“That’s because I’m happy. Adam and I were just talking about how well the public relations campaign is going. Your mother and I have two of our three children here for dinner. These days, I’m thankful for every little thing that goes my way.”
“I actually heard from Aiden,” Anna said, referring to their brother, the eldest of the Langford siblings. “He’s somewhere in Thailand. I don’t know much more than that. It was just a few lines in an email, and it’d been weeks since I’d reached out to him.”
Their father shook his head in dismay. “God forbid that boy should call your mother and tell her he’s alive.”
Their mother’s eyes grew sad. “He needs to stop avoiding your father’s illness and come home.”
“You know that’s not going to happen,” Adam said.
Aiden wasn’t coming back anytime soon, not after the last argument he’d had with their father. No one dared speak of it, but Adam suspected it was about why Aiden was never considered to run LangTel and was left with little more than his personal shares in the company.
Aiden’s upbringing was markedly different from Adam and Anna’s. Six years older than Adam, Aiden had been sent off to boarding school when Adam was only two and Anna was a baby. Adam still didn’t know why he and Anna attended private school in New York instead. He only knew that Aiden got into a lot of trouble at school—big trouble—and that Adam had been treated from a very young age as if he was the first-born. In many ways, it was as if Aiden didn’t even exist, or at least not in their father’s eyes. It saddened both Anna and Adam that they weren’t close with their brother, but Aiden seemed content with keeping his distance.
“Anna, can I get you a drink?” Adam asked.
“Please. I’ve had a brutal day.”
Adam stepped over to the bar in the corner to mix his sister a gin and tonic. She followed.
From the sound of things on the TV, someone had just hit a big shot in the basketball game. “Darn it all.” Their father eased back into his seat. “I always miss the big plays.”
Their mother consulted her watch. “Dinner should be ready in a few minutes. I’ll check with Margaret and see how things are coming.”
“You really heard from Aiden?” Adam asked Anna, careful to keep his voice low.
“It wasn’t much. It’s pretty clear he’d rather catch the plague than come home and face Dad.”
“It’d be nice if they’d stop feuding.” Adam shook his head, adding a jigger of Hendrick’s gin to the glass and topping it off with tonic. “So what’s the plan tonight? Are we going to talk to Dad?”
“Honestly, I don’t know if I have the strength. If I have to listen to the speech about how I should be looking for a husband and thinking about private school for my unborn children, I might scream. Between Dad and my current job, I feel like I spend my entire life beating my head against a wall.”
Adam drew in a deep breath. It was a miracle this subject hadn’t given both his sister and him an ulcer. Ironic that they both had what the other wanted—he saw LangTel as a soul-sucking proposition, seeing out someone else’s vision instead of his own. How he longed to have options like Anna.
She, on the other hand, would have done anything to become the first female CEO of a major telecom. More than anything, he sensed that she longed to prove herself, and do it on the largest stage imaginable.
Adam patted Anna’s back. “I’ll go to bat for you. We need to keep trying.”
Margaret, the family’s longtime cook, appeared in the family room doorway. “Dinner is ready, Langford children.” She smiled wide, looking like a pudgy Mary Poppins. For a moment, Adam could remember exactly what it was like to grow up in this household—every privilege a child could ever want, every expectation a young boy could never shoulder.
* * *
After dinner, Adam followed his father into his office, swirling bourbon in a cut-crystal old-fashioned glass. Since the cancer diagnosis, his dad had laid off the liquor. Roger took his place behind the massive mahogany desk, which had once been the prized possession of Adam’s grandfather, the second Langford man to make a fortune in business. Even when Adam and his dad were having father-son time, the setup always more closely resembled a meeting.
“Tell me how things are going with Julia. I know you didn’t want to talk about it in front of your mother, but you can tell your old man. You know, we actually look forward to seeing your picture in the paper now.” He laughed quietly. “That’s a big improvement from a month ago.”