Praying for Sleep Read Online Free PDF Page B

the money passed to her and Portia, exactly how much that hard work had amassed: nine million, plus this house, the Fifth Avenue co-op and a cottage outside of Lisbon.
    Owen gathered up papers and put them into tidy bundles, labeling each with a yellow Post-it tag marked with his boxy writing.
    “I’ll have copies made for you, Portia.”
    “Keep them safe,” Lis warned.
    Portia tightened her mouth at the motherly tone and Lis winced, looking for a way to apologize. But before she could find the words, Owen lifted a bottle of champagne to the desk and opened it. He poured three glasses.
    “Here’s to . . .” Lis began and noticed the others gazing at her expectantly. She said the first thing into her mind. “Father and Mother.”
    Glasses chimed together.
    “Practically speaking,” Owen explained, “that’s the end of the estate. Most of the transfers and disbursements’ve been made. We have one account still open. That’s for the outstanding fees—the executrix, law firm and accountant. Oh, and for that other little matter.” He looked at Lis. “Did you tell her?”
    Lis shook her head.
    Portia kept her eyes on Owen. “Tell me what?”
    “We just got notice on Friday. You’re going to be sued.”
    “What?”
    “A challenge to the bequests.”
    “No! Who?”
    “That problem with your father’s will.”
    “What problem? There a fuck-up someplace?” Portia looked at Owen with amused suspicion.
    “Not from me there wasn’t. I didn’t draft it. I’m talking about the problem with his school. Doesn’t this ring a bell?”
    Portia shook her head and Owen continued, explaining that when Andrew L’Auberget passed away he’d left his entire estate in trust for his wife. When she died the money went to the daughters, with a small bequest going to his alma mater, a private college in Massachusetts.
    “Oh, bless me, for I have sinned,” Portia whispered sarcastically and crossed herself. Their father had often reminisced—reverently and at great length—about his days at Kensington College.
    “The bequest was for a thousand.”
    “So what? Let ’em have it.”
    Owen laughed. “Oh, but they don’t want that. They want the million he was going to leave them originally.”
    “A million ?”
    “About a year before he died,” Lis continued, “the school started admitting women. That was bad enough. But it also adopted a resolution banning gender and sexual-orientation discrimination. You must know all this, Portia.” She turned to her husband. “Didn’t you send her copies of the correspondence?”
    “Please, Lis, a little credit. She’s a beneficiary. She had to be copied.”
    “I probably got it. But, you know, if it’s got a lawyer’s letterhead on it and there’s no check inside, who pays any attention?”
    Lis started to speak but remained silent. Owen continued, “Your father did a codicil to his will, cutting his bequest to the school to a thousand. In protest.”
    “The old shit.”
    “Portia!”
    “When he wrote the chancellor telling him about the change, he said he wasn’t, I’m pretty much quoting, he wasn’t against women and deviates. He was simply for tradition.”
    “I repeat, what a shit.”
    “The school’s challenging the codicil.”
    “What do we do?”
    “Basically, all we have to do is keep an amount equal to their original bequest in the estate account until it’s settled. You don’t have to worry. We’ll win. But we still have to go through the formalities.”
    “Not worry?” Portia blurted. “It’s a million dollars.”
    “Oh, they’ll lose,” Owen announced. “He did execute the codicil during that spell when he was taking Percodan pretty regularly and Lis was spending a lot of time at the house. That’s what the school’s lawyer’s going to argue. Lack of capacity and undue influence by one of the other beneficiaries.”
    “Why do you say they won’t win?”
    Grim-faced, Lis sipped her champagne. “I don’t want to hear this