Beauty and the Brooding CEO
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Juliette Hyland
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PROLOGUE
SILENCE WAS A weird thing. Everett Winthrope had spent hours, days, wishing his father would shut the hell up. Now all he wanted was a word, a threat, any kind of acknowledgment.
He’d given up hoping his father might like or even respect his artwork. But as long as Charles Everett Winthrope III screamed, Everett at least knew his father felt some emotion toward him.
Even if it was only anger.
He’d not said a word to his son since Everett called from the jailhouse phone. Technically he hadn’t spoken then either. Everett had explained the situation and the charge, and begged his father to come get him.
The line’s single click had devastated him. He’d had no one else to call. His mother had been out of his life since birth. His dad was all there was.
Shock, not relief, brought him to his feet when the officer said someone was there to bail him out.
That was almost an hour ago, now.
Was his father going to say anything?
Rain pelted the windows as his father raced down the road. The speeding wasn’t unusual. The man never drove anything less than ten miles over, but tonight the rain was splashing against the windshield faster than the wipers could react.
And his father was pissed, so his foot was pressed nearly to the floor of the car.
“Do you know what a damn disappointment you are?”
The words stole Everett’s breath. He knew. Had always known. But what was he supposed to say?
I guess silence was the better option.
“My art—”
“Your art is not art. It’s childish, meaningless graffiti.” The interruption was immediate. His father slammed his fist against the steering wheel, the small red sports car he loved more than anything, slid between the lanes.
“Careful.” Everett gripped the sides of his seat as his father’s head swiveled toward him rather than looking at the road. “We can fight when we get home, Dad.”
It wasn’t like this was the first time they’d sparred over his father’s disdain for his graffiti work—never mind how well the first ten pieces were received by the public.
I’m anonymous. No one even knows it’s a Winthrope tagging buildings in the middle of the night and disappearing.
The line he’d used over and over again hammered in his head. He could say it. Maybe his father was even expecting it. But what was the point?
“You were tagging another damn building.”
“I wasn’t.” Everett glared at the oncoming lights of other cars through the heavy raindrops. That was the real rub. It was pouring. One did not graffiti in the rain. Though that argument hadn’t swayed the arresting officer either.
Who would graffiti in the rain? The paint was quick drying but, in a deluge, it would simply color the puddles. All it took was a little common sense but the authorities were not interested in easy facts.
Several buildings had been tagged in the last few weeks, and Everett fit the profile. So...
“You weren’t planning on tagging the building?” His father swerved again.
There was no safe way to answer that question. After all, he’d been scouting. Checking out a location for his next piece. He’d not put a single blip of paint on the building, that was what mattered. Tonight wasn’t right for the next Roam piece.
Everett had signed the name to his first piece. It meant freedom. The only time he was free was when the spray-paint can was in his hands. When the image took shape before him.
And it wasn’t like he tagged places that weren’t in need of a little makeover. The first piece had raised the price of a building for an elderly couple looking to sell by almost 10 percent. His most recent—on a bakery that was struggling—had increased the foot traffic by more than 90 percent.
People came for the art, found a treat shop they loved. The baker, a single mom, no longer wondered if she was making rent.
His work was important and meaningful. But all his father saw was the spray cans. That kind of expression wasn’t enough for a Winthrope. No, he was supposed to be on the phone talking to clients. Making money for himself and others that already had so much.
“The police picked you up for tagging.”
“It’s a bullshit charge.” Everett crossed his arms. There was no way it was going to stick. It wasn’t illegal to have a spray can of paint. He’d literally been looking at the building wall. In the rain—when no one should have been paying any attention.
He still wasn’t sure how the officer had seen him in the shadows with the rain pouring.
Like the cop had nothing better to do than stand in the rain looking for a hint of a crime?
“You’re lucky you’re a Winthrope. They aren’t even pressing charges.” His father swerved—again—and this time the wheels of the car came up from the road. But only for a second.
Lucky. That was the word he’d heard all his life. He was lucky to be born into such wealth. Into a family whose money holdings were so vast they were listed on the top fifty richest families in the world...and that was only the assets everyone knew about.
There were other assets. Holdings in corporate names, bank accounts with trusts named as the recipients. His father once joked that the Winthropes made more money per minute in interest holdings than most of the world made in their entire lifetime.
It wasn’t something Everett was proud of. After all, what had he done to earn it? Nothing.
The thing a person had the least control over in their life was their birth. He’d done nothing to be a Winthrope. A simple twist of fate.
“Did you hear me? I said, they aren’t pressing charges.” His father puffed his chest out, like this was an accomplishment.
“Because they don’t have charges to press.” How many ways were there to say the same thing? “I wasn’t doing anything. And even if I was, I do good work. This isn’t crass—”
“It’s trash!”
“No.” His heartbeat hammered in his ears. This meant something to him. Meant everything to him. “No. It’s not trash. I am an artist.”
“You—” his father pointed a finger at him as he took his focus off the road, again “—are just a disappointment. You are wasting what the Winthrope name could give y—”
The windshield shattered. Tires screamed. Or had they been screaming before the windshield disappeared? His brain was processing everything but in slow motion.
The car was flipping. Turning in the air, once. Twice...
Boom.
A tree pushed into the side of the car.
There was blood in his eyes. His face was on fire. The world was spinning. But the car had stopped. That didn’t make any sense. His brain was misfiring.
“Dad?” The word felt funny on his lips as he reached for his father. Darkness closing in on the edge of his vision. “Dad?”
Sirens echoed somewhere in the distance. Someone was talking. Or maybe his brain was hallucinating to distract him from the pain he knew he should be feeling all over.
Everett tried to reach for his father again but, before his fingers could find anything, the darkness won.
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