Humbled into submission? Did he really just say that?
I open my mouth to reply, but he cuts me off.
“There is no discussion. This is not a deal to be negotiated. That part happened while you were sobering up this morning. This is an order.” He leans back in his large, wingback office chair and smiles. “Do it. Or don’t. And if your answer is no, then goodbye, Cooper. I wish I could say it has been nice knowing you, but the truth is, the last fifteen years were practically unbearable. You make me tired. And I’m done dealing with you. This is your last chance with me. And before you say no, understand this. Either all three of you show up and run the rush, or you, Ax, and Lars are all cut off. The deal has been made. And it’s not just about money. I’ve already instructed your brothers that they will never speak to you again. If you walk away, you walk away from all of us. I will remove every picture of you I have. I will erase you from this family. Your brothers will forget you even exist.”
“Bull. Shit. Maybe Dane. But Jack?” No. Jack would not do that to me. We’re tight. Aren’t we?
“Call him. Ask him. Trust me, Cooper. They signed on before you were even bailed out this morning. We’re all tired of you.”
I take a deep breath. I can feel my whole body heating up with anger.
My father, on the other hand, looks like he’s been practicing that speech and waiting for this day since my mother died when I was five.
He has always hated me. Always blamed me.
“Say yes, Cooper. Say yes and run the rush camp, find the next crop of initiates, and I will give it all back.”
“Where am I supposed to fucking live over the summer? What am I supposed to drive? How am I supposed to eat, for fuck’s sake?”
“I didn’t take the boat. That should suffice.” I say nothing while my father smiles at me for a long moment. Then he goes all casual, leaning forward on his desk like he’s about to chat up an old friend. “Can I give you a piece of advice?”
I scoff. “Better late than never, I guess.”
“Always have a plan B, Cooper.”
“What does that even mean?”
“Stash some money away for the next time you get caught and need to negotiate.”
“What?”
“You are such a child. When Dane got this lecture, do you know what he told me?”
“Dane? When did Dane ever get a lecture?”
“He told me that if I cut him out, he’d have me arrested for at least fourteen felonies and I’d spend the rest of my life in prison wishing I could hang myself from the window bars using shoelaces.”
“I’m sorry?” Like. Nothing he just said makes sense.
“He,” my father says, “has balls. Unlike you. You’re soft, Cooper. You don’t do anything one hundred percent. You coast. You never plan for anything—”
“Hello? I have a job waiting for me in New Zealand! Just let me get on the plane and I’m out! I’ll leave you alone forever!”
“No.” He leans back again. “You don’t get to simply walk away, Cooper. You have to fight your way out just like everyone else.”
I throw up my hands. “I have no idea what you’re even talking about.”
“That’s your problem. You have no idea about anything. Now get the fuck out of my office. I expect you and Isabella to join me for dinner tonight. If you don’t show up, well—I’ll just say my goodbyes now.” He leans across his desk, stabs a button on his phone, and says, “Laurie, send in the next one. Cooper and I are done here.”
“Yes, sir,” Laurie squawks back from the speaker phone.
My father stands up, walks over to his bar cart on the far side of the room, and starts pouring a drink.
I just sit there for a moment, wondering what I should do. Argue with him? Apologize? Throat-punch him, steal his car keys, and run?
What? What should I do?
“Get. Out, Cooper.”
I take my glossy blue and gold folder and get out.
CHAPTER TWO - CADEE
Why would the chairman of High Court Prep want to speak to me?
Come on, Cadee. You know why. They are throwing you out!
I mean, your mother is dead. D-E-A-D. She was the only reason you got to live on this ultra-pretty, super-special, highbrow, blue-blood campus to begin with!
I never fully appreciated how lucky I was to live here until my dad died three years ago. Before that I existed in blissful ignorance, taking everything for granted, including our home. Which was reserved for the campus landscape director, who happened to be my father.
When he died, my mother and I had to move into an attic apartment above the Alumni Inn and she had to take a job as the head baker for the prep school cafeteria and catering department.
What will they make me do now? If I want to stay here?
Take over her job? Give me another one?
Do I want to stay here?
I never went to High Court Prep. I was educated at home by my mother and that was great. My non-traditional schooling fit me. I’m more of a loner. I like books, and going on nature walks, and painting with watercolors.
A gentle soul. That’s what my father used to call me.
And I would not call a single child who ever set foot on the High Court Prep campus a gentle soul. Not even the artsy kids, which is the clique I probably would’ve ended up in. They are cut-throat creatives with dark souls that belong to the devil.
Not gentle at all.
That’s why my parents didn’t want me to go to Prep, even though at my father’s level, we were entitled to an employee scholarship.
God, I miss him.
And now my mother is gone too. It hasn’t truly hit me yet. Just how utterly alone I am in the world.
But I don’t have time to dwell on it, because Chairman Valcourt wants to see me and I’m ninety-nine percent positive he’s calling me into his office to kick me out of my attic apartment.
Then what will I do?
Where will I go?
I don’t understand anything right now. The past two weeks have been a blur of denial and sadness. Denial, because I still haven’t cried. Not even when I saw my mother in her casket at the funeral. I wanted to cry, I really did. But there are just no tears inside me anymore.
Something is wrong with me.
Focus, Cadee. You’re about to get kicked out of your campus apartment. You need to come up with a plan. Something you could say to the Chairman to make him let you stay.
Do I want to stay?
These are not my people. I don’t have a single friend on this campus. My parents were my friends and now that they’re both gone, there is really nothing for me here.
But I don’t have any plans, either. This feels like the path of least resistance.
So I keep walking towards my appointment with destiny because everything feels very much out of my hands right now.
The admin building is located on the north edge of the prep-school campus. The side facing me as I walk down the central gardens is bustling with parents and students as they wrap up all their last-minute details before heading home for the summer.
Then there are the seniors who will be going to High Court College next fall. That campus is right on the other side of the admin building. And these kids are having a party in the central gardens that includes water balloons, squirt guns, and cans of brightly-colored silly string.