Extra Bonus #96: The Future of Hale Co. (Patreon)

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RESOURCES:  Check out this narrative timeline graphic to visually see when this bonus scene takes place.

MUSIC: We listened to "Tomorrow" by Branches while writing his bonus scene.

SPOILER WARNING: There are spoilers from BURN BRIGHT in this bonus scene. We highly recommend reading the book for reading this bonus.

I HAVE NEVER felt like I would let my dad down until now. Not in this way. I’ve imagined rising to the occasion when it came to Hale Co. a million damn times. Never did I think I’d fail when the time came.

You have no idea how much harder this is for me than I expected.

Not that you know what’s going on with Hale Co.—this is all very quiet right now to ensure there’s no volatility in the market. The public isn’t aware a board seat is going to open up. Or that I’m taking one-on-one meetings with different directors all month to ensure I’m nominated.

Not all the meetings are at the office. Some are on a golf green. Others at restaurants, like today’s lunch at this upscale steakhouse.

I came into this “competition” with a gargantuan amount of confidence in who I am and what I can bring to my family’s company. I genuinely believe I am a better fit than Campbell Ellery, but I just don’t know if I can win this race.

It’s become clear to me that I might not have what it takes. And it has nothing to do with a college degree.

I could call anyone after I have one of the worst one-on-one meetings all September. I end up slipping into a vacant bathroom at the steakhouse, and I avoid my angry green eyes in the mirror while I dial a number.

“Don’t you have several old, wrinkled toes to go suck?” Charlie answers on the third ring.

My chest won’t untighten. “By the way Pat Hayes acted at lunch just now, you’d think I chopped off his entire foot.”

Charlie laughs—like a real laugh.

“Is it funny?” I feign confusion and scrunch my face. “I’m losing track of the humor.”

“You learned how to use a compass when you were three,” he says like I’m acting stupid. “You can locate the hilarity in a prick being put in his place.”

Charlie knows Pat Hayes is an old chauvinistic, power-hungry asshole. In fact, he knows all the Hale Co. board members by name and personality since he’s on the board for H.M.C. Philanthropies and the charity’s offices are in Hale Co.’s building.

“I didn’t put Pat in his place.” I adjust my phone against my ear, my fist tight. “I just pissed him off, Charlie.”

“Good.”

“Not good if I want on this board.”

Charlie goes quiet. Until he says, “It’s better if you’re not on the board if it’s going to compromise the most annoying thing about you.” I don’t ask what that is.

Because I know what he’s implying.

My nose flares. I can’t say my family won’t have money if I’m not on the board and one day named CEO. We all have shares and stake in Hale Co., which is where the wealth and most of our power comes from, but shaping the company means sitting on the board and eventually being CEO.

“They’re going to dilute the Hale name if Campbell is chosen,” I remind him. “They’ll turn the family brand into a company brand.”

“And most legacy families lose CEO control by the third or fourth generation.”

I don’t tell Charlie it’s what Connor told me yesterday. I’m fourth generation. Rolling my strained neck, I ask him, “Would you want Cobalt Inc. to end with you?”

“No,” Charlie says. “Unfortunately.”

He understands this pressure. I nod to myself and glance over at the mirror. My eyes are less enraged, and I smile a little bit at a thought. “Happy Birthday, man. Twenty-four.”

“One birthday text was already too much. I don’t need to be wished over the fucking phone.”

I already called Beckett this morning and wished him a happy birthday. He said their plans weren’t definitive yet, so I ask Charlie, “What are you doing tonight?”

“Babysitting Ben.”

I hope he didn’t tell Ben that. “Where?”

“The ballet, then the club.”

“So Ben is going?”

“That’s what he says as of now.”

“Luna?” I wonder.

“No. Eliot and Tom already told her it’s brothers only. All Beckett wants is for Ben to stay the whole night, and he might dip out if more family come.”

I frown. “I don’t get why he wants to be alone so badly when he wants to be with Beckett.”

