Chapter Nine
I came down for breakfast the next morning, Lincoln and my mother were sitting at the table with my father's attorney, Gordon Brasher.
"Jackson, it's good to see you, son," he said in deep booming voice as he flashed a smile as fake as the Rolex on his wrist.
"It's Jack," I said as I sat down and waited. A plate of eggs, toast, and bacon was soon placed in front of me, and I ate without saying another word.
"Ah, right. Jack it is, then," the lawyer said with a forced laugh. "We were just discussing the stipulations of your father's will, Jack."
"And this involves me how?" I asked with a mouth full of eggs. I was angry and resentful that I was being included in this ridiculous conversation.
"Haven't you told him?" Brasher asked, looking back and forth between my mother and my brother. "I thought he knew."
"No, we didn't say anything," Lincoln said coldly. "We thought this matter was better left to the professional."
"I see," Brasher said, nervously clearing his throat as he looked down at the papers in front of him. "Well, I guess there's no use in delaying the delivery then, is there?"
"Would someone just man up and tell me what the hell is going on here?" I said impatiently. "I'm tired of this secretive game of ping pong knowledge sharing."
"Jack, your father left a will stipulating that you are to become the new CEO of Baby Steps," Brasher said.
"Well, then he was out of his mind because that's never going to happen," I said matter-of-factly. "Anything else?"
"Um, yes, actually there is," Brasher said nervously. "You don't have a choice in the matter."
"The hell I don't," I replied. "I'm independently wealthy and need nothing from any of you. I owe you nothing, and I'm not doing anything to keep that stupid company alive in the absence of my father."
"Jack, listen to the man," my mother urged as she looked helplessly at my brother.
"Jack, your father’s company is held by Bank of Manhattan, isn't it?" Brasher asked.
"Indeed, it is," I nodded as I stuffed a bite of jam-covered toast into my mouth and chewed.
"Well, the money your dad is paying you has been frozen until you take the CEO position at Baby Steps, and you either decide to run the company or hire someone to run it for you," Brasher said quickly. "You'll have no access to any of the money you invested in the business until you take care of your father's business."
"Are you fucking kidding me?" I exploded.
"Jack . . ." my mother said disapprovingly.
"No, seriously?" I said looking around the table in disbelief. "That bastard stipulated that my assets—the assets I've earned through my own blood, sweat, and tears that I loaned him—will be on hold until his damn business is taken care of?"
"Jack, Pop had hoped that you'd come around and see that the company had a great deal of potential," Lincoln began.
"And you? You had to help him with this fucked up plan, didn't you?" I said, shooting my brother a look that made him avert his eyes. "Why the hell did he pick me? He knew I had no desire whatsoever to run the company."
"Your father believed that you were the one who could best represent the company's interests," Brasher said as he slid a stack of papers across the table. "It's all explained in this document, as are the parameters of the agreement. If you run the company for a year and turn a profit that is within the normal range of what Baby Steps has been doing for the past five years, then your investments in the company will be unfrozen. At that point, you'll be given the option of staying on and running the company or hiring someone to replace you. Either way, at the end of the year, you'll be free."
"So, in other words, I'm being punished for having helped that bastard yet again?" I asked in a tone so venomous that my mother got up and walked away from the table. I knew she was crying.
"I'm not sure I'd say that, Jack," Brasher said. "I'd look at it more as an emergency management strategy that your father hoped he'd never have to use but put in place just in case something like this happened."
"This is so far beyond fucked up," I said shaking my head as I scanned the documents in front of me. I looked at Lincoln and said, "You know that, right?"
"Jack, Pop needed someone in charge who knows how to run a business," he said. "I'm the company's banking resource. I can't do it."
"Why didn't he just vet someone and put them in place to succeed him?" I asked. "Seems like that would have been a hell of a lot easier than roping me into doing a job I don’t want."
"Pop had his reasons," Lincoln shrugged. "He didn't always explain them to me."
"This is such utter bullshit," I said angrily. "But I have no choice, do I?"
