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“Wow. He sounds like a real prize. What about your mother?”
“She married him for the money and never wanted children. After Rebecca was born, my mother rarely got out of bed. She moved around the house like a ghost. A year later, she left, and I haven’t seen her since.”
Fox refilled my glass and his. “I’m sorry.”
I nodded before downing another sip from the bottle.
“I was expected to follow in my father’s footsteps, to run his business with no concern for who he hurt and no feeling for anything but profit. I learned to pretend I cared for the same things he did. By the time I was eighteen, I had my mask well in place. I went to the college my father picked out and studied business. I aced every class, even though I hated most of them. It was ninety-five percent utter bullshit.”
“So you don’t use what you learned now?”
“I use what I learned working at the company, not what I learned in school. I also use the rules I learned growing up about power and money and what they get you and how to make people loyal. I’m not much better than my father. Don’t let me convince you otherwise.”
“Dare.” He cupped my face in both hands. “You are nothing like that bastard.”
I pulled free and shook my head. “You don’t know that.”
“Yes, I do.”
I wanted to believe I was better and that he truly saw goodness in me, but it was dangerous to let myself hope like that. “Once I graduated and started working for my father full-time, I constantly thought of ways to get out. I contemplated simply running away. I had some money in my name by then, plenty to get by on for several years, but I was so used to the lavish lifestyle, and I wanted the company to be mine. Making the changes I wanted would be the ultimate revenge on my father. I spent countless hours thinking about how I could improve things, but he wouldn’t let me make any changes. It was his way and his way only.”
I paused, knowing the next part was going to be hard to get out. Telling Fox my father was a bastard and I hated him wasn’t a big deal, but what he’d done to my sister…
“I’m here. It’s okay.” I felt the pressure of his hand on my shoulder and realized how fully I’d been transported back to those hellish days.
“Thanks.” His soft smile gave me the will to keep going. “My father wanted to buy out another company, but the owner was being difficult. He wouldn’t agree to my father’s terms until my father agreed to make him an offer he couldn’t refuse—my sister.”
Fox’s eyes widened and his mouth fell open. “What? But how—”
“He told the man he was welcome to take my sister out, then told her she would either agree to it or be disinherited.”
“And by take her out…”
“Yes, he meant exactly what you think.”
“That’s… Tell me the bastard is dead.”
“Yes, very dead.”
“And your sister?”
“She’s all right now. When I found out what my father had done, I managed to find her in time to stop the worst from happening, but it took her years to be ready to go out with a man again.”
“Wow. That’s… What did your father do after you rescued her? Did the buyout happen?”
“No, the man refused since he hadn’t gotten what he’d been promised. My father was beyond furious with me. He told me I would be disinherited. I still remember every second of our confrontation. I even remember that his office smelled like cleaner because the windows had just been washed. The sun was shining in, and I had to look away from the glare off the metal paper weight my father had on his desk.”
I paused to take a breath before finishing the story.
“I’ll wait as long as you need,” Fox said. But I had to keep going, or I’d never say what I needed to.
“My father pounded his fist on the desk and told me I was an ungrateful son of a bitch. He said I was fired and that he never wanted to see me again. His face turned redder than I’d ever seen it. He came around his desk and started toward me. I would have defended myself. I would have killed him if necessary, but he stopped halfway to me and clutched at his chest. He grabbed onto his desk and sank to his knees. He stared at me as he sat there, obviously struggling to breathe, sweat pouring down his face. He asked me to help him. His voice was barely a whisper.”
Fox reached for my hand, and I held onto him, needing that anchor. “He fell to the ground, and I just watched. He reached out toward me, but I didn’t move. I didn’t help him or call anyone or do anything until he’d lost consciousness. The paramedics tried to revive him, but they couldn’t. The heart attack had been too massive. He was gone as soon as he’d closed his eyes.”
