Chapter 8 Do You Even Know Who I Am, Bro?
DO YOU EVEN KNOW WHO I AM, brO?
Brendan
Any expectation that Niall Black would have developed the slightest bit of sentimentality after escaping the jaws of death evaporated with his statement each time I arrived at the hospital over the next week: “Oh, it’s fuckin’ you.”
Now that he was awake, Dad sounded like he had just walked out of the bookie’s office. Like he’d done nothing in the intervening years to massage the South Boston out of his accent.
Each day over the last week, I’d carved an hour out of my very busy schedule to visit him in the hospital. I couldn’t have said why, exactly. God knew he’d never do the same for me.
Something about the right thing to do.
Something about what she would do.
I dreamed of blue eyes. A blond halo. Goodness that shone from within the person I was admittedly hoping might appear on the days I was there.
She hadn’t, though. Not even once.
And now, we were about to leave. The doctors were releasing him today.
“Dad, for the last time, it’s going to take time,” I said as I scanned an email about Dad’s exact condition from yet another major stockholder.
They had been hitting my inbox every few minutes since the press release had gone out.
“The doctors have some tests to run and paperwork to file. You just had major surgery. Take it easy.”
“Take it easy?” Even sick, Niall Black’s voice was a barely stifled roar. “You think I got to where I am by taking it easy? I’ve never taken it easy a day in my fuckin’ life.”
It was true. Dad was an ornery lion, but he worked harder than anyone. Blackguard Holding wouldn’t have gone from a bookie’s operation to one of the largest investment conglomerates in the world otherwise.
Didn’t make him any less of an asshole, though.
“I can’t be cooped up like a goddamn zoo animal when we’ve got four deals on the line.” He tugged on the oxygen line still in his nose. “Look at me. I’m a science experiment.”
“The deals are fine.” I thumbed past a proposal to invest in a theme park operation.
Pass. It was better not to look like you were paying him too much attention.
Otherwise, he’d really attack. “Both Orson and Fletcher signed the acquisitions. The other two are being reviewed by the boards of both companies, but they’re in the bag. I have it handled.”
He didn’t answer. Not a good sign. When Dad was quiet, that usually meant he was about to explode.
I answered three more emails before I allowed myself to look up.
His face was bright red.
“What?” I asked.
“Twelve fuckin’ weeks, Brendan.” Dad sounded like a groaning pipe. “The doctor just told me again this morning. I can’t fuckin’ work because of the stress. Stress, of all fuckin’ things. Making me not work for twelve weeks is what’s causing me stress, I told the asshole.”
“Dad, you need to listen to the doctors,” I repeated for what had to be the ten thousandth time.
“What do they fuckin’ know?”
“What do cardiologists know about your heart? Everything.”
“I’m fuckin’ fine,” he hissed, though his eyelids were drooping. These tantrums took it out of him. He’d be asleep again in five minutes.
“I know it’s hard.” I took a stab at the empathy Simone had shown me. “But you’ve been priming me for this my whole life. The company will be fine.”
“And Liza? She spoke to you? About your…personal life?”
I looked up again from my phone. He really had been preparing for this moment. I hadn’t heard much about my “plans” since Liza’s first intervention in these very halls. This was the first time Dad had mentioned anything like it.
“That’s right.” I shoved my phone in my pocket. “I hear you think I have a problem with commitment. Have to say, I was a bit surprised, considering I basically married the company straight out of college.”
The others had had their fun, as we both knew. Owen had joined the Marines in a rare rebellion that had landed him in Afghanistan for six years. Ronan had gone full Che Guevara on a two-year motorcycle trek through South America. And Shea, of course, was still “soul-searching” on the yacht.
He stared at the wall while he spoke. Like just acknowledging a potential transfer of power was too painful to do face-to-face.
This from the man who left my college graduation early to make a tee time.
“It’s all appearances, Brendan. If things even look slightly unstable, we’re screwed. We have to keep the board happy, the investors. The fuckin’ market could crash around us, just by rumors alone, do you understand?”
I crossed my arms. “Of course I understand. Where do you think I’ve been for the last twenty years?”
“Good, because I need you.”
I stared, dumbfounded, as he reached out a frail, spotted hand lined with bulging veins, beckoning for mine. “I—you do?”
His fingers gripped mine, though in his fragile state, it was with a fraction of his usual clutch. “I do. But you’re weak, Brendan.”
