Page 75 of My Boss's Sons

I laughed bitterly. “Why? What’s the fucking point?”

“If you get thrown in jail, any hope you have of taking over this company is going to be trashed. I don’t want it but you do. Get your shit together before you lose everything you’ve ever wanted.” Alex flexed his hands at his sides, a sign that while he was trying to calm me down, he was ready to fly off the handle himself.

“I’m not going to hit him.” Even as I said the words, I felt like they were a lie.

“No one said anything about hitting him. The fact that that thought even popped into your head tells me everything I need to know, Noah.” Ethan had been uncharacteristically silent on the ride back from Sophia’s house. I could feel his anxiety and pain rolling off him in waves.

The elevator doors opened and I stalked out. “I’m not going to hit him.”

“Here we go.” Alex held up his hand to silence Dad’s assistant who stood up at the sight of us. “He won’t be taking any calls right now.”

“You can’t go in there! He’s in a meeting!” The woman tried to get in Alex’s way, but he just brushed past her.

Alex barged in first with me on his heels and the sight that greeted us was something I’d never get out of my head for as long as I lived. Sitting at his desk with his pants around his ankles and a woman on his lap was our father.

“What the fuck?” Alex’s shout shocked Dad into action and he pushed the woman off his lap and rushed to fix his pants. Alex grabbed the woman’s dress from the corner of the desk and tossed it to her. “Leave.”

“Ethan. God, yes. You feel so good.”

Dad slammed his fist down on his keyboard and the sound of Sophia’s voice shut off but it was too late. The only sound in the room for a few deafening seconds was of the woman leaving. Then chaos erupted all at once.

Ethan was across the room, landing a solid punch to our father’s face before any of us could react. He grabbed Dad up by his collar and we all watched as Dad’s face went red. “You sick bastard. Erase the fucking tape. Erase it right now or I swear to god, I’ll throw you off the top of this building. Erase it!”

Alex pulled Ethan off and held him by his arms while he struggled to hit Dad again. I stood still, rooted in place with fire burning every part of me. The man I’d loved and respected was just cheating on our mom and watching the revenge porn he had of our girlfriend. In the blink of an eye, it was like my entire life up until that point was different, dirtier.

Dad jabbed at his computer again and Sophia’s sweet voice filled the room once more. “Fuck!”

My feet finally moved. I shoved Dad away from the computer and stopped the video. Then I went through the computer while Dad silently watched and erased every trace of the video I could find. Instead of taking chances, I yanked the cords from the computer and stacked it on top of his laptop so I could take it with me and give it to someone who could be sure the thing was erased.

“What the hell are you doing, Noah? Put my computers back!” The shock had worn off for Dad and he was regaining his characteristic big guy persona. “Fuck, Ethan! What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”

“What is wrong with you?! Why were you watching that?” Ethan struggled to get out of Alex’s hold but Alex was hanging on tight.

“Let’s just talk about this in a reasonable way. Jesus. How the fuck am I going to explain a black eye to your mother?” Dad sat heavily in his chair and rubbed his face. “Little shit. You pack a punch.”

“Why’d you do it?” I didn’t recognize my own voice as I stood over my father. “Why did you lie to us and turn us against Sophia?”

“What are you talking about?”

I moved closer and gripped the back of his chair. “Was it because she didn’t want you? Was that why you chose to punish her?”

“What makes you think I was punishing her?” His voice was cold, devoid of the warmth he spoke to us with around other people.

“I saw the video of you attacking her!” I slapped his chair and watched him flinch. “Her assistant’s wife is a women’s rights attorney. I think she’d be interested in that tape. Mom sure was. Your reign of terror is over. You’re done. I’m not going to let you hurt another woman I care about.”

“Disgusting pig.” Ethan’s voice shook. “You belong in prison for what you did to her.”

“Can we all just grow up? I’m a man. I have needs and I’m not going to apologize for those needs! You boys are the same. You twisted little shits are all fucking the same woman. You think that’s not disgusting to some people? How’d you figure it out?” Dad looked at me with a smirk. “I know it wasn’t you, my golden boy.”

I punched him without thinking. I felt his nose break and knelt so I was in his space. “You’re not sorry for anything you did, are you?”

Holding his bloody nose, he shoved out of his chair and faced off with me. “I didn’t do anything! Your girlfriend doesn’t loosen up for anything less than a group fuck, apparently.”

Alex’s voice was dangerously calm. “Call a board meeting. We’ll present the evidence against this sick fuck and they’ll vote him out. We won’t hurt him by letting him see our disgust. We’ll take away the thing he loves instead.”

“No, the fuck you won’t. The board won’t remove me. Half of those guys would’ve done the same thing I did, but worse. You’re just as powerless as you’ve always been.” Marching over to his liquor cabinet, he poured himself a few fingers of scotch. “I try and I try. I built this company. I prepared you boys to take over and rule the fucking world. You have everything you could ever want at your fingertips because of me. And this is how you repay me?”

“We have everything. The theft accusations, the fake PI, the assault. The board won’t have a choice.” Alex’s cold stare was punctuated with a dark smirk. “We won’t give them a choice,Dad. They might be sick fucks, just like you, but they love their money. If half the shit you’ve done goes public, they’ll lose everything, especially after the three of us give a publicstatement and several highly televised interviews about how we went to them first, hoping they’d do the right thing.”

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