"No, Jack, you don't," my mother said from the corner of the room where she stood staring up at a painting of my father that she'd had commissioned several years before his death. In it, he looked like the strong patriarch everyone thought him to be, but all I saw was vengeance and anger.
"He's dead, and he still gets his way," I said, shaking my head as I grabbed the papers and stood up. "I guess tomorrow is as good a time as any to get started. Would you tell Jimmy to bring the car around tomorrow morning at eight sharp? I'll be going into the office."
I marched across the room, yanked open the door, and headed up the stairs to my room. I quickly changed into running clothes and tried to calm myself. If my father had overseen it, then the paperwork was airtight. I wasn't getting any of the money back that I’d loaned him until I'd fulfilled the terms laid out in the will. As angry as I was, I'd been trained not to openly defy the man who'd helped bring me into this world.
I did, however, have the beginnings of an idea how to get out of the deal and get back to my life before a year was up. I was going to have to play the part of the dutiful son and concerned CEO of this ridiculous company until I could work out the specifics of my plan. Tomorrow would be a good day to get started.
I put my earbuds in and headed downstairs to go on a very long run.
*
tossed and turned all night, trying to find a way out of the will’s stipulations, but I came up with nothing. My father had made sure that I would be locked into the position of CEO for as long as it took to keep Baby Steps running. There was no way out. By the time the sun rose, I had resigned myself to the idea that I was going to have to suck it up long enough to figure some way out. The one saving grace was that I knew I was under no obligation to hide my disdain for the job. I would do it, but I wouldn't do it pleasantly.
After a quick workout, I showered and dressed for the office. My father had been a casual man when it came to dressing for the office, but I didn't think following in his footsteps would be a good way to start my tenure as CEO. I picked the most expensive suit I had and dressed as if I were heading to Wall Street.
"You're overdressed, darling," my mother said as I sat down at the breakfast table. "Your father never would have put on airs with his employees."
"May I remind you that I'm not my father?" I replied as I helped myself to eggs and toast from the sideboard. A maid placed a cup of coffee in front of me as I sat down and, in return, I offered her a quick smile of thanks.
"Don't get fresh with me, Jackson," my mother said. "I want you to do a good job and make your father proud of you."
"It's a little late for that, don't you think?" I said as I sipped my coffee before digging into my plate of food.
"Why are you so intent on making this such a miserable experience?" my mother asked with a note of sadness in her voice.
"I don't know, Mother," I said flippantly. "Perhaps it's because I wasn't given a choice in the matter. Now I’m forced to do something I have no desire to do in order to reclaim what's rightfully mine."
"Your father never wanted to force you to do anything, Jackson," my mother said sadly. "He just wanted you to come back to the family and be a part of it again."
"Then perhaps he should have asked me rather than doing what he has always done," I said as I stood up. "Bullies never win, you know."
"Jackson . . ." my mother began. I looked down at her and realized that she'd aged a great deal since my father died. It was almost as if his death had sucked the life out of her as well.
"Have a lovely day, Mother," I said coolly as I walked out the door and headed to the car. I could hear her choked sobs echoing in the empty room as I opened the front door and headed for the car.
Jimmy dropped me off at the Baby Steps building on Jay Street. It was an enormous, red-brick warehouse that occupied most of the block and housed both the merchandise and the executive offices. I sighed as I looked up at the battered brick facade and the dirty windows that lined the top edge of the building next to the roof and wondered what it would take to renovate the facility to make it look more presentable. Compared to the building next door, the Baby Steps warehouse looked like a poor cousin in shabby hand-me-downs.
I walked inside and was immediately greeted by the warehouse workers who offered their condolences and told me how glad they were that I was there to take over for my father. I swallowed the lump of bitter resentment that formed in the back of my throat, and I nodded as I thanked them for their warm welcome before heading up to the offices on the second floor.
"Mr. Yates!" Norma Tatz called as I walked through the door. "It's so good to see you! My, don't you look like a biscuit covered in honey this morning!"
"Good morning, Ms. Tatz," I nodded as I walked past her desk.
