Chapter 29
“Always a maximum of thirty percent of risky investments at first. We have a reputation of stability, and we’d like to keep it. Some clients will personally ask you for the fastest gain, and in those cases, you have to make them sign a contract that specifically covers our ass, alright?” Ben gave the room a look, but unsurprisingly, no one made a peep.
Gathering the few notes he had taken, he shoved them in his briefcase, then said his goodbyes and left the room. It was late afternoon, and he was officially done. A quick clean of his office, then he could head back to the hotel, order a nice dinner and pack his bags for his flight early the next day.
“Mister Ackerman?” Anastacia said, standing up as he passed her desk.
“Yes?”
“Someone is waiting for you in your office.”
“For fuck’s sake,” he groaned. “Who? I thought I was done for the day?”
“It’s… it’s not someone from the company, but I was asked to let him in.”
That didn’t exactly make him feel better. And seeing who was waiting for him on the small designer couch made him wish the meeting he had just escaped had lasted a whole lot longer.
“Dad,” he acknowledged, dropping the briefcase on his desk, the sound of the leather smacking on the sleek glass surface echoing in the room.
“Son, long time no see.”
“A year or so.”
“Make it three. And if it wasn’t for Stewart letting his father know he had heard you were in town, I wouldn’t have known. That’s not how I raised you.”
“Since when do you care about seeing me?”
Bartholomew Ackerman gave him a bored, cold smile. “You’re my only child. Of course, I care about you.”
“Could have fooled me,” Ben muttered under his breath. “What do you want?”
“Just to have a chat with my son. Is that too much to ask?”
Ben shook his head, knowing that, unless he called security, his father wouldn’t leave until he had decided to. “I only have Scotch or water.”
“A Scotch would be nice. Neat, as you know.”
He poured his father a glass then fished a bottled water from the fridge for himself and took a seat on the leather chair in front of him.
“So, I take it work is good if they send you to check up on the smaller branches?”
“It is, yes.”
“That’s good. And for the rest?”
“What do you mean, the rest?”
“You’re almost thirty-two, Junior. Don’t you think it’s way past time you settle down, find a nice little wife?”
Ben’s jaw clenched automatically at the nickname. He had always hated it, a constant reminder of how Bartholomew Ackerman had only seen value in his child as long as he could mold him. It wasn’t an affectionate nickname a father had for his son, borne out of the pride to raise, nurture, and guide him. It was the trademark of a cold, arrogant man. “Like you did?”
“We both know it didn’t happen exactly like that. Which is why I’m trying to help you avoid my mistakes. Find a suitable candidate before you get tricked into marriage.”
Ben’s fist tightened around the bottle he was holding, the plastic bending in a creaky sound. “Mom didn’t trick you. And the mistake you’re talking about is sitting right in front of you.”
His father waved him off. “You know what I mean, it’s just a figure of speech. You come from a wealthy family. You have responsibilities, no matter how much you like to forget about them. Your life isn’t on the East Coast.”
“My life is exactly where I decided it to be. And that was as far away from you as possible.”
“Your grandparents should never have left you so much money. It made you ungrateful.”
“It made me independent from you, and that’s why you were so against it. Thank God they knew you well and made sure the will could not be contested.”
His father let out a dry chuckle before taking a sip of his scotch. “They spoiled you.”
Ben shrugged. “Probably. That’s what happens when grandparents have to compensate for a dead mother and an absent father.”
“You were too soft. Your mother had made you weak. Sending you to boarding school would have been much better for you. You would have learned how to deal with her death like a man instead of being coddled by my mother.”
“She didn’t want me to leave my friends on top of everything else. Unlike you, Grandma was human and had a heart.”
“Yes, yes, yes, I’m an asshole. This is old news. I’m here to talk about something else entirely.”
“Then, by all means, talk.” Ben wasn’t exactly looking forward to prolonging their conversation.
“I want to sell the house.” His father looked at him intently, and Ben knew he was observing him for a reaction.
“Our house? You want to sell it?” he repeated, his voice colored with shock.
“Yes. It’s just bricks, and since your life is now on the East Coast, what’s the point?”
“It’s where mom died. How can you say it’s just bricks when it’s where she died?”
“Technically, she died in the garden.”
The carelessness of his words was probably the hardest thing to accept. That his father could talk so lightly about what was the worst day of his life, a day that had traumatized him and was still haunting him… he didn’t know how half of his DNA could come from that man. “I know. I found her, remember?”
“One more reason to get rid of the place. It’s full of bad memories anyway.”
“It’s full of most of my memories of her.” How could his father, even after all this time, still find ways to hurt him so deeply? Ben hadn’t set a single foot in the house in years. But the idea that it would be sold, that if one day he needed to go there to feel close to his mom, to remember her, and wouldn’t be able to, it was like a knife in the gut.
That’s when he suddenly understood. Of course. This was his father’s punishment for not following orders like a good little soldier. Bartholomew wanted to control everything, including his son’s life. It was his way to try to force his hand. Go back to Hedera or lose his childhood home.
“You think you’re smooth, but you’re not. You’re trying to manipulate me to get your way. I know exactly how it works, I learned it all from you already. You want to sell the house? Sell it. I won’t come back to Oregon. I will not work with you. I will continue to live my life and pretend you’re not a part of it.”
“The only good thing your mother ever did was to give me a son, and you’re not even able to honor her memory.”
“Do not talk about her memory. You’re not worthy of speaking her name. Grandma told me you weren’t always like that. But you have never been able to get past the fact that you had gotten a girl pregnant because you were careless, and had to deal with the consequences of your actions, right? At first, your marriage was OK. But then you saw your friends living the life, carefree, and you realized you were already a father, responsible for a family by the age of twenty-two. That’s what made you so bitter. And that’s why you tried to make mom’s life so miserable. Why didn’t you just divorce her?”
“Divorce is a failure.”
“It’s always about winning with you.”
“Of course, it is. And it should be the same for you. It’s time for you to honor our family’s legacy. You’ve spent enough time playing with your grandparents’ money.”
Ben ignored the small jab. “Why didn’t you remarry? Why didn’t you try to have another child if this whole legacy thing is so important to you?” He had always wondered why his father, so obsessed with appearances, had never remarried. He had had a string of mistresses, something that Ben had always thought was extremely old-fashioned, and not the good kind of old-fashioned, but he had never married again.
Bartholomew made a small Tsk, Tsk sound. “Isn’t it obvious?”
“No. Quite the contrary.”
“I told you. I hate failure. One in my life was already enough, no need to take the risk to have another one.”
“Why did you even bother to come here? Why would you even want me around? You don’t like me any more than I like you.”
“I have cancer. Pancreas. I found out a few weeks ago.”
Ben didn’t know a lot about pancreatic cancer, apart from the fact that the survival rate was extremely low.
“Yes. I’m going to die. It’s already spreading. I probably have a few more weeks before I have to be hospitalized.”
“And you want me around because…?”
“I will not die alone.”
The laugh that escaped Ben was dry, humorless, and full of disbelief. “Oh dad… even if I decided to come back to Hedera… believe me, you would die alone nonetheless.” He stood up and wordlessly walked to the door, holding it open.
His father followed him, and Ben waited until he was near him to say in a low voice, “Just like mom.”
“I’ll sell the house,” Bartholomew said. “You’ll regret it.”
“Sell it. And just so you know… the name you gave me? I’ll gladly let it die.”