Chapter 7: The Call He Almost Didn't Take
Lucas saw the phone.
He stopped just inside the door.
"Do you need to—"
"Sit down," Jonathan said.
"Give me a moment."
He answered the call.
"Diane."
"Jonathan." Her voice was exactly as he remembered it — careful, measured, with the slight tension she always carried when she was about to say something difficult.
"I heard.
I'm sorry it took me this long to call.
I wasn't sure you'd want to hear from me."
"How did you find out?"
"Gerald called me this morning.
He said you asked him to."
Jonathan had forgotten that.
He had added it to the list of calls Gerald was to make before seven a.m., and then the day had moved so quickly that it had slipped entirely from his mind.
"I did ask him," Jonathan said.
"Yes."
A brief silence.
"How are you?" Diane asked.
"Better than I was yesterday."
"That's not a very high bar."
"No," he agreed.
"It isn't."
Lucas was seated in the chair by the window, hands folded in his lap, looking carefully at the floor.
"She kept you away from everyone," Diane said.
"From me.
From your brother.
From the people at the plant who've known you for twenty years.
I tried to call you twice last year.
Did you know that?"
"I didn't get those calls."
"I know.
Gerald told me." Another pause.
"Jonathan, I'm not calling to relitigate anything.
I just — I needed to hear your voice.
I needed to know you were still here."
Jonathan looked at the window.
The city below was fully lit now, a grid of small lights stretching toward the horizon.
"I'm still here," he said.
"Good." Her voice softened.
"That's all I needed."
After he ended the call, he sat with the phone in his hand for a moment.
Then he set it on the table and looked at Lucas.
Lucas looked back at him.
His eyes were still red, but he had steadied himself.
"I can't take that money, Mr.
Mercer," Lucas said.
"I know you feel that way."
"I mean it.
I don't — I haven't done anything to deserve—"
"Lucas." Jonathan's voice was not unkind, but it was firm.
"Do you know what I was thinking about when your wife — when Victoria was standing over me telling me about her plans for Malibu?"
Lucas shook his head.
"I was thinking that I had built something.
Thirty years of work.
A factory that employs four hundred people.
A portfolio that took two decades to build.
And the only person in that room who saw me as a human being was going to walk out the door in a few minutes and go load delivery trucks at midnight so his sister could have a chance at a normal life."
Lucas looked down.
"That is worth something to me," Jonathan said.
"Not because you did anything heroic.
You handed me a phone.
But you did it when it mattered, and you did it without asking what was in it for you.
That is rarer than you think."
"Chloe's surgery," Lucas said quietly.
"They said it's already scheduled."
"Next Thursday.
Dr.
Priya Nair at Northwestern.
She's the best in the country for this procedure.
Gerald made the call this morning."
Lucas pressed his hands together.
His jaw worked.
"I don't know how to—"
"You don't have to say anything," Jonathan said.
"Just make sure she gets there."
Lucas nodded.
He couldn't speak for a moment.
When he finally looked up, his expression had shifted — something younger in it, something that had been held back for a long time.
"She's going to want to meet you," he said.
"Chloe.
She's going to want to thank you herself."
"I'd like that," Jonathan said.
"When she's strong enough."
Lucas stood.
He straightened his uniform, the way people do when they are trying to hold themselves together.
"Mr.
Mercer," he said.
"I hope you get better.
I really do."
"I intend to," Jonathan said.
After Lucas left, the room was quiet again.
Jonathan reached for the glass of water on the table.
His hand was steadier than it had been the day before.
The cardiologist had said that was a good sign — that as the dig0xin levels fell, the heart muscle was beginning to respond.
Five days, the doctor had said.
Jonathan looked at his hand.
Steady.
Functional.
Present.
He had a great deal left to do.
His phone buzzed.
A message from an unknown number — a brief text, no greeting, no signature.
*You think you've won.
You haven't.
There are things about your company you don't know yet.
Ask Gerald about the Milwaukee plant.
Ask him who else has been talking to Raymond.*
May you like
Jonathan read it three times.
He called Gerald.
