Chapter 2
KENT
Istared at what had to be the most pathetic excuse for a map I’d ever seen in my life.
Hand-drawn lines that looked like they’d been sketched by a kindergartner mid-sneeze crisscrossed the yellowed paper, marking what I could only assume were roads, rivers, and other geographic features that meant absolutely nothing to me.
Was this masterpiece drawn by one of my nephews or nieces?
I had no idea what I was looking at or why?
“This is a road map to my personal hell,” I muttered, turning the damn thing around, trying to make heads or tails of it. Mountains. Trees. Rivers. Ravines. It meant nothing to someone like me who didn’t know the area.
My father’s hand cracked against the back of my head.
I was a grown man and my father still liked to pop me in the back of the head like I was a mischievous ten-year-old.
He reached over to spin the map back to its original position with the kind of exaggerated patience usually reserved for dealing with slow children.
“Pay attention, Kent,” Dad said, sitting back in the leather chair across from me in his home study. “This isn’t a joke.”
I rubbed the back of my skull and shot him a glare, but kept my mouth shut. When Armand Bancroft called you into his study the day after Thanksgiving, it wasn’t for a friendly father-son chat about football scores and leftover turkey. It was business. It was always business with him.
The man retired years ago. Except he didn’t. He still ran the family like he was our CEO. He was our patriarch. Big difference.
But I wasn’t going to be the one to tell him that.
The first snowfall of the season was coming down outside the tall windows that overlooked the estate grounds.
It was like nature’s way of announcing that winter had officially arrived.
I could hear Kathy humming Christmas music while she directed the house staff in hanging garland along the bottom sections of the stair bannisters.
“Silent Night” drifted through the air, all cheerful and festive. I had to suppress a groan. It wasn’t even December yet and the Christmas assault had already begun. By the time we got to actual Christmas Day, I’d be ready to burn every piece of tinsel and mistletoe in a fifty-mile radius.
“Kent.” My father’s voice cut through my internal grumbling and dragged my attention back to him. “I’m sending you there.”
I looked down at the map again, then back up at him. “Where, exactly? This looks like the middle of bum-fuck nowhere. Are you sending me to purgatory? Is this Siberia?” I slapped the heel of my palm to my forehead. “Oh! It’s the North Pole, isn’t it?”
“Stop being an ass.” Dad leaned forward and tapped a barely visible speck on the map. The dot was so small I’d initially mistaken it for a coffee stain. “I’m sending you here. To Northwood.”
“Northwood.” I squinted at the tiny mark on the paper. “No thanks.”
My father dismissed my attitude with the kind of wave he’d perfected over forty years of dealing with his sons’ various forms of rebellion.
“Northwood might be tiny, Kent, but it’s sitting on something very valuable.
Something that could make the family a considerable amount of money if we play our cards right. ”
I sat back in my chair, already knowing I wasn’t going to like whatever came next.
When he got that gleam in his eye—the one that said he’d spotted an opportunity to expand the family empire—it usually meant someone was about to get steamrolled.
And based on the fact that I was the one sitting in his study staring at a hand-drawn map, I had a sinking feeling that steamroller was going to be me.
He’d made our family very rich. So rich we never needed another business deal. Our children wouldn’t need to work a day in their lives. Hell, their children wouldn’t need to work.
So, why did I?
“A decade ago, some colleagues and I discovered that the area around Northwood is sitting on what might be one of the largest untapped oil reservoirs left in New York State,” he continued, settling back into his chair with the satisfied air of a man who’d just revealed his winning poker hand.
“Completely untouched. Ripe for the taking.”
Of course it was oil. Never mind the environmental impact or the people who might be displaced—if there was black gold in the ground, Dad wanted it. If he didn’t snap it up, some other rich friend of his would. Their greed would never be satisfied. I hoped I never let myself turn into him.
“When I first considered pursuing it over a decade ago, the town was thriving,” Armand went on.
“The local businesses were doing well, property values were stable, and nobody was interested in selling because they were all perfectly happy where they were. But times change, Kent. People struggle. And struggle creates opportunity.”
Something cold settled in my stomach that had nothing to do with the weather outside. “What kind of opportunity?”
“The kind where everyone wins.” His smile was the sort that sharks probably wore right before they bit you in half.
“The town is struggling financially now. The main businesses are failing, property values have dropped, and the locals are getting desperate. It’s the perfect time to swoop in with an offer they can’t refuse. ”
I sighed. “And that means?”
“It means we buy up the land, relocate the residents with generous compensation packages, and drill, baby, drill. Everyone gets paid handsomely to start fresh somewhere else, and we get access to a significant new revenue stream. It’s a win-win scenario.”
Right. A win-win scenario where an entire town got wiped off the map so the Bancrofts could get richer. Somehow I doubted the locals would see it quite the same way. We’d done this dance before. Many times.
“Why me?” I asked, though I was pretty sure I already knew the answer. “Why not Isaac or Hudson or one of the others?”
I caught the hint of disapproval that was never far from the surface when he looked at me these days.
“Your brothers are all busy with their own responsibilities. Isaac has his new wife and stepson to think about. Hudson has Diana and their daughter. Hayes has his hands full with his expanding business interests.”
“You mean they’re all tied down?” I asked dryly.
