thirty minutes ago. He and Jenna are slapping skin right now, so don’t expect to hear from him for a while.
I shake my head to clear out the mental image that Robert just provided me when my phone starts ringing in my hand. I look down to see that it’s my brother, Rhys, calling…again. I’ve ignored his calls the last three times, but I know I can’t continue avoiding him. With a heavy sigh, I sit down on my couch to brace myself for what is expected to be an unpleasant conversation and answer his call.
“Nice of you to finally pick up the fucking phone, Chase!” he growls into my ear.
“Why, hello to you too, baby brother,” I respond back, enjoying getting some sort of rise out of Rhys. Rhys is known as the ‘Ice King’ — not only for his career in hockey, but because he shows zero emotion or feelings.
“Chase,” he warns, his voice full of tension and I can just picture him rubbing his eyes like he normally does when frustrated. “I really need you to answer the phone when I call. Better yet, I need your ass on a plane home now!”
“Why?” I ask, sitting up in alert. “What’s going on?”
“Same shit, Chase, just a different day. I’m barely keeping this company afloat. I can’t do this by myself. All the potential investors we’ve approached refuse to have a meeting with me if you aren’t going to be a part of it.”
“Why do they have to know I won’t be there?”
“Because I’m not going to lie to people who I’m seeking millions of dollars from,” he counters.
“It isn’t lying, per se, Rhys. Once they arrive for the meeting, you can tell them I unexpectedly couldn’t make it,” I suggest. Rhys was always the good boy. Never wanting to lie or mislead people. He never got in trouble at school or at home. He knew from a young age that he wanted to play hockey so that’s what he focused on. I was supposed to inherit the family company and Rhys was supposed to play in the NHL. Our father even bought a minor league hockey team for Rhys to run when his future hockey career was over with. But his dreams of getting into the National Hockey League died that day our father did.
“Unlike you, Chase, I value my honor and reputation.”
I ignore his insults that are directed at my current profession because I’m tired of fighting with him. He disapproves of my life as a paparazzi - hell, so do I - but it’s the quickest way I can help save our family business. He refuses to acknowledge the sacrifices I’m making for our mother, for him, for this company that I now don’t even want to be associated with.
A company that if it wasn’t for my mother’s birthright, I would let go straight to hell where my father is.
I never wanted to run the family business. Owning the world’s largest ice wine estate sounds pristine, but doing the actual labor of producing the ice wine is boring as shit. I used to hate being dragged into the fields as a young boy by my father while he watched and yelled at the employees. Don’t get me wrong, I have huge respect and admiration for all of our employees who harvest the grapes in the summertime and freeze their asses off by picking the grapes off the vine during below freezing temperatures in the winter. Yes, I enjoyed the good life of the revenues my family made off of the ice wine, but that was not the division of the company that interested me. When my father wanted to be the most recognizable name in Canada, he created an entertainment division of Wilson Enterprises. He wanted Wilson Enterprises, and our wine, to be associated with every major VIP event and party in Canada. He started buying sports teams, sponsoring VIP parties, event venues and arenas. I loved the idea of growing our business and brand outside of the wine industry and that was the division I wanted to run. I went to college to study business and once I graduated, I moved permanently to Vancouver to start my internship with Wilson Enterprises. My father made sure I started from the bottom to see how hard it was to run a company. No favors were handed out to me for being the heir and oldest son to Thadeus and Lara Wilson.
We grew up privileged and lived