Chapter 4 - The Cancellation
"Cancel the flight," I said.
Eleanor paused, her hand hovering over the clasp of her Chanel bag. Her sharp eyebrows drew together in a frown of profound irritation. "Don't be dramatic, Marcus. Deal closing is in four hours. Call a social worker for the girl and let’s go."
"I said, cancel the flight, Mother," I repeated.
I reached into my breast pocket, pulled out my corporate phone, and unlocked the screen with shaking fingers. I tapped the icon for our chief financial officer, Arthur Vance—my cousin, who had always played by the rules until the rules started hurting people.
Arthur answered on the first ring. "Marcus? You boarding? The Boston team is setting up the projector now."
"Arthur, listen to me very carefully," I said, keeping my eyes locked on Eleanor’s hardening face. "Cancel the Boston acquisition. Pull our backing from the historic estate immediately."
Silence stretched across the line for three agonizing seconds. "Are you out of your mind? That’s a forty-million-dollar portfolio expansion! The board will crucify us!"
"Let them try," I snapped. "The deal is dead. Inform the sellers, notify the banks, and tell the board I won't be attending today's meeting—or any meetings for the foreseeable future. My priorities have shifted."
I hung up before Arthur could sputter another syllable, tossing the phone onto the carpeted floor where it cracked against the marble baseboard.
Eleanor’s face turned a mottled, furious red. For the first time in her life, the great matriarch looked genuinely unhinged. "You absolute fool! You just sacrificed the crown jewel of our expansion over a discarded mistress and two bastards!"
"Do not ever call my sons that again," I whispered, stepping so close to her that she was forced to lean back. The lethal coldness in my voice mirrored the darkest traits of the Vance men—traits my father had warned me about, traits I had spent a lifetime trying to tame. "And do not ever speak to Evelyn that way again."
I turned my back on my mother, ignoring the sputtering fury erupting behind me.
I walked over to where Evelyn was still kneeling on the floor, trembling as she tried to calm the twins, Leo and Toby, who were now crying softly into her coat.
I knelt down beside them, my chest aching with a hollow, crushing grief.
"Evelyn," I said softly, reaching out a hesitant hand to touch her shoulder. "I am so sorry. I swear to God, I didn't know. I spent six years believing you abandoned me."
Evelyn looked at me, her chest heaving as she tried to steady her breathing. "I know you didn't know, Marcus. If you had known, your mother wouldn't have let you live under the same roof as me. She guarded you like a vault."
"We're leaving," I said, standing up and scooping up the scuffed blue suitcase with one hand while extending the other to help her up. "You're coming with me. Both of you—all three of you. We're going home."
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"Home?" Evelyn repeated bitterly, though she allowed me to pull her to her feet. "Marcus, your family owns half of Chicago. Every hotel, every high-rise, every legal magistrate in this county is tied to the Vance name. Where is there left for us to go?"
"To my private estate in Barrington," I said firmly, my jaw set with unyielding resolve. "And then, we go to war."
