Jethro
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THE WEEK AFTER the polo match passed uneventfully.
Tuesday, I went for a hunt on Wings.
Wednesday, I saw Nila at breakfast before leaving to hide in my office until sundown.
Thursday, I was out late dealing with a special shipment of pink diamonds already purchased and due for delivery to a private yacht docked for one night in Southhampton.
Friday, I tried one last time to ‘fix’ myself, but Jasmine was right. The ice no longer worked, no matter what I did.
But I had a better option—a new regimen that Nila had selflessly given me.
Saturday, I spent the afternoon with Kes and the Diamond brothers playing poker in the billiards room of the Hall—deliberately giving my heart time to adjust to the life-shattering change of what’d happened between Nila and me.
I was ready to admit to myself that my world had changed.
It was time to face what I’d been running from all my life.
However, the next day smashed my hopes and dreams and hurled me right back into the darkness where I belonged.
The last day of the week...the day that belonged to love and togetherness, only brought pain and sadness.
Sunday, I received the worst news of all.
* * * * *
“Jethro, come with me, please.” Cut popped his head into my bachelor wing.
I jumped as if I’d been caught red-handed, just like I’d done most of my life whenever he’d appeared out of nowhere. Sliding a pillow over the tiny sharp knife I used to open the old cuts on my soles, I glowered at my unwanted visitor. “Come where?”
Nila had given me hope that soon I could stop hurting myself in such a way, but until I could be sure what she felt for me was irreversible, I had to use something to keep me in check.
Ice wasn’t working—pain would have to do.
Cut’s gaze fell to my scarred feet. “Do you need a session?”
The concern in his eyes was the key ingredient to how he’d been controlling me for so many years. He made me believe that he was there for me. That he wanted to help me. That I was the chosen one and deserved to inherit all that he had to give.
Of course, it was all bullshit.
Neither of us could erase what had happened between us that night. The night where we used Jasmine so terribly in a fixing session that we’d stepped over an uncrossable line. I’d refused. Over and over and over again.
He’d pushed and pushed and pushed.
I’d snapped.
I’d almost killed him.
And he’d said the words that were a noose around my neck and shackles around my feet for the rest of my days.
“Do you think your life is a gift? Do you think I can’t take it away?
I’ve been so fucking close to killing you, boy.
A fraction away from ending the embarrassment of knowing what you are.
I only hesitate because I believe you can change.
You carry my blood. You cannot be such a disgrace. I won’t let you be such a disgrace.”
I was only alive because he hoped he’d finally cure me. Every year that passed, he hovered over the birthday cake made especially for his firstborn and contemplated killing me with cyanide.
Or a hunting accident.
Or a shipment gone wrong.
So many ways to dispatch me. I lived in constant awareness of traps and mercenaries ready to steal my God-given right to breathe.
All because I didn’t conform.
He also told me what would happen if he did kill me.
What he would do to not just Jasmine but Kestrel, Daniel, and anyone else I held dear—not that there were many.
He couldn’t care less if it meant he would be left with no heir.
He believed he was invincible and lacked the fundamental trait of a father: love.
He didn’t love his children. Shit, he didn’t even like us.
Therefore, we were disposable if we displeased him.
That sort of panic...that sort of fear...continued to have a hold on me. No matter my age or strength—I’d lived beneath the shadow of death for so long, I didn’t know any other way.
I was a fucking idiot.
Placing my feet into a pair of moccasins, I shook my head. “Thank you for your concern. But I’m fine.”
Cut cocked his head. “You’re a terrible liar.”
Gritting my teeth, I stood up and smoothed down my black t-shirt. I wore no colour today—only black. I should’ve known that the colour would bring only darkness.
“I’m still following your orders. I’m still loyal.”
Cut smiled coldly. “For now.” He ran his fingers around his mouth, eyeing me up and down. “However, we shall see if you pass the next test.”
My heart lurched. Tests weren’t new. I’d been made to complete many of them as I grew—to prove that a son like me could become a man like him.
“What did you have in mind?”
Skinning an animal while it’s still alive?
Hurting another one of the club whores?
Cut’s smile sent shivers down my back. “You’ll see.”
I hated when he did this. I never knew if he was walking me out like a horse to be shot or if he genuinely wanted to prove to himself and to me that I was getting better.
For a few years, I’d been good. I’d found how to hide myself in blizzards and snow and be everything he wanted me to be.
That was before he informed me that Nila was my twenty-ninth birthday present. There’d been no cake that year—no threat of cyanide.
Only the detonation of my soul in the form of a woman I couldn’t deny.
Forcing a smile, I asked, “What about some father and son time? Forget the test. Let’s go for a ride. Talk business.”
Over the years, he’d schooled me on the running of the empire.
Those sessions were the only time he relaxed and enjoyed interacting with me.
Although, he wasn’t ready to give up his power—I could tell.
Regardless that our customs stated it would be mine soon, I knew it wouldn’t be a simple matter of handing over the throne.
“No. I have a much better idea.” Cut opened the door wider. “Come on. Let’s go.”
My knees locked. Something inside told me to refuse. This test would be worse than everything I’d been subjected to.
“Perhaps another time. I have to—”
Go find Nila and indulge in what she feels for me.
What would Jasmine say if she knew I’d achieved the impossible? Nila Weaver liked me...possibly even loved me.
