About That Night (31 page)

She leaned in interestedly, reaching for her champagne glass. “So what’s the next step for you?”

“I set up meetings and begin pitching to potential clients. The two graduates I hired from U of I start work on Monday, and then we’ll be ready to rock and roll. After that, I cross my fingers and hope there are some people eager to get in bed with the Twitter Terrorist.” He flashed her a cheeky grin. “Metaphorically speaking.”

Rylann cocked her head inquisitively. “I’ve been curious about something. What was it that made you change your mind about the corporate world? Back when we first met, I remember you saying that you wanted to teach.”

It was a perfectly innocuous question. And Kyle knew he could answer it vaguely, the same way he’d answered that question many times before. But as he sat across from Rylann, one day away from the nine-year anniversary of his mother’s death, he thought maybe it was time to open up about that part of his life. He kept telling himself that he wanted all of Rylann—perhaps, then, he needed to let down a few of his own walls.

So he cleared his throat, trying to decide where to start. “My perspective on things changed after my mother died. It was a rough time for my family,” he began.

KYLE. THERE’S BEEN an accident.

For as long as he lived, he’d never forget those words.

He had known instantly from his father’s voice that it was serious. His grip had tightened around the phone. “What happened?”

“It’s your mother. A truck hit her car when she was coming home from a drama club rehearsal. They think the driver might have fallen asleep at the wheel—I don’t know, they haven’t told me much. They brought her into the emergency room thirty minutes ago, and she’s in surgery now.”

Kyle’s stomach dropped.
Surgery
. “But…Mom’s going to be okay, right?”

The silence that followed lasted an eternity.

“I’ve sent the jet to pick you up at Willard,” his father said, referring to the university’s airport. “A helicopter will meet you at O’Hare and take you directly to the hospital. They said we could use the heliport.”

Kyle’s voice was a whisper. “Dad.”

“It’s bad, son. I feel like I should be doing something, but they…they say there’s nothing…”

Shock began to set in at that very moment, when Kyle realized his father was crying.

The drive to the airport, the forty-minute flight to Chicago, and the helicopter ride to the hospital’s rooftop had all been a blur. Some hospital staff member—Kyle couldn’t have picked his face out of a lineup two minutes later—rushed him to a private waiting room in the trauma surgical unit. He’d burst through the door and found his father standing there with an ashen expression.

He shook his head. “I’m so sorry, son.”

Kyle took a step back. “No.”

A tiny, drained voice spoke out from behind the door. “I didn’t make it in time, either.”

Kyle turned and saw Jordan standing in the corner of the room. She had tears running down her cheeks.

“Jordo.” He grabbed her and pulled her into a tight embrace. “I just spoke to Mom yesterday,” he whispered against the top of his sister’s head. “I called her after my exam.” She’d been so damn proud of him.

His heart squeezed painfully tight as his eyes began to burn.

“Tell me this isn’t happening,” Jordan said against his chest.

There was a knock on the door, and a doctor dressed in blue surgical scrubs entered the room.

“I’m sorry to interrupt,” he said in a somber tone. “I wanted to ask if you would like to see her.”

Jordan wiped her eyes, then turned around to face the doctor. Both she and Kyle looked expectantly at their father.

He said nothing.

“Some people find it comforting to say good-bye,” the doctor offered kindly.

Kyle watched as his father—a self-made mogul praised for his business acumen and decisiveness, whose face had been on the covers of
Time
and
Newsweek
and
Forbes
, a man whom Kyle had never once seen hesitate in any decision—faltered.

“I…don’t…” his father’s voice trailed off. He ran his hand over his face and took a deep breath.

Kyle put his hand on his father’s shoulder, then turned to the doctor with their answer.

“We’d like that. Thank you.”

Kyle quickly realized, right from those very first moments in the hospital, that his dad was having a hard time handling the many decisions that needed to be made with respect to his mother’s wake and funeral. To help alleviate that burden, he moved into his father’s house and took over most of the arrangements. It was a grim, emotionally draining time, and certainly not something he’d ever envisioned himself going through at the age of twenty-four—selecting readings and prayers for his mother’s funeral, and the outfit she would wear in the casket—but together, he and Jordan managed to do what needed to be done.

