Not for the first time, Jayden wondered whether things might be different if he'd answered his phone a year ago. That one fateful missed call was his mom, and she had news.

News he ended up hearing from the sobbing she left on his voicemail.

He sighed as he re-read the latest page in the epic document his lawyer wanted him to sign. There was only so much legal jargon he could absorb so early in the morning, but he was determined to make it through to the point where he could sign it and throw it over to Jo-Ann for her to mail back.

Until the next one came.

His life had become an endless cycle of to and fro while he himself stumbled around in a hellish limbo. There were worse problems to have than his, he knew that. He got to sit here in his penthouse overlooking Central Park reading documents from the very expensive lawyer that he could afford to retain, when out there he knew damn well that there were people who didn't have a roof, let alone one that cost this much.

He'd always refused to be the son his father wanted. Even if that meant mixing with the mass of humanity out there who weren't safe behind their security-staffed lobbies and their tinted glass windows.

Daddy wanted a scion, but what he got was a rebel.

And while Jayden had been picking up strangers in clubs in Portland, Daddy had a heart attack and died in his Mom's arms.

It was hard not to feel guilt for that. Dumb to think if he'd picked up the phone he could've changed the outcome in any way, but that didn't stop the horrible knowledge that he'd done the exact thing his father hated the most while his dad had stopped breathing.

It wasn't how he'd ever wanted their relationship to end. Hell, he didn't really think that it would. Parents were invincible. Eternal. They weren't supposed to leave, and sure as hell not die.

And they weren't supposed to out you to their colleagues and employees just a few weeks before they passed on.

Now nothing would ever get fixed between them. Dad had said things to the board which he never should have, and now a company which Jayden should have inherited wasn't in his hands any more. While Jayden was grieving the loss of the man he could never have a proper relationship with any more, those closed-minded, selfish, greedy assholes staged a coup and ousted Jayden from the board.

None of which got him any nearer to reading this damned legalese.

Jayden leaped from his chair and strode to the nearest window so that he could bask in the rectangle of greenery below. No matter the time of year there were always people down there, but thanks to the summer sun those people were laughing and smiling, drinking juice on their way to work as they cut through the park, or taking children for an early morning stroll. His apartment on Central Park West commanded both a fantastic view and an equally fantastic price tag, but Dad hadn't left him this place in his will. He'd bought it as a gift for Jayden's eighteenth birthday, maybe in the hope that it'd stop his son going off the rails and make him settle into the life of privilege he was born to.

Didn't work.

Jayden's 'problem,' as Dad once put it, was how he cared about the 'little people'. Honest to God, he'd said it without a trace of irony, too.

"If you keep focusing on the small things, you'll never see the bigger picture."

What an asshole.

He insisted that's what made him such a great businessman, and maybe that was true, because the board sure as hell didn't want Jayden around without his father to pull on his reins. Not now that he'd inherited the shares to go with the seat.

That might have been what angered him the most. He literally owned sixty percent of that company now, and they threw him out the door while he was burying the man and as many of the regrets as he could.

And that’s why he had a lawyer, who wasn't gonna get his company back for Jayden if Jayden couldn't make himself finish reading the gibberish in the first place.

He pushed away from the window with leaden feet and sat heavily at his desk. All he had to really do was get this done, then he could move on to opening the rest of his damn mail, and none of it could be as aggravating. If he treated the mystery letters as a reward for a job well done, he might just see a way through to finishing this.

Jayden rubbed his cheeks and then slapped them a few times to try and bring a bit of life back into his head, then he gripped the paper like he damn well meant it and started over from the top.

It was another hour before he was able to put his signature on all the slots that had his name by them. He was free at last! Free to get off his ass again. He jabbed the speed-dial on his phone and put it on speaker so that he could stride around and stretch his legs.

Thank God nobody could see him.

"Good morning, Mr. Deus," Jo-Ann said. She sounded far too perky. "How are you today?"

"Awful. Literally the worst ever." He laughed and scratched his stubble as he moved. "Still haven't shaved. I need a day job, you know? Something to make me get out of bed and put clothes on like a real adult."

"Are you in pajamas?" His assistant snorted. "No wonder the board fired you. You should try pants. They're super fashionable right now."

"Ugh, so corporonormative." Jayden did a couple of squats by the window. "Anyway, I've signed the latest. Can you get them sent over to Alan ASAP?"

"Sure thing." And like that, she was all business. Jo-Ann got shit done, and she did it on a tenth of the salary of anyone on the damn board. Those bastards couldn't remember their own wives' birthdays, let alone those of all their mistresses, but there she was, holding an entire company together with her bare hands.