My stomach tangled with my heart. I’d managed to stay away for six days, but I’d reached my limit. I needed to feel her fight, her goodness, her wet hot heat. I needed to forget about my fucked-up existence and live in hers, if only for a moment.
Cut waved his hand. “No. This supersedes whatever you were about to do.” Snapping his fingers—a trait I’d adopted—he growled, “Come along. It won’t take long.”
Hiding my nervousness behind the glacial facade I still managed to invoke around my father, I followed him from my wing.
Wordlessly, we moved through the house. Every step flared the pain in my feet, giving me something to focus on rather than my whirling imagination of what was to come.
The nights were getting longer, encroaching on the sunlight day by day—only seven p.m., yet it was already dusk.
I swallowed my questions as Cut moved purposely out the back door and toward the maintenance barn at the rear of the estate. Most people had a shack that housed a broken lawnmower and a few empty flowerpots.
Not us.
Our shack was the size of a three-bedroom house, resting like a black beetle on the immaculate lawn.
The air temperature bit into my exposed arms as we stalked over the short expanse of grass and disappeared into the musty metallic world of saw-dust shavings and ancient tools.
Along with servants to ensure our daily needs were met, we also had carpenters, electricians, roofers, gardeners, and gamekeepers. Running an estate such as Hawksridge took millions of pounds per year.
The minute we entered, two carpenters who were lathing a chair leg turned off the machine and subtly left the room. Dusk on a Sunday and still the staff worked—our insistence for perfection ran a brutal timeline.
“Good evening, Mr. Hawk,” one worker mumbled on his way out. His eyes remained downcast with respect, his shoulders hunched.
Cut wielded a power that made lesser men—including myself—want to run and hide.
When I was in charge, I would change that. I would change many things.
Cut moved deeper into the workshop, peering into the other rooms where paintings waited for restoration. Only once he was sure we were alone did he turn to me to follow.
With unease building in my gut, I did as ordered and moved into the back room where knick-knacks and miscellaneous childhood toys had been dumped.
“What is it that you wanted to discuss?” I asked, standing still in the centre of chaos.
Deliberately, I pushed my heel harder against the ground, activating a deeper throb from the new cut.
It wasn’t that I liked pain. In fact, I hated the stigma and weakness of cutting myself.
I didn’t get pleasure from it—but I did get relief from my disease by being single-minded and focused.
Cut shrugged out of his leather jacket, placing the embroidered Black Diamond apparel on Jasmine’s old nursery cot. His hair was unruly and grey, his jawline sharp and unforgiving.
“Show, not discuss.” With a secretive smile, he moved to the large termite-riddled cupboard at the back of the room. He removed an old brass key from his pocket and inserted it into the lock.
As I moved closer, my heart stopped beating.
It couldn’t be.
Yet it was.
Cut grabbed the handles of the cupboard and swung the doors wide, revealing what he’d shown me the night of my sixteenth birthday.
That same night, he’d made me watch what he did to Emma Weaver.
He made me witness video after video of what he’d done to Nila’s mother, all while beating me if I ever dared look away.
Sickness rolled in my gut.
My hands balled.
Palms sweated.
Shit. Shit. Shit.
Once again, my father had reminded me of my place and how fragile my wants, dreams, and very existence were.
My eyes burned as I drank in the age-old equipment passed down through generations. Shelf after shelf of torturous items used in extracting debts from the Weavers.
Cut’s face darkened, motioning me forward when I stayed locked to the floor. “I think it’s time you and I had a little chat, Jet.” Taking one particular item from the cupboard, I knew what he would make me do.
And I knew whatever love Nila felt for me would vanish like it never existed.
I couldn’t move, but it didn’t stop Cut from prowling toward me and placing the hated item into my shaking hands. Curling my fingers around the salt shaker, I hated that something so simple could deliver something so unforgivable.
My father murmured, “You have one last chance, Jethro. Use it well.”
Ice howled.
Snow fell.
Blizzards blew like fury.
I hung my head and gave in.
Motherfucking shit.
* * * * *
That was yesterday.
A Sunday I would never forget.
Today was Monday.
A Monday that I wished I could erase.
Last Monday had been full of freedom, kisses, and passion; polo and sex and blistering new beginnings.
This Monday was full of mourning and pain. Today was the day I became the true heir to Hawksridge because if I didn’t, I doubted I would wake in the morning.
Cut hadn’t said as much. But it was what he didn’t say that made the biggest impression.
Do this or I’ll kill you.
Obey me or this is the end.
Cut had seen what I knew he would. He took great pleasure in informing me that he knew I’d fucked Nila. He knew I’d chased after her during half-time at polo, and he knew my allegiances were changing.
It’d been a long fucking night.
After our talk, he’d forced me to go deep, deep inside. He tore away any progress Nila had made with me and filled me with snow once again.
In an odd way, I was grateful.
Grateful because without him tampering with my psyche, there was no way in flying fuck I would’ve got through today.
I thought I’d had months.
I thought I’d been the one in control of when the next payment would happen, but as always...I was wrong.
Cut had seen my ultimate plan before I’d even finalised the details.
He’d understood my tentative scheming of dragging out the debts until I was thirty. By then, I would’ve been in charge. By then, I might’ve found a way to spare Nila’s life without losing mine.
I had the Sacramental Pledge over the Debt Inheritance.
I’d put things in place to end this—once and for all.
But none of my forward thinking mattered anymore.
Today was the day Nila paid the Second Debt.