Aidan

 

 

“Aidan, you look like shit.”

Dean grins broadly and runs his hand through his flawless, freshly washed blond hair.

I rub my fingers roughly across my eyes, yawning against dry palms, “You’ve always got such sweet words for me, Dean.”

My best friend chuckles at my grumpy jest, plopping a tall cup of coffee next to my elbow. I snatch it up quickly, taking a greedy gulp of burning hot liquid and hissing in surprise.

“Watch out, it’s hot.” Dean offers with a careless shrug.

He sinks down beside me in a nearby chair, inspecting the papers I have strewn across my desk. He lifts one folder up with careful fingers, blank eyes narrowing on technical jargon he’d never be able to figure out.

“Is this for that virus thing on the computer?”

I just nod limply, closing my eyes and waiting for the coffee to hit me. I’d been up all night long just sitting at this desk and trying to make sense of everything. So far, so not good. I hadn’t made any progress. It’d already been almost a full week since the day of the system infection and we were not closer to having it solved. Our clients had begun piecing together that something disastrous was happening at Price Corp. We were lucky we hadn’t lost all of them yet. Thankfully, Eli’s honeymoon provided a thin cover for our inability to get any real work done. Unfortunately for Grant, that excuse only weakened his powerful image.

Dean glances over my wrinkled suit, red rimmed eyes, and slack jaw then clears his throat and adjusts his own pressed tie deliberately.

“Have you tried talking to your brother yet?”

“Hell no.” I snap back with surprisingly vitriol.

He takes another cautiously slow sip of his latte, single blond brow arching.

“Sorry. Grumpy.” I grunt. I was more than just grumpy. I was exhausted to the very bone, I could feel every muscle of my body aching. I hadn’t had more than a handful of hours of sleep all week.

“Understatement of the year, my friend.” He smirks, no doubt reveling in the fact that he slept in his own bed last night instead of half dozing in the rigid chairs of our office.

“Plus, Eli is still on his honeymoon. He probably wouldn’t answer to begin with. And do you really want to piss of Reagan?”

Dean hastily shakes his head, holding up his hands in front of him as though he was warding off a vicious attack, “I’m already afraid of that woman. No way in hell I’m interrupting her vacation.”

“Exactly. That’s why Grant hasn’t tried calling them either.”

Silence falls over us as we quickly glance down the hallway towards Grant’s closed office door. He’d shown up before the crack of dawn, heading into his office and locking the door and pulling the blinds. I had no idea what was going on in there. The blue eyed man barely said a single word to me.

Looking just as ragged and fatigued as myself, Grant Price had leaned against my door this morning, huge cup of coffee grasped white knuckled in his hand as I peered at him with eyes blinded by the bright light of my computer screen.

“Anything?” He’d asked, each syllable a quiet, guttural grunt.

When I shook my head, he vanished like a ghost down the hall. There hadn’t even been a creak of his chair. It was almost noon and there was no sign of him yet.

“Do you think this thing could take down the whole business?” Dean asks suddenly, not looking at me.

He glides a finger over a bead of dark liquid clinging to the rim of the cup’s plastic lid, chewing the corner of his mouth unhappily.

I know what he’s thinking. We only just made it big and we’re going to get tanked. We’d worked so hard to get these executive positions. We’d broken so many records. And now it was on the verge of collapse. Our resumes would be tainted forever.

“I don’t think so…” I murmur quietly. Dean lifts his chin to lock eyes with me, his jaw taut as I sigh and shake my head, “I know so.”

The corded phone on the corner of the desk abruptly rings, making both of us jump in surprise. The phone lines barely ever ring anymore. We always use our cells now. Grant likes to keep the old fashioned phones in the offices though. It makes us look more professional, apparently. I think it just makes us look dated.

“That’s probably my cue to try and get some shit done.” Dean mutters though we both know we’re not getting any work done until we have a handle on our malware situation. He climbs to his feet and lifts his coffee cup towards me in a grim salute, “Here’s to you, man. Godspeed. For both our salaries.”

With a morose smile I lift my cup back to him before tiredly dragging the phone off the receiver and clutching it to my ear.

“Aidan Cole speaking.”

“Hello, son.” A voice reverberates through the phone - deep, gruff, and vaguely familiar. My entire stomach clenches up around the sips of coffee I’d just sucked down, threatening to spew it all over the white sheets of paper on my desk.

“Dominic.” I spit out in furious surprise, without managing to keep a bitter frost from clinging to my words.

“Really, Aidan? You’re going to address your own father by the first name?”

“We both know you’ve never been a father to me.”

His laugh hisses through the phone like a dangerous snake. He’d taken up smoking again, I could hear it in the rasp of his Australian voice. “Eli tells me you’ve joined up with Grant Price.”

Of course my half brother told our father that. I rub my temples, hardly surprised but angry. It wasn’t Eli’s place to share details of my life with Dominic.

“So?” I try to sound calm and calculated, unwilling to let the man know how he claws beneath my skin, but even I can hear the rage marring my tone.

