When Empires Fall (54 page)

“Very funny,” she replied drily, reaching over to take another bite of asparagus, her eyes clouding then with concern and irritation. “That bitch Jorja Hale has been coming to see him all week. She’s bringing him his vices.”

“He was always a weak man. He can’t handle this life,” Raoul said conversationally, turning around to begin scrambling some eggs.

“Well, we know the reason for that now, don’t we?” She let out a long sigh and hugged her torso, feeling suddenly cold. “Somehow it doesn’t make me understand him any better, though. I feel only pity.”

“Man makes no choice in what he is given, only what he does with what he has.”

“And he chose to cower in the corner like a scared puppy,” she grimaced, rubbing her temple. “And, damnit, I shouldn’t feel sorry for locking him up. This week has gone smoother without me worrying about him making a scene at some bar or winding up in jail again.”

“Then don’t. You did what you thought was best,” Raoul reasoned, turning around to face her, a plate of breakfast food in his hands. He stared at her, quietly assessing the woman who was, strangely enough, his oldest friend. He had a tendency to burn his bridges with most other people, but never with her. “My advice,
cariño
?”

She met his eyes, feeling lost. “Yes, Raoul?”

He handed the plate to her, his mouth curving in a slow smile. “Speak to him. Make him see reason. And then ship him off to someplace where he won’t be a distraction.”

She nodded slowly, accepting the plate and staring down at its contents dully. Before she could say anything, however, the security guard rushed into the kitchen, looking pale as a ghost.

Madison lifted her head to look at him, her lips firming into a grim line at the glassy look of panic in his eyes.

“What happened?” she demanded to know, setting the plate aside and straightening, approaching him in a few quick steps.

“You need to come upstairs, Ms. Vasser. Immediately.” He shot a nervous glance over her shoulder at Raoul, who was glaring at him through narrowed, suspicious eyes. “Now, please.”

“Alright.” She glanced once over at Raoul before stalking off with the security guard, wondering what in the world could have possibly gone wrong now.

Moments later, she stood over her father’s body, and had the sharp, alarming realization that she was relieved he was gone.

They stood silently
in the hallway just outside the door of the suite while the police, medics, and coroner did what needed to be done. Grant had one arm wrapped around his sister and his other hand on the shoulder of his brother. Together, the three of them did the only thing they could do: they processed.

Madison was stonily quiet, her face revealing nothing. She wasn’t sure just what her brothers were feeling, but she knew in her heart that there was only a mountain of pity for their father inside of hers. She felt sorry that Win had gone down the road of self-destruction and that it had killed him, but there was little she could have done. He was a grown man capable of making his own choices and, no matter how hard she had tried, he had never listened to her. Instead he had simply continued feeding his addictions until they had ultimately killed him. It was pitiable and tragic, but certainly not unexpected. The only thing they could do was play down the story in the media and hope his death went largely unnoticed. The Vasser reputation had already suffered enough from Cyrus’ actions. She’d be damned if they would suffer any more because of Win.

Grant watched the EMTs wheel out the stretcher with the black body bag on it and had to grit his teeth and force himself to watch. It was closure, he knew, to play out all stages of death. The minute Madison had called him on his cell an hour or so before, he had raced immediately upstairs to see the body himself, to make sure he was truly gone. And now he would watch his father be wheeled away to the morgue.

Suicide. Somehow, perhaps sadly, it did not surprise him at all. On the contrary, a part of him had known for a while now that his father would likely attempt something of this nature. It didn’t make the fact that it had happened any easier to swallow, but at least it wasn’t completely out of the blue.

One of the cops emerged from the room after the body and made his way towards them, his expression professionally distant and unreadable. He nodded to the three of them politely before speaking.

“We found this in the bedroom.” He held up a clear plastic evidence bag with a mostly used joint in it. “We will need to wait on the toxicology report, but from a quick test it appears as though this joint may have been laced with PCP or some other substance, which may explain your father’s actions.”

“You’re saying the drugs made him commit suicide?” Grant asked doubtfully. “He had been under a lot of pressure recently, as we all have. Don’t you feel
that
is likely the reason he did this?”

“It’s possible, Mr. Vasser. However, I am just letting you know all of the possibilities before we dig in and find the truth.”

“Just don’t let this drug thing slip to the goddamn press,” Linc said, staring pointedly at the cop. “I don’t want to have to call down to the station house and have that shiny badge of yours taken away.”

The cop frowned as he met Linc’s eyes, but kept his remarks to himself. “We’ll need to close off this area. Are there guests in any of the rooms nearby?”

“No. Though the rooms have been on reserve for our family members who are flying in this afternoon,” Madison told him. “I suppose I will find other rooms for them.”

“See that you do.” The cop nodded again and headed back into the room, leaving them alone in the hallway.

