3

Sean knew what his brother did to strategize any difficult quandary. He ran. Will’s drive to increase his endurance, to best his own time, was what had made him an undefeatable force in high school in long-distance track. The same competitive edge had earned him captain of the lacrosse team while at Harvard.

Sean had a lifetime of practice in keeping up with his brother, trying to beat him in a race, but this time he didn’t follow. He didn’t even try. Anything he could say would be pointless. Once Will made up his mind, it was a done deal. Sean had learned that, or thought he had, until his brother short-circuited the Senate race and an almost certain first step toward an even bigger prize in national politics.

Sean paused outside Will’s front door to rein in his anger. It was bad enough that he had put his own life on hold, including many of his own NGO travels on behalf of Worthington Shares start-ups, to assist his brother with a fast-track campaign. With Worthington money, power, and connections, Will had been a shoo-in as candidate. So much so that Kiki Estrada, the executive director of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, had clearly focused her first-tier choice on the Worthington family, Will in particular. She’d pestered Will nonstop until he had agreed to run.

Now Kiki was fit to be tied. She’d already called Sean four times, and he knew she wouldn’t give up until she got an answer that made sense.

Sean had nothing to tell her. In addition, he’d used every networking connection he had, tapping into his far-reaching social media circle to ensure Will would get that Senate seat and it would be an easy run. Now Sean was embarrassed. True, Worthington money had financed the campaign up to the launch event, so they hadn’t needed to go after outside donors. Still, Sean had cashed in a lot of long-standing favors with his colleagues. How could he explain Will walking away—with nothing to show for it?

The media circus would be bad for a while, but Sean could deal with that. Hardly a day passed where one of the Worthingtons, particularly Sean and his social butterfly sister, was not emblazoned somewhere. So even though this was the rich and famous Worthington family that all of New York liked to watch, Will’s withdrawal from the race would play in the headlines for only a short while. Then the press would be back to wringing what they could out of the oil spill and the mystery of the Polar Bear Bomber. When that failed to offer public titillation, they’d be on to the next hot story.

Sean could understand Will leaving the mess at American Frontier. Who on earth would want to remain a board member, much less take on a role as the new CEO of an oil company in the midst of a colossal oil spill that would affect every ocean system on the entire planet? Well, other than Will, who thrived on challenges that appeared impossible to overcome.

A snippet of their childhood flashed into Sean’s mind. Whenever the two brothers played, Will cast himself in the role of the Caped Crusader, complete with their mother’s tablecloth draped for effect. Sean was the villain.

I guess nothing’s changed in Dad’s eyes, Sean thought.

Will would forever be the perfect son, groomed for the helm of the family company. He managed the stable end of Worthington Shares—the big, established, blue-chip companies.

Sean fell into the “we might as well see if we can make any money here” role. Entrepreneurial ventures, launched with Worthington capital—the risky side of the business, where big money was won and lost—had ended up a natural fit for Sean. They allowed him to stay at the forefront of world events. Jet-setting across the globe, connecting with people, and kicking off dreams energized him. Seeing a few of those dreams fly whetted his appetite for more. Ten or so of his more than 100 start-ups were now poised to break out in big ways.

Bill Worthington understood both sides of the business but, like Will, was more comfortable with the blue-chip companies. However, it had been Will and Drew Simons who had maneuvered for Sean to take over the expansion of Worthington Shares in the start-ups. The job perfectly fit him and his entrepreneurial ways, they said, and Bill had agreed to give Sean the opportunity.

Sean had more than delivered—nearly a billion dollars in value in the last five years. Why then did he feel like he didn’t belong around the family dinner table? Or that no matter how much he did, he could never fully please his father? Maybe it was because, when they were growing up, he was the least likely one to be missed if he was MIA. With the spotlight on either his older brother or his charming baby sister, Sean felt stuck in the middle, which is exactly where he was.

Just like he was again, right now. Stuck between his family and those who had expected more out of a Worthington.

Sean sighed. Bill Worthington would find a way to cast Will in the role of Caped Crusader even in this situation. And that left Sean with the role of . . .

Some things never changed.

Will picked up his pace in Central Park. Once his breathing steadied and he’d fallen into a natural rhythm, he kicked into brainstorming mode again. It was a given that he needed to get more information about that photo of Sean and the Polar Bear Bomber, but how exactly could he go after it without tipping his hand?

The easiest solution in the short-term was to ask Sean what he was doing in the bar with the Polar Bear Bomber. But asking that question would spark further tension between the brothers when tension was already high. Still, Will played out the scenario in his head.

“You think I had something to do with that?” Sean would say. “Are you crazy? Do you think I’m crazy?” His mysterious brother, who drifted in and out of their lives, disappearing occasionally for days or even weeks at a time without telling them where he was going, would be incensed. “You don’t trust me. You never trust me.”

The conversation would turn and head downhill fast, and Will would learn nothing. Worse, if Sean was unaware of who the soon-to-be bomber was—if he’d been set up—he would be driven to vindicate himself. He’d pursue the original source of the photo. He might be hotheaded enough to start asking the wrong parties questions. And he would run squarely into people like Jason Carson, who played the lowest kind of hardball.

Will’s protectiveness kicked in. No, that’s not the way to go.

His processing switched gears. What about Sarah? Or Darcy?

The answer came swiftly. A no-go on both fronts. Yes, Sarah was a Worthington, but in the case of the Polar Bear Bomber, she was spearheading the lawsuit on behalf of the DOJ. If she had information on a possible link or suspect, even if it was her brother, she’d have to follow it to the hilt. Ditto with Darcy, who was like a dog with a prize bone. The agent would never back down.

No, the only thing he could do with Sarah was insert an occasional question about how the search for the Polar Bear Bomber was going. Carson had assured him the news story would hit soon. Then the world would know that the man in the polar bear suit had committed suicide by jumping from the top of a building near Times Square. He’d even left a signed note in a flat in Brooklyn, explaining why.

He could already hear Sarah’s response: “Well, isn’t that a little too tidy.”

The news would only add to his sister’s and Darcy’s suspicions about the timing of the bombing. It had morphed the public ire against the oil spill and the dying whales into empathy for the poor, beleaguered oil company that now had to battle ecological crazies.

Will had come to his own conclusions—that Eric Sandstrom, CEO of AF, had ordered the bombing of his own building to turn the tide of opinion in AF’s favor. Only a storehouse section had been damaged by the backpack bomb.

As Will slowed his pace to wind down, he decided that as soon as his parents left, he would tell Laura about the photo. There were never any secrets between the two of them. She was the only one who knew everything of import that happened in his world, so of course he would tell her about Jason Carson. Because she also knew about Ava’s revelation, she could help put the pieces together of what moves to make next.

Drew? The man always knew more than anyone gave him credit for. He hadn’t texted or phoned Will since Will stepped out of the race, and his silence spoke volumes. Likely Drew was already on the trail, connecting the dots. It was only a matter of hours before Will would have to come clean with him. But how much should he tell? Only about the photo of Sean and the Polar Bear Bomber? Or about Ava’s surprise too?