Chapter 2

"Come to the table everyone," my mom announces, entering the living room. I'm reading on the couch while my dad pretend-smokes his cigar in his favorite armchair. "The meal is ready."

Sunday brunch at my parents' house is an unmovable Mercer tradition that has existed since the dawn of time. No one is exempt from attending the family get-together, not unless gravely ill or not on Manhattan soil. So it's weird that Mom would call us to the table before Gabriel, my older brother, has gotten here.

"Shouldn't we wait for Gabriel?" I ask, noting how my brother is twenty minutes late. Very atypical.

"He isn't coming." Mom sighs.

"What? Why not?" Last I checked, he was in New York and able-bodied.

"He texted me earlier." My mom beams. "He and Blake got back together last night. I told him not to worry about us and to spend the day with her."

I set my fantasy thriller book aside and stand up. "Thank goodness. I couldn't have suffered his moping, beaten-dog attitude for another minute."

Mom shakes her head. "Ah, Thomas, one day you'll fall in love, and then you'll mess it up, and we will support your beaten-dog attitude because we love you. Now, let's go."

"Come on, son." My dad squeezes my shoulder affectionately. "There's something I need to talk to you about."

Uh-oh, no sentence starting like that ever ended up in a good way for me.

"No shop talk while we eat," Mom counters.

I frown. "You know what this is about?"

Mom nods.

I turn to Dad. "What?—?"

"After lunch, son." His solemn tone doesn't allow for a retort.

I stare at Mom.

She shrugs.

Dad moves along, topic dropped.

Fine.

No point in asking again. If Dad said we'll discuss the topic after lunch, he won't give me any hints until the last crumbles of dessert are polished.

"Very well, then," I say. "Let's eat."

Delicious as the meal may be, I don't enjoy the food much. With the ominous "we shall talk" looming over my head like a dark cloud, I'm too worried about what's coming next. It'll be something work-related, I'm sure. And I won't like it, I'm equally positive.

The decision to join the family business the moment I graduated from college was a no-brainer for me. I didn't have the same drive my brother had to build a new business from the ground up. One family empire is enough for me. But sometimes, working for my dad, and him being the literal boss of me, is not the easiest.

By the time coffee is served back in the living room, I'm bouncing my knees so hard that even my mom can't stand the tension anymore.

"Nolan, please," she says. "Go to the study to discuss his new position. I can't stand to watch him break his kneecaps from jitters."

My ears perk at the words new position. I love my current role as head of corporate communications at Mercer Industries. I'm the group's spokesperson and media relations guy. In short, all I have to do is look pretty, charm investors, and pose for the cameras. I'm the face of the company.

If WIRED magazine wants to publish an article on our environmentally conscious approach to mining iron ore, I'm the guy to interview. If Fox News is doing a special on our innovative mental health initiative for employees, I show up. Company parties, retreats, public appearances, charity galas… I'm the family representative who attends all these events.

"Yes, love." My dad sighs, nodding to my mom. He rises and turns to me. "Let's move to the study."

I follow him out of the living room, wondering what sort of curve ball he's about to throw at me. My father turns right and enters the study. I get in behind him and close the door.

This is the only room in the house my mother had no say in decorating. The space is all Dad with its antique desk and wall-to-wall bookshelves, carrying enough books to sink the Titanic. The tomes sit alongside plaques and photos of him with other successful people—heads of state, Nobel prize winners, celebrities, innovators, athletes, other titans of industry—next to more low-key family portraits. And at the back of the room, a gorgeous view of the city below. As usual, Dad's desk is clean and orderly. Papers, pens, and other office supplies are arranged perfectly in the antique wooden tray next to his giant computer screen that's now off.

From the mobile wooden bar in the corner, Dad pours himself a Scotch, raising another glass to me as a question. I shake my head and take a beer from the refrigerated cabinet.

We settle on opposite sides of the mahogany desk, and I can tell he's in an excellent mood from the way his white mustache bristles as he takes his first sip of the amber liquor.

I grip the leather armrest of my chair. Things are looking grimmer by the second.

"Well?" I ask, taking a swig of beer and bracing myself for the worst.

"Proctor is retiring at the end of next year," Dad says, skipping preambles.

