“Is that Bug?” I heard her ask.
“Yes, Mrs. Prince.”
Shuffling on the other end and then Mom came on the phone. “Nathan, where are you?”
“Dodging jellyfish on the beach of Citrine Cove,” I replied. “How are you, Mom?”
“You know me, Bug. Nothing can get me down.”
She does sound good today.
“How are you?” she asked. “Have you met a nice girl?”
“Met loads of nice girls. And it sucks how much I like them.”
“Sucks? Why?”
“Because they’re so nice, they shouldn’t be saddled with me.”
“Nathan,” she scolded. “Don’t be ridiculous. Anyone would be lucky to call you husband.”
A husband who doesn’t love them and is using them for their money. Most wouldn’t call that lucky.
“I sent you something,” I said, changing the subject. “Margaret said she put it on your bed. Did you open it?”
“Hmm. Let’s see.”
More shuffling and the sound of tape.
“Oh, Nathan,” she said. “This is great. Vanilla orange soap, orange sugar scrub, honey orange bodywash, and vanilla orange candles.”
“This place is lousy with orange stuff. I thought—”
“What’s going on in here?”
The bellow invaded my ear.
“What are you doing in my daughter’s room, Abraham? How dare you!”
I heard faint apologies and explanations on the other end.
“Father, calm down,” Mom said tiredly. It was eerie the draining effect he had on her. Seconds in his presence and the life, cheer, and color leeched from my mother like a painting drenched in turpentine. “Abraham kindly let me use his... his...” She trailed off, losing the word.
“Who are you speaking to?” His voice was closer. “Hello?”
“Colonel.”
“Nathaniel.”
We both spat the names out like they were poison on our tongues.
“I see,” he said. “You’ve roped the driver into sneaking you phone calls. I hope it was worth his job.”
My eyes flared. “You can’t be serious. You’d fire a man that worked for you for ten years because Mom asked him to call me? What the hell is wrong with you?”
“Watch your language!” he roared. “What my daughter asks for is irrelevant. Yesterday she asked for a spaceship. I told you you’re not to speak to her outside of the designated times when I’m available to observe the phone calls. Speaking to you causes her unnecessary upset. Imagine being told you have a son that you can’t remember? All the progress she’s made won’t be undone by your selfishness.”
My grip tightened fit to break the phone. “She may not remember me, but I am her son. You can’t stop me speaking to her.”
“As always, Nathaniel, you’re wrong.”
“Colonel—”
“I’m afraid Abraham needs his phone to begin his search for a new job. Think about this the next time you con an employee of mine into disobeying the rules. Goodbye.”
“Don’t—!”
He hung up.
“Arrghh!” I flung the phone into the sea. The piercing glare off the waves blinded me. The splash let me know it found its new home.
“Yo, Nathan.”
The guys on the beach stared at me. I wasn’t alone. I rarely was these days.
“You okay?” Pedro asked.
“Fine.”
He glanced out over the waves. “What about your phone?”
“I’m rich, Arroyo,” I replied, stalking past him. “I’ll buy another one.”
I stormed upstairs to wash off the sand and change for special projects.
It wasn’t the best day to sit me down and drone in my ear about excess and long-term thinking. But skipping out on activities might get me the boot. I had to be here.
I had to find a wife.
“—investments,” Hendrix said. “Many a person has lost their shirt. When you have that much money, what is it to lose a little here or there to chance a big payout? It’s important to—”
I tuned him out.
Hendrix set us up in the dining room, and sitting with her group next to the pool, was Belle. She couldn’t have been least interested in event planning, but she nodded along, and spoke up when the girls turned to her.
Seeing her brought the familiar twist in my stomach and tightening in my pants. My body couldn’t choose between one or the other. Arousal or agitation.
The truth is it would likely be both until the day I died. Her sitting across from me, sweet and determined, as she offered to become my wife—sealed my lifelong battle.
How could she not know she offered me Voldemort’s choice of drinking blood that would save me from death, only to live a cursed life?
That night I didn’t go to Kelli like I insinuated.
I took the whiskey under my bed, jacked a golf cart, drove into the grove, and passed out drunk under a tree. I woke the next morning to a worker shaking me awake.
The first reaction was to get drunk. The third thought was to talk to her. The second was the one I landed on—avoiding her and conversation to focus on what I came here to do. I got distracted by Belle and the result was becoming her charity case. We could stand on equal footing again when I had an understanding fiancée.
“Mr. Prince? Are you listening?”
I tore away from her.
“I’d like you to finish those financial plans today,” he said. “We start our second project tomorrow.”
I saluted him.
My report was done. I finished it the first night he assigned it.
Hendrix gave us all a million dollars a year and a set amount we had to pay in taxes, services, and on life. Twenty-five percent off the top for taxes. Then we factored in the other costs.
Fifty thousand a year per child. Sixty-five thousand a year for a personal chef. Forty thousand a year for a driver. Five thousand dollars to take the other half on a fancy week-long vacation. You get the gist.
The long list of services and accommodations community members built their life on were cataloged for us to decide what we needed and could afford.
The lesson wasn’t lost on me, but I knew it was lost on most of the guys here. They’d be living on much more than a million dollars a year after we were set free from this place. Taking over billion-dollar companies. Inheriting trust funds containing twice the amount of the national debt. I suspected only two people in the room would ever know the experience of scrimping, saving, and living on a budget.
Me and Hendrix.
“I’ll leave you gentlemen to it,” Hendrix said. “If you need help, you can find me in the theater, setting up for movie night.”
Chairs scraped the floor as the guys took the invitation to break up.
“I’m going upstairs to knock this out,” said Carter.
“I have to catch my mom.” Preston stood up too. “Something important we need to talk about.”
“You good, man?” I asked as I drifted to Belle.
“It’s not me with the problem,” he said. “But it’ll be fine.”
They headed out, leaving me and a few stragglers behind. Through the window, Belle started massaging her temples like she did when she was prepping to use the headache excuse. It was almost scary how well I knew her.