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“Mmm.” I took a long pull from my bottle. “You shouldn’t have asked, and I shouldn’t have gone along with it. You knew I would, though, because I’ve always supported you.”
“Like I always support you.”
“Maybe.” I put my empty bottle down and rested my head on my chair’s cushion, watching the sky explode in oranges and pinks. “You crossed my line, Jer. I think you did it because you were sure I’d stay, no matter what. And you might’ve been right. Before Clara, that is.”
He exhaled slowly. “I know she means a lot to you. In retrospect, there was no need to keep the story from her. At the time, I was grasping at straws, trying to save the deal if I could.”
“I know that. You’re not telling me anything new. Retrospect or not, you shouldn’t have asked.”
“This is a subject we’ll have to agree to disagree on.”
I turned my head, glancing at him. Jeremy wasn’t a bad man, but he’d learned to be cold from the people who should have given him warmth. He could turn his emotions off when they got in the way. He adored his wife, but if I’d asked, he would have kept the same secret from her. No matter how long I’d tried to give him what he’d grown up without, he wasn’t going to change. My loyalty and sacrifice were appreciated, sure, but they weren’t sacred. Jeremy might not ever outright betray me, but he’d trod over me if he had to.
Hell, he already had.
“I’m not coming back to MZ,” I stated.
He jerked like I’d surprised him. It shouldn’t have, though. I’d told him what would happen if he kept secrets, and I was a man of my word.
“This is not the time to walk away. Without the Rossi deal, we’ll have no choice but to close more stores. You’re the only one I trust to handle—”
“It’s done, Jer. The minute you learned about Dallas Fox and chose to call Roman and the others before telling me what was going on, I was gone. The only way you and I are going to be able to get good again is if I have nothing to do with MZ. You can’t be my brother and boss. It’s not going to work. You’re no good at it, and if I don’t walk, I’m afraid I’ll bow under your pressure and fuck up again.”
“Come on, Jake. There won’t be another Rossi deal. You know that. There’s no chance for you to have a conflict of interest with Clara again.”
“That may be true, but I don’t like who I am working at MZ. It’s not me, Jer. I don’t need or want it.”
He scoffed. “You don’t want the salary that bought you this house?”
“I don’t. If I need to, I’ll move somewhere smaller. Hell, I’ll take a page out of your book and sell my shares to Roman.”
“You’re not selling your shares,” he gritted out.
I shrugged. “I lived a long time without our grandfather’s money. It was a good, comfortable life. I’m going to get back under the hood—do what I do best. If that means I need to give up my shares, they’re yours.”
His gaze bore into the side of my head, but now that I’d told him my intentions, a weight had been lifted off my chest, and I could take my first deep, clear breath since before he’d asked me to work at MZ with him.
“You’re serious.”
I smiled at the horizon. “Deadly.”
“When I need you most, you’re walking away?”
I drummed my fingers on my stomach, calm as I’d been in a while. “Not walking away from you, Jer—walking away from a job I don’t want and get no joy from. If I stay, you and I are gonna end up hating each other.”
“We’ve been fine the last few years.”
I raised a brow. “You’ve been keeping secrets. I imagine there’s a lot more I don’t know about, and that’s okay. I don’t want to know. MZ is your legacy—it’s never been mine.”
He shot up from his seat and crossed to the railing. Gripping it tight, he tipped his head back to the sky and hollered his frustration.
“Fuck!” he cried. “God-fucking-dammit.”
I got up and stood beside him, placing my arm around his shoulders. No matter how old we got, he was still the kid who had come to me on empty and allowed me to fill him up. I was honored I’d been the one to do it, and I wasn’t relinquishing that role. Brothers didn’t do that, even when they disagreed.
“I’m sticking, Jer. You hear me?” I turned to him and took his shoulders in my hands, giving him a jostle. “This doesn’t mean I’m not sticking. We’re gonna get back to the good we’ve always been—when the favors you asked of me were fixing your car or helping you plan a surprise for your wife—things I’ll jump at the chance to do. Always.”
He nodded. If he was more than frustrated, he didn’t show it. Jeremy’s emotions were buried deep, only ever surfacing for brief, fleeting glances.
