I remember telling him that I didn’t have a choice, that I had to do it. Since my father’s death in a plane crash, I was the heir not only to the family fortune but the family business as well. My mother spent every waking moment reminding me how my office was waiting for me. I had no siblings while Kyle had an older sister who seemed keen to join the business. But she wasn’t a son, Kyle had said, darkly. His father wanted him in the driving seat.
He had successfully avoided the pressure this far, first by going to college, then by going on some adventurer’s challenge. He always had some plan or scheme to get out of his responsibilities. It had started to catch up with him, though, and before his stint in rehab, he apparently drove his car into a lake, coked up to the eyeballs.
“She’s nice,” he said, looking over at Taya, who was chatting to someone across the room. He pretended to shiver and looked at me pointedly. I smiled and shook my head. Taya came across as a bitch, but we understood each other. Most importantly, she knew not to have any expectations of me or our relationship. I could always call on her to come with me to these society events, where she knew what to say and what to wear. She got on with my mother, which helped too. As long as I didn’t have to spend too much time in her company, we got along fine.
She wasn’t Lauren, of course.
The thought popped into my head, rather unexpectedly.
Since finding out about her working there, I had started to play a rather naughty game at work with Lauren, messing with her head. I knew it was mean, but I enjoyed watching her trying to meet my crazy deadlines and insane requests. Putting team members under pressure was an old technique of mine and my executive team knew that. I made sure that Lauren wasn’t the only one working long hours. Over the past week, I’d tasked her with creating positive buzz around a vegan product that had been launched a year ago but struggled to sell. The biggest problem was that we had a competitor with a similar product, which was not only cheaper but tastier too. I’d told Diaz that I expected Lauren to come up with a campaign that would help product sales increase by at least twenty percent. He’d looked very uncomfortable with those numbers, and I’d put him on the spot. Could they do it or not? If they weren’t up to the task, then I’d find people who could.
I enjoyed the scramble that followed. I watched from the corridor as Diaz briefed Lauren, saw her outrage and then determination as she hunkered down behind her computer. There was a large screen in the foyer, and I could easily stand there watching the Communications department through the gap between the screen and the office. Within days, Lauren had managed to put up a video of an actress eating a sandwich made of our vegan cheese. Even though the actress was a former soap star, she was still well-known. Suddenly people talked about anti-aging properties of vegan food and a whole buzz was created in the media around how plant-based diets slowed down ageing. By the end of the week, sales for our vegan cheese had gone up by thirty percent.
On Friday afternoon, as the others started leaving the office, I called Diaz and told him I wanted a report on the week’s social media campaigns as well as a breakdown of their figures before the end of the day.
Then I went home.
I received an email with the report at eleven o’clock that evening. I didn’t even look at it. I didn’t have to open it to know that Lauren was doing a fantastic job as community manager. I loved trying to think up new ways of making life difficult for her. Why, though? I hadn’t spent a lot of time thinking about my motivation, even though I did spend a lot of time thinking about her. Maybe I was trying to punish her for filling my thoughts the way she had, making her pay for being less than keen to spend time with me.
Or maybe, there was more to it than that.
I was enjoying the idea of her working her heart out. It was to my benefit really, it was for me, indirectly. I was getting her attention, one way or another. I didn’t think that she would quit. Every challenge I threw at her, she was able to meet and beat. She was even more efficient and creative than I thought she would be. It was as if she was accepting my challenges and saying, all right, I’ll meet your bid and raise you one. A delightful game of mental poker.
I had not had as much fun at work in a long time.
It wasn’t anything I could talk about to anyone though, not even Kyle.
“What’ll you do now?” I asked him. We went outside and he lit up a cigarette. Summer was drawing to an end, and there was already a bite in the air. Still, I preferred this to the stuffy drawing room with all the guests wearing faked smiles while pretending interest in one another’s conversations.
“My father says he’ll cut me off if I don’t join the firm,” Kyle shrugged and smiled gamely. “I figured as much. Suppose I’ll need to get a job.”
“Doing what?” Kyle had never shown much interest in anything but partying and traveling.
“I figured I may take up sailing, do some racing, get some sponsorship.”
“Sailing?”
Kyle nodded. “One my father’s friends bought a yacht over in Monaco. He wants me to bring it back here. Guess I’ll start off doing that.”
“At least you won’t have to worry about getting a place of your own then,” I said with a laugh, slapping Kyle’s back.
“Sounds like you’ve got it made!”
Kyle looked at me.
“You could come with me?”
“I wish!” I said with a laugh. The truth was that I didn’t much like being CEO or running the company. But since Lauren had started working there, I had found myself looking forward to coming to the office for the first time in months. The long hours, the dreary meetings; all made worthwhile when I thought of her sitting at her desk a few floors below me, thinking of ways to meet my mad demands.
We stood in silence for a while. The party continued behind us and neither one of us seemed keen to go back in. It was the only life either of us had ever known, with not much choice as to the part we had to play.
Even though it looked like Kyle had found a way to get out of it, for now, it remained to be seen if he would be able to make a living off it. I could see my mother watching us from inside. Even from a distance, I could sense disapproval emanating from her. I knew she didn’t like Kyle and thought him weak and without purpose. She’d felt his parents had been too soft on him, made too many allowances. The subtext was always that I should not think I would be able to get away with that kind of behavior.
My relationship with my mother was tricky. After my father’s death, she had been devastated. She spent a year locked in her room, heavily sedated while nannies made sure I got to school and ate my dinner. When she finally seemed to step back into the world, there was always a slightly vacant expression in her eyes, as if she had taken one too many sedatives. Then there was the smile that was always on her face. She was an attractive woman, still, and she’d inherited millions from my father’s estate. But shewas never interested in remarrying. She only cared about the family business. It was all about protecting my father’s legacy and that was me. It was all on me. Ensuring my father had not died in vain, building a business and a family name that had to become one of the finest in the city. She became obsessed by it, and it was the only thing driving her. Without it, she would have no reason to live.
If I ever stepped away from the company business, I would destroy not only myself but her too, and the family business.
Chapter 5