“Bitterness doesn’t look good on you, Kent.”
“Bitterness? I would have to be jealous to be bitter, and I’m definitely not jealous of my brothers swimming in diapers, spit-up, and whatever plague their kids bring home from school every week. Trust me, I’m perfectly happy with my current arrangement.”
And I was. While my brothers were dealing with midnight feedings and soccer practice schedules, I had spent the fall enjoying VIP access to the best ski resorts in Colorado and Switzerland.
Beautiful women, expensive wine, perfect powder—that was my idea of a good time.
Not cleaning baby crap and pretending to care about finger paintings.
“Why would I want to trade that for…” I gestured at the map. “Whatever the hell this place has to offer?”
Northwood didn’t sound like it had beautiful women or high-end amenities. It sounded like the kind of place where people went to disappear from civilization entirely. Did they even have running water? Wi-fi? Dad said the town was desperate, dying. The opposite of fun.
“It doesn’t matter what you want, Kent. It’s time you pulled your weight and contributed to this family’s success the way your brothers do. You’re thirty years old. You can’t spend the rest of your life playing while everyone else works.”
There it was. The ultimatum I’d been expecting for months now. Ever since Isaac had settled down with Mina and Hudson had married Diana, I’d been the odd man out in the family. The bachelor. The playboy. The one who wasn’t “contributing” in any meaningful way.
“Since you don’t have a wife and children to worry about, and since you’ve never particularly cared for Christmas anyway, you’re the obvious choice for this assignment,” my father continued.
“You’ll go to Northwood, you’ll investigate the situation, and you’ll secure this deal.
You’ll meet with the family that owns most of the town—the Northwoods, appropriately enough—and you’ll convince them to sell. ”
He made it sound so simple. Just walk into this struggling town, flash some Bancroft money around, and watch everyone line up to sign on the dotted line.
“What happens to the town once we get the oil rights?” I asked.
“The town gets flattened to make way for the drilling operation,” he said matter-of-factly, as if we were discussing the weather.
“It’s the only way to extract the resources efficiently.
But don’t worry. Everyone will be compensated generously for their inconvenience.
They’ll be able to relocate to whatever equivalent shithole town they choose and start fresh. ”
“And if I refuse?” I asked, though I was pretty sure I already knew the answer to that too.
His smile turned cold. “Then you forfeit access to your trust fund, effective immediately. No more ski trips to Switzerland. No more penthouse parties. No more credit cards with unlimited spending. If you want to live like a Bancroft, it’s time you start acting like one.”
There it was. The threat I’d been waiting for. Do this job or lose everything I’d ever known. It wasn’t really a choice at all, and we both knew it.
“When do I leave?” I asked.
“Tomorrow morning. I’ve already had your assistant book you a flight to Albany and arrange for a rental car. The weather might be an issue. There’s a storm moving through the area. But I’m sure you’ll manage.”
Of course there was a storm. Because traveling to the middle of nowhere in upstate New York in late November wasn’t going to be miserable enough without adding blizzard conditions to the mix.
“How long do you expect this to take?” I asked.
“As long as it takes to get the job done. A week, maybe two at most. It’s a small town, Kent. How complicated can it be?”
Famous last words. In my experience, the things that looked simple on paper were usually the ones that turned into complete disasters in real life.
Dad stood up, signaling that our conversation was over. “I’ve prepared a brief with everything you’ll need to know about the town, the key players, and the property values. Study it on the plane.”
He handed me a thick manila folder that felt like it weighed about ten pounds. Great. Light reading for the flight.
“And Kent?” He paused at the door of his study. “Don’t disappoint me. This deal could set us up for the next decade. I don’t want any of your usual half-hearted efforts or creative interpretations of instructions. Get it done.”
With that, he walked out, leaving me alone with the map and the weight of expectations I wasn’t sure I wanted to meet.
I sat there for a long moment, listening to Kathy’s humming drift in from the hallway as she continued her Christmas decorating. The sound was cheerful and warm, everything that this conversation hadn’t been. Everything that this assignment wasn’t going to be.
I looked down at the map one more time. Somewhere up there, people were going about their lives, probably getting ready for Christmas, completely unaware that a Bancroft was about to show up and turn their world upside down.
The smart thing would be to approach this like any other business deal. Go in, assess the situation, make the offers, close the deal, and get out. Clean and simple. No emotional attachments, no second-guessing, no moral quandaries. Just business.
I folded the map and tucked it into the briefing folder, then stood up and walked over to the window. The snow was coming down harder now, coating the estate grounds in a blanket of white that would probably be beautiful if I was in the mood to appreciate natural beauty.
From down the hall, I could hear Kathy laughing at something one of the staff members had said. The sound made me think about what it would be like to spend Christmas in a place like Northwood. Probably all small-town charm and community spirit and people who actually knew each other’s names.
Well, they were about to get a rude awakening.
I grabbed my coat from the back of the chair and headed for the door. I had packing to do and a flight to catch in the morning. And somewhere in upstate New York, there was a struggling little town that was about to meet Kent Bancroft.
Buckle up, Northwood. The Grinch was coming to buy all their shit, whether they wanted to sell it or not. Because Bancrofts didn’t take no for an answer.