His words sliced, but I didn’t flinch. I’d learned not to.
“Sure, you know the business inside and out. But I don’t know if you have the spirit.”
“Spirit?” I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Not when I’d been the cold-hearted consigliere of this company for years.
At that, his hand pulled back, and he finally turned to me, his haggard face full of the ruthlessness I’d always known.
Even the hospital couldn’t keep it at bay.
“You have to be hard. Cutthroat. Hungry as a fuckin’ lion, willing to do whatever it takes to survive.
I’m not sure if you have that in you, boy. ”
I took a deep breath, fighting the urge to argue, fight, lash out like that lion would if it felt this trapped. The fucker didn’t have a heart, and he’d trained me. Why did he think I did?
“What does this have to do with my personal life? Liza said I needed to look more like a family man and less like a bachelor. But you’re asking me to be the same predator I’ve always been. I don’t see the problem.”
“A lion still has its pride. Takes what he wants, but everyone sees the home he protects. Why do you think I stayed married, even if I had to get a new wife? You think it was for love?” Dad snorted so hard, his oxygen tube almost fell out as he made himself cough.
“Jesus, take it easy.”
I leaned over to pat his back, but he waved me away. “It’s all business. Your personal life is not personal. Your personal life is merely an extension of your business life. It reflects badly on you that you don’t have a wife, a family, kids, all of it.”
“So Liza said. But I can’t just hire a wife and kids in a matter of days.”
“Can’t you?” The expression in those cold, tired eyes was still razor-sharp. “Marriage is just a contract. Another fight you have to win.”
“You’re serious. You’re nuts, you and Liza. You’re both fuckin’ nuts.”
“You want CEO?” His hand rose in a gesture of dismissal, like I was a servant he no longer needed. “Be the prince I taught you to be, Brendan. Black-hearted to the core. Now, find one of the nurses. If I have to have tests, then let’s get the fuckers done so I can get home.”
With a sigh, I turned for the door. There was no point in arguing with him. But I didn’t need to hurry to do his bidding either.
I went to the sink across from the nurses’ station to get myself my fifth plastic cup of chlorine-scented water and ice.
“Girl, you all right?” the head nurse was asking someone as I approached.
Her name was Joan. I knew this because I had already made sure Joan’s department received a donation of two million dollars to upgrade their scheduling equipment in exchange for the best care they could provide for my father.
It bought us the cardiac ICU’s only private room and Joan’s personal care of my father when she was on her shift.
“You look like you got run over on the T,” Joan continued to a blond hidden behind the array of computers at the station. “Everything okay? We weren’t expecting to see you at all this week after you called in.”
“I’m fine. Just…long week.”
I froze.
Fine, I’ll admit it. In between checking emails and sparring with my bedridden father, I’d been casually watching the clock, wondering where Simone was, just like I had every afternoon this week.
Wondering why she hadn’t been here at all.
The goddamn nurses hadn’t known a thing, despite the hundreds I’d pushed their way.
I’d wondered if she was sick. Or dealing with that sister of hers.
Or avoiding me.
No. I wasn’t given to neurotic speculation, and I wasn’t going to start now.
I remained at the water station with my back turned, emptying the cup and refilling it four more times while Joan and Simone talked.
“Don’t you usually work nights, honey? When do you even sleep?”
“Usually, in the morning before I come here. But this week, I’ve had things to do, and—”
I strained to hear after Simone cut herself off, but she didn’t finish her sentence. Something had happened in the last week. Something I would have wagered involved her twin or her family or whoever else probably depended on her in a crisis (and the rest of the time too).
Goddamn it. Why did I want to know so badly?
Weariness threaded through her voice, but there was something else in it too. Something hopeless. Like she was resigned to the fact that her life’s purpose was to be used by others, and there was no way out of that truth.
The plastic cup collapsed with a crunch in my fist.
“I’ll be fine,” Simone said, and I didn’t have to turn to know she was smiling bravely.
“Yo, did anyone else have to fight through a wall of cameras to get in the building this morning?”
I used the interruption by one of the male nurses to move behind a computer monitor outside Dad’s door, where I could lean against the wall and stay mostly hidden.
Was I eavesdropping?
Sure.
Was I sorry?
Not really.
The reason I was the most trusted of Niall Black’s sons wasn’t just because I was the eldest—it was because I knew when to keep my mouth shut and listen.
Information was currency, and I’d been collecting it all my life.