Another pause. Was he telling me the regrets of his past now? We haven’t had a conversation like this—at least none I can easily remember. The fucker had to be dying or something to be talking like this.

I waited silently for him to continue. Interrupting him was asking for a death sentence.

He sighed. “I don’t think you’d be able to handle the company is my point. What we do is a balancing act—the line between life and death. Maria is—was—our family and that girl is the next generation. The future of everything that’s been built over generations. We’ve grown so large, and only with the right leaders, can we keep it.”

Lighting up my own cigarette, I settled into the chair again, wondering where the conversation was heading. If he was announcing his death, I’d be shocked. If he was telling me that I’m the next generation to lead his company, I wouldn’t believe him. Considering how he told me I was worth less than shit in the yard, it would be a cold day in hell.

“Look, boy, you’ve been picking up the ropes like I knew you would. You’ve been in every room learning every perspective.” Ashing his cigarette, he folded his hands on the table. “Are you going to be ready to take all of this over?”

“As in after college?”

“It might be sooner than you’d think. College doesn’t teach you jack shit, and you know it. It’s not like you went there to learn anyway. Once that girl hits twenty-one, hell is going to break loose and a stupid little university for rich brats isn’t going to matter. You’re not going back after this semester.”

That’s not what I expected. Leave school? Stop playing baseball? Join the company in a legitimate manner?

“I don’t have much left, and I enjoy baseball.”

“Fucking hire your own team in the backyard, then! Your team doesn’t even play fair since we pay for the results anyway. The only people who have benefited from that university are the scholarship recipients. The rest of ‘em are just playing Barbie dream house, and that includes you.” He looked like he was about to fish around for a bottle of something when he brought out a small, ornate box from his desk. Pulling out a pill, he popped into his mouth and grabbed another cigarette from his silver case. He lit it up. “If I assume correctly, that girl is just as magnetic as her mother, no?”

“Sir?”

Did he just roll his eyes at me? “I know you’ve stayed at her house as many nights as she allows. You think your men don’t gossip and compare dicks when you’re not around?”