Chapter Sixty-Four Bennett
Chapter Sixty-Four
Bennett
Present Day
The woods felt more ominous than they’d ever been in his whole life. Bennett had a bad feeling. A very bad one.
He parked. Brooke shifted in the passenger seat, peering through the windshield, her fingers playing with the hem of her dress.
Bennett tapped a restless rhythm on the steering wheel, his nose still throbbing from Myles’s sucker punch.
That would be the last time Myles ever laid a hand on him.
He was glad to be out of that room and away from the goddamn recording of Edie that Isla had played.
How? He needed time to think of a recourse.
Instead, here he was, summoned like some errand boy by Jackson, of all people.
Bennett hated it most when someone told him what to do.
He exhaled sharply. “We need to be talking to Dad, not playing hide-and-seek in the woods with your goddamn lover.”
Brooke stiffened. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. Jackson works for us and the Foundation. Nothing more.”
Her response was too asinine to answer, and Bennett didn’t have the time or patience for her games now. He pressed his fingers to his temple, anger clawing up his throat. “How the hell does she have that?” he muttered. Had Isla been there with them?
He gestured to the darkness outside. “Why are we here instead of with Dad? There’s no telling what she’s saying to him after all that other shit.”
“You know Jackson,” she interrupted, forcing a brittle laugh. “He takes care of things for us. It’s always been that way. He’ll definitely come up with a fix for this and that woman.” She spat out the last word.
That was Brooke’s problem. She’d become too reliant on Jackson. She’d become complacent and blurred the lines of employer and employee, giving Jackson all the power. Now they had to suffer his ego.
“What was that recording Isla played, Bennett?” his mother asked cautiously. “Why is your voice on it?”
Bennett let out a primal yell, striking at the steering wheel with his fist, startling her. She called his name, the fear in her voice bringing him to his senses.
He put his hands back on the steering wheel and tightened his grip because there was nothing else to take his anger out on. Jackson used to ask. Now he acted like he was in charge. Like he was more than just the help.
A sharp rap at the window made them both jump. Jackson stood on the other side, a flashlight in one hand and two shovels in the other. Gone was the tuxedo from earlier. Now he was in dark gear, looking like he was about to go hunting—or worse. Bennett’s bravery betrayed him just a little.
Bennett rolled the window down. “What the hell, man?”
Brooke’s voice was tight. “Why’d you have us meet out here?”
Jackson took a step back, and Bennett saw a large black bag on the ground, which Jackson grabbed as he said, “Out. We don’t have much time.”
Bennett bristled, resisting the urge to slam the door into Jackson’s gut, but complied.
Jackson was already moving, vanishing into the trees.
Brooke winced as her heels sank into the uneven ground.
She whimpered about her $1,000 heels as she clung to Bennett, stumbling every few steps, each yank fueling his rage as they struggled to keep up. First Isla, now this motherfucker.
They reached a clearing tangled with overgrown bushes. Jackson stood there, staring at the ground beyond him as if it held some terrible secret.
“Jackson,” Brooke started, her voice uneasy. “We don’t have time for this. The guests. Victor. We need to do something about Isla and that recording she clearly manufactured.”
Bennett swallowed hard. He wished the recording had been manufactured. He wished that night had never happened. It was the one time he’d ever regretted anything he’d done, because despite all the things his father would forgive him for, hurting Edie was a dealbreaker.
Jackson ignored her, turning abruptly, holding one of the shovels out to Bennett.
“The first thing he’ll do is have the whole property searched,” he began, his eyes boring into Bennett’s. He looked terrifying in the dark. “We can’t have them finding anything.”
Bennett looked down at the shovel like it was a foreign object. “Find what?”
Jackson’s stare was cold. “There’s no case without a body. And as far as anyone knows, she could be alive. Though we both now know that’s not true.”
Brooke inhaled sharply, taking a step and then stopping, unsure of what she wanted to do. “Body? Jackson, what are you saying? What happened at the old Abbott farm? Who’s alive?”
Bennett’s pulse pounded. “Edie was alive. She left on her own. We all heard it on that tape.”
Jackson’s expression didn’t change. “Didn’t your mother say it was manufactured?
” When Bennett didn’t answer, he continued.
“Did you really think Edie’s been out there roaming the globe all this time, sipping cocktails on some tropical beach, shunning her daddy?
She was impaled on glass that damaged vital organs.
You really think she just walked away from that? ”
Bennett’s eyes went wide. “How would you know that she . . .” he blustered, realization hitting him.
