Page 84 of Most Eligible Billionaire

Through my scotch-fuelled haze, I scramble to remember my picture for him—a fish. A whale.

“Jonah,” I say, taking his hand, clapping mine over his.

The three of us take a seat at the edge of the place and talk development. Bonding. We talk about the Ten. I want another scotch, but I go for a club soda to avoid the famous Renaldo side-eye.

Jana Jacabowski waves from across the room—she’s leaving with a friend. I sit back and relax.

“So what’s really going on?” Renaldo asks me as soon as we’re alone.

“I screwed up. I didn’t go with my gut.”

“Tell me,” he says.

It’s been ages since I went to Renaldo with something. He knows about Vicky and Smuckers, of course. I lay it all out. I tell him about humoring her until the competency hearing. I tell him about taking her around the company, and how incredible it’s been. The bright, fun energy she brings. The goodness of working with her. I tell him about the makers space. “You would love it,” I say. “Spending just that time with her without all the bullshit, that was amazing. We were amazing. She’s special.”

I tell him I’m more convinced than ever that she accidentally fell into this thing. Lay out everything about that.

Then I tell him about the joke she made and he winces. “Ouch. A dog face?”

“I didn’t have to let it mess me up. Like I couldn’t be strong for the firm and open-minded about her at the same time? I had to react.”

He smiles into the distance.

“What?” I demand.

“She hit your button,” he says. “Don’t be so hard on yourself, Henry.”

I watch him warily, bright brown eyes and skin like leather.

“Your mother was a crazy bitch. She dedicated her life to smashing every sand castle you managed to build. My picture of your childhood is you sitting on the front stoop of your mansion, clutching that bear of yours, crying your eyes out because she’d left. Yet again. Bernadette was a narcissistic gold digger who blamed you for everything. And your father didn’t do shit to correct that.”

“Don’t,” I say. “That’s enough.” He’d always kept opinions like that to himself.

“Yet you always wanted her love. You’d follow her around. Remember how she always called you Pokey?”

Pokey.Her nickname for me. “I never could keep up with her.”

“Of course you couldn’t. You were a child.”

I shrug. “I'm glad for how she was. She taught me to be strong, to rely on myself.”

“You’ve never been a liar, Henry. Don’t start now.”

I turn to him. It’s been a while since Renaldo lowered the boom. “What?”

“Please.” He mimics my shrug. “Like you don’t care. You loved her and she broke your heart. These last few years, I know the Christmas gifts you’d send her would come back unopened. The cards returned, the calls unanswered. You never stopped trying to be a good son to her. You didn’t want to be made strong. You wanted a relationship.”

I frown.

He gives me a long look. “I watched you build this company, even with Kaleb blocking your best ideas. You sweat blood for this company. These people. Then your mother comes along and gives a strange woman absolute power over it. A woman who has zero reasons to care about it.”

Who seems to actively hate rich guys,I think, but I don’t say it. “Vicky’s starting to care about it. She’s starting to get what we’re doing.”

“Not the point.” Renaldo crosses his legs, face grim. “She makes a joke about repainting the cranes in some ridiculous image? That’s what your mother would do. Except she’d actually do it. You believed the worst because how else could it be?”

“I acted like she was my mother.”

“Your button,” he says.

---