Wesley
“Can you grab that folder off the top shelf,Wesley?”
My morning was spent putting out fires, answering emails, and drafting my letter of resignation.
The knowledge that Granny had been playing puppet master behind the scenes, dragging me on the internet, revealing private shit to anonymous keyboard warriors pissed me off. Even more than that …
That shit hurt.
Life hadn’t been easy for me. Even before my father died, I’d struggled to feel like I belonged. That I was a Batchelor in more than just name only. I busted my ass for her every day. She’d given me the keys, but it was up to me to walk through the door. I’d done the work. And she’d embarked on this smear campaign to embarrass me, to make me the laughingstock in a family that had never really accepted me.
The anger that coursed through me after Albany revealed her findings hadn’t dissipated completely, even after I’d driven her to her first orgasm of the day. I’d spent the rest of the morning turning everything over in my mind and I still couldn’t figure out what I’d done to deserve this, what I’d done to make Granny want to hurt me.
“Wesley?” Granny called.
I stared at her for a moment, before I handed her the folder she’d asked for.
“Sit down,” she ordered. “Did you get the report about that property near Belleville? I’m considering developing the land into a studio. Not as big as Tyler Perry’s but comparable. There’s nothing like it in this area, and the tax dollars it could bring … Hm. Let’s talk about it in our next one-on-one.”
“Why did you do it?”
She froze, her fingers hovering over the keyboard. Her gaze flickered up to mine. As always, her face was unreadable. She dropped her hands into her lap. “Excuse me?”
“Whywouldyou do it?”
Granny sighed, leaned back in her chair, and crossed her legs. “What would that be, grandson? If you have something to say, please just say it.”
“Albany kept telling me that Ms. Tea was someone close to me. I shrugged it off, because I’d never really given anyone access to me. Aside from my mother, Hendrix, and Erica—and you—I try to fly under the radar. It made sense to me that John would try to destroy me. He wants me out of the company. It even made sense that Jackson or Samira or even Elijah would try to sabotage me.”
“Elijah?” she asked.
“Of course. He spent years in prison because of my father. He could’ve bided his time, waited to make his move, to make Cedric’s son pay.”
“That’s ridiculous,” she grumbled.
“It doesn’t matter because none of them tried to hurt me. You did.”
Seconds passed before Granny pressed the intercom on her phone. “Please hold my calls and cancel my afternoon meetings.” She stood and walked around the desk. Leaning against it, she sighed. “I’ve done a lot of things to change the trajectory of people’s lives. Some I’m proud of, some I’m not. Ms. Tea was never meant to hurt you.”
“Why did you do it?” I repeated.
“I felt guilty,” she explained.
Frowning, I stood and paced the floor. “Guilty? For what?”
“Your life wasn’t easy, Wesley. You did everything you could to destroy yourself.”
“That was a long time ago. Things are different now.”
“They weren’t so different, Wesley. I could see that you were drowning. Yes, you’re productive. You show up every day. You do an impeccable job. But you also drink a lot. You were hanging out in bars, taking random skanks to bed…. You isolate from the family. I didn’t want to watch you go down that hard road again. Not when you’ve worked so hard to come out of it.”
Closing my eyes, I blew out a slow breath. She was right. As much as I’d tried to deny it, I wasn’t where I needed to be. While I wasn’t doing those things every night, I could’ve easily fallen back into a pattern of numbing myself with liquor and women.
I’d realized that after the fundraiser. Since then, I’d taken steps to avoid my triggers. I avoided certain parts of the city that reminded me of my father, stayed away from Wellspring, and kept my ass in the gym or at the crib. Or with Albany. I’d stopped drinking liquor and limited myself to one beer at a time. And only for certain occasions. Even when I was tempted to drink the cognac in my cabinet, the night I made love to Albany, I’d settled for apple juice.
I was good.
“Why do you feel guilty, though?” I asked.
