The Acceptance
Page 21

“You can learn.”
Tyler nodded. “Yes. I could learn. But I think I could change the world if I tried. I think that Aunt Simone’s charity work is more my style.”
His father stretched his arm over the back of the couch and looked at him. “I never would have thought that would be her calling. But it was.”
“She’s changed a lot of lives.”
“She has. Hers included.”
Tyler had heard all the stories of his father and his aunt growing up together in France. His aunt still admitted that until she’d fallen in love with his Uncle Curtis, she’d had a crush on his father. It all seemed weird to him, but his Aunt Simone wasn’t the same woman then that she was now.
She was a strong figure in the community. She’d walked away from fortune and family to marry the man she truly loved. That did say a lot about her character.
Zach patted Tyler’s thigh. “Are you thinking you’d like to talk to her about a job?”
Tyler shrugged. “I don’t know the first thing about how to help people either. I don’t know much about anything.”
A smile formed on his father’s lips. “You’re selling yourself short.”
“In the past three years I’ve held four jobs.”
“Yes, and one of them was on a Pierpont Oil rig.”
“You’ve talked to Uncle John?”
“We’re a tight family.”
He knew that. Wasn’t that the part that drove him home—family?
“Tyler, I want you to do what you want to do. I will always have opportunity for you here. That’s what fathers are for.”
“Spencer and Ed belong here.”
Zach nodded. “They do. Ed has always had it in him and Spencer was designing things from the time he could put Legos together. You’ve always had your head somewhere else and that’s okay.” Zach stood and Tyler followed. “Why don’t you talk to Simone? Feel out what you want to do. If you need something in the mean time I could get you a job at the Starbucks downstairs.”
That made Tyler laugh. “I’d rather work in the building permits department.”
Zach rested his hand on his son’s shoulder. “You give me the word and you’ll have a position.”
“I’ll let you know,” he said, but he was sure that working in an office that overlooked Nashville would make him crazy. Of course the very fact that he was standing there and Courtney crossed his mind made him equally as uncomfortable.
He’d seen her mother pass by him. Surely Courtney was going through her own hell. Tonight. He’d call her tonight and they could compare horror stories. Corporate jobs vs meddling mothers. The thought nearly made him laugh.
First he’d head over to see his aunt. Suddenly helping the less fortunate seemed a lot more appealing that private elevators and parking spaces.
Chapter Twelve
Simone Keller’s office was simple and smaller than the room Tyler had occupied on the Pierpont Oil rig. She sat at her desk, pinched against the wall in the small medical clinic where she’d once worked and now ran her charity. Her long black hair hung over her shoulder. Tyler could hear her and he knew that a phone receiver was pressed to her ear under that curtain of hair.
As she spoke about a fundraising event she looked up at the doorway to see him standing there. A smile lifted her cheeks and sparkled in her eyes.
“That sounds great. If we can get them to help us financially we’ll gain a lot more followers and revenue.” She nodded and took a few notes on a pad in front of her. “Okay. Let me know what you find out.”
She hung up the phone and stood. The chair in her office hit the wall behind her and she shimmied out from behind the desk and moved directly to him.
“To what do I owe this pleasure?” Her French accent was still deep even after all the years she’d lived in Tennessee.
“I’m out visiting. I just left Dad’s office.”
“He did say you were going to stop by there today. So what is your new title? What kind of view does your office have?”
Tyler rubbed his hand over the back of his neck. “I didn’t take a job yet. I’m not sure commercial real estate development is my forte.”
She nodded. “I once used to travel the world attending meetings and listening to men discuss oil. It didn’t seem to be for me either.”
“I think your work here is more important.”
She smiled wide and pride in what she did was evident. “I received a phone call today from a young mother who has relocated in Ohio. Her daughter, who had been sexually abused by the mother’s boyfriend, is in school and doing wonderfully. And the mother has a good job and just got a promotion. She called to thank me. Isn’t that wonderful?”
And it was the look on his aunt’s face that told him he couldn’t thrive in corporate America, even if his name was on the side of the letterhead.
“You know, Tyler, I did not know this would have been my calling. One day I did something that changed someone’s life and it changed my life too. I’m sure your father would agree that he didn’t expect me to create something so selflessly.”
He didn’t know about that, but then again he’d only ever known Simone as a woman who gave her all to help others.
“Anyway,” she went on, “why are you here?”
“I was thinking maybe this was more my speed. I thought I’d see if your organization was in need of someone who knew nothing at all.”
She laughed easily, crossed her arms over her chest, and studied him. “You want to work within my organization?”
“I know you probably don’t have the funding for very many employees. My rent is low. I’m bumming a car from my parents. And I really don’t want to work in construction.”
She nodded and pressed her painted lips together. “I have a gala coming up in three months. It is one of my biggest events of the year and nets the organization most of its operating costs. Are you up to the challenge of helping to organize it?”
“Really? I’d love to try.”
She nodded and held out her manicured hand to shake his. “Well, Mr. Tyler Benson, I would love to work with you. And I am not a very nice boss.”
That caused him to laugh as he leaned in and kissed his aunt on the cheek. “I won’t let you down.”