CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

Arthur’s POV

My mind has been clouded since I made a DNA request to Raymond. And the question still sits at, how do I get the lab requirements from Xavier. To get Bryan’s is quite easy.

So, I think like an old man I was and I got a solution… so easy… do not test the intelligence quotient of an old one.

The solution is a dinner setting, and I arranged one.

***

The dinner with Xavier required no elaborate staging, that was the convenient thing about being the family patriarch. It all went about an old grandpa inviting his grandson to dinner.

No questions, everyone knows old men like me loves company a lot and my grandson not showing up will make him look like a bad and ungrateful grandson, which my sweet boy doesn’t want… haha.

I called Xavier the next morning which was a Wednesday and told him I’ll be expecting him for dinner on Friday.

He reluctantly agreed after making a fuss about a board summary he had to finish.

“Well, the board summary would still be sitting there on Saturday, but my cook would be making lamb sauce on Friday, just like you love it.” I had said.

I knew he was already salivating at those words. He had loved lamb sauce since he was a kid, he could finish a whole bowl of it.

“Can’t it wait till Saturday,” he cried.

“I wish to, but my chef would be traveling on Saturday, she has an emergency at her mother’s place. She should go on Thursday, but only decided to stay till Friday because I have been craving the lamb sauce for a while, and we’re finally getting some fresh lamb meat on Friday. So, if you don’t come, your loss.”

“I will.” The words came faster from his mouth before I finished my sentence. “You’re right, grandpa, the board summary can wait. I’ll be there by seven.”

I smiled sheepishly to myself and ended the call.

On Friday, I confirmed the menu with the cook, satisfied, I asked Margaret to set the table in the smaller dining room rather than the formal one, I had to give Xavier the impression that this was a relaxed dinner rather than ceremonial.

I had already kept aside, two ziplock evidence bags Raymond had sent over for the DNA samples.

***

Xavier arrived at exactly 7:03pm.

Ah ah… this boy mean this dinner.

Talk about what you can use to lure or kidnap Xavier.

He came in with the slightly disheveled, the loosened quality of a man at the end of a working week.

“You look well,” I said to him, as he sat by the table.

“You always say that,” he said, looking around the table. “Dinner not sef yet?”

“The cook says to give ten minutes more,” I replied.

“Okay then,” he said, and glanced at his wristwatch briefly.

We moved the topic while we waited.

We talked about some foundation business, a property acquisition the company was considering. The discussion was smooth and engaging, nothing like the Xavier I’ll force to say a word on a normal day. Lamb sauce is really doing a whole lot.

Xavier reached for the wine on the table, it was one of the oldest wine I kept aside for wonderful moments like this. The evening atmosphere was exceptional and the ambiance was amazing.

He poured the wine in two glass glasses and handed a glass to me. Red wine they say, is good for the heart.

I asked about the accounts team restructure he mentioned on the phone sometime last week. He gave me the update with the succinct efficiency.

I asked about Aria Ashford too, of course, I knew that she now works at the Beaumont Group. I noticed a slight change in his countenance at the mention of Aria’s name but I didn’t push too hard on it.

Few minutes later, the lamb sauce arrived, together with the dessert.

We ate in silence while Margaret stayed nearby, refilling the water glasses when necessary.

My eyes were on Xavier momentarily, looking out for the perfect time.

Then, I got my chance.

Xavier was saying something about the property acquisition we discussed earlier. I reached out my glass of water as if I wanted to drink from it, then I let it slip intentionally and shattered on the floor.

“Are you okay, grandpa,” Xavier asked, as he rushed to my side, concern written boldly on his face.

In a jiffy, Margaret is at my side too, cleaning the shattered glass. That was the exact moment I switched Xavier’s fork with another one.

The one I took was already dropped in the ziplock evidence bag and hidden safely in my jacket pocket.

Raymond had explained that a used utensil was more than sufficient, what was needed was the saliva on the fork tine.

Xavier almost noticed the switch.

The fork he was eating with was on his rice plate, but when I switched it, I dipped the switched fork in the lamb sauce gently. Because dropping the fork on the rice plate where I picked that one will likely blow me out.

He just looked at it for like a second and continued with his meal. Margaret had already cleaned the shattered glass, and I had already accomplished my mission.

I watched as he devour his meal with the appetite of a man who had so much missed a sumptuous meal as this.

***

I didn’t really bother about Bryan’s sample because that was probably the easiest. If only because five-year-olds most times leave biological evidence on approximately everything they touched.

The following day, which was Saturday, Bryan arrived at the estate with his usual momentum, a backpack, his football boots he insisted on wearing despite the fact that we had no plans involving a football pitch, and a cup of the specific brand of apple juice Aria had sent with him after he rejected the estate’s version on the grounds that it tasted “too fancy.”

Not long after he arrived, the apple juice cup had being abandoned on the garden table while Bryan himself gone to inspect the koi pond at the regulation distance he keeps now.

The juice cup sitting exactly where he had left it carries the clear evidence I needed to complete my medical puzzle.

I collected it immediately and wrapped it up neatly as I retracted to my room hurriedly to align it with Xavier’s sample.

I hurried back from the room before Bryan comes back from the koi pond and starts looking for me.

I got back in collision with when Bryan was hopping back from the pond, why he was hopping rather than walking properly was what I don’t know. Kids and different dimensions.

***

I sent both samples to Raymond that afternoon by a private courier service, with a strict instruction that they go directly to the laboratory Raymond listed out for me. A discreet facility outside the city that majored on sensitive paternity cases.

Raymond confirmed receipt by seven that evening.

I was in my study room afterward with a cup of tea I only had for staring sake. My neck already stiff from waiting.

The old ledger was resting on one corner of the desk beside me, its leather cover worn soft with age, the handwriting inside belonging to a man who had understood, long before any of the rest of us, that the Beaumont name was only worth carrying if the people carrying it were worth the name.

I looked at the photograph of young Xavier beside it.

It is understandable for Bryan to mistook Xavtfor himself. The resemblance was too much.

Same nose, same eyes, same mouth shape, same jawline… only because Xavier is older now… even same eye pupil color.

Raymond had said the laboratory test would take five to seven days to process a result.

I honestly can’t wait to have it.