Chapter 29 #2
Beau was always the most congenial of the three of us growing up, and apparently that extended to when we became five.
He picked up our conversational slack easily.
“So, Vanessa, I have to ask, what made you decide to sponsor a bull rider? I know you said it was because Tessa was a woman trying to make her way in a man’s world, but how does news of her even come into your world?
No offense, but you don’t seem like rodeo people. ”
Nathan grinned, pointing his steak knife at Beau.
“You shouldn’t judge a book by its cover, kid.
I’m one hundred percent Wyoming born and raised.
I prefer bronc riding, but I watch the WbrP coverage on the sports channel.
When I saw your girl there pop up at the beginning of the season, I knew it was something that Vanessa would be interested in.
Hell, that we’d all be interested in. The time for gently leading the world into equality has come and gone, in my opinion.
Women can and will do everything a man can do.
It’s time to get on board or get out of the way. ”
They all murmured their agreement. Huh. It was obviously something they really believed, but I was from the South.
It was going to take a few more decades I think, even if I did completely agree.
I wouldn’t be doing what I dreamed of otherwise.
We made general conversation, about California and the weather and bull riding.
We asked about VANT Enterprises and learned that the company was formed after they all became committed to each other, which was obvious now that I thought about it.
Vanessa, Antony, Nathan, Trent equalled VANT.
Duh. But they had all met in college, gone into tech roles down in Silicon Valley.
Eventually Vanessa got sick of being passed over for promotions or project leadership, and decided to head her own company.
She called up her old college buddies Nathan and Trent, who’d agreed to turf over their jobs to help her get her start up off the ground.
Antony had been their lawyer. As they say, the rest is history.
Together they created an AI security system that was so intuitive it could read your vitals and call for help if you had a heart attack.
It could sense your distress and call the police if you yelled for help.
The whole thing was amazing and something out of a comic book movie.
We were on our third beer and sitting around a lit fire pit when Dylan asked the question we’d all been dying to know. “How did you guys get together?”
Trent laughed. “It was a long road, and it had some serious potholes and speed bumps along the way. Twenty years ago, the world had been a lot less accepting of relationships like ours. We lost clients, friends. Family.” He looked over at Antony who just smiled sadly but sipped his wine, his arm around Vanessa’s shoulders.
“But we didn’t waver. We knew that we all wanted Vanessa, and we wanted this to work.
Good communication is key, but that can be said for any relationship.
It's just five times more important in situations like this.”
“Carve out one on one time too. I know it's hard, especially when there's five of you, but it's important to feel the connection on an individual basis as well as a polycule,” Nathan added.
I felt like I should be taking notes.
Frankie cleared his throat. “What about kids?”
My head whipped toward him so fast I felt like I got whiplash. Kids? Who said anything about kids?
Vanessa giggled at my expression. “I struggled to have children, so we have one beautiful daughter who is away at college right now. But when we talked about it, we decided that any children we had would be our children, raised as if we were all biological pieces of the child. I think we’ve done that admirably. ”
I looked at Antony. “Do you have any advice?”
He just grinned. “Yeah. Get a bigger bed.”
As the booze flowed and the laughter got louder, the subject turned to the article in the Chronicle. Nathan scowled. “Fucking trash rag. We should buy it and then fire everyone.”
Dylan’s mouth dropped open. “You could do that?”
Nathan slapped him on the back. “Like I was dropping this week's grocery money. The tech business, especially in our field, is booming and we have everything we need. What else are we going to do with the money other than sponsor bull riders and buy unscrupulous newspapers for revenge?”
I shook my head. I couldn’t comprehend being that rich. “It’s not the newspaper’s fault anyway. It's Stan Wilfred Seniors fault. And his rapey psychopath son.”
Antony frowned in my direction and Vanessa leaned forward. “What do you mean?”
It might have been the drinks, or the warm feeling that the group gave me. They felt like family, which was insane because they were strangers and they were loaded. Still, as my sponsor, they probably needed to know anyway. The whole story poured out, although I left Davi out again, just in case.
At the end of the story, Vanessa’s cheeks were flushed. She looked at Antony. “Fix it.”
His jaw was tense but he nodded. “Consider it done.” He pulled a gold pen out of his breast pocket and wrote down his number on a napkin. “Give this number to your friend. What did you say the Police Detective from Wichita’s name was?”
“Detective Kane.”
He wrote that down in a little notebook that also appeared from his breast pocket. “I’ll take care of that too.” He lifted his glass in my direction. “There is nothing I enjoy more than taking out the trash, my young friends.”
He grinned, and it was completely shark like. I was kind of glad he was on our side right now. I wouldn’t want to oppose him in court.
The conversation turned back to gentler topics and the next time I looked at my watch, it was nearly one in the morning.
We stood and made our excuses, and Trent called for the town car.
All four of them walked us to the door, and Vanessa hugged me goodbye as the guys all shook hands.
“Stay strong. It's hard being a trailblazer, but you’ve got a spine of steel and strong shoulders. Just remember you can lean on them too. You don’t have to do it all yourself. ”
I smiled and hugged her one more time.
“I will.”
It was another hour before I was climbing into bed between Frankie and Dylan. Snuggled between their bodies, I could reassure myself that it would all work out. This was almost over.