“It’s probably me.”

“Janie said he’s avoiding more than you.”

Charlie lets out an aggravated sigh. “He’s definitely hiding something. I’ll figure it out.”

I have more belief that Charlie will than I have belief in myself at this point. Frightening, I know. I can’t remember the last time my self-confidence took this big of a nosedive.

Once we end the call, I exit the bathroom to an unfamiliar face. The thirtysomething temp bodyguard leads me to my car. I wish Farrow were here.

For more than just seeing him.

Our son is sick at home, so Farrow took off work to take care of Ripley. I can admit he would do a better job at this than me. He is the doctor.

Once I’m back at Hale Co., I decide to make a pit stop and slip into my dad’s office.

“You okay, bud?” he asks from his desk.

I must be wearing my feelings. Which is just awesome. Five gold stars for me and my corporate future. “Doing fantastic,” I say tightly.

“Switch the thing.” He waves toward the switch on the wall. He’s leaning back in his chair, his feet kicked up on his desk, a Millennium Falcon paperweight in his hand.

I flip the switch and the glass walls frost for privacy. My brain is still spinning.

“You sure that’s okay?” I take a seat across from him and gesture to the frosted walls. “The other directors here might think we’re conspiring.”

He gasps. “With my son? No way.” He flashes a half-smile. “What do you think Millard does every day with his own son? I’ve caught them whispering in the break room three times while eating cheese like rats.”

I massage my aching neck. “I have nothing good to say about Campbell, so I can’t even tell you to be nice.”

“Your mom would still try if she were here.” He smiles just thinking about her, which makes my lips rise a little bit. He points the paperweight at me. “I’ve recused myself from the vote anyway.”

“Yeah, I know.” So has Millard, who sits on the board and whose son, Campbell, is in contention for the same position as me. Which means out of fourteen board members, there are only twelve votes to fight over.

Since the beginning of September, I’ve been careful to distance myself from my dad. I didn’t want anyone to think I needed to run to him for help. I have no college degree and Campbell has an MBA from Wharton. I wanted to prove that I’m capable on my own—that I can handle intense boardroom dynamics.

Come to find out, it’s not exactly the hill I’ve needed to climb.

“Still,” I tell him, “I wasn’t planning on being here for long since I’m coming back from a one-on-one.”

“You had lunch with Pat Hayes?”

“Yep.” I nod stiffly, then I crack a couple knuckles. My dad looks like he wants to use the Millennium Falcon as a weapon. I motion to it. “You could fly that thing out of here,” I joke.

He gives me a sharper, more protective look. “Do you want to?”

“No.” I think about how I’d fight before I’d flee. I’ve always been too aggressive, and in a corporate setting, it’s not always a good thing. “I kind of feel like Peter Parker today.” My eyes burn. “Only when he’s been bitten by a radioactive spider, instead of gaining superpowers the inverse happens and he’s stripped of them.”

Dad drops his legs.

I’m terrified he’s about to tell me to let go—that this isn’t for me—to fly away while I still can. “Don’t say it’s too much responsibility,” I add. “I’m twenty-six now. You became chairman of the board when you were twenty-nine.”

He places the Falcon on the desk. “You think I’d ask you to be on the board if I thought you weren’t prepared or if I thought it’s not what you wanted?”

I think this over. “You need a Hale in power.”

“I want a Hale in power.”

I nod. “We both don’t want the Ellerys to take over.” I suddenly notice the comic book on his desk. I reach forward and pick up the early copy of Human Him, Cosmic Her that hasn’t hit the press. Written by Luna Hale. Illustrated by Paul Donnelly.

I think about my sister.

And I say, “We’re fighting against the Dark Side.”

Dad laughs—like a real, bright laugh. Wow. First Charlie, now him. I just made the two people who usually laugh bitterly laugh for fucking real today. What does that say? I’m in Bizarro World. Everything is backward.

No.

I don’t know.

