Trillion - Winter Renshaw Page 0,5
team of nannies? For a version of my life I’ve never wanted?
People like me don’t do the marriage-and-family dance.
It’s not who we are.
It’s not who I am.
I’m aware of my strengths. I’m also aware of my weaknesses. I’d be a horrible husband and an even worse excuse for a father.
Nolan agreed to put everything in writing—that he wouldn’t offer his shares to anyone else in the next two years, and the board agreed to do the same. I imagine there was an extensive amount of coaxing going on behind the scenes, hence the muting, but I don’t have time to imagine what he could possibly hold over their heads because I’m too busy wrapping my mind around this preposterous, unprecedented stipulation.
“Who the hell does he think he is?” I all but spit my words at Broderick when we disconnect a few minutes later. “He’s insane.”
Broderick rises, his chair groaning beneath his bodyguard-esque frame, and he tosses his pen on the table. Pacing the windows, he inhales hard and heavy, always a man of few words.
“I’m going to need you to actually fucking say something.” I exhale, my patience non-existent. Though my words are sharp, Broderick’s got a chainmail ego. He can handle it, unlike the spineless trout before him. He puts up with my moods, whichever way they swing, and when necessary, he puts me in my place.
It’s why I’ve yet to replace him in the ten years he’s worked for me.
Most people tell me what I want to hear.
Broderick tells me what I need to hear—the truth.
A man can’t make savvy business decisions based on sugarcoated lies.
“It’s a power move,” he says, eyes pointed yet unfocused. I don’t like this side of him. I need my shark, not his shell-shocked alter.
“Obviously.” I clench my jaw. “So what do you propose?”
He stops wearing a pattern into the carpet with his polished dress shoes and turns to me. “How badly do you want this?”
“Do I even have to answer that?”
His mouth forms a straight line, nostrils flaring. “Fine. This is the plan. We hire someone. We find a woman—one we can trust—and we pay her to marry you, have your child, and to do it all in Nolan’s timeframe.”
“Please tell me you’re fucking joking.”
He lifts a brow. “Eight months of this back-and-forth bullshit and the man hasn’t budged, Trey. Hasn’t even come close. You heard what he wants. He’s not wavering on that clause. And unfortunately, he knows he has the upper hand because anyone else would’ve walked by now.”
“This is the most absurd thing I’ve ever heard.” In my nearly fifteen years of negotiating acquisitions and takeovers, I’ve yet to hear of such a provision. If I didn’t know better, I’d think I was being pranked. But Ames has a reputation. He’s a family man. Wife of nearly ten years. Two kids. The bastard even wrote a book on “creating the ideal marriage in an anti-marriage world.” Instant bestseller. He considers himself an expert in that—and many other—arenas.
In my experience, powerful men who think they’re the smartest asshole in the room make some of the dumbest decisions … sometimes simply because they can. The world doesn’t tell men like Nolan Ames “no” just as it doesn’t tell men like me “no.”
I hunch over the table, staring down at the circled name.
Sophie Bristol.
“All right. Plan B. We tell him we’re going to pass,” Broderick says, lifting a finger because he knows I’m about to protest. “If he knows you’re willing to walk away and take your excessively generous offer off the table, maybe it’ll light a little fire in him. Level the playing field a bit. Tip the scales in our favor—or at least equalize them.”
“And if it doesn’t?”
“Then we move on and find another company to buy.”
I don’t like the idea of moving on. I want this company. I’ve had my sights set on it for years, and when rumor had it he was looking to sell so he could retire early and focus on being a “family man,” I jumped on the opportunity.
“No.” I exhale. Perhaps I’m being petulant in this moment, but I don’t fucking care. There’s a way to make this happen, I’m certain.
“Then we need to find someone,” he says, “someone who’s compatible with you, someone you find attractive, someone who would be an ideal mother, and like I said, someone you can trust. We could have them vetted by a psychologist if you want, a doctor as well to make sure she’s capable of bearing—”
I