The Angels' Share (The Bourbon Kings #2) - J. R. Ward Page 0,33

would think you’d care about her welfare more than this.”

“I moved out here to this incredible luxury”—Edward waved a hand around at the ratty furniture—“to get away from all of that and all of them for a good reason. So sink that big fancy ship up on that hill. Shoot your cannons at my family’s mansion until the whole lot of it ends up on the seafloor. It is not going to affect me one way or another.”

Monteverdi jabbed a finger across the space. “You are not worthy of calling yourself a son.”

“Considering who my parents are, I’m proud of having lasted as long as I did under that roof. And do us both a favor. Don’t try to mask your self-interest in the rhetoric of altruism while you’re threatening my family. Tell me, how much interest did you pocket? Ten percent? Fifteen? If the loan was for six months, that’s at least two and a half million right there for you. Nice work if you can find it, huh.”

Monteverdi tugged at his icy white French cuffs. “I regard this as a declaration of war. What happens next is your fault.”

“How codependent of you.” Edward indicated his body. “But I’ve been tortured for eight days by people who were going to kill me, and in my case, that is not hyperbole. If you think there is anything that you can do to get my attention, you are delusional.”

“Just watch. You may not care about your mother, but I wonder if you feel so cavalier about your siblings. As far as I understand it, you have always been quite the caretaker.”

“Were.”

“We shall see.”

The man turned away and was out the door a moment later. And as the old-fashioned phone started to ring again, Edward stared down at his ruined legs … and wondered, not for the first time, what might have been.

What should have been.

Too late for all that now, however.

Cranking his head to the side, he stared at that receiver hanging on the wall by the galley kitchen. The thought of walking over there exhausted him, but mostly, he knew what the call probably was about.

They were going to have to come for him if they wanted him, though.

ELEVEN

Edwin MacAllan, Master Distiller for the Bradford Bourbon Company, was getting nowhere. Sitting in his office, which had been his father’s command central up until the man had died unexpectely a decade ago, Mack was trying to reach someone, anyone at the business center. Nothing. All he was getting was voice mail, which, considering he was dialing senior management’s private lines and not going through the receptionist, was unprecedented.

The CFO, COO, and three senior vice presidents were not picking up.

Lane was also not answering his cell.

As Mack hung up the phone again, he knew damn well that caller ID on the corporate phones meant that people knew who it was. And whereas one or two might not have answered, all five? Yes, their CEO had died, and there was chaos, but the business had to keep running.

“Hey, am I doing this—”

Before Mack could get to the word “right,” he shut his mouth and remembered that his executive assistant, who had also been his father’s, was not out there anymore. And hadn’t been since her brother had had a heart attack the day before yesterday.

As if all the interviews he’d done today hadn’t reminded him of the loss?

Clearly, they’d just thrown him into a case of denial.

Putting his elbows on the piles of paperwork, he rubbed his head. Hiring was a lot like dating. HR had sent over a number of candidates, and each one of them had been a swipe left, the executive assistant equivalents of high-maintenance, bobbleheaded beauty queens; neurotic, Glenn Close, bunny-boiling clingers; or sex-less, defensive, hairy-armpitted manhaters.

“Shit.”

Getting up, he walked around the battered old desk and took a lingering stroll around, looking at the artifacts that were displayed in glass cases and shadowboxes. There was the first barrel that had been stamped with No. Fifteen, the company’s brand of relatively reasonably priced bourbon. A line-up of special bottles celebrating the University of Charlemont basketball program’s wins in the NCAA tournament in 1980, 1986, and 2013. Historic revolvers. Maps. Letters from Abraham Lincoln and Andrew Jackson to various Bradfords.

But the wallpaper itself was the true testimony to the company’s product, longevity, and pride. Every inch of flat, vertical space was layered with labels from countless bottles, the different fonts and colors and images illustrating an evolution of marketing, value proposition,