Page 182 of Soul Mates: Hercules Valentine and I

I arrived early on purpose. If I’m seated first, then the restaurant becomes my domain, a place where I set the rules. Usually my father, Christopher Bradley Valentine, doesn’t participate in power struggles. He never cares where he sits. But if I were having dinner with Orion or Achilles, we would all be jockeying for the head position at the table. A certain amount of stress comes with having to engage on those battles. I guess that’s one thing I like about being around my father—he’s easygoing, usually to his own detriment. And my mother is definitely his weakness. Nobody can keep Marigold’s secrets like he can. Whether she’s right or wrong, he’s loyal to her to fault. My parents have a partnership void of a romance. I don’t think they’ve ever been in love.

My father and I are having dinner at Jay Mile’s steakhouse. The restaurant has two tiers, and we have the coveted center seat on the top level, which has its own circular balcony and an unobstructed view of the entrance. We have the privacy we need too. Other diners, to my sides and rear, are at least twenty feet away. Also, the acoustics favor our table. If we keep our voices at a normal level, nobody will be able to make out what we’re saying. That’s why this is my favorite table. It’s prime seating, and the waiters who serve us know they’re going to get tipped big for waiting on us.

Finally, Chris walks in, and I check my Swiss watch. It’s 8:59 p.m. With one minute to spare, he stops at the hostess’s counter. My back straightens as I notice how much he’s changed. He has on tan Bermuda shorts, a button-down gray shirt with graphics of bent palm trees above the hem. And he’s wearing sandals that are a step up from flip-flips. I scoff because he’s also wearing the kind of tan only achievable by people who have nothing to do but sunbathe all day. I’m pissed that he looks twenty-years younger. He doesn't display a kernel of the stress I carry every day from trying to keep the family business and the treasure chest that pays for his lifestyle afloat. When I look in the mirror, I see how dog-tired I am. He’s the father. I’m the son. Maybe we should trade places. I would like to sport a gnarly tan too.

As a hostess named Katie escorts him to my table, I push my anger aside. This meeting has a purpose—and I intend to walk out of this restaurant with answers to my questions.

“Herc,” Chris says, arms up and out. “You look well, son.”

Even though I don’t want to, I get up and hug him. My father is as tall as I am—roughly six feet, four inches. I haven’t hugged him since I was very young. And when I last saw him, he was skin and bones. Not anymore. He’s not overweight or muscular. He’s just in good condition.

We keep our eyes on each other as we sit.

“Smith will be over to take your order,” Katie says. “What can I get you to drink?”

She’s looking at me, but when I nod at my father, she knows to give him her attention first.

“Tonic water with a twist of lime,” he says.

My eyebrows shoot up. “Bourbon on the rocks.” When Katie strolls off, I ask, “Nothing stronger?”

His smile is toothy. “Nope. I’m fine.”

The fact that he didn’t order alcohol kind of works against the visions I have of him sunbathing on a white-sand beaches while drinking rum and chasing tail.

“I am glad you called.” He’s still grinning as if he doesn’t have a care in the world.

He doesn't seem like the same guy who had a heart attack on my last day of high school. We were never very close. He worked a lot while I was growing up. On the rare occasions we interacted, he would do something like muss up my hair and say, “Have a good day, buddy.” That was the extent of his fathering. My mother did everything else. I used to get the feeling that my brothers and I belonged to her and not him. The older I got, the more my mother instilled that belief in me. Chris was just the man who’d given her the seed to sprout her sons.

But I didn’t agree to sit down with him to lollygag and pretend we have something to talk about other than what’s on my agenda. So I get right to the point.

I plop an elbow on the table and lean against my arm. “Listen, Dad…”

“Oh, and congratulations. I heard you’re getting married.”

I force my tongue to the roof of my mouth. It takes every ounce of restraint I have to not deny it. If I tell him I have no plans to marry Rain, I’m certain it’ll get back to Marigold in a nanosecond. I need the element of surprise to win this war.

“Why are payments from the trust in my name and only my name?” I ask in a tone that indicates I’m ready to get down to business.

That smile he can’t seem to shake, the one that makes him look a few decades younger, slowly dissolves into a frown I’m more familiar with. “Why are you asking me that?”

It’s almost satisfying to send the happy man he’s been since walking into the restaurant back to where he came from.Almost.

I set my jaw. “Why aren’t you answering?”

Katie’s back with our drinks. She serves him then me.

“Thank you,” we say at the same time. It’s insane how much we sound alike. It appears it catches him off guard just as much as it did me.

She’s gone, and we’re glaring at each other like two cowboys in a duel. My last question still hangs in the air. His lips are pressed; they’re sealed, which clues me in that the answer has something to do with my mother.

I snort out of frustration. “All right, Dad, if that one’s too hard for you, then try this one. Why doesn’t mom have a history past 2025?”

His eyes open a bit wider as he shifts nervously in his chair. “Who told you that?”

I watch the blood slowly drain from his face. “I have my sources.”

He glances over his shoulder toward the front of the restaurant. I can tell he wants to run away from this conversation. But I’m not going to let him escape without giving it all I’ve got.