“Welcome back.” He gives me a cocky smile. One that has gotten him very far in life even when we were kids.

“I didn’t know you were back.” Chase travels excessively for his family's company, the Silverstein Group. They build some of the tallest buildings in the world.

“I wouldn’t miss your father’s birthday. Besides, I figured we had work to discuss.” He holds his hand out and knocks the sides of my fist. Fuck, I think it’s been a few years since I’ve seen him. We always keep in touch talking business, but we’ve both been busy doing what is expected of us. “You don’t look happy to be home.”

“My father got married.” I say what he already knows.

“So?” He shrugs. “It’s not some twenty-something girl. The woman was a nurse.”

“Was?” She already quit her job. Of course, she did. Why would she need to work? I know what she’s nursing now. My father’s wallet.

“Who gives a fuck if she is only about his money? If he’s getting what he wants, then she gets what she wants. It’s a fair trade, man.”

“You’re not wrong, but Dad isn’t in this for only sex. He’s in love with her. You should have seen him.” I shake my head, thinking back to the dinner I was forced to attend when my father showed up in Japan.

Okay, I wasn’t forced, but I wasn’t going to miss seeing my father if he was in town. It was clear the man was smitten with the woman. She’d been nice enough—pretty, too—but I could tell she was nervous. Why? Was she scared I’d see who she really was? Likely. My father has a type. Soul-sucking leeches.

My father and I tend to be a lot alike. Neither of us want to fail. It’s why he stuck with the marriage to my mother for so long. He kept trying to make it work when all the woman did was make all our lives hell. It had been me that finally got her to leave and never come back. I gave her enough money to never bother any of us again. My father could have done the same, but he kept thinking she’d change. People don’t change.

“He’s a grown man who can clean up his own messes, Ash.”

“Pretty sure I cleaned up the last mess.” Chase mutters something under his breath. He’d disliked my mother as much as I had. I wasn’t going to allow Emily to bear the same fate as I had with her.