“Both my boys in the same city, in the same business...”

“The same city and business that isn’t yours, you mean?”

He goes silent and I know I’ve hit a nerve. Dominic Nelson had wanted nothing more than for Eli to work for him forever and carry on the family name. Now, apparently, he was desperate enough to settle for his bastard son instead. Too bad for him I wouldn’t be so easy to snare.

“Why’d you call today, Dominic?”

“I just wanted to hear for myself that you were abandoning your family’s business.”

“If you had ever treated me or my mother like family then perhaps the situation would be different.”

“Aidan-”

I slam the phone back down on the desk, chest practically heaving with rage. To think that man would have the nerve to call and ask for me to join the ‘family’ business when he’d spent my entire life pretending that I didn’t exist. He hadn’t even spoken to my mother since he failed to force her into an abortion. He’d even gotten his lawyer to tell her that she wouldn’t be getting a penny of child support so that he didn't have to face her himself.

Dominic made me sick. Every inch of him revolted me. He probably didn’t even care that his once lover was dying.

With a sigh I dig my cell from my pocket, tapping the quick dial number for my mom.

She answers almost immediately, her perky voice like a song on the other end of the line.

“Aidan! Is anything wrong? You don’t normally call during the day.”

“No. I just remembered you had that doctor’s appointment this morning. How’d it go?”

She sucks in a breath before filling the silence with a laugh I know full well is forced, “Oh, you know. Same old, same old.”

I click the speaker button, letting the phone rest on my desk as I rub my eyes.

Every time she had an appointment, I hoped against hope that something was found, something that would give my mom even a little bit more time. We had so little of that right now and I was so busy… but all that I did was for her, for our name. I could only hope she hung on long enough to see the success.

“I was going to pick up a pot roast for dinner.” She muses absently over the dull roar of her car engine revving to life, all clangy and sharp. I was going to have to pull it into the garage for a tune up. “Does that sound good to you?”

A guilty pang stings my heart as I rub my eyes harder until little black specks swirl in front of my vision. “I won’t be home in time for dinner tonight.”

When was the last time I’d managed to sit at the table with her for supper?

The woman doesn’t falter for a second, another one of her laughs echoing in my office.

“Well this weekend, I’m demanding you bring over that sweet fiancée of yours. Miki is such a lovely girl-”

“Holy fuck!”

I jump, gaze shooting up to meet the shocked, wide eyes of my best friend.

Dean instantly charges over as I say a hasty goodbye to my mother and hang up the phone.

“You’re engaged?!” He yells, pacing around in a wild circle, “To… Miki? Is that girl from the rehearsal dinner?”

Too roughly perhaps, I grab his arm and try to quiet him with a stern glare. Unfazed by the tight curl of my fingers on his elbow, he sinks down on the edge of my desk and slowly shakes his head in pure awe.

“Damn, man. You move quick! I’m honestly amazed.”

My lips part to tell him the truth about me and Miki and the words rise up the back of my throat like bile. I want to tell him how all of this is fake, how our engagement is nothing but a sham, how inconceivably crazy this whole thing is… But the fewer people who know the truth, the better. I can’t tell him. Not now. Probably not ever.

I swallow the words, shoulders sagging. He pats my arm, sighing at the conflict etched onto my face.

“Is she pregnant?” He asks softly, “Shotgun wedding bells come a’ringin’?”

“What?” I snap, surprised, “Of course not.”

His comforting hand slides from my shoulder, utter confusion replacing the sympathy of his green eyes.

“Then… uh. Like. Why, man?”

“It just happened, the day the computers got infected. I guess, I just feel like… she’s different than everyone.” The honest words come with surprising ease.

A low, long whistle escapes his lips. His head tilts back to inspect the tiles of the ceiling as though it were the most fascinating thing in the world. He blinks fast, trying to process the fact that I’m engaged and he had absolutely no idea.

“Well. She seemed nice, I guess.” He finally sputters, uncertain, “I can’t believe you’re engaged to Grant Price’s sister-in-law…”

A yelp and a smash cause the both of us to whirl around to take in the sight of a very upset, very pregnant woman behind us. At her feet is a smashed plate of chocolate chip cookies.

Tears swell up in Poppy’s eyes as she gapes open mouthed at me, one accusing finger lifting towards me.

“What did you just say?” She whispers with hoarse, pained words, “Are you talking about my sister? Are you talking about Mikayla?”

I swallow the thick lump in my dry throat, mind buzzing with possible excuses.

But she was going to find out anyway. It might as well be now. Miki had almost a week to tell her and hadn’t yet, after all.

“We were keeping it quiet.” I finally decide on saying, exchanging a cautious glance with Dean who was trying to melt into a puddle on the floor, “It only just happened.”

Poppy doesn’t say anything else, glare forming like a storm across her auburn brow as her fingers curl into angry fists at her sides.

 “Mrs. Price…” I begin hastily as a furious red sheen seeps slowly up her neck to her cheeks. I’ve never seen anything so crimson in my life. I half expected her head to pop off her neck with a huge billow of steam.

