Chapter 17
SEVENTEEN
I’d never seen my father fire-breathing mad before.
Annoyed, often. Bad-tempered, sure. But flames practically shooting out of his eyes with enough force to scald me where I stood opposite his desk? This was a first.
This day was destined to have many of them apparently, and it was only—
I glanced at my watch. Past three already.
Guess fucking my assistant on the conference table had taken longer than I’d realized.
Pity it hadn’t taken even longer. I could’ve spent years lost in her luscious body.
And I probably would have—at least for a second round—if not for my father deciding to epically cock-block me.
“Was this necessary?” I asked in a brutally low voice, searching for calm.
“I assume you mean interrupting your…work.” His smirk as he sat back in his desk chair set off a pulse at the base of my skull. “You have a bed at home. Use it.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Sure you don’t. Interesting that your sharp-tongued new assistant isn’t at her desk right now, isn’t it?
” He crossed his arms, straining the shoulders of his crisp gray jacket.
It didn’t have a single wrinkle, unlike mine, I was certain.
“Have to say I’m surprised at you, Preston, considering your attitude in other ways.
But I’ve found out plenty of things about you today that surprised me.
That you’ve taken up with some witchy floozy barely rates. ”
“You are not to speak of her like that ever again. Do you understand me?” I made a fist and barely resisted slamming it on his desk. “My mistake was not taking you to task the last time you dared to open your mouth about her.”
“Taking me to task?” he thundered, his face blanching as he rose to his feet.
“Have you forgotten who started this law firm? Who can fire you at any time?” Before I could respond, he smiled thinly and leaned forward, bracing his hands on his desk.
“Or is that what you’re hoping I’ll do, so you don’t have to make the decision to walk? ”
I almost didn’t hear the question, because the way he was looming toward me, deliberately trying to intimidate me, reminded me how I’d done the same move to Ryan over a damn coffee pod.
I was my father’s son, in far too many ways to count. So, how did I have the right to question his behavior? I didn’t have an explanation for mine, except ones that cleared my guilty conscience.
“How do you feel about Courtney?” I asked suddenly.
If he’d been any more surprised by my change in direction, he would’ve toppled over. As it was, his dark eyes narrowed as the color slowly returned to his cheeks. “What?”
I repeated the question.
“What business is that of yours?”
“I’m your son,” I said tightly. “I might not be particularly proud of that fact right now, but I am. If you have feelings for her, it’s not an excuse, but it’s not as bad as if you’re just using her. Just using Mom.”
Almost as if it had never existed, his anger drained out of him and he sank into his chair, looking years more exhausted than he had when we entered his office. “Did it ever occur to you they’re using me just as much?”
I refused to believe it. “No. Mom isn’t using you. She loves you.”
“We love each other as friends do, Preston.”
I yanked on the knot in my hastily redone tie. “Explain.”
“This isn’t really appropriate for us to discuss.”
“Right, because it’s appropriate for you to take cheap shots at a woman who’s done nothing to you just because she means something to me.”
“What does she mean? Besides a convenient—”
“Don’t,” I interrupted, shoving my fists into my pockets. It took everything I possessed not to use them. “Don’t even say it. Don’t even think it. Because not only will I quit this godforsaken firm, I’ll walk out the door and never speak to you again.”
He inhaled deeply through his nose. “You don’t even know her.”
“I feel like I do. I feel… Jesus, far too much.”
And I’d never even gotten a chance to ask if she was all right afterward. She’d seemed fine for those brief moments we’d spoken, but maybe I’d missed a cue. I didn’t want her to be alone right now, shoring up her walls to shut me out.
She probably figured I was doing the same.
“Be careful, son.” His voice gentled. “I know we’re at odds right now, but contrary to what you obviously believe, I’ve never wanted anything but the best for you. I don’t want to see you hurt.”
“Then don’t look at me, because I’ve been fucking miserable for years.
” When he started to reply, I held up a hand.
“I’m not asking for a violin accompaniment, okay?
I know I’m lucky that I’ve had this job, that my lifestyle is beyond comfortable.
You gave me opportunities my whole life that so many others haven’t had. ”
Ryan, riding around in a van with her mother, hadn’t had them. She’d struggled. She hadn’t even told me all the ways she had, but I could see some of what she’d gone through in her eyes. Her bravado draped around her like a cloak. Keeping her safe from those who would make judgments.
