Page 51 of Her New Billionaire Bosshole

“I…” I think of all the calls I ignored — and for what? Not talking to my brother to make my dad happy? Now that I’m facing the situation directly, it feels foolish.

“It’s okay,” Brandon says, glancing at me.

“If nobody sent you — I mean, how did you know where to find me?”

“I didn’t,” he laughs, taking his drink and sliding a twenty onto the bar. I realize his drink isn’t actually a drink at all — it’s just a Coke with a wedge of lime on the glass. Brandon jerks his head toward the large glass window behind us. “I was walking by. Looked in and saw you.”

I suck in a breath. “No way.”

“Total truth,” he says, and that phrase punches me in the gut.

I face my drink, stare at the amber liquid. “That’s wild.”

“So, you in town for Mom’s birthday?”

Glancing at my brother, I wonder about that question. We haven’t spoken, so how would he know that I’ve been out of town at all?”

“Search alert on your name,” he says, rolling his eyes, as though I’m slowing down the conversation. “Congrats on the soccer thing. Never thought you cared much for sports.”

I think of my conversation with Steven and Rhett and say, “I guess I caught the soccer bug.”

Brandon pulls back, considers me, then nods and says, “Good for you, man.”

A long moment passes, and I just reach for it, asking what I really want to know. “Why are you doing it?”

He blinks, brow furrowing. “Doing what?”

That pulls a laugh from me, and I gesture, encompassing a tiny planet. “Everything. Pissing Dad off, divesting, dropping out. Wouldn’t it just be easier to give in, keep Dad from doing all this shit?”

“Oh,” Brandon laughs, shaking his head and meeting my eyes. “I mean, none of that is about Dad. I’m going to live my life, and what he does is up to him. Had to come to terms with that a long time ago. I realized that, with all that money…”

He pauses, looks across the room, thinking. Finally, letting out a breath, he says, “Look, I’m not going to sit here and say I don’t need money. Everyone needs money. But growing up, watching Dad always on the edge, missing our shit? I didn’t want to be that.”

Brandon pauses, rolls his cup in his hands, then goes on, “I appreciate the money, I really do. But just with that inheritance from Gramps?” Brandon slides his eyes to me, acknowledging the insane amount of money we received when our grandfather passed. That, on top of our trusts that were released to us on our eighteenth birthdays. “I could take a tenth of that and never have to work another day in my life. Once you have that, what’s the point of making more?”

My eyes are still on my cup, and I think about how much money I’ve made over the years. When you search my name online, the net worth it tells you is about a billion too low.

“Like, think about it. Maybe I want to get married someday, have kids, right? I want to bethere for them. See their childhood. What’s my life going to be worth if I spend the entire thing making money, grinding, losing sleep over the fucking stock market? All when I have enough to live one hundred lives, stress-free? It doesn’t make any sense to me.”

While Brandon talks, I see our father. Obsessed with his money, ignoring his wife at the table during her birthday lunch. What’s the point of all that money, all that success, if you don’t spend your life with the people you love?

“What are you even doing with it all?”

“Started a foundation in Gramps’ name,” Brandon says, and it shocks me — Dad didn’t tell me that. “Most of it I donate to different causes. Those people need the money a lot more than I do — what do I do with it? Just leave in it in a portfolio? Let it sit? This way, kids get food. Cancer treatment. Seems like a better use of the funds to me.”

“Still.” I press my lips together, glance at him. Think about the way Dad has always talked about money. Like a single mistake could make everything disappear. “Doesn’t it… scare you? To give all that money away?”

Brandon laughs again, and I realize he looks much, much better than the last time I saw him. Clear eyes, a brightness to his cheeks that wasn’t there before.

“Nah.” He shakes his head, turns his head to look at me. “Best decision I ever made.”

CHAPTER 24

SOPHIE

It’s late when Lena Athens slams through the door to my office, a smile splashed over her face, a paper in her hand, flapping through the air as she swings it up and slaps it down on my desk.

“There!” she says, breathless and windswept, looking like she ran halfway across the facilities to get here.