me.
I flee to my father’s place.
I’m not going there to complain, I tell myself as I drive toward my father’s mansion. My dad was asking, earlier in the week, for me to come by and let him know how the company is faring so far. I’m not going to go and whine about the fact that I hired a woman I have feelings for; a woman who hates my guts, no less.
With this in mind, I keep going up the driveway and park my car in front of the massive front doors. A tall man in a suit with impeccable posture is waiting for me, and he nods as I get out of the car.
“Your keys, sir?” he asks politely. “I will park your car.”
“Thank you,” I reply, tossing him my keys.
My parents have always lived more extravagantly than me, but they’ve always been supportive of the choices I’ve made in my life. It’s why I know I can always count on my father, even with Mother gone, to be there.
The front doors creak open at a touch, and I step into the large, open foyer. It’s largely empty except for massive paintings decorating the walls. My mother had always loved art, and my father couldn’t bear to part with them after she passed away.
There’s no sign of my father, but I know exactly where he would be at this time in the afternoon. I stride confidently down the hallway until I reach the living room. As expected, my father is sitting on the large, plush couch. He looks up from his book as I enter, a wide smile spreading across his face.
“Jason,” he says, pleased, as he stands. “I didn’t know you were coming.”
“Sorry.” I laugh sheepishly. “I realized I had a few free hours tonight, so I decided to come by.”
“I’m glad,” he says warmly.
My father has been there through everything. He was the one that held me through my mother’s sickness and eventual death, and who tried his best to encourage me when I fell off the rails during college. He never once gave up on me, though I know I gave him plenty of reason to do so. It’s because of him that I became the strong man that I feel I am now.
“Are you staying for dinner?” he asks.
“Sure,” I say, shrugging. I hadn’t made plans beyond visiting, but having dinner with my father would be nice.
My father puts his arm around my shoulders and steers me out of the room.
“Why don’t you tell me what you’ve been doing with the company,” he says.
“We’ve been making lots of plans,” I say to him. I hope he’ll be proud of what I’ve done. “Right now, we’re looking at the budget and trying to see if we can spare some funds to update the technology. A lot of our computers are outdated, and there are some new finance and marketing programs that would be great to use.”
“Hm, yes, the technology could use some updates,” my father muses.
“Before we put everything into that, though, we’re taking a closer look at some of the employees.” I hesitate. “It came to my attention that one of our employees was using her position to give her relatives a job and destroy the careers of others while achieving that goal.”
My father’s arm drops and he turns to me sharply.
“Who?” he asks, eyes narrowing.
“Sandra Lawrence,” I say, eyeing him. “Do you remember her?”
“She was one of the managers that I put in charge of training interns,” he says.
“Yeah… She gave her niece a job over better candidates,” I tell him. “One of the other interns made an effort to get the job anyway, despite Sandra making it clear that she had already chosen, and got a terrible report written on her for her efforts. We investigated Sandra further, and it turns out that this isn’t the first time she’s done this for her preferred candidate. On top of that, the niece she employed didn’t actually do any work during the internship. Everything she was credited for was done by the other intern that Sandra tried to ruin.”
“I’m sorry to hear this,” my father says, pursing his lips. “I wish I had known about it before I resigned. How did you find out?”
I stiffen despite myself.
“The other intern… She came to see me about it,” I say slowly. “I happened to know her, so I promised her I’d look into it.”
“An intern you know?” my father asks, frowning. “Who…?”
I see the moment comprehension strikes