by Hadley Quinn
All of that pain could never be undone, and Max regretted that the most. And then Teague even did the unexpected and still kept it all a secret to protect everyone’s privacy. There aren’t too many men in the world who would do that.
“You seem like you have a lot on your mind,” Camryn spoke quietly. She’d somehow wrangled some coloring books and crayons and Chase was busy being artistic.
“Yeah, I do,” Max admitted with a nod.
Camryn seemed to think for a moment before she asked, “Is my husband going to be a ticked off grizzly bear after you leave tonight?”
He knew what she meant. He could set off Teague just by being near him.
“I hope not,” he answered sincerely. He paused, debating his next sentence, but decided to go for it since it was part of the reason why he’d come. He settled into a neutral façade for this conversation and remained expressionless. “I don’t get him enough, you know,” he added, barely motioning to Chase. “I want you to know I have nothing to do with that.”
Camryn studied Max for a moment, and then glanced between him and Chase. “No?” she finally asked, seeming doubtful.
“No, I don’t. When I have him, I make sure he sees you guys.”
She narrowed her eyes at him in thought, just as Teague came out the back door with the baby in his arms. “You mean to tell me you only see him once a month?” Camryn quietly asked with disbelief.
Teague’s gaze was cautiously set on him too, but he looked just as confused as he silently sat down at the head of the table.
Max eyed the baby for a moment and felt a slight pain in his chest. The little guy was beautiful, a complete mix of his mom and dad. He took a subtle deep breath, hoping the heartache would go away. “Yeah, just once a month. If that.”
Teague settled his eyes on Chase for a moment. The kid was so enthralled in scribbling he hadn’t noticed his uncle’s presence. “Chase,” he said to get his attention.
Chase looked up, noticed him, and then smiled big as he waved.
“Hey buddy, come say hi,” Teague said, moving C.J. to one leg so he could receive Chase on the other. Chase was already on his way over and Teague pulled him up onto his lap. “What are you coloring over there, huh?”
“Mm, Buzz and Woody,” he shrugged.
“Buzz and Woody? They’re pretty cool. I like Rex, he’s kinda funny.”
Chase giggled. “What if Andy gets another dinosaur?” he quoted the movie in his preschooler voice.
“A mean one?” Teague finished.
They both laughed.
Max smiled, but it was more toward the table since he couldn’t make eye contact. Just seeing his brother holding both boys hit a corner of his heart that he wasn’t expecting. He’d missed out on so much of what was important in life, and for what?
Just to keep peace in a family that was impossible to appease in the first place.
He knew he needed to do this, at least give it a shot, and he should just get it over with. Max cleared his throat. “Uh, you think we could talk?” he asked Teague suddenly, before he lost his nerve.
Teague paused and studied him for a second, seeming surprised. Then he slightly nodded, and without even giving Camryn any kind of signal, she took the baby from him in one arm and Chase’s hand with the other.
“Let me show you C.J.’s new baby piano,” she said. “Maybe you can show him how to use it.”
“Okay!” Chase replied eagerly.
There was almost a minute of silence after the three of them left. Teague was waiting for him to speak first, but Max wasn’t sure where to start. He needed to remember what was at stake here. Thinking back on their past and the relationship he and his brother used to have reminded him of what he desperately needed in his life again. However, there was a chance that he could share some things with Teague and have it completely backfire on him.
Finally Max said, “I want to tell you something, and I know you might not want to listen, but I think it’s time I do this.”
He looked his brother straight in the eye but Teague didn’t respond. He sat there with a stone expression and cold ocean eyes. Max knew he’d hurt his brother so badly he may never forgive him, but he couldn’t keep living like this anymore. He needed to clear the air.
“I’m just going to start talking, okay?” Max added. “I’ll talk if you could just listen for a bit…ask questions later but…just listen for now.”
Teague didn’t answer.
“Okay?” Max prodded, deciding he needed some kind of response.
His brother held out his hands. “Fine. Start talking. I’m listening. But is this going to be you talking or one of your characters,” he added dryly.
Max took a deep breath, choosing to disregard that while trying to settle on where to begin. He picked the days with Olivia, when he and his brother first started to drift apart. “When Olivia and I got together… I know that was hard for you.”
Teague said nothing; he only stared at him with icy teal eyes, so Max continued.
“I know it was wrong of me to get so caught up in all of that—to basically put you on the back burner for all of that media attention—but it’s not really what you think it was.”
His brother narrowed his eyes slightly. “What do you mean?”
Max sighed. “So you know Dan Douglas, the music producer? Olivia and Sarah’s dad?”
Teague slowly nodded.
“Well, him and Dad made a business deal to get Olivia cast in that movie. Music rights for the soundtrack were traded for a starring role. You know all this, right? Because of all that shit with Tyse? We had that fabulous family meeting about it all,” he added dryly. It was the day Tyse decked him in the face, which he might have deserved—to a degree—but it was a memorable experience nonetheless.
Teague was expressionless, but even though Max had asked him to remain quiet, he was waiting for another response.