The woman takes a step back, that lone pointer finger still dangling threateningly in the air between us, “Don’t you even speak to me. Not now. Not ever.”

She stumbles backwards another step, letting her violent dagger eyes flick towards Dean before she whirls on her heel and rushes hastily down the hall towards Grant’s office.

“Damn.” Dean groans, slapping his forehead, “You dragged me into this good, Aidan. We’re in some deep shit now.”

So much for Miki’s claim that Poppy would love the idea of her getting engaged. I was going to have to be more careful about her wild claims from now on. Maybe this whole thing was just a stupid, colossal mistake.

“We’re fired. We’re so fired.” Dean slides against the wall, palm still pressed against his face, “Grant is gonna take us both down.”

“No, he’s not.” I mutter back quickly, “Because I’m going to figure out what’s going on with our system and fix it.”

“Aidan, you’ve been trying for like an entire week now. When was the last time you even slept?”

I ignore his doubting words as I storm back around my desk and lower myself into the black leather chair. Dean doesn’t understand how much is riding on this. He doesn’t understand that Eli is returning home from his honeymoon and that I need to take care of this by then. Eli already considered me a failure, he doesn’t need any evidence proving it.

“Come on, man. You need to go home to your mom and your bed. You need to rest.” He lingers at my side as though he’s unsure whether to stay or leave or drag me out of here like a caveman, a frown tugging his lips.

“I’ve got shit to do, Dean. You can either help or get the hell out of my office.”

Usually my sharp jabs roll over his back like water off a duck, but this time the displeasure on his face grows even more so. Apparent I’m not the only grumpy one in the office today.

“It’s after five. I’m going home.” He snaps darkly before yanking the door of my office closed with a resounding bang.

I wince at the loud noise, letting my forehead clunk down on the table.

“Sorry, Dean.” I mutter, though he’s so far away he won’t be able to hear me.

I hadn’t meant to upset him. He’s my only real friend here and I value that immensely. But he doesn’t understand my family or the pressures that I have on my shoulders. He doesn’t understand how much all of this means to me, or what’s hanging on the line.

 

~~

 

The moon is high in the sky by the time I finally lean back in my chair, eyes glazed over and dry. Even blinking is painful. Against my closed eyelids I can still see the white glare of my computer screen.

Running my hand through my hair, I yank the heavy black helmet from under my desk and tuck it under my arm as I head towards the elevator. I’d known I wouldn’t be seen by too many people coming and leaving the office due to the bizarre hours I’d been putting in to taking down the ransomware infecting our software. There was something about being on the back of a motorcycle, the wind whipping around my head and yanking at my clothes, my hands clutching the metal bars and the vibration of the bike beneath me that settles my mind.

I could jump on the motorcycle and blow down streets and around corners and just forget everything for a little while. In those moments, my mother wasn’t ill, my family wasn’t strained, and everything was just… okay.

Even in the night sky, black and angry clouds loom visibly overhead as I roll to a slow halt at a stoplight, one foot on the road balancing my bike. At this time of night, the roads are nearly empty, the only light coming from the flash of lightning overhead. I can smell the rain before the heavy drops pink across my helmet. Unlike some other riders, I don’t mind driving through the rain, even when it’s heavy. Going at full speed, each drop plucks your flesh like a sharp zap of electricity. It’s not a sensation you find anywhere else. It’s centering in an odd, uncomfortable way.

My phone buzzes suddenly in my pocket as my fingers trace over the outline of the small device within my jacket. I look up at the crimson glare of the stoplight one more time, frustrated by how long it’s taking in the face of the upcoming storm.

With a grunt, I pull off my helmet and retrieve the phone to press to my ear without glancing at the screen.

“Aidan. It’s Miki.” She’s speaking so fast I can barely keep up with her words as a large boom of thunder rolls loud as a freight train through the sky. I can feel it reverberating through my whole body, “We need to talk, I just saw Poppy and she-”

“Wait, wait, I can’t hear you.”

A blinding streak of lightning cracks the sky open, black spots floating before me from the brightness. The rain starts coming harder though the stoplight still refuses to change. Within seconds, everything is faded out by a thick haze of falling raindrops that blow in my eyes and ears and mouth.

The phone is slippery in my gloved hand, almost falling to the ground.

The woman’s voice continues hurriedly in my ear as I groan and rev the engine of my motorcycle to turn on the road and head towards the nearest overhang of a building. I wasn’t getting anywhere right now, I’d have to wait ‘til the worst of the sudden storm blew over. The gears grind on my bike, unable to find traction on the suddenly slick road. I push it forward, phone falling from my hand and onto the black, wet street.

Hastily, I slide off the bike and grab it, clutching it back to my ear.

“Mikayla-”

Another shocking lightning bolt lights up the entire street, though I realize all too late that the source of the brightness isn’t the weather at all - it’s a car turning too quick down the road.

The last thing I hear is the sharp squeal of tires and the grizzly crunch of metal and bone on pavement.

The last thing I see is Miki’s gorgeous smile floating on the back of my eyelids.