Those of you who reviewed – YOU ROCK!!
For some reason I really like this chapter.
Chapter 7: 10 years later - Troy
Troy's eyes opened and he found himself staring at the ceiling. He didn't need to turn to look at the bed side clock to know that it was five in the morning. Some mornings he felt like buying a roundtrip ticket to his home town, killing the bastard that was his father and coming back.
When he was ten his father had decided that he should have morning training sessions and had proceeded to drag him out of bed at five o'clock every morning no exceptions for weekends or holidays. It was three years later that he could get himself out of bed at the unholy hour with the help of three alarm clocks and two more before he just started waking up at that particular time like clockwork. Now even after ten years away from his father's thumb no matter how tired he was or little sleep he had the night before (he had gone to bed just 3 hours ago) he would still wake up on the dot at five unable to fall back to sleep no matter how hard he tired.
The only times he did not wake up was if he had drunk enough to forget his name the night before and that had not happened since he was an undergrad. He got up and put on a pair of shorts and t-shirt and considered that perhaps he should get himself some new running shoes as the ones he owned seemed scruffy. Then he hit the streets for his morning run.
Troy Bolton had done well for himself. At the age of 28 he was one of the most sought out corporate lawyers in New York. Companies had threatened to walk out of the firm he worked for if he was not the lawyer that was assigned to oversee their company. He had made lead attorney just after two years being at the firm, had a personal assistant plus two secretaries and three junior associates working under him.
Not bad for a high school jock whose father told him regularly that he would not amount to anything.
When he was a senior at high school Troy had accepted a full scholarship to NYU with an early admittance and had gone off to graduate from NYU just after 3 years. One of the reasons he had chosen NYU was because the scholarship had come regarding his academic achievements rather than his sporting ones although they had expected Troy to either play basketball or golf for the school but not both.
Shortly after coming to New York he had to make the decision to give up either basketball or golf. Much to the disappointment of the NYU basketball coach he had given up basketball knowing even though he was good at the game he was not going to grow much taller and this was something you needed when you played college ball. The coach had told him that he was young and he was bound to grow but Troy had been realistic; he was at the time 170 already and it was not likely that he would grow another 10 centimetres after 18 and even if by some miracle it happened it still would not have been enough to play college level basketball. He realised that he had been right about his decision when his height levelled out at 173. He found that he enjoyed playing basketball far more than before when he played it just for fun which he still did, two times a week with friends.
In the time he had spent at NYU he had gone off to claim the title Junior Golf Champion to US two years in a row. And after a suggestion from the counsellor he was seeing due to his anger management, donated his summers to the peace core building schools, fixing water pipes etc. around the world in poor provinces, seeing more of the world then his age mates ever dreamed off. These achievements had got him a full scholarship to Harvard Law and then to a prestigious New York law firm right after graduation.
Now after four years at the law firm he was indispensable. He made a mind blowing amount of money which he had no idea of what to with as he was used to living his life on the minimum. He only replaced the things when needed. Even though he owned more suits and shirts then he would ever need he still did not excessively spend. The biggest amount of money he had spent was buying his Manhattan penthouse and his beloved Audio R8 which he only used on the weekends to get to the golf course otherwise he either walked or took the metro to get to work.
After his run he was back at his penthouse, taken a shower, eaten cereal for breakfast and was at his desk in his office around six thirty. His personal assistant Mark came in around eight bringing his coffee and with that his day began. His maniac work ethics from high school that had taken him though college and law school with ease remained as he was thorough with his work and always early with his projects. He held seven meetings that day including a lunch meeting. Completed a mind blowing number of jobs that left other lawyers wondering whether he was human or not.
It was now around seven and he was still at the office suffering though a meeting with a client, he messaged the bridge of his nose, he had a headache since lunch, not surprising when he got gotten about 5 hours of sleep in the last three days. They were trying to close the tax payments for the clients company for they were taking over another company which was always a mountain of paper work to do. He was exhausted and wanted to go home take a bath (yes so he enjoyed baths – they helped him relax) and go to bed when he heard his private cell phone go off. He saw though the glass window Mark answer it and then get up and move towards his office, he knew this would have to be important as only a handful of people had access to his private number.
He excused himself and met Mark half way, "it is your sister Melinda and she says it is an emergency." Troy froze for a moment, had something happened to one of his sisters?
"Mel," he said to the speaker and knew that something was very wrong when she started crying after hearing his voice.
He turned to Mark, "clear my schedule for the next week and get me on the first plane to Albuquerque." It took a while but he finally put together what Melinda was saying, Jack had done something to the girls and they were at the hospital with someone or another and she was calling him for their cell phone. When he heard that Melinda hadn't heard or seen Jess since they had brought them to the hospital his heart rate went up. He knew he should not have left the girls with the bastard after Sarah passed away.
He had feared that something would happen but never in his wildest dreams had he thought that the girls would end up in the hospital. He himself had never even needed first aid after the bastard was through with him. He had made the girls promise to call him should anything out off ordinary happen even both had asked what he had meant and he now regretted being so vague when they both had pressed for an explanation. He knew he had been selfish in not going back for the funeral but he couldn't bear to face the bastard. Now he was paying for it in triplicate like usual.
After he hung up with Melinda he hit redial hoping to get the person who actually owned the phone.
"Hello?" came the timid voice, just what he needed, someone his father could corner.
He barked out a "Who are you?"
"I am Gabriella Montez," was the reply, while the name rang a bell he couldn't place it and it did not give him much information to go with. He got where he was by being blunt and straight to the point. He didn't make a lot of friends however he got the job done.
"That doesn't give me any information other than your name Ms. Montez. I was asking along the lines of how you are you involved in this situation."
He walked into his office and ordered Mark to get his overnight bag out for him while he packed his laptop up. The partner he was working under came in concerned and he just gave him the brief version between listening to Ms. Montez explain how she had gotten involved in the situation. His boss knew enough about him because Troy considered him enough of a friend to tell him certain things and John told him to take as much time as he liked, and in that time he knew that Ms. Montez was the girls maths teacher 'for F--K sakes!', not who he would like to have near his sisters at a time of crises but beggars couldn't be choosers.
"I will be there as soon as I can," he said to her in and when Mark told him that the next flight to New Mexico was in six hours his eyes flashed that had Mark baking up. John, his boss, told Mark to contact the firm jet and have it ready for Troy to go when he got to the airport. Troy gave his boss a nod and took a breath and asked the maths teacher, "My father?"
"He was arrested and is down town."
He was relieved to hear that and it could be heard in his voice as he ordered the girl "Good, make sure he does not get to my sisters before I get there,"
"Don't worry, I will stay until you get here and then hand over the reins to you" said the girl on the other hand and he was comforted to hear that at least someone the girls knew would be there for them.
He turned around to Mark who was following him and told him to get him a chopper on the roof to take him to the airport. He had money, if it was not going to be used at times like these then when would it be used? He needed to say at least something nice to the maths teacher.
"Thank you for being there for my sisters, I will personally thank you when I get there" with that he hang up the phone without waiting for her reply and made his way to the roof where he could hear the blades of the chopper. For a moment he relished in the power that when you threw enough money around you could get a chopper within ten minutes.
His satisfaction however was short lived as he was going back to what he had run away from ten years ago and would come face to face with the man that haunted his nightmares.
The meeting is coming up in the next chapter that should be up tomorrow...