His brother leaned forward onto the table. “That’s not surprising. You know how Dad and Grandpa work. There’s a lot of secret shit behind the scenes. They are always working deals with people. But you went along with it? The deal with the Douglases?”
“Like I said at the family meeting, I didn’t know,” Max explained adamantly. “I honestly didn’t. As far as I knew, Olivia tried out for the role and was cast in the movie. I had no idea it was set up that way in exchange for music rights. I actually thought she fit the part perfectly, so when we started dating… I just figured fate was in my favor. I’m not going to play off how much all of this has hurt me and how humiliating it is. It has and it is. I loved Olivia. I truly did fall in love with her. I let my guard down and allowed myself to feel something for someone for once. She, on the other hand, didn’t feel the same way, and when she found out she’d been traded like a business pawn, she thought I was a part of it too even though I told her I wasn’t.”
“So you didn’t convince her you weren’t, whether that’s true or not? Is that why you guys went your separate ways?”
Max stared at the table again until he could form the right words. He knew he’d receive his brother’s doubt no matter what he said. He could easily sense Teague’s skepticism because of all the times he’d thrown bullshit at him in the past with the help of his flawless acting.
Finally he went with the full truth and admitted, “I was in love with Olivia and asked her to marry me.”
Teague’s eyebrows shot sky high.
“She said yes,” Max continued, “but apparently she was just caught up in the hype of everything because a few weeks later she changed her mind. She said she couldn’t handle the pressure anymore; that my family was too much for her to deal with and she didn’t want to be in the industry any longer; that she was just turning nineteen and wasn’t ready. She said she didn’t believe I loved her, and it didn’t matter what I said to convince her that I would always put her first…she still walked away from me. I kid you not, I made a fucking fool out of myself to get her back. I thought she really did have a poi
nt about my family and just needed to be assured they wouldn’t matter. I thought I’d prove to her that we could have a life together and I could protect her from the media.”
Teague nodded ever so slightly. “Yeah, that’s a hard thing to promise with your status,” he said softly.
“I know,” Max agreed. “But…I was blind, I guess. Thought I had the power to give her anything she wanted. Maybe I just couldn’t accept that she didn’t want to be with me. I guess I’m that arrogant, but I truly did love her and just couldn’t fathom that she didn’t return that anymore. Or…at all.”
Teague laced his fingers together. “I get it. And that’s why you started kissing dad’s ass more?”
Max scoffed. “I didn’t kiss his ass. When you were veering away from him and starting to go your own way, I think he panicked. He no longer had that card on the table that was in his favor—two sons working in the same industry together. So he focused his attention on me and…I let him for a while. I honestly didn’t know what the fuck I wanted, and because things went to shit with Olivia, I felt like I lost a part of me—probably the only good part of me. I didn’t deal with it well, took it out on you, let dad keep me occupied with work… That’s all it really was—my only way to keep my mind off of what happened. Teague, it’s one thing to have your heart ripped out of your chest…it’s another thing to know what to do after that. What if you’d gone through something like that with Camryn?”
Teague immediately looked defensive as he studied Max for a moment, a mix of anger and caution on his face. But the way his brother took in a slow breath of air as his features softened, Max could tell he empathized somehow.
Finally Teague sighed. “Have you talked to Olivia since all of that?”
Scoffing again, Max smiled sarcastically. “She wanted nothing to do with me. Changed her number, wouldn’t let anyone know where she was… I tracked her down a few times and found her on the east coast, but she still turned me down. Then she ended up moving to Europe. No, I haven’t seen her or heard from her since. I got nothing after she broke things off. Absolutely nothing more than ‘I don’t love you, leave me alone.’”
Teague cringed. “Ouch.”
Max had no response. Ouch was right. Ouch didn’t even cover a part of it. His father threw one project after another at him and he gladly took every one of them to keep his mind on other things. He became obsessed with working, taking on other emotions and roles so he didn’t have to deal with his own. He thought time might do Olivia some good; maybe she just needed some space. But one year turned into two, and then he found out she got married to some British guy.
“How come you never told me any of this?” Teague asked.
Max studied him closely, aware that he was being sincere. They used to be so close growing up, even just as half brothers when Teague moved into the mansion. His mom had died of an overdose when he was just four years old. They were so young and didn’t care about minor details over whose mom was whose. They just became best friends. Then as teenagers, Jay was added to the mix more often and the three of them became inseparable. They could always confide in one another, and were always each other’s allies against their parents.
“I honestly have no good explanation for that,” Max shrugged. “Just a combination of things maybe? I got busy, you got busy, I was too angry and selfish to do anything about it… I don’t know. Dad was always mad at you; I was wallowing in my self-pity because of Olivia and kept trying to avoid how I was really feeling. Stress was getting to me. Sometimes it was making me sick. I felt like I was stuck in the middle of you and Dad so I tried avoiding both of you more…
“I don’t know, Teague. I know that’s not a good enough answer, but it’s all I have. I wish I’d handled it better. I basically shut myself off, and for all it’s worth…I take full responsibility for it and I’m sorry. From the bottom of my heart, I’m truly sorry. I acted like an asshole because I let my crushed heart change me, and it was easier to let dad have control of my business decisions because I didn’t want to think about any of it. And when Tyse came to town… God, I had no idea what the hell was happening when he started dating a Douglas. Seriously out of all the people, he picked the one girl that’s almost the spitting image of her sister who nearly destroyed me.” He sighed. “I’m sorry for all of it. I know it’s one excuse after another, but I’m sure I could have handled it better.”
