“Dad!” Ophelia exclaimed, her cutlery falling from her hand to the plate in front of her.
“Can’t I ask my son-in-law that?” Carter asked, turning to Cade and then to Ophelia with a shrug.
“Why would you ask him that?”
“Isn’t that why he married you?” Carter asked. “To become the chairman, so I am wondering what is taking so long.”
“My grandfather had more…”
“Stop there,” Ophelia said, cutting him off before he could say anything more. “You do not have to explain anything to him.”
“Ophelia, stay out of this,” Carter said before gesturing to Cade to explain.
“My grandfather’s first requirement for the position was that I get married.”
“Which was why you got together with my daughter?” Carter asked. Ophelia was shocked that it took her father this long to speak about it. He was not deceived by their petty tricks at all. He still knew that they were together, mostly for business benefits.
“Yes, sir, but recently, due to new policies, grandfather is saying that we need to have children before he can transfer the chairman’s rights to me.”
“Then have children,” Carter said. His tone of saying it made the problem sound insignificant. It was like they saw the solution to the problem, but they were choosing to ignore it and act like it was not there. “How hard can it be?” Carter added that he was seated with a bunch of brainless children.
“But we already agreed not to have,” Cade replied. He had not taken Ophelia’s explanation for it. He wanted to make sure that if they were having kids, it was because they both wanted to do it and not because they were forced by their families. It had been something he wanted when he thought love was a real thing everyone needed. Now that he was certain that not everyone needed love, there was no need for him to be so focused on breeding a family.
“You agreed by yourself?” Carter asked, and Cade nodded. Ophelia wanted to interject to tell her father that they were going to have kids and make sure that Cade was promoted to chairman, but she wanted to hear what her dad thought on the matter. She wants to see so desperately where the conversation would end.
“Without your families? The reason why you are both together?” Carter was saying the words but he could not believe that he was.
“We were brought together by our families quite alright, but we do not want to have children, and we are busy people; we do not want to bring them into this world without caring for them,” Cade explained.
“Care? That is what you get a nanny for. A nanny can take care of them,” Carter said.
“I know, but what about parental love? We do not want to have kids in case we spill up.”
“Are you two already thinking of a divorce?” Carter asked.
“Absolutely not,” Cade said in a haste. What would his father-in-law think if he heard that they had already picked the year of divorce and were just waiting for the date to come so they could go their separate ways?
“I don’t care what you do later in life; all I know now is that you need to do whatever it takes to get to the chairman position as soon as possible,” Carter said. He was not telling them to have kids because he wanted to have little children running around the house to bring joy to it, and neither was he saying it so they had a better commitment to it, but because he needed Cade to take a step up.
“As you know, Ophelia here will be resuming work on Monday, and exactly two weeks from then we will be introducing her as the vice chairman of the group. The woman who has been gracious enough to hold the forte all this while has been promoted to CEO of one of our branches abroad.”
Cade thought about it and how Carter would consider going from vice chairman to CEO a promotion and not the other way around. He was not going to say anything about it though because he was not in the position to do so.
“And the board of directors think it is a shame that we are promoting Ophelia to vice chairman when her husband isn’t even a vice chairman himself.”
“The board?” Ophelia finally broke her silence and leaned forward. “Really dad? The board?” she asked again. Ophelia glanced at Cade, and she noticed the way his countenance fell. He was uncomfortable with the matter being discussed, and she was the one who could stop her dad from ragging like a mad dog just to fulfil his desires.
Carter cleared his throat and looked around uncomfortably. Maybe he should have had this meeting with Cade alone. Ophelia was making it difficult for him to say what he wanted to.
“This talking is not what the board said but what you think; why not just come out clean and tell him that you are worried he might not get promoted after you sold me off to him?” Ophelia added.
“Sold you off? Why would you say it like I collected money?” Carter asked.
“You might not have gotten money now, but pretty soon, right? All the collaborations and contracts you are hoping to get, right?” Ophelia said.
Cade held Ophelia’s hand that was in a ball on the table; she turned to him, and he shook his head. “You know what, Dad,” she said, ignoring his silent plea that she stop.
“Give us three months and I will be at your door with a positive pregnancy slip.” She was confident, and it made Cade gasp. What was she talking about?
“Ophelia, do not allow rage to overcome you.”
“Rage?” she looked from Cade and then to her father. “You can delay my appointment as vice chairman till I present you with my pregnancy test results.”
“Think before you speak,” Carter warned with a stern voice.
She stood up, pushing the chair back and turning to Cade. “Why are you still sitting? Shouldn’t we go make a baby?”