“Calder?” Marta’s voice brings me back to the present moment. “Still there?”
“Yes.” I pinch the bridge of my nose before rubbing the sleep from my eyes, and then I release a heavy breath into the phone. “I’ll have my assistant get a hold of you. Set something up.”
Marta is quiet. “You …you don’t have an assistant.”
“A lot has changed in four years, Marta,” I’m quick on the reply.
She clears her throat, quiet. “All right, then. May I have her number? I’d be happy to reach out first.”
“I’ll forward her your contact information. She’ll be in touch.”
Marta’s nervous humming fills the ear piece, a cross between a laugh and a two-note song. That little quirk would get old quickly if she were my assistant. But I won’t have to worry about that. I’m never going to have an assistant. The idea of having to talk to and look at the same person day in and day out is about as appealing as gouging my eyes out with rusty pliers.
I crave change.
I crave variety.
I crave a tether-free existence where I rely on no one but myself.
Anything else would be a prison sentence.
“I would love to have her email at least,” Marta says, her voice slightly shaky. “If that’s all right with you.”
I imagine my father standing over her, clinging on to her every word, scribbling shaky notes onto Post-Its with his weighty gold pen, micromanaging every sentence that comes out of her thin-lipped mouth because the man is obsessed with my approval …
I’m the only person on this entire planet he can’t pay, manipulate, or scheme into respecting him. But respect is the one thing he’ll never have from me until his dying day, and even then, when his shriveled, lifeless body rots, encased in the family mausoleum in Bedford, he still won’t have it.
But I’ll be there.
I’ll be there to remind him what a piece of shit he is as he takes his last breath, and I’ll be there to spit on his grave as the concrete is sealed.
A bittersweet and just finality fitting for an asshole of my father’s caliber.
“Calder … I don’t know how to tell you this, so I’m just going to say it.” Marta is quiet for a second, a dramatic pause perhaps, likely my old man’s suggestion. “Your father is dying.”
The girl in my bed is still scrolling through her Instagram feed. I don’t even think she’s fucking blinked in the last two minutes.
Hannah.
That’s her name.
Not that it matters.
“Calder, your father is—” she begins to speak again, her voice an octave higher and a notch louder.
“—I heard you the first time.” My voice booms enough that Hannah’s shiny eyes dart up and her phone almost drops from her hand.
“He’d like to meet with you to discuss matters of his estate,” she says.
“I’m sure he has a will.” Not that I want anything from him. Money—and the Welles name—is nothing more than a burden. “And I’m certain that when the time comes, his attorney will be in contact with me.”
“There are some matters he’d like to discuss with you personally—while he’s still able,” she says. “The meeting won’t take long. Maybe ten or fifteen minutes of your time is all. Could you come by this afternoon? Your father has time between one fifteen and one forty-five.”
“Not going to happen,” I say. I’m in Telluride, enjoying an impromptu weekend of skiing and snowboarding. Or at least … I was enjoying it.
I move to the edge of the bed, my back folded and my forehead pressed against my open palm. The keys to my Cessna lie on my nightstand. I could fly back to the city today if I wanted to.
If I wanted to …
My father wanting to “go over matters of his estate” is nothing more than code for him wanting to manipulate me into doing something he wants me to do … something that would benefit him because it’s always about him even when he’s supposedly dying.
As far as I’m concerned, there’s nothing he’s holding over me in this moment, and that makes me a free man. There’s not enough Welles money in the world to make me want to change that.
The girl in my bed slinks out from beneath the covers before fishing around on the floor for last night’s clothes—a skintight lace dress if memory serves me.
“Calder … do you have a phone charger?” she whispers, wincing as if she’s sorry for bothering me during my important phone call.
“Marta, I have to let you go,” I say.
My father’s assistant begins to protest, but it’s too late. I’ve already hit the red button.
I have to admit … my curiosity is piqued, and telling my father off one last time before he croaks is on my proverbial bucket list, but I won’t be had that easily.
If I decide to show up, it’ll be on my own time. And only if I feel like it.