𝖂𝖍𝖆𝖙 𝕸𝖔𝖓𝖊𝖞 𝕵𝖚𝖘𝖙 𝖂𝖔𝖓'𝖙 𝕭𝖚𝖄 𝕸𝖊

รɦαω

"You're such a lucky bastard," my brother tells me as we drive back from an early morning settlement negotiation.

"No," I tell him."Just a rich one."

Luck didn't just pay for having one of the best corporate lawyers in New York to defend me, money did.

Sebastian pinches his nose, "I can't believe that attorney made them settle for that little."

"That's why called him a shark," I tell my brother."He's a cold-blooded and unreasonable brute and I respect him for it. . ."

"Well I don't," he chimes in."Those people your shark attorney just tore apart were once employees of yours."

I glanced over at my younger brother, I had almost forgotten that he devoted himself to being the champion of the little guy.

"They deserved a fair settlement after the hell you put them through." He adds.

"They tried to drag my company through the mud," I snarl. "They shouldn't have walked away with a dime."

Sebastian gives me a dirty look," Is the company all you care about?" He hisses and opens the door and slips out of the car.

"Seabass," I call him by his nickname but he disappears into the city.

"Where should I drop you?" my driver asks, slowing the car.

"The same restaurant I had lunch yesterday," I tell him in a hoarse tone, my voice rough after having spent an entire day answering questions from lawyers.

"I don't where that is," he whispers in a nervous voice."I wasn't your driver, yesterday."

"Just drive downtown, and I'll tell you where to stop." I give him simple instructions.

He manages to follow them and stops off in front of the restaurant. I walk out of the car and straight to the bar inside.

"Whiskey," I snap my fingers to get the bartender's attention, ". . .neat."

He nods, pours two fingers of whiskey into a glass, and slides it to me.

"You promised me, wouldn't drink," a soft hand stops me from downing the drink.

I consider my ex-fiancée who tries to take the drink from my hand.

"I don't remember promising you that I wouldn't," I tell her.

Mallory and I may have ended our engagement years ago, but we just tell everyone that we were too busy with our careers to play wife and husband. The truth was, that Mallory never wanted to marry me. It was her grandfather's influence that made her accept my proposal in the first place. She much preferred a woman's companionship to that of a man's. And no matter how greatly I could love her, I could never change who she was.

Though she refused to admit it openly, we both understood the reality - she was waiting for her dear old gramps to kick the bucket so she could get her inheritance and be free of our sham of an engagement.

"You're going drink yourself to death," she says.

I deflect with humor, not wanting to acknowledge that might have a drinking problem."Yeah. You're right. But then you won't have to pretend you give a shit about me."

"You're truly an ill-humored jerk," she scoffs."No wonder, no one likes being around you."

─── ⋆⋅☼⋅⋆ ───

I lie back against my seat, messaging my throbbing temples. I get a headache every time I am forced to listen to the stupidity that my supposedly world-class sales team comes up with. I hated nothing more than professional incompetence.

"Shut it off," I yell to the guy working the projector. "I am tired of seeing how awful you all are at your jobs." I point to everyone on the team who just presented their ideas for our new sales campaign. "This brand stands for quality and timeless craftsmanship, not for gimmicky trends that no one will care about in a week or two. So, I suggest that you get back to the drawing board and come up with a sales campaign that's in line brand messaging of this company." I shout.

I stand up from behind the table and slam the door on my way out of the conference room.

"Shaw," Sebastian tries to keep up with my pace. "What did I tell you about shouting at the employees? Do you want another lawsuit filed against the company?" He follows me into the elevator.

"What?" I snark."Should I've praised them for being bad at their jobs?"

I am getting tired of him being buddy-buddy with everyone in this office, it only made room for inefficient work.

"No . . . but could try motivating them a bit instead of being a hardass." He pleads with me.

"You motivate them," I snarl."You're the VP of Sales . . . if anything their failure says that you're bad at your job."

Sebastian is shaking his head. A smile forms on his face, the kind of smile that isn't a smile at all but a tight-lipped expression of sadness. "I am your brother," he reminds me."If can't be nice to anyone that works here -"

"You're not," I cut him off. His being my brother doesn't excuse the fact that he allowed the people he's in charge of to waste my time with a pathetic presentation. "Not when you're on the clock. From hours 9 to 5, you're just my employee."

The elevator stops at the top floor and I step off in the direction of my office.

I tug open a drawer from my desk, and it's not there. No Aspirin . . . No Pandol . . . No Tylenol, nothing is there that could help with my headache.

"Fuck." I groan, slamming the desk so hard that the drawer falls to the floor, breaking. Joe . . . Josh . . . whatever my assistant's name, is needless to say fired.

I take out my old MP3 player from my pocket, untangle the earphones, and close my eyes to listen to rain sounds. I almost fell into a nap when both my VP of Finance and head of HR walked into my office giggling.

"Ladies," I breathe, not in the mood for their overly cheery attitudes. "Have you found me another assistant yet ?"

"We have two candidates for you to choose from," Charisma drops two files on the desk.

I quickly skim over the files, and back up at them.

"Really? You're wasting my time with this." I chastise them.

"This lady has an MBA from Northwestern," I flash the resume in front of them. "How the hell does a guy who didn't go to college get an interview in the first place ?" I yell.

"Because . . . that guy who didn't go to college scored better than all the other applicants on that obnoxious IQ test you forced us to add to the application." Felix sasses.

"Really?" I huff, taking a second look at the guy's resume, this time ignoring the scarcely empty education column. The only experience he had listed was working as a bellboy in a small-town hotel and some custodial work but he cleverly found a way to only draw attention to his transferable skills. But, I need someone that has some sort of business acumen.

"And he was so gorgeous." I hear Felix whisper to Charisma.

"Did you see the cute way he slicked his hair back ?" Charisma asks her in a hushed tone.

"Not to mention how good that brown pinstripe shirt looked on him," Felix whispers.

The two workwives continue their back-and-forth banter on just how gorgeous this guy is that I start to think I had mistakenly sent them scouting for models instead of a personal assistant.

"I am not hiring anyone because they're good-looking," I say to their disappointment.

"Did we fail to mention he's also quick-witted and charming ?" they say in unison.

"I don't care," I tell them."You'll hire the girl."

I am on the brink of shoving them out of my office when my current assistant scurries back into the office.

I motion for him to enter, and he tentatively steps inside.

"Where are the pills I asked you to go out and get me ?" I demand.

"I... I forgot," he stammers.

"You forgot?" I roar. " Well, since you like forgetting so much . . . why don't you forget that you have a job and don't come in for work tomorrow."

"But sir?" he pleads.

"No buts," I cut him off firmly. "You're fired."

I turn in the direction of Charisma and Felix, "Looks like I need an extra assistant," I remark.

"You can hire . . ." I glance back at the resume, ". . . Mr. Summers." I tell them.

─── ⋆⋅☼⋅⋆ ───

They say the true meaning of home is sanctuary . . . a safe place but my home fails to live up to the meaning.

Maybe money couldn't buy happiness after all. Money had bought me this luxury home, but not the happiness to make it an actual home.

When I brought the house, I dreamt of how Mallory and I would've filled every single of the room with only the happiest of memories.

The only thing that dream does now is haunt me.

I push inside the house and head straight up to my bedroom. I go into bathroom and toss a two maybe three sleeping pills into my palm and toss my head to swallow them with less bit of water.

I drop myself into bed, knowing that I would wake up tomorrow as the same swallow hard-hearted man I was today. Who had all the money in world yet none of the happiness.