Chapter 158: What We Leave Behind

The Vance ancestral home became considerably quieter after dinner.

Most of the bed-and-breakfast guests had already retired to their rooms, while Rosalie and Alejandro disappeared into their private quarters after spending another half hour talking with Giovanni.

Apparently, inviting someone to stay overnight also meant making certain that person had eaten enough for three.

Alexander couldn’t really complain. His mother had always expressed affection through food.

He and Giovanni eventually ended up outside with coffee, settling into two wide wooden patio chairs beneath the covered veranda overlooking the darkened grounds. The chairs had thick cushions and broad armrests, placed close enough together that the inner rests nearly touched. It left only a narrow space between them, enough that now and then, a slight shift caused their forearms to brush.

Neither man seemed particularly interested in going to bed yet.

Maybe it was because of Arturo.

Funerals had a way of leaving behind thoughts that didn’t disappear simply because the burial was over.

Alexander took a slow sip of coffee and settled deeper into his chair, his hand resting only inches from Giovanni’s.

He’d spent most of the evening telling Giovanni about Second Life Workshop because it was easier to talk about warehouses, architects, permits, and construction than death.

Eventually, however, they ran out of workshop problems.

The silence that followed wasn’t uncomfortable.

Giovanni stared toward the garden.

Alexander studied him for a moment.

"Are you okay?"

Giovanni didn’t answer immediately.

"I will be."

That sounded more truthful than simply saying yes.

Alexander nodded.

"Mr. Arturo seemed like a good man."

"He was."

"You were close."

"As close as he allowed anyone to get."

Alexander smiled faintly. "That sounds familiar."

Giovanni looked at him.

"What?"

"Nothing."

"You were implying something."

"I would never."

"Alex."

Alexander laughed softly and took another sip of coffee.

For a moment, Giovanni seemed almost amused. Then his gaze drifted back toward the grounds.

"He taught me how to make a fishing trap once."

Alexander raised an eyebrow.

"Did you actually catch anything with it?"

"I did. One small fish."

"So if we ever get stranded somewhere without food, we’re screwed."

"I’d give you the bigger portion."

"Wonderful."

That earned him another small smile.

Then Giovanni became quiet again.

"Arturo knew how to do almost everything."

"Apparently."

"My father thought some of it was unnecessary."

Alexander could understand why.

Back then, Matteo Mercer hadn’t built a business empire. Mercer Group didn’t even exist yet. He was simply a father trying to make sure his son finished school and had a good future. Learning how to start a fire without modern conveniences, locate a safe source of drinking water, or tell which wild plants and crops were safe to eat probably hadn’t seemed nearly as important as whatever Giovanni was supposed to be learning inside a classroom.

Arturo apparently disagreed.

"He used to tell me that knowing how to make money was useful," Giovanni continued. "But knowing how to survive without it was better."

"That sounds like something worth remembering."

"It was."

Especially considering how drastically Giovanni’s life had changed after high school.

Matteo had waited until his son graduated before selling nearly everything the family owned and taking the risk that would eventually change their lives. He’d started as an investor in a construction business, long before the Mercer name became associated with the company Giovanni would eventually inherit and expand.

Arturo couldn’t possibly have known where Giovanni would end up when he’d taught a teenage boy how to work with wood or make do without modern conveniences.

He hadn’t been preparing Giovanni to become Giovanni Mercer, CEO.

He’d simply been preparing him for life.

"Arturo had been observing you too."

Alexander turned toward him.

"He told me you were a keeper."

"A beekeeper?"

"No." Giovanni’s mouth twitched. "His definition was a little different. He said a keeper was someone who held on to the people he cared about. Someone who looked after them, loved them without keeping score, and sometimes became so busy taking care of everyone else that he forgot to take care of himself."

Alexander’s amusement slowly faded.

"That’s surprisingly deep."

"Arturo could be surprisingly deep."

"And he noticed all that about me back in high school?"

"Yes." Giovanni looked at him. "And I agree with him."

Alexander wasn’t entirely sure what to do with that.

Giovanni continued before he could answer.

"You were already looking after Dominic back then. You kept doing it for years afterward."

There was no bitterness in his voice despite everything that had happened. He said it with enough certainty that Alexander found himself looking down at his coffee instead.

Because when Giovanni put it that way, Arturo hadn’t simply noticed how Alexander treated Dominic. He’d noticed the kind of person Alexander was long before Alexander himself had ever thought to define it.

Maybe that was simply how Arturo had looked at people.

He’d spent most of his life surrounded by students who eventually grew up and left him behind. Yet, he’d apparently paid enough attention to remember what kind of children they had been and, sometimes, what kind of adults they might become.

And somehow, despite having no family of his own waiting at home, Arturo had never seemed particularly alone.

The thought brought Alexander back to the funeral.

