Chapter 4 - The Secret Behind Victory Air
Victory Air had almost died fifteen years earlier.
My grandfather, Charles Mercer, built the company from nothing. He believed an aircraft should offer more than transportation. It should give people time—the one luxury no amount of money could replace.
My mother, Evelyn, inherited that philosophy.
She also inherited a company buried beneath debt and outdated systems.
When she became ill, Marcus encouraged her to sell.
“There is no future in sentimental businesses,” he told her during one of their final conversations.
My mother smiled from her hospital bed.
“Every business is sentimental to the person who built it.”
After her death, Marcus assumed I would liquidate the company.
Instead, I placed my shares in a private trust and hired Rebecca Sloan, one of my mother’s most trusted executives, to lead the recovery.
Rebecca and I held meetings before sunrise and after my children went to sleep. We sold unused properties, retired inefficient aircraft and focused on medical transport, executive charters and international corporate travel.
The work was slow.
Then, during a global transportation crisis, demand for secure private travel exploded.
Victory Air’s value multiplied.
By the time Marcus asked for a divorce, we owned eighteen aircraft and managed twenty-six more. We had contracts with hospitals, technology companies, professional sports teams and government agencies.
Our newest aircraft was a white Gulfstream with the company name painted in deep blue letters along the side.
Rebecca had called me the week before Marcus announced Penelope’s pregnancy.
“It’s ready for delivery,” she said. “Your mother would have loved it.”
I had planned to use the aircraft for a family trip after revealing the company’s success to Marcus.
Now it would carry my children and me away from the wreckage he had created.
Rebecca understood immediately.
“Where do you want to go?”
“California,” I answered. “Temporarily.”
Victory Air had recently opened an executive office near San Francisco. The children could complete the school term remotely while I established a new routine.
I was not running away.
I was choosing distance.
During the final weeks of the divorce, Marcus became increasingly impatient. He had moved into a luxury apartment purchased by Hale Meridian and spent most nights with Penelope.
He visited Sophie and Ethan twice.
Both visits ended early because Penelope needed him.
One evening, Sophie found me packing photographs into a box.
“Does Dad love the new baby more than us?” she asked.
The question nearly broke me.
I knelt in front of her.
“Your father’s choices are not a measure of your worth.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
She had always been observant.
“No,” I admitted. “It isn’t.”
I took her hands.
“I believe your father loves you. But sometimes adults become so focused on what they want that they fail to protect the people they already have.”
“Will he come back?”
I thought of Marcus asleep beside me during our first year of marriage. I thought of him holding Sophie for the first time. I thought of the man who once drove six hours through a snowstorm because my mother needed medication.
Then I thought of the man who had brought Penelope into our home.
“He will always be your father,” I said. “But our family is going to look different now.”
Sophie nodded, fighting tears.
From the doorway, Ethan asked, “Are we still a family?”
I opened my arms.
May you like
Both children came to me.
“Yes,” I said. “We absolutely are.”