It was Teague’s turn to sigh. “It wasn’t all on you, man. I was to blame, too. So many things have changed… I think we were all caught in the whirlwind and didn’t know where to start picking up the pieces so nobody even tried. And as for handling situations with Dad…I know how that goes. I’m guilty of handling things poorly too. You just can’t win and he has a way of making things worse.”
Max thought about that for a minute, glad Teague could understand. You really couldn’t win either way with their dad. Even when Max was completely golden in a glorious public moment or career achievement, his father still pressured him to do better.
Max also had information he was holding back and had been asked not to share it with his brother. However, he felt it now needed to be disclosed. He’d followed so many instructions from his father over the years—some results had been good and some bad—but maybe it was time to just throw everything on the table and start over.
“There’s something else,” he began.
Teague eyed him suspiciously. “Okay…”
“It’s about Dad.”
“Hit me with it. Am I even going to be surprised?”
Max shrugged. “I don’t know, but he didn’t want me to tell you.”
Teague’s face darkened. “Fabulous,” he spoke sarcastically.
“Probably nothing like what you’re thinking but… About five years ago—shortly after Olivia left and you and Dad started getting into it even more…”
Teague waited for him to continue, but gave him an impatient look that said, “And?”
“Dad was diagnosed with cancer. He had surgery, went through treatments… He went through a really rough time. I guess you could say that was part of the reason why I stuck around so much. He made it clear he wanted me to sign on with the company—both of us, actually. You and me.”
“What kind of cancer?” Teague asked, rubbing his forehead with a sigh. “They got rid of it?”
“Pancreatic. And no, not at first. It was worse than they thought and surgery was a little more complicated. Because of how much of the pancreas they had to remove, and some of his intestine, he’s had to take medication for digestion issues and now he’s even borderline diabetic.”
“Was this when he wanted us to meet with his lawyer to go over his business assets? The meeting I refused to go to?”
“Yes.”
“He was worried he was going to die from this and wanted us to split the company with Grandpa?” It was more of a statement.
“Yes.”
Teague sighed again. Now he was rubbing his face with both hands and he did so for almost a minute. Max didn’t know what else to say, so he gave his brother the time to contemplate.
Finally Teague said, “Well, a lot of things make sense knowing this. It would have been nice to know this a few years ago.”
“I know,” Max bowed his head. “And I’m sorry. He didn’t want anyone to know, including me. I only found out because he looked a bit jaundiced one day and…that’s one of the signs. Then I saw some of the medication he was taking and confronted him about it.”
“So you didn’t know about it until after he had the surgery?”
“Yeah, he was planning to keep it from all of us. He didn’t want it affecting any of his business deals. Like I said, I only found out by chance. Remember when he went to the Caribbean for a month?”
Teague nodded his head.
“Well, he actually didn’t. Apparently he was here, having surgery and recovering in his own damn house.”
“Why the fuck would he keep this from us? God,” Teague groaned.
“I guess we McCallans hate to show weakness,” Max answered matter-of-factly. “It’s the fucking truth.”
Teague studied him sincerely for a moment. “Yeah, it is the fucking truth,” he agreed. “Shit,” he sighed, shaking his head. “What am I supposed to do about this? I feel like…I feel like I should say something to him or… Hell, I don’t know. I’m conflicted. He’s treated me like shit over the years but I’ve given it right back. I feel like there are way too many things to get past. I honestly don’t know how I’m supposed to feel about this.”
“I don’t know either, and I go round-and-round with him too, and knowing this has made it hard to cut him off completely,” Max shook his head. “Like I said, he didn’t want you to know. I think he wants your respect, not your pity. And I didn’t want you to know about Olivia so… I guess we kind of made an agreement.”
“You two are both assholes,” Teague stated.
It made Max laugh. “And so are you.”
Maybe that’s what was needed at the moment because Teague laughed too. “Yeah, I know. It’s that fucking McCallan pride. It’s a recipe for success but it’s also a curse.”
They were both quiet for a while, but Max knew his brother was thinking pretty hard about something. He could tell by the way he was mindlessly stroking his stubble with his fingers. They were both prone to doing that.
Finally Teague looked at him and said, “So here we are, talking about shit. Is there anything else you want to talk about?”
It was a specific request to discuss Kate and Chase, but Max’s heart started pounding in his chest.
He still didn’t know if he could go through with it.
Chapter Six
Feeling like he needed a strong drink, Max settled for a couple of beers with his brother. It really did seem to be a buffer, but putting off the conversation wasn’t doing him any good.
“I didn’t know who Kate was back then,” he began. “You and I weren’t close anymore so…I didn’t know who you were seeing at the time. And I would swear on my own life about that. She was the one who approached me at the HOB one night; she was pretty and didn’t seem to care who I was. But…you know how that goes. It’s part of her game.”