Arturo had died without a wife, children, or any surviving relatives.

And yet, hundreds of people had shown up to say goodbye.

"Do you ever think about it?" Alexander asked.

Giovanni glanced at him. "About what?"

"Getting old."

"Occasionally."

"That’s a very boring answer."

"What would you prefer?"

"I don’t know. Something profound. We just came from a funeral."

Giovanni considered it.

"I would prefer to get old."

Alexander stared at him before laughing.

"All right. Fair."

"At least I’m realistic."

"Painfully."

The amusement faded naturally.

Alexander looked across the property. The ancestral home had existed long before he was born and would probably remain long after he was gone. Augustus had certainly intended it that way.

The older man had spent much of his life building things he expected the next generation to preserve—property, businesses, wealth, and a family name that would continue long after his own death.

Arturo hadn’t left behind anything comparable.

No sprawling estate. No company bearing his surname. No children to inherit what he’d accumulated over seventy-eight years.

Yet his funeral procession had stretched farther than Alexander could see from their car.

Hundreds of people had come because one quiet school caretaker had mattered to them.

It made Alexander wonder which man had actually left behind more.

"Arturo never married?" he asked.

"No."

"Did he ever say why?"

"Not to me."

"Children?"

Giovanni shook his head. "He didn’t have any."

Alexander traced one finger along the rim of his cup.

"Do you think he regretted it?"

"I don’t know."

"He didn’t seem lonely."

"He wasn’t."

That answer came quickly.

Giovanni leaned back in his chair.

"The school was his home. Students came and went, but there were always people around him. Even after he retired from most of his responsibilities, former students kept visiting."

"Including you."

"Yes."

Alexander smiled faintly.

"So maybe family doesn’t necessarily look the way people expect."

"No."

For some reason, that brought his thoughts back to Augustus.

The two men couldn’t have left behind more different legacies. Arturo had possessed relatively little and still managed to fill a cemetery with people who’d come to mourn him. Augustus had left behind property, businesses, money, and enough instructions to continue affecting Alexander’s life years after his death.

Neither way was necessarily wrong.

They were simply very different men.

Alexander looked at Giovanni.

"What about you?"

"What about me?"

"Have you ever thought about what you want to leave behind?"

Giovanni was quiet for a while.

"Mercer Group, presumably."

"That sounds like the answer people expect Giovanni Mercer to give."

"It is still an answer."

"I know."

Alexander waited.

Eventually, Giovanni sighed.

"I don’t know."

Alexander smiled. "Look at that. A normal human answer."

"I give those occasionally."

"I’ll mark the date."

Giovanni ignored him.

"I’ve spent most of my adult life thinking about what my parents left behind. I haven’t spent nearly as much time considering what I’ll leave."

That Alexander understood.

For years, much of his own life had revolved around responsibilities and expectations other people had already defined for him. There was Vance Holdings, the family name, Augustus’s expectations, and even the future he’d once assumed he would have with Dominic.

Then Dominic hadn’t shown up.

Alexander’s carefully planned life had fallen apart spectacularly enough to become internet entertainment.

Strangely, being abandoned might’ve been the first time he’d been forced to seriously ask what he wanted, with no plan telling him what came next.

Second Life Workshop had come afterward.

So had Giovanni.

Alexander stopped.

That thought lingered longer than expected.

Giovanni noticed.

"What?"

"Nothing."

"You’ve said that twice tonight."

"I think I’m allowed."

"You’re usually thinking something when you say it."

Alexander looked at him.

Unfortunately, Giovanni knew him too well.

Maybe that was why he’d been putting off another conversation. Not because he didn’t know what to say, but because he wasn’t entirely sure what Giovanni would say.

He’d recently asked Augustus’s trustee lawyers to review the older man’s will and trust provisions in detail.

What they’d explained wasn’t something Alexander had fully understood when he’d walked into Giovanni’s penthouse and proposed marriage.

At the time, he’d been trying to solve too many problems at once. Dominic was gone, the collaboration with Sebastian Group had collapsed, the Board had been watching him, and his grandfather’s trust had been another consideration.

Somehow, Giovanni Mercer had become the answer Alexander placed in the middle of it all.

Except circumstances had changed.

More than Alexander had realized.

"Gio."

Giovanni looked at him.

Alexander hesitated.

"There’s actually something I’ve been meaning to talk to you about."

The change in his tone must’ve been obvious because Giovanni immediately became more attentive.

"About what?"

Alexander glanced toward the ancestral home.

Augustus had been dead for years, yet somehow, the older man was about to interfere with Alexander’s marriage plans one more time.

"Grandfather’s will."

Giovanni’s expression changed.

"What about it?"

Alexander took a slow breath.

This conversation was probably overdue.

"The trustees found something I think you need to know."