"Oh honey, you don't need to be so formal with me," she said in her cheerful southern accent. "Now that you're the boss, why don't you just call me Norma and get on with it?"
Norma was originally from St. Charles Parish just outside of New Orleans, and she always threw out some southern-flavored observation. She was a short, compact woman who looked like she had been built to withstand a hurricane, both in body and in hair. She meticulously maintained her personal appearance through the heavy use of hairspray and cosmetics, the smell of which entered a room long before she did. She was cheerful, but tough, since she had always been the boundary between my father and everyone who wanted a few minutes of his time. As a child she had intimidated me but, as an adult, I could see how useful her honeyed tone and iron will could be.
"All right, Norma," I said as I dredged up a smile and tried to make it look like I was happy to be there. If I was going to survive this tenure at Baby Steps, I was definitely going to need Norma on my side. "I'd like to look at the financials for the past five years and then find out what projects my father was planning for the next year."
"It's all on your desk, darlin'," Norma chirped. "I was fixin' to get the ten year financials, but then thought that might be overdoing it."
"Thank you, Norma," I said, bowing my head slightly as I turned toward the office. On the desk, in neat stacks, were all the documents I'd asked for and then some. Norma had thought ahead and given me everything that she thought I might need in order to understand the business and, as the morning wore on, she continued to add to the piles.
By lunchtime, I'd read through most of what she'd given me and had a pretty clear understanding of where the company had been and where it was headed. My father had been an exceptional businessman and had entrusted a great deal of the day-to-day operations to the woman who ran the warehouse. It became obvious to me that if I was going to truly understand what was going on, I would have to work closely with her until I was up to speed.
"Norma!" I called from behind my desk. "Can you get Leah Walsh up here to talk about the warehouse?"
"She'll be here in ten minutes, darlin'!" Norma called back as the phone rang, and she answered it. I could hear her talking with someone she obviously knew well, as she tossed in a few "Sure thing, sugars" before hanging up.
At that moment, I realized that if I played my cards right, I might not have to do a whole lot of work. If my father had trained and entrusted all of his employees the way he'd done with Norma, then this company might just be able to run itself while I functioned as a figurehead, at least until we found a suitable CEO. I smiled as I plotted the ways in which I'd be able to escape the office for a few rounds of golf and have some leisurely lunches with a few of the beautiful New York socialites I'd met on my travels.
"This might not be as bad as I thought it would be," I murmured to myself. "I can manage this."
"Hopefully I can make it a little easier for you, Mr. Yates," Leah Walsh said as she entered my office.
I looked up and saw the pretty little blue-eyed girl I'd kissed at my father's wake standing in the doorway holding a clipboard and offering a warm smile. I had no idea how old she was, but I guessed her to be midway to thirty. At the wake, her hair had been pulled up into a severe ponytail. But now the long dark waves framed her face and, with the splash of freckles across her nose and cheeks, she looked even prettier than I had remembered. Her face looked friendly, but her body knocked it out of the park. Unlike most of the women I'd met on my travels, Leah was shorter and much curvier. I could see the outline of her figure under her warehouse uniform and it quickly reminded me of the few moments I'd held her soft body against my own. I quickly shifted my gaze back to her face as she crossed the room,
"I'm Leah Walsh," she said as she held her hand out.
"It's nice to see you again, Ms. Walsh," I said as I stood and shook her hand. She didn't say anything about the moment we'd shared at the wake, which left me wondering if she remembered it.
"It's nice to see you again, too, Mr. Yates," she said, still smiling. "But please, call me Leah. Your father did."
"Well, Leah," I said as I looked down into her bright-blue eyes and returned the smile. "Then you'll need to call me Jack."
"All right, Jack," she said as she looked down at her clipboard and then back up at me. "Would you like to tour the facility with me?"
"I'd love to, Leah," I said as I grabbed my jacket from the back of the chair. "I'll follow you."
It took a lot of control not to let my gaze settle on the gentle sway of Leah's hips as she led me to the warehouse, and even more control not to let the images I had of how it had felt to kiss her play in my mind.