Page 1 of True Honey (The Hornets Nest #4)

SHORE

I pushed my fork around my plate until Mom reached over and slapped the back of my hand. I looked up at her, still beautiful through all this bullshit, and tried to smile.

“What’s wrong?” She asked like it wasn’t obvious.

Everything.

“Nothing. The game today was just stressful, and Grandpa’s late. It’s making me anxious,” I said, rolling my shoulders back. The dining table was dressed with the finest china, the shiniest silverware. And yet, it was just the three of us. Just like always.

I inhaled an annoyed breath.

“If he’s not here soon, I have work to do—”

“What are you complaining about now, boy?” Seymour Shore’s voice echoed through the halls of his massive, practically empty manor.

I looked around, feigning confusion. “Sorry, for a second there I thought you’d taken up haunting the estate. You look older today,” I insulted him and he laughed as he took his place at the end of the table.

It was a wonder he was still moving around the way he was.

Most of his major joints had been replaced with metal and his dark hair was long, gray and thinning on the top of his head.

He managed to hold onto the beard that covered his stern jaw, and never lost the ability to silence a room with his glare.

“I am,” he grumbled and adjusted uncomfortably in his chair.

“You look well, Dad,” Mom said, reaching over to pat his hand and he smiled at her.

“You always were my favorite daughter-in-law,” he cooed.

“I’m your only daughter-in-law, Seymour,” she joked.

The serving staff brought out the meal and my hunger got the best of me as I started eating the second it was set down in front of me.

Grandpa and Mom engaged in small talk but we all knew that’s not why he called us here on a random Wednesday night.

Family diners were Sunday, always . Tonight despite everything feeling like Sunday, was out of the ordinary.

Which meant that he had business to discuss and I was already annoyed that he was tip-toeing around the issue.

He eats slowly, chewing every bite and sipping on his scotch between each one. He watched me carefully like he was doing it all on purpose to drive me nuts. And knowing Seymour, that was the point.

I finished my food and laid my napkin over my plate with a small huff.

“Thank you for dinner.” I extended my gratitude and pushed up from the seat, but Grandpa stared at me, his eyes cold and commanding.

“Come on, old man,” I scoffed, “I have stuff to do, too much stuff for one person and sitting here agonizing over ham and potatoes was not on my Wednesday to-do list.”

“Spending time with your family is a chore now?” He asked me.

That’s not what I meant.

“No,” I sighed loudly, “I just need to be somewhere else. Dinner was lovely, tell Joanna it was wonderful.”

“You can tell her yourself when this conversation is finished,” he said, his eyebrows lifted and his head nodded to my chair. “Sit.”

I listen only because it might actually get him to talk.

He cleared his throat into his napkin, loud, harsh, and wet. When he lowered it, a spatter of blood bloomed red across the cloth.

“The board has concerns,” he said.

“We anticipated that,” I said. The most obvious of all our problems was my father and his fraud, tax evasion, and sketchy spending habits.

“The conversation they're looking to have isn’t just about your father, Silas. It’s about the future of this family's investments in Harbor, in the University. It’s about our legacy.” He swallowed roughly. His shoulders were brittle in his old age but he pinned them back.

“You own fifty-one percent of all the holdings, legally their opinions mean jackshit.” I swore, “Sorry, Mom.”

She raised an eyebrow and gave me a look.

“Exactly, I am the sole proprietor of our holdings,” he said. I could hear the frustration in his voice but I didn’t understand why he was wasting time worrying about that when we had damage control to do.

“Let me deal with the public image of the family. I just need a little time to figure out how to clean up Dad’s mess,” I said, laying my hands flat on the table.

“Your father will rot in jail,” Grandpa said coldly as he flung his napkin across the table, “and I’ll be dead in six months.”

Mom dropped her fork to her plate, her expression filling with grief as she looked between the napkin and my Grandfather. I stared at it, hoping that this was all some scare tactic, but he didn’t move. Mom had stopped breathing altogether. Her worry rolled off her as she reached out to him.

“What is it?” I asked.

“Lung cancer,” he said back in the same cold tone.

He was ornery on the best of days but he had never been one for nonsense.