After the funeral, his original plan had been to stay at his dad’s place for another week or so, helping him sort through all the phone calls, sympathy cards, flowers, and e-mails that flowed in every day. Given the empire Grey Rhodes had built, there was an incredible outpouring of people who wanted to offer their condolences, and Kyle and Jordan did the best they could to keep up with all of it.

But when that first week passed, things still seemed no better. His father showed little interest in receiving visitors or speaking to friends and family on the phone, preferring instead to spend the days alone in his study or go for long walks around the estate grounds.

“Maybe he needs to talk to someone. A professional,” Kyle said to Jordan one night when they were sitting at their
parents’ dining room table, picking halfheartedly at a lasagna someone had dropped off the day before. They could feed a small nation for a month with the number of casseroles, lasagnas, and baked macaroni and cheeses they had stacked in the refrigerator and freezer. No matter that their father could practically
buy
a small nation.

“I already tried suggesting that to him,” Jordan said. “He says he knows what’s wrong: that Mom’s dead.” Her eyes filled with tears, but she quickly shook them off.

Kyle squeezed her hand. “It’s just the grief talking, Jordo.” He had half a mind to march into his father’s study right then and tell him to pull his shit together for Jordan’s sake, but he doubted that would help. And he certainly understood his father’s pain; they were all struggling to make sense of their mother’s death.

He decided to stay in Chicago for another week. And then two weeks became three. There weren’t really any good days, just bad days and slightly better days. Eventually things progressed to a point where his father was willing to see friends and family, which Kyle assumed was a good sign. But his dad continued to show absolutely no interest in his company—and the business-related calls, voicemail messages, and e-mails began to pile up, all unanswered.

Thus, it came as no surprise when, three weeks after his mother’s funeral, Chuck Adelman, the general counsel of Rhodes Corporation, called Kyle and asked to meet with him. In addition to working for the company, Chuck was his father’s personal attorney and had been one of his best friends since college. Kyle agreed to meet him for lunch at a restaurant only a few blocks from the company’s downtown headquarters.

“Your father isn’t returning any of my calls,” Chuck led in after they ordered.

“From what I can tell, he’s not returning anyone’s calls,” Kyle said matter-of-factly.

Chuck spoke in a quiet tone, his eyes kind. “Look, I understand. I was there when your parents first met—it was Hash Wednesday, and we were on the quad. Your father spotted
your mother sitting under a tree, on a blanket with her friends, and said, ‘That is one totally groovy chick.’ He walked over and introduced himself, and that was it for both of them.”

“Oh my God. My parents told Jordan and me that they met in a bookstore, fighting over the last Classical Civilizations textbook. They were
stoned
at the time?” Having gone to the University of Illinois for six years, Kyle knew exactly what people did on the quad on Hash Wednesday.

Chuck paused. “Of course, a bookstore. It’s all coming back to me now.” He pointed. “The calculus textbook. Now that’s a cute story.”

“Classical Civ.”

“Probably best if we never mention this part of the conversation to your father.”

“Agreed,” Kyle said. “Now, aside from scarring me for life and ruining every sanitized, wholesome image I had of my parents’ first meeting, why else did you want to meet today?”

Chuck rested his arms on the table, getting serious. “He can’t do this, Kyle. He’s the CEO of a billion-dollar company.”

“And as CEO, I would think he’s entitled to some personal time,” Kyle growled protectively. “My mother just died three weeks ago.”

“I’m not trying to drag him into the office. But if he could at least make himself accessible. Pick up his cell phone once in a while. Let people know that he’s still in command,” Chuck said. “The other board members are starting to wonder what’s going on.”

“Surely they understand these are unusual circumstances.”

“They do. But that doesn’t change the fact that this is a privately owned business. Your father
is
Rhodes Corporation.” He shifted in his chair, as if debating how to continue. “As general counsel for the company, I’m obliged to mention that in the event your father was ever to become incapacitated, he named you as his legal representative. Which means that you would be in charge of running his affairs, both personal and business—including the controlling management of the company.”

