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Home / Urban / THE BOSS BEAST / CHAPTER 7 — THE VOICE AT HOME
CHAPTER 7 — THE VOICE AT HOME
Author: Lionaira
last update2026-01-15 05:50:21

The house was quiet. Too quiet for a man whose mind wouldn’t stop shouting. Richard Hale sat on the edge of the leather sofa, tie loosened, jacket folded beside him like something he no longer trusted.

The television played without sound, images flickering meaninglessly across the screen. Across the room, his wife, Margaret, sat with a book in her lap she hadn’t turned a page of in over ten minutes.

Richard cleared his throat. She didn’t look up. “Margaret,”

he said. The sound of her name felt unfamiliar in his mouth. He noticed that. Didn’t like that he noticed it. “Yes?”

she replied calmly. He shifted. “I wanted to ask you something.”

That made her look up. Slowly. Carefully. “When last,”

she said, “have you ever asked me anything?”

The question wasn’t sharp. That made it worse.

Richard frowned. “That’s not fair.”

She tilted her head slightly. “Isn’t it?”

He exhaled. “I’m serious.”

“So am I.”

Silence stretched between them, thick, practiced, old. Richard rubbed his palms together. “Hypothetically,” he began, “if you fired someone… and later people insisted that person had solutions, would calling them back be wise?”

Margaret studied him. Not the question. Him. “You sacked him,” she said.

“Yes.”

“And now things are worse.”

He hesitated. “…Yes.”

“And people say he warned you.”

Richard stiffened. “They exaggerate.”

Margaret closed her book and placed it on the table.  “Answer me honestly,”

she said. “Is this about pride, or survival?”

The word hit him harder than expected. “Why does everyone keep saying pride?”

he snapped. Margaret didn’t flinch. “Because,”

she said gently, “it’s been killing things quietly for years.”

Richard scoffed. “That’s dramatic.”

“Is it?”

she asked. “Your company is bleeding. Your staff are scared. And you sit here asking if listening is weakness.”

He leaned back, frustrated. “You don’t understand the pressure I’m under.”

She smiled faintly. “I understand more than you think.”

He looked at her sharply. “Oh?”

“When last,”

she asked, “did you come home before midnight?”

He opened his mouth, then closed it. “When last,”

she continued, “did you ask how my day went?”

Silence. “When last did you listen,”

she said softly, “instead of commanding?”

Richard looked away. Margaret stood up. “You used to ask me for advice,”

she said. “On everything. Big decisions. Small ones.”

“That was different,” he muttered.

“Yes,”

she agreed. “You weren’t powerful then.”

The word lingered. “I built that power,”

Richard said defensively. “And it’s destroying you,”

she replied without hesitation. “Your finances. Your company.”

She paused. “And your marriage.”

Richard’s jaw tightened. “That’s not fair.”

Margaret stepped closer. “Isn’t it?”

Her voice remained calm, but now there was something underneath it. Years. Restraint. Unspoken disappointments. “You don’t lose businesses overnight,”

she said. “You lose them decision by decision. The same way you lose people.”

Richard looked at her then, really looked.

“When did you become so… opinionated?” he asked quietly.

Margaret laughed once. Not kindly. “I’ve always been,”

she said. “You just stopped listening.”

The words landed clean. No insult. No exaggeration. Truth doesn’t need volume. Richard sat there, stunned. His quiet wife.

The one who rarely challenged him. The one who let him lead, even when leadership turned into control.

She met his eyes. “Calling someone back isn’t weakness,” she said. “Refusing to hear them is.”

He swallowed. “What if he humiliates me?”

Margaret smiled sadly. “You’ve been humiliating yourself for months.”

The room fell silent again, but this time, it wasn’t hostile. It was reflective. Richard leaned back, staring at the ceiling. “Everyone thinks I’m arrogant,” he murmured.

Margaret sat beside him. “Everyone thinks you’re afraid of being wrong.”

He closed his eyes. For the first time, he didn’t argue. “What if he refuses?”

Richard asked quietly. “Then at least,”

she said, “you tried humility once in your life.”

He exhaled slowly. A long breath. The kind that releases something old. Margaret stood.  “I’m going to bed.”

She paused at the doorway. “Richard… when last have you ever called me to ask for advice like this?”

He had no answer. She turned off the light and left the room.

Richard remained seated long after the house went dark. The television screen went black.

The silence stayed. He thought of boardrooms. Of shouting. Of control.

Then he thought of a young man standing calmly while he pointed at the door. Get out. He rubbed his face. Pride. Arrogance. Words he hated. Words that kept returning. Eventually, he stood.

Slowly. Quietly. He went to the bedroom, undressed without turning on the light, and lay beside his wife.

She was already asleep, or pretending to be. He stared at the ceiling. No anger. No certainty. Just questions. And for the first time in a very long while, 

He let them stay unanswered. The house breathed quietly around him. And somewhere in the city, a phone rested on a table, waiting for a call that pride was finally too tired to stop.

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