Repaying My Debt to the Ruined Tycoon Chapter 1

The man who funded my education for years went bankrupt and lost his sight.

I found him, brought him home, and took care of him.

He stared blankly with unseeing eyes, his voice fragile and thick with unshed tears. "Don't be so good to me, Harper. I'm thirty. I’m a ruined man. I don't deserve you."

I leaned over to gently wipe the dampness from his cheek.

But out of the corner of my eye, I saw his adopted son leaning against the hallway wall, arms crossed, watching him with a frigid glare.

"He's right. You are thirty," the boy said softly.

He shifted his gaze to me, a smirk playing on his lips—a smile wrapped in barbed wire, radiating a storm. "And me?" he said. "I'm only eighteen."

* * *

It was my third year in the corporate world when the news broke: Arthur Harrison had lost everything.

His massive gamble on a tech merger had failed spectacularly. He was wiped out. His rivals hadn’t hesitated to kick him while he was down, and amidst the chaos, a car accident had taken his sight.

"Arthur Harrison just didn't have the teeth for it. A businessman with a heart that soft was never going to last," my coworkers gossiped over their cubicle walls.

"God, he used to be Chicago's most eligible bachelor. Now look at him. He's worse off than a beggar on the street."

"Harper? Are you okay? You look awful," one of the women finally noticed me.

I stared at them for a second, my mind entirely blank, before I grabbed my purse. "Sarah, I have a family emergency. I need to take the afternoon off."

If you had told me three years ago that my reunion with Arthur Harrison would happen in a greasy, linoleum-floored diner near Chicago Med, I would have thought you were insane.

Three years ago, he was a wildly successful young entrepreneur. He had been the keynote speaker at my college graduation.

He had stood at the podium—radiant, effortless, and devastatingly handsome. The campus anonymous boards had talked about him for weeks.

Now, his eyes were dull and unfocused. His long fingers groped blindly across the sticky Formica table.

I saw a smear of ketchup near his sleeve and quickly caught his hand. With my other hand, I took a wet wipe and scrubbed the table clean.

"Stop fussing and just spit it out!" a brash, impatient voice snapped.

I turned my head. Sitting across from Arthur was a college kid radiating pure, unadulterated hostility. He had a shaved head, a slit in his left eyebrow, and a silver stud in his ear.

He knocked his knuckles hard against the table, barking like a cornered stray. "I’m warning you, the money is gone. You could shake him upside down and you wouldn't find a dime, so drop the Good Samaritan act."

"I apologize. My son’s temper gets the better of him. He didn’t mean to offend you," Arthur said softly.

"Why are you being polite to her? Anyone looking for you right now is a debt collector."

"Jaxon, that's enough."

They started arguing. Arthur kept his voice low, trying to de-escalate, but Jaxon was relentless. He was stubborn and vicious, throwing words like punches until Arthur’s pale cheeks flushed with humiliation.

I stared at the rigid, defensive line of Arthur’s back for three full seconds before I realized I was still holding his hand.

I looked down. There was a tiny, distinct mole resting right on the webbing between his thumb and index finger.

Only when Arthur’s flush deepened and those cloudy, unseeing eyes turned vaguely in my direction did I finally let go.

"Mr. Harrison, you misunderstand. I'm not here for money. My name is Harper. Harper Hayes. I’m one of the students you sponsored."

Arthur blinked slowly, his brow furrowing as he searched his memory.

I figured he had forgotten. He had dropped out of an Ivy League school to build a startup that changed the industry, and in his quest to change the world, he had funded the education of hundreds, if not thousands, of underprivileged kids.

But then, Arthur smiled.

It was the same smile from three years ago, when he had his bodyguard hand me a bouquet of flowers at graduation, waving goodbye to me through the tinted glass of his town car.

"I remember you," he said softly. "All the other kids called me Arthur in their letters. You always called me Mr. Harrison."

He remembered.

I took a deep, shaky breath, trying to suppress the sudden, violent hammering of my heart.

"Mr. Harrison," I said, my voice remarkably steady. "If you don't mind, you can stay at my place for now."

Jaxon crossed his arms. "He can't pay rent."

"He doesn't need to."

Jaxon scowled. "He needs money for medical bills."

"I'll pay them."

Jaxon narrowed his eyes, assessing me. "You’ve got a good job, you’re pretty. Why the hell are you anchoring yourself to dead weight?"

Arthur turned his blind gaze toward me, silent, lost, and deeply worried.

I tapped the table, a flicker of genuine anger sparking in my chest at the term "dead weight."

When I spoke, my tone had turned to ice. I looked right at Jaxon. "Seven years ago, I had nothing. If Mr. Harrison hadn't paid for my schooling, I would have been trapped in a dead-end factory town for the rest of my life, popping out kids."

I sat up straight and looked back at Arthur. "I will remember that grace until the day I die. I am here to pay my debt. He is not dead weight, and I refuse to let him sink into the mud. I will hold him up. I will carry him."