Page 63 of The Paradise Problem

I keep walking.

“I’m not going to have expanded my father’s business into what it is today only to see it crumble in the hands of my three sons!”

“That’s the point, Dad,” I say over my shoulder. “You have two other sons already working with you.”

“Alex is a fucking head case!” my father booms, and the words echo down the path.

He didn’t even bother to consider Jake, and I laugh humorlessly. “Maybe if you did more than humiliate him once in a while, he wouldn’t be.”

He snorts. “Like you’re one to talk.”

“I’m not his father.”

We walk in tense silence, emerging onto the beach, walking toward the wooden footpath leading to the bungalows.

“If this is about PISA—” he starts, but I immediately cut him off with a low, growled, “I’m not fucking talking about PISA with you, Dad.”

“What do you want from me? A hug and an apology?” He laughs incredulously. “You know why we handled it that way. You were a kid. A fucking child when you made that software. You would rather I shoulder the blame and watch the entire company fall apart because of what happened with a thing you created?”

I wheel on him, white-hot with fury. “You and I both know it was never created for that. So, yes. I expected you to shoulder the blame because what ended up happening was your fault.”

“So that’s why you skulked away?” he sneers. “Took the limp-dick route through life instead? Went to school to prove to the world what a nice guy you are, that you couldn’t possibly have been behind all that ugliness because deep down you’re a jacket-with-elbow-patches good guy who teaches a bunch of rich virgins about how to be a nice executive when they get their first seven-figure salary?”

“I had to redeem myself!” I yell. “I had to run as far away from that world as possible just so I could—could—could imagine a time when everyone we knew wasn’t talking about me and what they thought I’d done. I had to find a way to get myself out of the business section of every newspaper in the world. At twenty, Dad. Twenty. None of the blowback ever touched you, and you never even fucking acknowledged it.”

Dad’s expression morphs. His teeth pull back into a grotesque sneer. “You want a thank-you? Fuck you. You want an apology? Fuck you. The only reason you exist is because of what I gave you. The only reason you can live is because of my money.” He steps closer, getting in my face, his spit hitting my chin as he huffs out a derisive laugh. “Do you forget? Everything I gave you, I can take away just as fast. I own you. Every single one of you.”

He shoves past me down the path toward his bungalow and I feel the planks beneath my feet vibrate with the force of his footsteps.

He has no way of knowing how direct a hit that was. That he’s got me in the soft underbelly, my biggest fear, that it won’t just be my life I’ll ruin, it will be all of ours. I haven’t felt this close to crying since I was twenty years old and my entire world shattered around me. I never wanted to go back to this feeling, and yet here we are. I can’t avoid it if he’s nearby. I just can’t.

Shaking, I turn down the bridge toward our bungalow.

But the sight of Anna staring down from the upper balcony pulls me up short. The look in her eyes, the devastation gleaming there… she heard all of that. Or at least enough to know it was messy and painful. Enough to question what the fuck PISA is, what the fuck I did, what my father did, what on earth could have happened between us eleven years ago that has angry, ashamed tears burning the surface of my eyes.

I don’t want to talk about it. I don’t ever want to go back to that time in my life. But when she comes down the stairs, hurrying, like she’s in a rush to get to me, I let go of all the rational hesitations, the reality of our circumstances, and walk faster, too, desperate to get to her. We crash together with her two steps above me on the stairs, pulling me into her arms. Wordlessly, she presses my face to her ribs and holds me, whispering a soothing “Shhh, it’s okay” against the top of my head. I send my arms around her hips, curling into her as I shake. I don’t know what she can possibly be thinking, and for the moment, I don’t care. I have never needed anything more than I need this, from her, right now.

Nineteen

ANNA

I have always been an oversharer. Whether I slept badly, am experiencing some minor tummy upset, or have strong emotions about the ending of a long-running TV series, chances are, if you ask, I’m going to tell you how I feel. If someone doesn’t really care how I am, then why not just say hello and go about it? I prefer honesty, I prefer openness, I prefer real. I know I’m lucky to have been raised by a dad who impressed upon me the importance of sharing my emotions, but I don’t think I realized just how lucky until I was surrounded by a half dozen dysfunctional Westons.

It’s not that family breakfast the next morning is awkward, exactly, but the elephant in the room—that Ray Weston is a controlling, narcissistic asshat and his entire family has to make excuses for his behavior and accommodate his moods—is impossible to ignore. Everyone is walking on eggshells. People cut their food delicately, with intense focus, asking about the weather, remarking upon the size of the waves down on the beach, laughing loudly at his jokes that aren’t particularly funny. Charlie is getting married in a matter of days; she is about to embark on the emotional journey of her lifetime with a man who gazes at her like she’s made of stardust, and somehow Ray is the center of attention. No one is asking Charlie and Kellan anything about their nerves, their hopes, their shared dreams.

Just watching ten seconds of this family at a meal, even if Liam had told me nothing at all about them, I’d know Jake Weston was the charming underachiever who evaded his father’s attention, Alex Weston was the intense pleaser who chased his father’s attention, and Liam Weston was the golden child who naturally exuded the kind of capability and virtue that a narcissist gloms onto and takes credit for. I’m sure West rarely rocked the boat, and I’d bet all the money he’s paying me that his decision to pursue a doctorate and the almost five-year estrangement that followed was his first real bird flip to his shitty dad. Which, good for him.

And yet, here we are.

Next to me, West stares out at the water, chewing a bite of egg-white omelet so thoroughly I think it ceases to exist as matter. When he senses my attention, he blinks over to me, gaze unfocused, and returns my smile with a distracted, flickering one of his own. But even if he’s mentally aloof, physically, he’s close: his shoulder is pressed against mine; he eats with his left hand and has his right hand planted firmly on my upper thigh. It’s supposedly all for show, but news flash, Dr. Weston: nobody can see your hand under the table.

It didn’t surprise me that he put himself back together almost immediately after our hug yesterday. He’s clearly been taught that feelings are bullshit and the only action that’s acceptable is one that benefits his father. “I’m gonna grab more coffee and then we can go,” he says. “Want anything?”

“I’m good.”

West stands from the bench and his spot is immediately filled by Blaire.

She nods to West’s retreating form. “Somebody seems a little tense this morning.” My eyes immediately drop to her boobs, and my goodness that’s a lot of cleavage for brunch. “Bad sex earlier?”

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