Chapter 29
TWENTY-NINE
GREGG
The study door slams so hard that the shelves around the room rattle as Dad crosses to the desk.
With his back to us, he shakily pours scotch into a tumbler, promptly tossing it back and pouring another.
He doesn’t turn around for what feels like an eternity, he simply stands there, bracing against the desk like he is physically holding himself together.
Mum sits rigidly on a sofa, her ankle crossed, hands folded in her lap.
Her face is pale, stunned but not furious, like the evening has cracked something she can’t quite name.
Cameron stands near the door, his posture straight and respectful, but seems so hurt and out of place that it breaks my heart.
I close the distance of the room and stand beside him, running my thumb over his cheek with care.
“What happened out there,” Dad finally says, turning around, his voice low and tightly wound. “Was unreservedly humiliating.”
“Dad—” I start.
“No,” he snaps, cutting me off. “You do not get to Dad your way out of this.”
Mum exhales softly and slowly. “Greggory, that spectacle alone, I mean people will talk, they always do. This will make it all the way to London.”
“Then let them talk!” I concede. “Let all the people out there talk about how Celeste Thorne is immature, conniving, and—”
“Though I do not agree with Celeste’s delivery,” Mum interrupts. “She—”
“She what, Mum?” I snarl. “You’re honestly more concerned about what people will think about what she said, not the fact that she’s robbed me of my own narrative?”
I feel Cameron shift beside me, discomfort rolling in like waves.
“What narrative, boy?” Dad booms, attempting to regain control. “This,” he gestures between Cameron and me, “is not an option. Not in this family.”
Mum looks at me then with sadness in her eyes, but it doesn’t soften the blow. “It’s simply not what I would’ve imagined for you. But I suppose I should have recognized it.”
“Recognized what, exactly?” Dad scoffs.
She ignores him, her cool blue eyes holding mine, softened by memory and regret.
“All those years,” her voice trembles slightly, “watching you play at the piano. The way you disappeared into it. You always felt everything so deeply.” She shakes her head faintly.
“I told myself you were simply sensitive, artistic.” Her mouth curves into something regretful.
“I suppose I chose the version of you that was easiest for me to understand.”
Dad turns to her suddenly. “Don’t you dare. Part of the blame here is you!”
Mum stiffens, and a single tear rolls down her cheek.
“You indulged him too much.” His anger begins to spiral, unchecked. “All that nonsense! Music and feelings. You let him believe softness was acceptable. I’ve had to spend years making him strong, because you made him weak.”
“That’s enough,” I blurt out.
“No,” Dad barks back. “You have no right to absolve her. If she had raised you properly—”
“If you finish that sentence,” I cut in, stepping forward, “you won’t like how it ends.”
He glares at me, his chest heaving.
“Mum didn’t make me weak.” My voice breaks with fury. “She made me human. You think that compassion, creativity, even love are flaws. That speaks volumes about you than it ever will about me.”
Mum’s eyes fill with tears.
“And for the record,” I add, making sure Cameron can hear too. “Nothing about loving him makes me any less of a man. It makes me honest.”
Cameron clears his throat carefully. “Mr. and Mrs. Harwell, I never intended to—”
Dad rounds on him immediately, his eyes dragging Cameron up and down with open contempt.
“Oh spare me! You think I don’t recognize ambition when I see it?
It must be easy, work your way through a first class cabin, slumming your way into proximity and hoping to attach yourself to something permanent. ”
“Excuse me, but that’s not fair,” Cameron denies calmly. “I care about Gregg, and I haven’t asked for anything—”
“You don’t have to,” he barks. “Men like you always think the same way. Opportunity first, morality second.”
“Enough!” I shout, my conviction surprises even myself. They all turn to look at me, as if they’ve forgotten I was still standing there. “You don’t speak about him like that,” I defend, heat flooding my chest. “Not tonight. Not ever.”
“This is exactly what I mean.” Dad scoffs. “You’re throwing everything away for,” his lip curls hatefully, “some faggot and a queer fantasy.”
The word hit like a slap. Cameron inhales sharply, but I step forward, putting myself squarely between them.
“I love him,” I state loudly, unshakably, with my entire being. “Allow me to make myself perfectly clear. I love this man. From the day I met him he has haunted my mind, body, and soul, and now that it’s all out in the open, I will not pretend otherwise just to keep you comfortable!”
Dad’s face glows red. “If you go through with this,” he declares, his voice shaking with fury. “Then it’s over. Your inheritance. Archeon. Everything.”
Silence rings in my ears and I don’t hesitate. “That’s fine.”
Dad blinks wildly. “Excuse me?”
“I said, it’s fine,” I repeat, anger steadies me instead of breaking me. “Because Kenneth Franklin is on the board of directors at Regal Crown, and he offered me partner tonight.”
He freezes, his face turning scarlet.
“You see, I don’t need to be bought with silence anymore. I won’t live a half-assed life just to preserve your dinner invitations.” I turn to Cameron, who looks like he is stuck between being mortified and relieved. “And I’m choosing him.”
“Have you lost your senses completely?!” Dad roars. “Throwing away your name, your inheritance, and selling yourself to Regal Crown?” His voice cracks with rage. “Kenneth Franklin poaching you is the greatest betrayal of all!”
“I wasn’t poached,” I shoot back. “I was offered respect!”
He laughs wildly as he becomes unhinged. “Do you think that Regal Crown will save you? All the money in the world can’t replace blood!” He steps toward me, his face is flushing and spittle clings at the corner of his mouth. “You are destroying this family!”
“Please, stop this,” Mum pleads, rising halfway from the sofa.
But Dad doesn’t hear her. “You are nothing without this name!” he screams. “Do you hear me? Nothing without—”
He stops mid-sentence.
At first, I think he is gathering breath for another attack. His mouth opens, but instead of venom, a peculiar sound escapes from deep within. His hand goes to his chest, his fingers clawing at his jacket and his face drains of color.
“Dad…?” I whisper.
He staggers slightly, then his knees buckle, and the sound of his body slamming into the floor was dull and final. For a moment, no one moves.
“Dad!” I drop beside him, panic detonating within me and erasing the burning anger that was just there. I shake him as I shout, “Dad—can you hear me?!”
Nothing.
Then Cameron is on his other side. He kneels fast and puts his ear to his chest. His face changes instantly, replaced with sharp focus.
“He’s not breathing,” he announces as he interlaces his fingers and precisely places his hands at the center of my father’s chest. “Gregg… he’s in…
cardiac arrest,” he says firmly as he delivers deep compressions.
I watch in shock as he counts aloud under his breath, his arms locked, his shoulders driving downward.
“Mrs. Harwell… call emergency services… now!”
Mum stands frozen, staring at her husband like she’s never seen him before.
“Victoria!” Cameron shouts, not unkind but urgently. “Call 911… or 999… whatever it is… over here… Just call for help!”
She flinches as if someone has struck her, then as if awoken from a trance, she fumbles with the phone on the desk. With shaking hands, she brings the receiver to her ear. “I—I need an ambulance,” she stammers. “My husband… he’s collapsed. He’s not breathing!”
Cameron doesn’t stop, not even as sweat drips from the end of his nose and soaks through his suit. He is relentless, and all I can do is kneel there, helpless, watching the man who had just disowned me lie motionless on the floor while the man I love fights to keep him alive.
The irony burns.
Please, I think. Not like this.