“Just think…” I said, trying to reassure her, “when I return after my time in Maiduguri, I’ll never want to leave the comfort of the carriage house again.”
Her eyes brightened, as I knew they would when talking about me actually having purchased a place in which to settle down, then she tapped her lips with a finger. I knew what was coming next. My mother, as delicate looking as she appeared, was a shrewd businesswoman and loved to “tinker” in real estate, as she called it, increasing her astounding inherited wealth exponentially over the past few decades.
“Are you quite sure you wouldn’t be happier with a Central Park view, darling? Sting’s penthouse is on the market and word on the street is that I could snap it up at fifty-two.”
It was hard not to roll my eyes. In my mother’s world, fifty-two million dollars was a bargain she could easily write a check for. I remembered how she’d just looked at me like I was some alien being zapped into her life when I purchased the 1903 carriage house and began the process of bringing the old building back to life. It wasn’t finished yet, but the contractor and decorator I hired came well recommended and promised to have it completed months before I returned from overseas.
“You should drop into the carriage house and see the work they’ve already done,” I said to distract her further. “They’ve pulled down the ceilings to find the most incredible beams. I can’t believe anyone in their right mind thought it was a good idea to plaster over them. And the floor will be the showcase of the entire building when they’re finished.”
The distraction worked, and Mom brightened, tucking the lace back into the sleeve of her twenty-thousand-dollar Versace gown. “Yes, I’ll do that. I’ll keep everything on track while you’re…” She sniffed again. Shit, the handkerchief was making a reappearance. “Gone.”
I was saved from the weepy look Mom gave me as a three-tier cake was wheeled into the room. I blew out a breath and forced a smile onto my face as the mayor clapped me on the back and a slice of the delicious cake was handed to me.
“The Big Apple is going to miss you, son,” the white-haired man said, and I set down the cake, knowing there would be no additional time to finish it. I shook his hand, then all the other hands that followed, saying the right things as the evening finally came to a close. My parents had thought it fitting to have me a “sendoff” party that had morphed from a small “intimate” dinner of twenty to a gathering of nearly two hundred in their expansive penthouse, or “city home” as Mom called it. The “country home” on King’s Point was simply too much of a drive.
“Can we leave yet?” Josh moaned as he handed me another whiskey. Best friend since boarding school, Joshua Latimer wasn’t impressed by this shindig either. Like me, he’d smiled pleasantly through many of them during his life.
I looked at my watch. “Half hour.”
“Thank the fuck.” He tossed the expensive drink back in one gulp and smiled as one of the supreme court judge’s daughters passed by, giving his tie a little tug. He winked at me. “See you in thirty.”
I snorted. “Five, if rumor is true.”
He flipped me off and followed the pretty blonde down the hallway, refraining to tell him she’d tugged my tie earlier. I hadn’t been interested. Hell, I hadn’t been interested in much of anything in the past couple months. The cottage house had been a nice distraction while I waited to step onto the plane and be gone from this place for a while. Truth be told, I was burned out. Or maybe I was just fucking tired and needed to sleep.
My last shift in the emergency room had been last night, and I hadn’t been able to save a little girl with three bullet holes in her abdomen and chest. She’d fought so hard. Just eight years old, she survived the ambulance ride and had been so brave. Even as tears streamed in rivers down the side of her face, she hadn’t been able to voice her fear, just beseeched me with big brown eyes to save her.
I tried. I failed. And the wails of her mother as I told her the shocking news still rang in my ears.
Tossing back the whiskey, I forced the thought away. Forced away the thoughts of all those who had died under my scalpel.
I couldn’t save them all. I knew that. And I hated it.
It was good that I was going away.
I needed to get away.
Away from the gangs who killed innocent young girls over a pair of shoes. Away from the victimization that had become America. The pointing fingers. The lawsuits. The expectations.
God. The fucking expectations that threatened to suffocate the entire world, including me.
Once, in a philosophy class I’d been forced to sign up for at Columbia, one of the students had learned who I was and the wealth behind my name. During an open discussion, the pretty little brunette had snarled at how pathetic I was to not, in her words, “Share your billions with the rest of America, with the world!” Leesa was of the even distribution mindset and wore the “money is evil” t-shirt above her expensive True Religion jeans that she’d purchased with her daddy’s credit card to prove it — in her mind, at least. I’d shut her up when I pulled out my wallet and fished a five and three one-dollar bills from it, handing the eight dollars to her.
“What the fuck is this for?” Leesa had snapped, crushing the bills in her fist, eyes blazing.
I lifted a shoulder and spread out my hands. “Your share of my wealth.”
Her eyes had narrowed as she tossed the eight dollars at my chest. I hadn’t bothered to catch them, just let them fall to the floor. “Do you think I’m stupid?”
“No.” There had been twenty sets of eyes on me at that point, but I hadn’t cared. Even back then, I was tired of the big-dreams-with-limited-thinking mentality that had surrounded me. “But I think your rose-colored glasses have caused you to be mathematically challenged.”
Leesa stomped her foot. “I’m very good at math.” Then she snarled, “Even for a girl.” She was trying to turn the argument into the dirty waters of sexism if she could. I’d seen it before. Women were like that, twisting and turning every damn thing you said until you couldn’t remember the original words.
I hadn’t let her derail me from the point I was trying to make. “Terrific. How much money do you think I have in my trusts, investments, and accounts?”
She crossed her arms over her chest and huffed. “The internet said over…” her nose wrinkled like she smelled something bad, “a billion ridiculous dollars.”
“You might want to double-check your sources. If I sold all my assets and cashed out my trusts, it’s closer to two point five billion,” I told her, being brutally honest. No way in hell was I going to have her do some vengeful fact-checking and accuse me of lying later. “There are over three hundred and twenty million people in the United States. If I distributed my wealth equally to all of them, that…” I nodded to the crumpled bills on the floor, “is your share. I hope you enjoy your caramel macchiato with it.”