Page 35 of Unravel You

Zack put his hands up in surrender. “I don’t need another ass-whooping. Wesley?”

“I’m good. How about a shot instead?” Wesley turned to me. “Got business to talk to you about anyway. You’ll be more amiable if I’m not messing up your pretty face.” He hooked his arm around my neck.

“Shot sounds good.” I shoved him off me.

“Jeez, this place is a real maze.” She gripped my arm as I ushered her down the hall to the wine cellar and the double doors that led to the lower level of the gardens.

“It was worse before. There was no open space at all. The basement was five different rooms that served no real purpose. We split it into two rooms with a great area in the middle.”

“Admit it—you just wanted the booze right next to the gym.” Zack stood at the bottom of the garden steps and let Valentina go first.

Valentina stopped halfway and turned to me. “Do you mind if I go for a walk?”

“I’ll come with you.” I offered her my hand. Behind her, Wesley rolled his eyes.

“No, it’s fine. I just want to see something real quick. I’ll meet you up there.”

“Okay.”

Valentina skipped down back to the gardens. Wesley threw his arm around me and ushered me back to the upper terrace. “She’ll be fine. This place is a fortress, although we did see a fox the other day.”

“She’s an adult. Let her be.” Zack plopped himself on one of the Adirondack chairs.

Wesley disappeared through the kitchen door and came back with three glasses. He set them on the side table and sat next to me. “Drink up. You’re not gonna like what I have to say.”

“Out with it.”

“I’m passing on your proposal.”

“What? You realize I’m the client, right? I pay you.” I pointed at myself, then him.

“Yes. You pay me to make sure you have enough money to pay me the next cycle.”

“Did you talk it over with Mom?”

He shook his head and took a long swig of his bourbon. “No.”

“I think we should ask her.”

“What the fuck is wrong with you? This is not a solid investment. High risk, well above what I’m able to tolerate. And if this were anyone else’s idea, you wouldn’t tolerate it either. You can’t keep losing your money because Mom wants you to.”

I braced my arms on my knees and met his gaze. In her day, Mom was good at her job. But lately she was all over the place, especially when it came to investments for me. Since I moved half my money over to her wealth management company, I’d been steadily losing money. I’d stayed because it was Mom. Now that Wesley was back and working with her, he’d been pushing back.

“I get that this is your way of saying sorry for leaving. I love Mom, but she has to let that shit go. She has to let you go.”

“I thought if we worked on it together, she’d come around.”

Zack leaned forward to look at me. “You screwed up, man. But it’s obvious you have no idea what you screwed up on.”

“Enlighten me.” I rolled my eyes.

“Mom doesn’t want your money. She wants you. Real quality time with you.”

“Says the guy who’s been gone for two years.”

“I’m saving lives. She loves that. I left for something bigger than us. To make a change.” He sat back with a satisfied look on his face.

I downed the rest of my drink. Lately, no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t keep the people I loved happy. Just a few hours ago, Valentina was ready to leave me. Now, after losing millions to feed her portfolio, Mom and I had not made progress. Talk to her, Valentina had said. Was it really that easy? If the house renovation and investing a big chunk of my money into her company hadn’t done the trick, what could I possibly say to her to show her I was sorry?

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