Emmet Proctor is the current CEO of Mercer Robotics, a subdivision of Mercer Industries—the umbrella company to all our various businesses. We're a global leader in manufacturing advanced automotive components, specializing in electrification and automation for sustainable solutions across industries, including mining.

Proctor and I have crossed paths once or twice. He's one of the best managers in the industry and helped make our robotic division the leading automation company in the world. The man has a mind like a damned computer. He's an engineer, but gifted with a business-oriented brain capable of foreseeing where the market is going to be in five, ten years from now with alarming precision. He'll be hard to replace.

A cool shiver walks down my spine. This is monumental news. I hold my breath, waiting for Dad to go on.

"He will announce his decision to the board at the shareholders' meeting next week," Dad continues, "and we want you to be his replacement."

"Me?" I laugh at that. "You're joking, right, Dad?"

My father stares me straight in the eyes. "I'm not."

"You can't be serious. Mercer Robotics is our most technology-heavy division. You can't even set foot in their facilities without holding at least seven engineering degrees."

"Your great-grandfather funded this company with no degree at all. And your technical skills might be lacking, but you have a good grasp on how the business side of things works."

"My great-grandfather was living in a different century," I clarify. "When everything was growing and being smart was enough to seize an opportunity. A bunch of hardcore engineers will never respect a guy from communications as their leader."

"Come on, son, that's not true. Many industry CEOs aren't engineers. At that level, you're not required to be technical, you only need to have a general understanding of the technology's fundamentals and be able to analyze the numbers to make strategic decisions."

I pick at a loose thread in the leather chair armrest. "Well, my robotics knowledge is exactly zero." I make an okay symbol with my hand to emphasize what I'm saying.

"Which is why I'm not proposing you start in the role of CEO tomorrow." Dad's eyes glint, signaling he's got me exactly where he wants me. "We have roughly fifteen months to make you robotics savvy enough to guide the division. And I want you to start your training at the core of the business, in the RD department. I set a meeting with the research and development director for tomorrow morning at eight?—"

"Wait, you set the meeting already?" I drop my beer on the desk with a loud thud—I should've gone for the Scotch. "Before I even agreed to the career pivot?"

"I don't enjoy wasting time, son. We need to plan for the future, and I'm an impatient man. If you want to replace me as the next head of Mercer Industries one day, you can't keep being our poster boy until I retire, and then move straight from communications to the top job." Dad leans back in his chair, looking so much like a domineering CEO that I suddenly revert to being the awed kid who followed his hero father around the office. "You'll have to get your hands dirty at some point."

I stare at him, aware he hasn't left me much of a choice.

The silence stretches for a while until Dad speaks again. "Glad to see we agree. I'll see you tomorrow at eight, then."

"I can't tomorrow," I reply, taking another sip of beer and rejoicing in being able to deny him at least my presence at his little ambush.

"Why?"

"I have a ceremony at our facility in Newark."

"Can't someone else go in your place?"

"I don't know, Dad. Our longest-employed worker is retiring after forty years. I'm supposed to hand him a plaque. You're the one who always told me how someone from the family must show up for this kind of thing." I pin him with a stare. "So, you tell me, can I skip?"

"No, you can't. Anyway, no harm done. You'll have to meet with the department head on your own in the afternoon."

Another thought strikes me. "Who's going to take my place as spokesperson?"

"No one," Dad says. "You'll still do most of the public appearances."

Oh, so I'm not getting a new position, I'm getting a second job on top of the one I already have.

"Don't make that face," Dad chides. "You've had it too easy so far and you know it."

"I guess the new challenge will be good for me," I reply, irritated.

"That it will. You're always complaining you spend too much time on social events. Now you can put all your focus on what really matters—the core of our business."

"Sure, Dad."

I rise to my feet, ready to leave my parents' house—I've got a lot to process, starting with my new job title. I glance at my father and Dad beams at me, the stern captain of industry gone, the loving father back. "Don't underestimate yourself, son, you can handle the extra responsibility and a million other things if you put your mind to it."

"And now you sound like my third-grade teacher."

Dad laughs, standing up and coming next to me to pat my shoulder. "You've come a long way since then, haven't you? I'm very proud of you, son."

"Thanks, Dad. I love you, too."

He opens his arms and I embrace him.

Is this what they call tough love? I prefer to refer to it as inconvenient, pain-in-my-ass love.