Page 58 of Absolution

I smirk. Of course. Nothing says bonding like an ambush with clients. I glance over at the kids, packed in next to me at the round dining table, making a glorious mess of the syrup-drenched pancakes.

“Go enjoy the day with your father,” my mother says from the other end of the room. She’s wearing a silk robe and a tight smile. “I’ll watch the kids.”

I nod, pushing back my chair and tossing my napkin on the plate. “Hey, would you guys like to spend the day with Grandma?”

“Yes.” Iris says, while Jemma and Levi nod, their mouth full of half-chewed pancake.

“Just call me if you need anything,” I tell them, tapping the tablet from the centre of the table. “I’ll come right back, okay?”

I glance at my mom. “Levi already took his meds. I’ll be home before his next dose. Just follow their lead, they know what to do.”

She gives me a look over her rimless glasses. “Kyle. I’ve raised a child before, you know.”

I smile tightly. Technically, yes. Though grandma did most of the actual raising.

My father insists on driving his beloved vintage convertible to the club. He calls it “The Shark” and handles it like it’s part of his own myth. I sit in the passenger seat, watching his knuckles grip the wheel, rings flashing in the sun.

We pull up to the club, and instead of heading to the golf carts, he leads me toward the lounge.

“I thought we were playing a few holes,” I say, slowing down.

He gives me a look over his shoulder. “Come on, son. Real networking happens over whiskey.”

“It’s ten a.m.”

He doesn’t reply. Just raises an eyebrow like I’m embarrassing him.

Inside the doors, it’s a different world entirely.

Men in tailored suits recline in overstuffed leather chairs, cigars in hand. A haze of smoke floats just below the vaulted ceiling. Waitresses in what I can only describe asaprons pretending to be skirtsglide between them, refilling glasses and laughing at things that aren’t funny.

It looks like something out ofMad Men, ifMad Menhad a ‘no women unless they’re serving you’ rule.

Jesus.

No wonder it’s members-only. Andmen-only.

I glance around the room. Everyone here looks like a version of my father.

And I wonder,what the hell am I doing here?

I may not know exactly who I am yet. But I do know who Idon’twant to be.

Watching my sixty-year-old father flirt with a woman young enough to be his granddaughter, with his hand casually resting on her ass like it’s a damn armrest, makes me physically sick.

Is this me?

Jesus.

The cigar smoke coils thick in my throat. I cough once, then again, harder. My chest tightens, sharp and sudden. A bolt of pain shoots across my ribcage.

I freeze.

It’s just the smoke, I tell myself, but then the pain deepens, radiating up toward my shoulder, and a wave of dizziness crashes over me.

I stumble outside, vision tunnelling, clutching the railing as the stone steps blur beneath me. My knees buckle near a manicured hedge, and I double over, gasping.

My heart’s racing, wild and uneven. It feels wrong. Like something’s misfiring inside me.

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