The Bastard and the Heir

Chapter 1

WREN

T here’s a big difference between money and power. Sure, those who have the money hold the power, but no one and nothing can compete with the strongest power source on the planet.

It makes the world go round. Has the ability to create. From world leaders to anxiety sufferers and everyone in between.

It’s none other than mother’s guilt.

“I’m not going,” I say for the billionth time. It might sound childish, and I’m sure that slamming the dirty dishes from our lunch in my sink doesn’t help with handling this maturely, but come on.

“Please.” Mom’s bright eyes, which match mine—the only physical feature I got from her—soften. She’s gone from demanding I go to my father’s funeral to rationalizing it to now begging. “It’s what he wanted.”

I scoff. “I couldn’t care less about what the sperm donor wanted of me.”

“He wasn’t a sperm donor, and you know it. It was your choice not to pursue a relationship with him.”

“I’m sorry, but having an affair with my mother and knocking her up before abandoning her screams sperm donor to me. Actually, no, he’s worse. At least with sperm donors, the mothers know he won’t be part of their child’s life.”

“He might not have been in your life, but he was there for you.”

I hate when she throws that in my face. My whole childhood, I knew next to nothing about my biological father.

I never questioned where Mom got the money for my private education or my very expensive college degree, but if I’d known it came from him , I would’ve enrolled in public school. Gotten student loans. Anything.

She kept his identity from me for twenty-one years, and upon graduating with a BA in business, she sat me down with a man she calls my father, who promptly offered me a job at his company. Sorry, no, one of his many companies under the MediaCorp umbrella.

I still remember how it all came out. It’s burned into my memory as one of those epically devastating moments I’ll never forget.

Like finding out Santa isn’t real or when my mom’s dad—one of the only father figures in my life along with Uncle Hal—told us he had terminal cancer.

It’s one of those scenes that play out in my head as if I’m watching a movie instead of reliving it.

Mom and I were sitting in a fancy-ass restaurant, but there was a third setting at the table.

“Are we waiting on someone?” I asked. “I thought you said it was going to be just us for my special graduation dinner.”

Her gaze shot away from me as she straightened the cutlery in front of her.

For my whole life, it was me and her, and I couldn’t remember when she’d ever been so fidgety.

She went to open her mouth when her gaze caught on someone behind me, and the blood drained from her face.

She’d stammered, “Y-you’re early. I haven’t had a chance to?—”

I turned to see a well-dressed, expensive-looking man standing above me. He had salt-and-pepper hair and the type of distinguished aging people pay thousands to achieve.

His smile was warm but maybe trying a bit too hard, and that’s when it clicked.

“Are you introducing me to a boyfriend?” I asked Mom.

“No, honey. He’s … Well, this is …”

A hand appeared in front of my face. “Warren Ritcherson. Pleased to meet you.”

My smile dimmed. I didn’t take his hand. My gaze flitted between him and my mother. “Warren? Warren … Ritcherson.” I knew that name but not in context with mine. I’d learned all about the MediaCorp conglomerate and the Ritcherson fortune in my business classes.

I tried not to jump to another wrong conclusion, but it was difficult when the only thing my mother had ever told me about my father was that I was named after him.

She also used to tell me that he loved us and he would be with us if he could but that it was impossible. In that moment, I’d realized why.

And I hated both of them for it.

Mom snaps me back to the present. “Warren, please.”

I cringe at the use of my full name. She knows I hate it when she does it, but she’s trying to make a point.

“I promised him,” she says and then slams her mouth shut, knowing she said something wrong.

“You’ve been in contact with him?”

“He called me. When he found out he was sick.”

“Why would he want me at his funeral? It’s not like he would’ve left me anything, and even if he did, I wouldn’t accept it.”

Mom sighs. “You have siblings. You have family.”

“You’re my family. You, Uncle Hal, and Aunt Marcy. Remy.”

Mom walks from my small kitchen to my even smaller dining room, where her purse sits on the table, and pulls out an envelope. “He gave me this to give to you.”

“Whatever it is, I don’t want it.”

She doesn’t listen. She places it in front of me on my kitchen counter. In cursive script, it has my name. Wren .

“I have respected your decision to not accept anything from your father. To want nothing to do with him even after he made an effort. But this is something I’m not going to let slip through your fingers.

Read it. If I can’t convince you to go say goodbye to him, then maybe this will.

And if that doesn’t work either, then I can pull out my pouty face and ask you to do it for me.

The woman who birthed you. Raised you. Made sure to knock before entering your bedroom from ages thirteen and upward.

Didn’t even blink when you told me you were gay. ”

And there’s more of her expert guilt trip. Only this time, it’s hitting where it hurts.

“Fine, I’ll go, but I’m not reading … whatever that is.” I wave toward the envelope. “So you may as well take it home with you.”

She pats my cheek. “Wonderful. You can pick me up on your way to the service.”

“You … you’re going? To where your lover’s wife and children will be mourning his death? You? The mistress? Is that really a good idea?”

“Wren, there’s so much you don’t understand about what happened between your father and me. So much you don’t know because you refused to let me tell you.”

I run a hand through my hair and lean back against the counter. “Then tell me now.”

“Are you ready to hear it?”

Am I? No. I don’t know if I will ever be ready to hear why he chose his other family over us. Mom claims he loved her, but how could he abandon her? And me? Still, if I’m going to his funeral, I want to try to understand.

If I had some clarity, maybe I’ll be less inclined to set his coffin on fire.

“You know your father is a big deal.”

“Big deal might be understating one of the richest men in the world.”

“He had expectations put on him from when he was young. He was always going to marry rich. We knew from the beginning there was no future with us, even if we both wanted one. I have no doubt whether he loved me or not. I know he did. But our lives were never going to mesh together.”

“So you were fine with being his side piece until he got married? Where did I fit in to all of this?”

“You weren’t planned, but you were a blessing. And I knew the minute that extra line showed up on the pregnancy test I would have to be a parent on my own, but I wasn’t willing to give you up. Or to give that piece of him up that he left me with.”

“It sounds like you’re still in love with him.”

She rolls her eyes. “Please. It’s been almost thirty years. I’m not that sad and pathetic.”

Only, I think that she might be. That’s her everything is fine lying voice.

“Did you and him ever … you know, continue what you had over the years?”

She shakes her head. “I was willing to be with him for that summer, but once he got married, I refused to be the other woman. All of our contact after that was about you.”

I don’t want to admit that I’m relieved. It would be uncomfortable to know he still had a relationship with her but not me.

Yes, it was my choice to not pursue any kind of contact with him, but that was for her benefit. Because if I remember anything from my childhood, it’s that I didn’t have a father. I didn’t need one, but … I really, really wanted one.

Twenty-one was too late.

I was already a grown-ass man.

I was already bitter.

And hell, I still am.

She wants me to walk into that church and meet the children he chose to keep. To meet the wife he chose over my mother. Say goodbye to the man I despised yet yearned for at the same time.

Funerals are never fun, but this one’s going to be a shitshow.