They looked confused to see me back so early and started asking questions.
I didn't answer. I just said one thing.
"I pulled all two hundred million out of Southeast Bank."
They glanced at each other and asked nothing more.
They never could figure me out. I didn't want Sterling Group—didn't want to run it, didn't want to inherit it. All I wanted was to drift through life without anyone needing anything from me. They let me, and they handed me two hundred million to do it with.
I couldn't spend it all. Then my old classmate Nelson Fox hit a wall in his career, so I deposited the money straight into his bank.
He'd thumped his chest and sworn up and down—once the bank was back on its feet, he'd roll out the red carpet for me, nothing but first-class everything.
I'd grown up swimming in that kind of treatment. None of what he was promising moved the needle. Then he heard I was bored out of my mind every day, so he carved out a position for me at the bank and practically begged me to take it—just something to kill time, he said.
But now he'd gotten full of himself.
Lost all sense of where he actually stood.
Fine. Then I'd help him figure it out.