say anything else about it. Then a few weeks ago Roy got the call that he had nightmares about.
"Come meet me at the usual spot." He recalled how hoarse Fait's voice had been over the phone.
Their usual meeting place was a historic park by the harbor. He quickly found her and sat down on the bench beside her.
She was staring out at the water. They sat in silence for a while and watched a little tug boat guide a large ship into port.
"Mack is gone." She tried to hold back her tears but a few managed to escape and roll down her cheeks.
Even though he already knew, even though he had done his best to brace himself, those words still hit him like a freight train.
He hadn't wanted to believe it. He wanted it to be a bad dream.
Looking at the documents now reminded him that this was very much real. He shook his head and cleared up his thoughts.
"So, Chance... do you think you can handle it?"