I’m so fucking confused. It makes me wish Farrow were here even more. I almost look to the left just to see his smile stretch at me and his hands sliding casually in his pockets, but the space is empty. My eyes graze over some framed comics on the wall before I look back at my dad.

“Let me in on the joke, I’m dying over here,” I say with thick sarcasm. “I’m Peter Parker without powers today.”

His laughter fades, his smile warmer than usual. His amber eyes dance over my features. “What’s funny is it took me so long to think I was even partially good. I knew—always, always goddamn knew—that my grandfather and my father were the Dark Side. I was never fighting for anything good. It was just corporate hell, all evil.”

A lump balls in my throat.

My jaw tics.

I stare harder at him. “I’m not naïve.”

“I know. You grew up way too fast to be.” There is one apology in his eye, and I harden my gaze to tell him not to be sorry. He scoots closer to the desk, to me. “I would let the company pass over leadership if you weren’t willing, Moffy. I never wanted this. I was told and forced and groomed for this, and that was not going to be you. It isn’t the son I raised.”

“Maybe it should’ve been.” It hurts to say. My chest is on fire. “Everything about myself I thought would help is a hindrance.”

Dad shakes his head slowly. “No.” He squints at me like I’m a harsh light. “Everything about you is exactly why you should be here.”

That gets to me. “You aren’t going to tell me to get out of this corporate hell?”

“Not unless you want out.” He tries to soften his gaze on me, but his eyes are still blades. “You know why I want you on the board?”

“I’m another vote in the Hale camp.”

“I want you to be CEO one day so this company can become even better.” He glances at Luna’s comic in my hand. “My grandfather was Sith. My father, Anakin Skywalker. Me, maybe one step closer to a Jedi, but you—you are your mother’s son. You are good and moral and pure, and Hale Co. will be better for it.”

I try not to get choked up. “I’m also my dad’s son.” It dawns on me now what he’s saying. “I can swim with sharks because of you.” I realize, “You know I can survive corporate hell.”

“I know you’ll hold your own. You’ve never let anyone walk over you, and I hope you punched Pat Hayes in the goddamn nose.”

“Shark was defeated in the sense that he’s angry at me. I don’t think I was supposed to kill the shark, Dad. Play nice with it—”

“Hales don’t play nice,” he cuts in. “You’re doing fine. Pat Hayes will try to get what he wants out of you now that he has leverage, but the truth is, he’s going to vote for you no matter what. Campbell isn’t in his best interest.”

Pat is a marketing-growth director who values the monetization of the Hale brand. I explain parts of the lunch. “He said my greatest value is through brand capital. He kept making demands. I kept saying no. I refused to let him use Ripley or Cassidy as assets.” My eyes graze over the comic. “Even Luna agreed to use her comic book as marketing leverage for Fizzle.”

“That comic book isn’t her kids.”

I look over at my dad, and an unsaid thing hangs in the tense air. I was used as an asset for Hale Co. as a child. He also had Anakin looming over him, dictating what he should and should not do. I don’t have any darkness to wade through.

My dad gave that to me.

My chest rises in a deeper breath of gratitude and love for him.

He nods to me. “You are Luke Skywalker. Be Luke. Don’t be me. Be better. Every generation, let’s try to be better. Okay?”

“Okay.” I nod. “But I’m not so sure you aren’t Luke.”

“I’m not so sure you ever lost your powers, Spider-Man.”

Thanks so much for reading this month's extra bonus scene! It's coming to you on the last day of the month, but we really do think we've saved the best for last ;) We love, love, love being back in Maximoff's POV!

Hale Co. and the future of all the family companies are so interesting to us, and we love getting to show this thread now that the second gen are getting older. We hope you enjoyed it!

That's it for the content this month, but there's more podcasts and bonuses coming in April. Stay tuned!

xoxo Krista & Becca

 “The Future of Hale Co.," Copyright © 2026 by K.B. Ritchie