Chapter 29 : Nate's Potential
The poker game was going exactly as badly as I'd expected.
Nate Westen sat at a corner table in a bar that probably should have been condemned, down four hundred dollars and sinking fast. His tells were obvious—a slight twitch when he bluffed, a shift in his seat when he held good cards—and the regulars at the table had been reading him for hours.
I watched from across the room, nursing a drink I didn't want, waiting for the moment to approach.
Nate wasn't the black sheep of the family in the simple sense. He wasn't evil, wasn't malicious, wasn't fundamentally broken. He was something harder to fix: wasted potential. A man with enough intelligence and charm to be dangerous, but without the direction or confidence to use either properly.
In the original timeline, he'd die trying to help Michael. That death would tear apart what remained of Michael's emotional stability. It was one of the canon events I'd marked for prevention from the moment I understood what my presence in this world could mean.
But prevention wasn't enough. I needed to give Nate something to live for—a purpose beyond being Michael's disappointing younger brother.
The poker game ended badly, as they always did for Nate. He headed for the bar, shoulders slumped, probably calculating how many more bad decisions he'd need to make before he hit rock bottom.
I intercepted him.
"Nate Westen?"
He looked up, instantly wary. People who knew his name usually wanted something—money his family had, information about his brother, leverage for some scheme or another.
"Who's asking?"
"Someone who's been working with Michael. But that's not why I'm here."
His expression shifted—still guarded, but curious now. "If you're looking for Mike—"
"I'm not. I'm looking for you."
That stopped him. People didn't look for Nate specifically. They looked for Michael and tolerated Nate as a side effect.
"What do you want?"
"I have work. Small jobs, low risk, pays better than cards." I gestured toward the poker table. "And definitely pays better than whatever that was."
"What kind of work?"
"Logistics. Picking things up, dropping them off, making sure they get where they're supposed to go. Nothing complicated. Nothing dangerous."
"Sounds too good to be true."
"It's exactly what it sounds like. I need reliable people. You're available and you're not stupid—you just haven't had anyone trust you to prove it."
Nate's jaw tightened. I'd hit a nerve, which was the point.
"You don't know me."
"I know your brother. I know your mother. I know everyone talks about you like you're a problem to be managed instead of a person to be invested in." I met his eyes. "I also know that's garbage. You're capable. You just haven't had the chance to show it."
Silence stretched between us. The bar noise faded into background static.
"One job," Nate said finally. "I'll do one job. If it's what you say, we'll talk about more."
"That's all I'm asking."
The job was simple: pick up a package from a storage unit, deliver it to a PO box across the city, confirm delivery via text. Clean, legal, and completely beneath my actual capabilities—which was the point.
Nate handled it perfectly.
Not because it was hard, but because someone trusted him to do it right. He showed up on time. He followed instructions. He communicated clearly. He acted like a professional because someone expected him to be one.
I paid him five hundred dollars—more than the job warranted, but exactly what his confidence needed.
"Same time next week?" he texted afterward.
"If you're available."
"I'm available."
Three words, but I heard what was underneath them: Someone sees me. Someone thinks I'm worth something.
Michael found me the next day.
"You hired my brother."
"I gave him work."
"Same thing."
"Not remotely." I kept my voice calm. "An employee does what they're told because they're paid. Your brother is building something for himself. Confidence, competence, a sense that he can contribute without being Michael Westen's screwup little brother."
Michael's expression was unreadable. "He's not an asset."
"He's not your asset. He's working for himself. Isn't that what you wanted for him?"
The question landed. I saw it in the fractional tightening around his eyes, the slight shift in his posture.
"I wanted him to stay out of this life."
"Too late for that. He's already in it—he just hasn't had a productive role. You tried to protect him by excluding him, and it turned him into exactly what you were afraid of."
"You're analyzing my family."
"I'm seeing what's in front of me." I met his gaze. "Nate has potential. Real potential. He's smart, he's charming, and he wants desperately to prove he's not the family failure. Give him something to succeed at, and he will."
"And if he fails?"
"Then he fails at something small instead of trying to prove himself during something big." I let that sink in. "Your way leaves him on the sidelines until a crisis, and then he jumps in unprepared and gets hurt. My way builds him up gradually so he's ready when the crisis comes."
Michael was silent for a long moment. I could see him running scenarios, calculating outcomes, weighing my analysis against his own.
"If he gets hurt—"
"He won't. Not on my jobs. I'll make sure of it."
Another long pause. Then Michael nodded once—not agreement, not approval, just acknowledgment that the argument had merit.
"I'm still watching you," he said.
"I know."
He left without another word.
Nate texted me that evening: "Mike asked about the job. He seemed... okay with it?"
"He's coming around," I replied. "See you next week."
In the original timeline, Nate died without ever knowing what he could become. In this timeline, I was going to make sure he had the chance to find out.
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