Jackson nodded knowingly. “That’s right. Follow me over there.” He pointed again to that section of clearing ahead. “To dig her up.”
“Dig—dig her up?” Bennett shuddered, seeing Jackson in a new light. He’d always known Jackson fixed messes, but this . . . this was insane.
“Me, insane?” Jackson asked. Bennett hadn’t realized he’d spoken his thoughts aloud. He didn’t like the look in Jackson’s eyes. “Interesting.”
Brooke grabbed Jackson’s arm, trying to reason with him. She was the only voice of reason in these godforsaken woods. “Jackson, stop this. Let’s go back. Let’s talk somewhere out of these woods. Victor is probably wondering where we’ve gone.”
Jackson pried her fingers from him. “This is your mess too. You made him this way. False bravado and weak inside.”
Bennett willed his hands to stop shaking. “You’re insane.”
“No,” Jackson murmured, his voice low and dangerous. “What I am is tired. Tired of cleaning up after you two when you let your emotions get the better of you and you mess up. It’s about time this family started acting like the unit we are.”
Brooke gasped. She gave Bennett a panicked look and Jackson a pleading one. “Jackson, don’t—”
“Don’t what? Tell him?” Jackson turned to Bennett, eyes gleaming with something almost like amusement and contempt. “Why do you think you’ve been fighting so hard to get Victor to make you his successor, and once he’s made you that we’ll get rid of him? Because you are mine.”
Bennett felt like the ground beneath him had disappeared and he was falling into an abyss. “What are you saying?”
Brooke went silent. She took a step back, her hands trembling. She looked around as if something or someone could help her, but there was nothing. Bennett went from one to the other and saw the answer on his mother’s face.
“No.” Bennett shook his head. “No way. Mom, tell me he’s lying.
Tell me he’s crazy.” But she couldn’t bring herself to do it, and her silence validated every feeling he’d had growing up.
This must have been why he’d always been jealous of Edie and felt like he could never live up to Myles.
Because deep down he’d known he was different.
Everything he’d thought he knew about himself was a lie.
Jackson said, “Now he’s getting it. From the moment you convinced me to go along with letting another man marry my woman and raise my child as his own, the thought of eventually taking all Victor has has been what’s kept me around, taking your and his shit.
Don’t act so surprised. It’s beneath you. ”
She stammered, incredulously, “I didn’t. You want to kill Victor? And, and Edie . . . Edie is there?” Brooke was barely able to get her words out, the truth unfathomable.
“Bingo.” Jackson was smug.
Bennett retched. “Oh my God.”
Jackson popped in a stick of gum. “This is your reality, son. Victor isn’t your father.
And if he ever finds out, you’ll both be out on your asses.
There’s no way he’s keeping you when you played the oldest trick in the book on him, Brooke.
” He looked at her pityingly. “That’s why we need to make sure no one can ever find her. ”
Brooke was desperate, caught between the man she relied on and the child she loved more than anything. “Listen to me. Victor loves you. He would never disown you. You are his son in every way that counts.”
Jackson scoffed. “Maybe if he hadn’t just heard you were involved in Edie’s disappearance. But now? The moment he finds out the truth, he will end you, all of us.”
“Shut up!” Bennett yelled. Bennett’s breath came sharp and ragged, on the cusp of a panic attack. “Both of you, just shut the hell up. Let me think.”
“There’s no more time. They will start looking. We need to move the evidence and get our stories straight.” Jackson stepped closer, and Bennett backed away in a sort of dance. When they were side by side, in a standoff, their likeness couldn’t be denied. “First Edie. Then Victor.”
Jackson gave Bennett a lasting look before picking up the shovel Bennett had rejected and shoving it hard against Bennett’s chest. The force knocked Bennett back a couple of steps, and he realized Jackson wouldn’t let them leave. Gingerly he took the shovel from this new man he’d never seen.
Bennett’s stomach twisted. “But I didn’t—I wasn’t even there!” His legs locked; he was unable to step toward Edie’s grave.
Jackson snapped, “But you set everything in motion.” His patience was gone.
“You sicced your friends on her. You didn’t take her to the family or tell Victor when he returned from his trip the next day.
It was lucky I overheard your call to your friends and followed you because you were acting odd and heard you tell your friends where to take her.
What were you going to do about her at the Abbott farm, hmm? I spared you that.”
Jackson waited for an admission that Bennett was too ashamed to make.
“Right. I cleaned it up for you. I made sure you and your idiot friends never had to face the consequences. Like with that accident when you were kids. Like with Edie. But now? Now you both need to do your part. We are in this together. Now move.”