Making friends through tarot. Wearing black so she didn’t attract too much attention, although that was impossible. Quietly helping others while claiming she didn’t need any herself.
My first instinct upon learning about her work history had been to look down at her. None of the jobs she’d held were important. She wasn’t suitable for an attorney of my caliber.
What a crock of shit. She’d hugged a woman she didn’t even know, because she was crying and broken-hearted. Her first instinct was to heal, not harm.
And she was the unsuitable one? No, that was me, with my rigid rules and my need for order above all else. Meanwhile, the life was being constricted out of me, day by day.
“Yet you aren’t happy.” My father phrased that as a statement, not a question.
“No.”
“You want to do something other than divorce law.”
“Yes.” I didn’t know how he knew this all of a sudden, but I had to assume Dex was involved. “I want to help people instead of helping them be awful to each other.”
I didn’t expect him to laugh out loud. Or that I could smile too.
Until I thought of him cheating on my mother—and denigrating Ryan. Neither of those things could stand. My silence might as well have been agreement.
“When did you stop loving Mom?” I asked quietly.
“I didn’t,” he said after a long moment. “We love each other, son. We just aren’t in love. I don’t know if we ever were.” He let out another short laugh, this one far darker. “What is love anyway? Some romantic notion in the books. It’s not real. It’s not worth ruining your life.”
I swallowed hard, thinking of the feel of Ryan’s skin under my fingertips. So soft and vulnerable, with that strength beneath that was both enviable and scary as hell. “It’s everything.”
“We’re happy enough,” my father went on as if I’d never spoken. “She lives her life, I live mine. I take care of her very well. She wants for nothing.”
“Except your love and fidelity.”
“If you asked her, she’d tell you she was happy,” he insisted.
Since I knew she’d done that very thing, I said nothing. How could she be happy when her husband wasn’t faithful to her? Money was a poor substitute for a true companion who adored you as much as you adored them.
Not that I knew what that was like. I didn’t.
My longest relationship had lasted perhaps half a year.
We hadn’t been in love, just serious like.
She’d dumped me when she fell for her polo instructor, a fact I’d found mystifying.
The falling in love part, not that she’d developed a particular fondness for polo.
But over the past couple of weeks, I’d started to question things. To wonder if maybe I could have that too.
If I even had any choice in the matter.
A sex hex wasn’t to blame, but something much more elemental. I’d never believed in love at first…email before, but I had to say, I was beginning to. And being with Ryan had only sharpened my hunger for her.
Would that still be the case next week, next month, next year? Hell, sixty years from now? Once, I would’ve said of course not. Now everything was in flux.
Especially me.
I sagged into the chair opposite my father’s desk. “Are you happy?” I asked finally when the silence between us grew too deep.
He didn’t answer for a long time. “Why does it matter?”
I simply shut my eyes.
My father let out a frustrated breath. “What the hell is going on with you? This isn’t you. You don’t behave like this.” Then after a moment, he made a sound that verged on a growl. “Let me guess.”
“Don’t.”
But he was on a tear. “Not since you were caught in that fountain with that ridiculous girl have you acted so erratically.”
“Yeah, and that was probably the last time I was truly happy.” What a sobering realization that was.
“So what? Do you think we all dance through life every day? No. We handle our responsibilities and take advantage of the perks we’re offered—”
“Like your secretary, right? Was she one of your perks?”
“I could ask you the same question.”
“No. She’s not a goddamn perk. I wouldn’t be surprised if she never let me touch her again, and you know what?
She’s probably right. I’m not worthy of her.
I haven’t lived the way I truly want to for so long that I don’t even know what it would look like.
It’s a fucking miracle my dick still works. ”
At my father’s shocked expression, I gritted my teeth. So, I probably could’ve stopped before saying that. Honesty didn’t mean a need for family therapy sessions.
But we did need one. All of us. Probably even Mr. Happy Go Lucky Dexter, though he was seeming wiser all the time.
He understood he couldn’t put his real life on pause, because the world didn’t stop.
I didn’t want to look back and realize my best years had passed me by and for what? I had enough money.
What I didn’t have was fun. And pleasure. And freedom.