Reese Ebersole had bought and sold close to a hundred businesses. He’d acquired his first one twelve years ago using his meager savings, earned from his job bussing tables while he went to school, along with what had been left of the inheritance from his parents. The inheritance itself had not been substantial. He’d lost more money than his parents had ever earned in their entire lives. They’d meant it for him to finish school or pay for a wedding. Have a baby with a woman he loved. All the things they’d wished for him and would never see. Not because they’d both died far too early, but because Reese had never done any of those things.
He’d been too busy working. He’d had as many as thirty small companies in his portfolio, but currently owned only four that remained active. A string of kosher grocery stores. A tech company specializing in up-priced gadgetry appealing to people with too much money and not enough junk to spend it on. A media company with an emphasis on social media applications and development. The final company also specialized in something specific—catered holidays geared for überwealthy kinky people who wanted to travel in the lifestyle to which they’d grown accustomed. Bed and breakfasts with dungeons set up in actual dungeons, or buffet meals served on the bodies of naked, ornamentally beautiful men and women. The sorts of things they showed in the movies but normal people never did.
He had a penthouse flat in Philadelphia, a cottage in Ireland, a condo in Hawaii, and a pied-à-terre in Manhattan with a view of the Empire State Building. Mom would have tutted about the expenses of holding down so many households, especially without a woman to organize them. She’d have wanted to be sure each of them was fully stocked with toilet paper, milk, and eggs, and dishes that matched the silverware. Dad would not have been impressed with what he would have considered extravagance and indulgence. Dad would have counseled more caution. But beneath the criticisms, they both would’ve been proud, or at least Reese hoped. He guessed he would never know. He’d lost them both within six months of each other, long before he’d ever even made a bid on a business.
He’d stopped paying much attention to reports on his assets about two years ago when the numbers had reached a point where they’d become ridiculous, like playing with Monopoly money. Cash could buy and sell a lot of things, but Reese wasn’t na?ve enough to believe happiness was one of them. Other things—cars, houses, tailored suits, fine wines. Those could bring at least the briefest interludes of happiness. Very rarely, however, had anything brought him joy.
Well, fuck joy. He’d given up on that a long time ago. For now it was enough to have the money he wanted to do whatever he pleased. As far as Reese was concerned, Heaven looked a lot like a long, long string of numbers in front of a decimal point.
Once, Reese’s Heaven had been something else to him, but that had also been a long, long time ago, before he’d become the man he was now. He’d learned to be ruthless. Uncompromising. How to cut a path for himself without caring much for who stood in the way. How to get what he wanted, no matter the cost. Reese had fled Lancaster County at twenty-three, but here he was again, and the gently wafting scent of manure that had drifted through the car windows as he drove had been enough to slam him back into the past and places he’d worked hard to forget.
Nothing he’d learned, it seemed, had taught him how not to look back.
“Still waiting? Can I bring you something to drink awhile?” The pretty brunette with the ponytail gestured at Reese’s empty wineglass.
“Yes. Two glasses of the Rendezvous Orchard Cabernet.”
“Do you want me to bring it when…she…gets here?” The lilt of the question made it clear she wasn’t sure what to think about the fact Reese might very well be on his way to being stood up. Or maybe she was just surprised that anyone in this rinky-dink town had ordered from a fifty dollar bottle of wine in the middle of the afternoon.
“No. Now. She’ll be here. She’s just running late, I’m sure.” He didn’t check his watch again.
He’d been waiting for half an hour. It was unfathomably rude and far from professional, but he couldn’t be surprised. Everything about Stein and Sons had smacked of small-town folksy standards, including handshake contracts and keeping what Reese thought of as country time. His parents had been that way. Languid and leisurely, getting there when they got there, wherever there was. And for his parents, it had never been very far.
She would be here. She had to be. He’d come all the way from Philadelphia. He’d had his personal assistant, Tony, confirm and reconfirm the meeting. She was going to show up.