Mr. CEO(88)
He slams his hands down on the desk and screams, his breath stinking and spewing over the space between us. “What the f*ck are you doing, disrespecting me like that in front of Nathan? How dare you contradict me in front of the staff!”
Contradict? What the f*ck is he talking about? I was trying to deflect him, calm him down. “Pops, that wasn’t my…”
“Shut the f*ck up!” he yells again, at least taking a seat. “Jackson, it's bad enough that you embarrassed yourself, and yes, embarrassed me. You've been a disappointment your entire life, really. At least Andrea has enough sense to try and make something of herself, even if she does refuse to act like the proper daughter I've tried so hard to get her to be. But you had your uses. It's time to grow the f*ck up, and that means seeing that life isn't all parties and limos and threesomes with sluts. Sometimes it means making hard decisions and doing hard things.”
“Like ordering your attack dog to do your dirty work for you?” I ask before I even realize what's coming out of my mouth. Pops starts to turn red again, and I decide to just f*cking go with it. “You've made your own bed. Now you're upset that someone's calling you on it? What about the rest of the family, Pops? Did you ever think about us in your little tirade?”
He slams his fist on the desk, sending a pen cup flying. He's staring daggers into my face. “I promise you, Jackson, if you ever disrespect me like that again... you'll find that Katrina Grammercy isn't the only person who can have her throat cut in front of someone she knows. Get the f*ck out.”
I get up, and I make my way out to the hallway. I immediately go looking for Nathan... once again, I have to know.
I find him in the back after twenty minutes of searching, where he's indulging in his other hobby, animals. The plantation still has a stable attached to it, and while it doesn't hold horses any longer, the Great Dane that Nathan keeps there is nearly as big as a pony. “Nathan.”
He holds up a hand, and I see in his right hand he's holding a stiff-bristled brush that he's currently using to brush down the dog. “Yes, Maverick, you're a good boy. I know, I promised you a walk this morning, but I've got some business to attend to, so I'm going to have to keep this short. Tonight though, you and I can go for a romp in the back acres all you want. Wouldn't you like that?”
Maverick obviously does, as the giant dog wags his tail briskly. Nathan looks over at me, then back at Maverick. “You think it'd be okay if Jackson comes along?”
Maverick wags again, settling the issue. Nathan reaches over and unsnaps the long lead attached to Maverick's collar, and rubs his head. “Well, come on then. Maybe only a mile or so, then we can head back.”
Maverick goes bounding off, acting for all the world like a two-hundred-pound puppy, heading for the door. His dog out of earshot, Nathan speaks to me for the first time. “Your shoes will get muddy. And I'd appreciate it if you'd limit the unpleasant talk around Maverick. He's a big baby, but he's my baby.”
I look down and shrug. “I can get others. It's not as important as what you and I need to discuss.”
Nathan nods and takes the lead, his long legs eating up the ground. We leave the stables and head north, into the unkempt scrubland that used to be indigo fields two hundred years ago. It's now mostly fields, with a little bit of wild indigo still covering areas of the property, but most of it disappeared after later attempts to turn the fields into tobacco and then cotton before the Civil War broke out. For Maverick, the open spaces are wonderful, even as I feel the first squelch of mud underneath my foot. “So why'd you brush him before this run?”
“We start every day with a brushing, even if it's just a few minutes,” Nathan says, and I notice that he's changed into what looks like old combat boots, albeit unlaced. “Like I said, he's my baby, since I've never had children of my own. Lots of nieces and nephews, but none of my own.”
“How often do you see them?” I ask, surprised at this insight into Nathan's mind. It's like when we sat down for tea, I'm finding depths to the man that I never knew existed.
“Not often enough,” he admits. “Some of it is because I'm pretty busy working for Peter, but also... well, I'm not the sort of uncle that is exactly welcome at the family Thanksgiving table. How do you explain to a five-year-old that the richest member of the family got that way because he's put enough men in the ground to populate a small village?”
“Yet you keep doing it,” I say quietly. “I'm not accusing you, just saying.”
Nathan nods, his eyes following Maverick as the dog goes sniffing around. “Maverick! Leave that rabbit alone!” he hollers with a laugh, then sobers. “I do. It's all I've ever known, and to try and make myself out to be something more than what I am... I think the ghosts of my past would condemn me even more if I pretended to be something I'm not. But there's a part of me that would like to go back if I could, back to when I was a Green Beret. Yeah, there was a lot of killing then... but we did more than that. I can remember going into what some people call Kurdistan. We were working a black ops mission, this was when Saddam was still in power, just after the Mogadishu op that I told you about. We were supposedly there to reinforce the no-fly zone Clinton insisted on, but really we were there to help the Kurds get on their feet. I spent ninety days in that area, and never fired a shot. But what I did do was help them build three schools, and we dug two wells for villages that were struggling. I'll never forget the look in the eyes of those Kurd children when I pumped the handle, and fresh, clean water flowed out of that pipe. They thought I was Santa Claus and Allah all wrapped up in one that day. I use that image a lot when I meditate, trying to find inner peace.”