"You're the best, Jo-Ann," he said. And he meant it. "I swear once I'm back there you're first in line for a raise."

"I'm not doing it for the money," she answered. "And nor are you. We'll get this in the bag, Mr. Deus, and then we can fix everything else."

"And then will you call me Jayden?"

"Maybe."

He chuckled. "Okay. I'll call you if I need anything else. Stay safe."

"You too."

She always ended the call before he could. It was risky for her, still with an office of her own at his father's company, still shuffling the schedules of the rest of the board all by herself. If any one of them caught her handling Jayden's affairs too, she'd be fired in a heartbeat.

Yeah, she was seriously good people, and the company was filled with them. People like Jo-Ann, who hadn't been born to obscenely wealthy parents, who had families to raise and care for, who wanted to go home every day knowing they'd made a difference. It was just the head that was sick.

The irony didn't escape him.

As he returned to his desk, Jayden perched on it and put his phone on top of the signed documents, then began to rifle through the rest of his envelopes. They were all letter-sized, unlike the box Alan had sent him, and he could discount a couple immediately as junk, so he opened those first just to get them out of the way. Maybe Jo-Ann could identify those in the future and make sure he didn't get them somehow. Assistants had access to strange and mysterious ways and he wasn't privy to any of them.

Next up, a credit card statement. He eyed it to make sure his identity hadn't been stolen, then tossed it down. He had a direct debit set up to cover that stuff, he didn't need to do anything more about it.

The last item, the one he'd saved because it seemed the most exciting, was a total mystery. The envelope was good quality, but nothing fancy, and there wasn't a return address on it. The postmark was New Jersey, but then so were many things in life. Only the rich and those with access to rent-controlled apartments actually chose to live on Manhattan.

He tore it open and pulled out a single sheaf of similarly good quality paper, but frowned as he unfolded it. His eye caught blocky type and thin edges, and for one crazy moment he thought someone could have sent him one of those letters made of newspaper cuttings you saw in movies.

Jayden's breath caught when he held the letter up so that he could see it properly.

They had.

It was newsprint. Edges roughly trimmed, typefaces a mish-mash as words and sentences were glued together with brute force, far away from whatever original meaning they once held. The new meaning was way worse.

YOU THINK YOU ARE SAFE IN YOUR IVORY TOWER

YOU ARE WRONG

IT'S TIME TO GET YOUR AFFAIRS IN ORDER

Jayden's hand shook, and the letter gave off a faint breeze, so he let it fall to the desk. His pulse was racing, and that was insane, right? Nobody sat down and cut words out of newspapers to send to people. This was the 21st Century! They sent texts, or Tweets!

It had to be a prank.

So why did he feel dizzy?

He looked at the letter again, but didn't touch it. Something about it was repulsive. It made him feel sick to his stomach to know that - out there, somewhere - a total stranger had been angry enough to make this obscene jigsaw puzzle and send it to him.

And it was obscene. It was a threat. He wasn't able to shake that sense of danger the words imparted on him. Either this was a troll who was pissing himself laughing about making random people afraid for their safety, or...

Or it was someone who meant every word.

Jayden grabbed his phone and redialed.

"So soon?" Jo-Ann asked.

"Yeah, uh." His voice shook far more than his hands did, and he tried to stop it, but he couldn't. "Jo-Ann, I've... God, this is gonna sound so stupid."

"What's wrong?" Her voice became sharp, focused. "Mr. Deus? Are you all right?"

"Ha." He tried a laugh, but it refused to come. "Shit. I don't know. I was just going through the rest of the mail and... Wait. Let me show you."

Jayden lowered the phone and snapped a picture of the letter, then forwarded it to Jo-Ann. He brought the phone back to his ear and waited.

Nobody ever needed to tell Jo-Ann to check her email.

He heard her suck in a breath. "I see. All right. Stay right where you are. Don't open the door to anyone. I'll cancel the courier for now. Let me take care of this, and I'll call you back."

Jayden nodded. "How?"

Jo-Ann clicked her tongue at him. "How do you think? I'm going to hire a bodyguard for you."

He blinked at that. "You're kidding, right? You think some meathead tailing me around is gonna protect me from some lunatic?"

"Mr. Deus," she said with all the calm in the world, "I am going to hire a bodyguard, and once I have confirmation I will be in touch so that you can get on with your day to day life. Until then, you sit down and you wait."

Jayden blinked at that, then stared at the letter.

"Yeah," he said weakly. "Okay. Let me know when to expect them."

She hung up, and he considered heading back to the window, but then he decided against it.

If someone wanted him dead, maybe he'd better stay away from the glass for a while.