“I swear, the saying ‘when it rains, it pours’ should be our new family motto.” Linc sneered, rubbing at his face angrily before letting out a heavy sigh. He glanced over at his siblings and shook his head. “What are we supposed to do now, guys? I’m out of ideas.”

“We should be grieving,” Grant pointed out flatly.

“Yeah, well, we don’t really have time for that, do we?”

“Would we grieve, though? If we had the time?” Madison asked suddenly, her amber eyes honing in on her brothers, darkly serious.

They considered her words carefully for a moment, neither really sure what to say.

When they said nothing, she continued. “The man has been a thorn in our sides since we were children. I, for one, am not ashamed to say that I am relieved he is gone.”

“You don’t mean that,” Grant shot back, staring down at her disbelievingly.

“That’s harsh, Mads,” Linc put in, eyebrows raised. “Thorn or not, he was still
our
thorn. He was the only father we’ll ever get, and yeah, I spent most of my life resenting him, but that never made him any less my father.”

“He’s not coming back this time. He’s gone for good,” Grant murmured softly, the first signs of dark grief showing in his eyes as he stared at her incredulously. “Eventually you will come to terms with that, and then you will mourn him.”

With that, he took off down the hallway, eager to get back to his office.

Linc stared at his sister, disappointment clear in his eyes. “You’re good at doing the ‘I’m a cold, distant bitch’ thing, sis, but there’s a time and a place. This is not it.”

He turned swiftly on his heel and followed Grant out, leaving her alone with her thoughts and regrets.

When he made it down to his office, Linc ran promptly into Walter, who shoved a stack of small call notes into his hands.

“Your phone has been ringing off the hook. The press wants a comment.”

“Tell them to fuck off,” Linc spat, tossing the stack of little papers promptly into the garbage can.

“Can I do that?” Walter asked, looking hopeful.

Linc sighed and collapsed into his desk chair, resting his head back against the cool black leather and shutting his eyes. “No. I wish, but no. Just tell them that the family has no comments at this time. Until I can draft up a proper press release, that’s what we’ll have to go with.”

“Sounds good, boss.” Walter nodded and started to leave, only to stop as Linc called him back in.

“Wait, stay here. And grab a notepad and a pen. I wanna brainstorm a bit.”

Walter did as he was told and sat down in one of the chairs facing Linc, notepad in hand.

Linc grabbed his slinky from his right hand desk drawer and began playing with it, rolling it from one hand to the other, his mind working over ideas and details. Whatever it took to keep from thinking about the fact that his father was dead. He didn’t think he was quite ready yet to come to terms with the cold, hard truth of it.

“Alright, so our reservation numbers are down by about fifteen percent from this month last year at this hotel alone, which means we’re in trouble. For all five hotels combined, we’re down about eight percent. If it continues to slump into next month, as we get into summer, then we’re really fucked. So we’re gonna have to revamp things a bit, try out some new ideas to keep our profit margins steady.”

“Like what?” Walter asked, eyes wide. “You’re not thinking of downsizing, are you?”

“Walter, you’re an intern. You work here for free, remember?” Linc grinned, one eyebrow raised. “If I was thinking of downsizing, why the hell would I let the one guy I don’t pay go?”

“Good point.” Walter smiled, feeling better. “Okay, so then what’s your idea?”

Linc leaned forward over his desk, eyes flashing with anticipation. “The same one I’ve been working on for months, son. Only I think the time has finally come to implement it.”

“Appeal to the middle class market? Offer some good deals?”

“Precisely.” Linc nodded, smacking his fist down upon his desk and grinning. “Write this down, Wally. We’re gonna shake things up.”

Grant stood alone
in the elevator hours later, leaning his head back against the upholstered wall as he shut his eyes tiredly. It had been, to say the least, a trying day.

There were still reporters outside the hotel, hoping for more information on his father’s suicide. Despite their best efforts, they wouldn’t get any. Not yet, anyway.

The rest of the Vasser clan had arrived that afternoon, arrival flights layered over the span of a few hours from varying parts of the country and the world. But eventually they had all come, some in stretch limos and others in sleek black town cars, home to where their family legacy had begun some hundred years earlier.

Fifty-four people in total, all of whom were staying in the hotel until the weekend, after Cyrus’ funeral. Some, he knew, might even stay on until Win’s funeral on the following Thursday.

It had been an exhaustingly stressful four hours of trying to get everyone situated, greeting family members he barely recognized, meeting their young children who he had never met. Now, it seemed that the family only got together when there was a funeral or a wedding to attend, a fact that in some ways saddened him and in other ways relieved him. After all, he didn’t think he could handle dealing with the stress of pulling everyone together more often than he already had to.

They had badgered him with questions, fears, and concerns, few of which he could actually answer or do anything about. It had left him feeling frustrated and guarded, which only made his mood sour and his patience short. But if he had snapped at a few too many of them or been callously short, then to hell with it. He wasn’t a saint. He had as much a right to be angry and upset as any of them.