Kyle felt the burning in his eyes. He’d known, obviously,
that his father had always wanted him to work for Rhodes Corporation but had had no idea that he had this much faith in him. It was an honor, and also an incredible responsibility, but most of all he could not believe that things had gotten to the point where he and Chuck needed to have this conversation. True, his father wasn’t himself these days. But no matter how messed up the situation was, there was one thing they needed to get straight, right then and there.

“
No one
is declaring my father incapacitated,” Kyle said, looking the general counsel right in his eyes. “That man built an empire—he’s a genius and an extremely powerful businessman. I dare anybody to say otherwise.”

Chuck’s expression was sympathetic. “I’m not the enemy here, Kyle. I’m trying to help. You’re right, he did build an empire. And now somebody needs to start running it. Otherwise, people will begin to say all sorts of things, whether you and I like it or not.”

Kyle got the message, loud and clear. And during the thirty-minute drive along Lake Michigan back to his father’s north shore estate, he debated what approach to take. Ultimately, he decided the direct one was best.

When he got back, he walked straight into the study and found his dad sitting at his desk, scrolling listlessly through photographs of an older-model car on his computer. Since his mother’s death, his father had expressed some interest in restoring a classic car, something he used to do as a hobby before his company had exploded with the Rhodes Anti-Virus.

“Find anything?” Kyle asked as he took a seat in front of the desk.

“A guy up in McHenry is selling a ‘68 Shelby,” Grey said in a subdued tone.

Every time his father spoke, it struck Kyle how
unlike
his father he seemed. Dispirited. Listless. Somber. A stark contrast to the dynamic, almost larger-than-life man Kyle had known for twenty-four years.

“McHenry is only about an hour away. Maybe we can drive out there tomorrow and take a look at it,” Kyle said.

“Maybe.”

Kyle had been suggesting excursions like this for the last three weeks, none of which had come to fruition. Although his dad talked about rebuilding a car, he didn’t seem to have much interest in taking any steps to actually pursue that. Then again, he didn’t have much interest in anything.

Grey turned to Kyle with a tired smile. “Maybe you could drive out there and look at the car for me. You need to get out of this house as much as I do.”

“Actually, I did go out today. I met Chuck Adelman for lunch.”

Grey’s face went flat. “Really. And what did Chuck have to say?”

Kyle decided it probably wasn’t the best time to bring up the Hash Wednesday revelation. Frankly, the image of his father wearing bell-bottoms, smoking a joint, and calling his mother a “totally groovy chick” was wrong on so many levels he wanted to erase the whole thing from his memory. “You need to start returning calls and e-mails,” he said bluntly. His father was a grown man—perhaps a little tough love was in order.

“Chuck is overstepping his bounds. He shouldn’t have gotten you involved in this.”

“I think it would be good for you to get back to work, Dad. It’ll be something to take your mind off things.”

“I don’t want anything to take my mind off things.”

Kyle sat quietly for a moment. “It’s not dishonoring Mom if we move forward with our lives. That’s what she would want us to do.”

Grey turned back to his computer. “I gave up so much for that company. Not anymore.”

The comment took Kyle by surprise. Because his father had grown up with little money, he’d always been particularly proud of his success. Talk to the man for five minutes, and he would find some subtle way of bragging about the fact that the Rhodes Anti-Virus protected one in every three computers in America. “What are you talking about? You love that company.”

Grey shook his head. “Not as much as I loved her. She was…everything. I just hope she knew that.”

His father began crying. Kyle started to rise from his chair, but his father immediately held out a hand.

“Don’t. I’m fine,” Grey said. He wiped his eyes, quickly composing himself.

“Dad—”

“I put off so many things,” Grey said, cutting him off. “That safari trip, for example. How many times did your mother talk about that? She did all the research and planned this two-week vacation to South Africa and Botswana for us. What did I say? That things were
too busy
for me and that we would go next year.” He struggled to control his emotions. “Guess I broke that promise, didn’t I?”