Chapter 40 – Young Girls Forbidden Love Series: My Best Friend’s Daddy

Filed to story: Young Girls Forbidden Love Series: My Best Friend’s Daddy

A knock sounded on my door just as I had walked through the door from my balcony. I reluctantly opened it, silently saying goodbye to my plans of spending the evening on my own, drinking in silence.

“Marmie, what are you doing here?” I asked my ex as she barged into my home without waiting for an invitation.

“I needed to go over the budget for Lauren’s wedding before I start finalizing the plans,” she said as she made herself comfortable on my brown leather sofa.

I took a seat on the opposite side of the living room from her. I couldn’t help but rub my temples. Dealing with this woman, especially discussing the topic of money, never failed to give me a raging headache.

“Just let me know what my portion of the wedding is, and I will pay for it. I am not in the mood to discuss the cost of linen tablecloths and reams of silk with you,” I said as I closed my eyes and leaned back into the couch cushion.

I continued to rub my temples. I hoped she would take the hint and leave, but Marmie was a woman on a mission. When she got this way, there was no way to stop her until she got exactly what she wanted.

I was lucky her late husband had to deal with her more than I had.

“Well, you are in a mood, aren’t you? I figured you would want to have more involvement in your only daughter’s wedding,” she said with an overly dramatic sigh.

“I already said I would pay my share of whatever Lauren wants. She doesn’t want my opinion on the actual details of the wedding, and neither do you.”

“Well, that is fair enough,” she said with another sigh.

I let silence fill the room until I couldn’t take it anymore.

“Was there something else you wanted to discuss, Marmie?”

“Well, now that you ask, yes, there is a small matter I wanted to discuss with you.”

I sat up and looked at her, waiting for her to continue. Of course, she didn’t, and I had to question her more to finally get the reason for her visit out in the open.

“And what is this small matter?” I asked with as much sincerity as I could muster.

“Lauren’s trust.”

“Yes? As we have already discussed, Lauren has a trust set up by the Astor family,” I said weary of why Marmie would be bringing up Lauren’s trust.

She had a history of making horrible decisions with money, so I had been very careful in setting up Lauren’s trust to ensure that her mother could not gain access to it.

I hoped that as Lauren got older, she would become more responsible with money. That was probably wishful thinking on my part.

“Well, since she is getting married, I think she would benefit from receiving it now,” Marmie said confidently.

“The trust is set up so that she will not be able to access the funds until she turns twenty-five,” I said firmly. We had had similar conversations in the past when she claimed that Lauren desperately needed access to the fortune of the trust fund early.

“She has to wait until she is twenty-five to receive what is rightfully hers?”

“Yes, that is how the trust is structured. That way, she is mature enough to handle that amount of money.”

“That is all fine in theory, but that puts her in a difficult position right now,” she continued.

“How so? Todd seems fully capable of supporting her. He has a good standing in his father’s company,” I responded.

“That is true, but I was just talking with Todd, and he had his eye on a penthouse on the upper east side that is a bit out of his price range. It would be the perfect starter home for them, and I would hate to see them deprived.”

Alarm bells started ringing in my head as soon as Marmie brought up Todd. The two weren’t even married yet, and he already had an eye on Lauren’s trust fund.

After finding out how he had been treating Shelby, I shouldn’t have been surprised.

“I see. Does Lauren know about this penthouse?” I asked.

“Of course not. Todd wants to surprise her with it as a wedding gift,” she said as though I was ridiculous for even asking.

“I will change the terms of Lauren’s trust fund on one condition,” I said, sitting up straighter and looking Marmie dead in the eyes.

“What is that?”

Her eyes widened, hopefully. I expected she figured I would need more convincing.

“Todd will sign a prenup. Everything that Lauren pays for will remain in Lauren’s name alone. He will not have access to any of her trust fund money.”

“You are being ridiculous, Michael. A healthy marriage can’t operate like a business transaction.”

“Those are my terms. If Todd doesn’t like it, they don’t have to get married at all,” I said with finality.

“You would really take away your daughter’s one chance at happiness over something as trivial as money?!” Marmie screeched at me.

I found it funny that she found money trivial when she always seemed to have a huge emergency that required my financial assistance.

“If money is so trivial, then Todd should have no problem signing a prenup,” I said.

I doubted that Todd was my daughter’s one chance at happiness; in fact, I had a sinking feeling that Todd would only lead Lauren into misery. The more I got to know Todd, the more sure of that reality I became.

I would have approached Lauren about it if I had thought it would have done any good. However, Lauren was like her mother in that once she had decided on something, she would do everything in her power to make it happen.

“I can’t believe you would be so selfish! You are going to ruin the surprise of the penthouse completely, and that will cast a horrible shadow over the entire wedding. You are going to ruin everything for Lauren. She has had enough to deal with in her life by losing one father figure. Now you are going to break her heart all over again!” Marmie spat at me.

I was used to her throwing her first husband in my face to get what she and Lauren wanted. She always played Lauren out to be the victim, forgetting that she was the reason that Lauren did not know her real father for the first ten years of her life.

The guilt used to work on me until I realized what Marmie was doing.

“Those are my terms Marmie; you are not going to back me into a corner. If this was truly important to Lauren, she could come to discuss it with me, but I am not making any changes to her trust because you and her fiance are conspiring together.”

I had rested my phone on the sofa cushion next to me, and a sudden vibration pulled my attention to it. A call from Bruce lit up my phone screen.

“Excuse me, Marmie; I have to take this,” I said, picking up my phone, happy for an excuse to get away from that unpleasant conversation.

I walked back out onto the balcony, closing the door securely behind me. The last thing I needed was for Marmie to know anything about Blaine. She was pacing back and forth in my living room, clearly fuming from our conversation.

“Bruce, what news do you have?”

“Sir, I just got word that a woman matching the young lady’s description just left your office. Apparently, she talked with the receptionist about needing to speak with you. The receptionist called security right after she left.”

“Thank you, Bruce,” I said and hung up the phone.

I sent a text to my assistant to send the car around, and I stormed back into my penthouse.

“Where the hell do you think you are going? We are not finished here,” Marmie yelled at my back.

“Yes, we are, Marmie. I expect you to leave before I get back. I will give orders to my security team downstairs to forcibly remove you if you refuse.”

I left her to collect her jaw from the floor.

I was not going to lose Shelby again.

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