“What are they offering for treatment?” I asked, there had to be a way around it. We had enough money to pay the doctors, to get him better. My head was spinning with the possibilities. I had seen a few start-up studies when Lorraine was sick, maybe…

“Silas,” he coughed again, and I could feel the reality set in before he even opened his mouth to speak. “I have six months.”

My blood ran cold.

“No.” I said with the shake of my head.

Grandpa chuckled, “You can’t fight this one boy. It’s not a problem you can solve and I know that’s hard to hear because you’re a fixer, it’s what you do. But listen to me,” he slammed his hand on the table and Mom jumped. “You cannot fix this.”

He was being cruel but I understood why, anything else would have provided wiggle room. I could flip kindness on its head and push for more answers. He was shutting me down.

I pressed my hand to my forehead trying to steady my breathing as my heart pounded, too fast and too hard. The sweater I was wearing suddenly became itchy and the room was wildly hot in temperature.

“When did you find out?” I asked him, swallowing back the lump in my throat.

“You’re asking stupid questions,” he scolded me as Joanna brought a plate of pie for him.

“Did you know?” I asked her as she set it down in front of him. She doesn’t say anything before patting my Grandfather on the shoulder and excusing herself. “Of course she knew. What is wrong with you? If we had known we could have—”

“Enough,” he barked and the exertion made him cough some more.

“Si,” Mom said, her voice soft as ever. She reached out to me and her fingers brushed my forearm gently. “Just listen to him.”

I wanted to yell at her, to tell her that I didn’t have time to listen to the rantings of a dying old man when it all could have been prevented if had just told me months ago about his diagnosis. I could have done something.

And now I can’t do a damn thing.

Helplessness sat uncomfortably on my chest.

“What can I do?” I asked. I could feel the tears stinging the back of my eyes, and I shoved them away. Refusing to cry in front of them.

“As of right now, if I die tomorrow, Charles will become the sole owner of sixty-three percent of the shares.” He explained, his voice slow and tight.

He was sicker than I’d expected, and I cursed myself for not noticing. There was just so much going on that slowing down wasn’t an option and in my rush to handle everything I had overlooked the most dangerous of all our problems rotting right under my nose.

“How is that possible with him rotting in county?” I asked him.

“He’s not dead, which means it’s legal. The assets are seized but it doesn’t mean he can’t take ownership of them,” Grandpa said and I nodded in understanding.

Business was always a little foreign to me, I was good at nerves and muscle, bone and blood. I just knew where to put the money when Grandpa said to use it.

“How do we stop that?” I asked.

“You,” Grandpa said, his finger pointing in my direction.

I barked out a tight laugh, stopping only when I realized he was serious.

“What the hell can I do, this is way out of my league,” I admitted and he smiled at me.

“I know, if only you didn’t become a useless member of society,” he grumbled along, and I let it slide because if I started that argument, we would be here until he keeled over at the table. “I want to sign my shares over to you,” he said, calm and final.

“That sounds like a lot of responsibility,” I said, not meaning to sound like a child but I was overloaded with information and the more he talked the more sweat formed and I was starting to feel damp and overheated.

“It is.” He took a bite of his pie and made a face before setting his fork down. “I have to convince the board that you’re ready for that responsibility but I can’t when you’re messing around at the stadium all day and screwing women like you’re your fathers son.”

Mom’s eyes widened at the comment and looked at me.

“I don’t...” I tried to dismiss the accusations but he wasn’t finished. “I’m not that bad!”

“If I’m going to convince the board that you can handle this,” he started, and inside all I could scream was I’m not ready, I can’t handle this, I don’t want it! “Then you need to get yourself a wife, and you need to do it before I die.”

“What?” I choked on my own spit and grabbed for my water glass.

“A wife , Silas. You need to grow up and you need to show the board that you’re serious about your future.

They take family men seriously, and right now, you are the exact opposite of that.

You spend your days running around with the baseball team instead of running the company that pays for it!

” Grandpa raised his voice and I wanted to get loud right back but I held my tongue.

“I can’t just find a wife,” I argued and he narrowed his eyes on me.

“That’s the deal, Silas. Find a wife and keep Harbor out of your Father’s hands.”