Page 23 of When Hearts Collide

The thought echoes in my mind as I trace the faint scar on my eyebrow, the streak of pale skin almost invisible from far away. After all, it has been almost twenty years ago.

The scar is a reminder of the steep price to pay when you go off the beaten path. My path is with my family, toiling away in the family business, not in the wild, not in academia, not in anything else.

Ping.

I glance down, noting my driver’s text stating he has arrived.

A ball forms in my throat and I take one last look at my reflection before walking out the front door without a backward glance.

Chapter 10

ON THE SURFACE, the various theories of business ethics are contradictory. Utilitarianism suggests the correct ethical decision should maximize net benefit or minimize the costs for all parties. The Rights Theory dictates a decision should be evaluated based on the impacts to the individual and basic human rights of the stakeholder.

I want to offer an alternative argument. Aren’t these two theories two sides of the same coin? The right to autonomy, to make decisions for ourselves, for example, is a crucial factor to our happiness. Without considering individual happiness, how can we achieve happiness in the group?

My fingers smooth over the pendant nestled above my navy cable-knit sweater as I reread Millie’s first paper. The topic is to argue for a prevailing ethics theory.

“Without considering individual happiness, how can we achieve happiness in the group?”

Her words are arrows to my chest. She’s speaking directly to me, peering under the thousand-dollar suits, the shiny facade of a fancy title and a rich last name, and jabbing her weapon into the tender flesh of my heart, opening wounds no one else has ever seen before.

I clutch Mom’s pendant tighter in my grip, the metal edges digging into my palms before letting go and looking out the airplane window forty-plus thousand feet in the air.

“Mr. Anderson, we’ll arrive in New York City in one hour. Would you like any food or refreshments?”

“No, thank you. Are the arrangements ready when we land? We’re already running late.”

“Yes, sir. The helicopter is on standby and will take you straight to The Orchid,” the flight attendant replies before returning to the attendants’ quarters.

I settle back into my seat and close my eyes, but Millie’s words keep echoing in my ears. I can hear her dulcet voice whispering those sentiments to me then following with, why aren’t you living for yourself, Professor?

It’s madness. The thoughts are a disease corrupting my mind, attempting to obliterate my control, my morals. Why am I thinking of her?

I shouldn’t be noticing the way she fiddles with her fingers before she speaks in class. Or the way the swells of her chest move when she releases a deep exhale after delivering her answers with passionate ardor. Or how her eyes trail me as I walk around the room.

I shouldn’t notice the way her pale skin flushes a pretty pink when my eyes catch hers in the middle of lecture, her tongue flicking out and swiping her plump lips as if she’s nervous.

I shouldn’t live for the moments when she lingers after class to ask me follow-up questions on lecture topics, her pupils dilating when I mutter back a response. Or memorize the way the tips of her ears flush when she makes a comment that’ll make my lips twitch with repressed humor.

Gnashing my teeth together, I open my eyes and stare at the dimming skies, an endless stretch of dark blue, a thick blanket of clouds underneath us. I’m literally soaring above the earth, a sensation I used to revel in when I was six years old, when Dad took me on the jet for the first time.

Back then, as I stared at the great beyond, my face pressed against the windows, I felt like life was filled with endless possibilities. I could become a superhero like Dad, who I’d hear from classmates how many people worked for him, how he was a very important man.

I could become anything.

But now, as I behold the endless skies before me, the freedom it represents, suspended in midair with technology not making sense to me even as an adult, the elation I used to feel is long gone. Instead, the dark expanse out there seems to taunt me.

You can look, but you can’t have.

My phone pings with an incoming email with the heading “Congratulations to our newest tenured professors at ULA” and it’s a dagger digging into the bleeding wound in my chest.

What I’d give to be on the shortlist for tenure track, instead of dealing with IPOs, investors, and reporters. To spend my days buried in research, my specialty being corporate governance and ethics, something rising in importance in a world that is increasingly focused on the bottom line at the expense of morals and ethical standards.

But I can’t, because of the damn trust. The fucking prison.

All legal Andersons, defined as legitimate Andersons through marriage or bloodline, must work for the family business if they choose to work. Failure of one person to do so will cause the entire family to lose a significant portion of our wealth and control over Fleur. The funds will go to an array of government organizations.

Our forefathers thought this was a way to tie the family together, to ensure the wealth gets passed down the generations. It was an idea they brought with them from regency England back when the estates and fortunes of the aristocracy were entailed.

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