Jethro #2
“That I’m no better than a Weaver. That being a Hawk doesn’t grant immunity or power over another’s life. That I’m not the monster I tried to be.”
Silence reigned once again.
I had no reply. He didn’t need one.
I played with the knife, running the blade through my fingers. His head never left my shoulder, his arms useless by his sides.
He couldn’t move even if he wanted to, but I felt he didn’t want to. This rare precious moment would never come again, and we needed to touch, to say sorry deeper than words.
Ten minutes could’ve past or ten hours—I lost track of time. My thoughts were with ghosts of people I’d lost. Of tragedies that’d come to an end but would never be forgotten.
Finally, my father forced his head off my shoulder and smiled sadly.
“You’re a good son, Jethro. I’m proud of the man you turned out to be, even after I screwed you up.
I wish I could say sorry to Nila for taking the Debt Inheritance too far.
I had the power all along to stop it, just as my father did, and I chose not to.
I also wish I could apologise to my brother for what I did and to Rose for how terribly I treated her.
So many things to apologise for.” He sucked in a breath, his arms and legs like discarded puppet strings.
He couldn’t sit up. He could barely breathe. “So many things I’ve done.”
I’d done that to him. I’d shown him what he’d become, and he’d finally accepted his actions were bad, but his soul...it wasn’t as decayed as he feared.
Shifting, I kissed his temple. “I believe you.”
His sigh expelled more than just worry but his entire scorecard of wrongdoings. He exhaled his past, living the final moments in the present. “I’m ready to go, Kite. I want to go. Let me die and find peace. Let me fix the wrongs our family have caused.”
My heart charged faster. As awful as it’d been breaking my father, forcing him to be honest and true, I didn’t think I could kill him.
Not now.
Not now we’d connected like we always should’ve—man to man. Father to son.
Another tear rolled down my cheek. “I accept your apology, and I grant you my forgiveness.” I passed him the knife.
“I don’t have the power to grant redemption for what you did to Jaz or Kes or Emma or Rose or the other people you hurt, but I do promise they will know you regretted it before you passed.
If they can, they will forgive you in time. ”
Cut clenched his jaw as I moved away.
I accidentally knocked his painful limbs to squat in front of him. “I can’t kill you, Dad.”
Dad.
I hadn’t used that word since Jasmine’s disability.
Not since the last time he’d deserved such an adoring title.
Cut smiled, his golden eyes matching mine in the darkness. “I’ve always loved you. You know that, don’t you?”
I wanted to say I didn’t. That when he shot me in the parlour. That when he hurt my sister in the barn. That every day I strived for his respect and love, I didn’t know what was beneath his sadism.
But I refused to lie to a dying man.
I’d known. And that was why I trusted that eventually, one day, the goodness inside him would win. That he wouldn’t remain as awful as he had.
A childish hope and finally, it had come true.
Only for him to die.
“Kite...before I go...I want to do something to right my mistakes.” His voice ached with sorrow. “Something to protect you all from the instructions I set beyond the grave.”
If I didn’t sense his sincerity, I wouldn’t have believed he could feel so much regret. But he did—mountains of it. Chasms of it. He truly hated what he’d done. To everyone, not just to Jasmine and me but also to Nila and Kes and Daniel. And Rose. Most of all Rose.
I stared at him. He wanted something...something to...
“A piece of paper? Is that what you need?”
Cut smiled crookedly. “You always were a mind reader.”
“Even when you tried to beat it out of me.”
The truth in our words was just that. Truth. Not judgement or accusation. Just a statement of what was.
Cut nodded. “I’m sorry.”
“I know.” Climbing wearily to my feet, I moved toward the large table with implements of destruction and opened a rickety draw. Inside, I found a mouse-chewed notepad and a gnawed-on pencil.
Taking both back to my father, I sat back down and passed them to him.
He tried to take them, but his arms wouldn’t work. The tendons failing to transmit instructions.
He sighed. “You’ll have to do it.”
He didn’t lay blame. Just spoke the facts. He accepted his punishment and didn’t hate me—if anything, he was grateful to have paid for his trespasses.
“What do you want me to write?”
He took a deep breath, thinking.
Finally, he recited, “I, Bryan ‘Vulture’ Hawk, do solemnly pledge my death is justified and accepted. I renounce all former decree that if my death is judged as murder that my firstborn heir, Jethro ‘Kite’ Hawk, is cut from my will. I revoke the agreements in place to send him to Sunny Brook Mental Institute and rescind all further instruction dealing with my daughter and other inheritors.”
His voice hitched, but he forced through his body’s shortcomings to relay his final message. “On this day, I draw forth a new Will and Testament with Jethro Hawk as my witness and true heir that all lands, estates, titles, and fortune pass to him upon my demise. This is binding and unchangeable.”
A ball lodged in my throat as Cut shifted awkwardly. “Hold the paper and help me grab the pencil.”
Swallowing hard, I wrapped his fingers around the pencil and hovered it in place on the newly written Will.
I didn’t know if it would stand up in a court of law, but we had paid lawyers on our side.
Marshall, Backham, and Cole would ensure the paperwork would be lodged and executed.
And then I would destroy their practice so they would never serve law to monsters such as my family again.
Cut grunted in agony as he signed his name; his signature almost illegible. Remembering what else lived in this barn, I hauled myself to my feet for the second time. “Wait there.”
I returned with a handheld video recorder and new battery that’d been stored in the safe away from vermin. I didn’t let myself remember why there was a recording device in here.
Ripping open the battery casing, I inserted it into the device, and turned it on.
The first thing that came up was the last filmed event.
Me.
Stored in this tiny recorder was what happened once Jasmine’s back had been broken. I remembered the day in crystal clarity. It was never Cut’s intention to hurt his daughter so much.
The video unspooled, crackling with sound.
Jasmine looked at me. “Kite...I can’t feel my legs.”
Instantly, Cut shed his pompous strictness of emperor of our estate and become a terrified parent instead.
He rushed to release my binds, not caring I crunched into the dirt once he’d loosened the leather. Once, I was free, he scooped up Jasmine and darted toward the exit.
“We’ll go to the hospital, Jazzy. Fuck, I’m so sorry.”
All he cared about was fixing what he’d done.
But I didn’t let him get far.
I snapped.
I became like him. I craved his pain after what he’d done to my baby sister.
I wasn’t proud of what I’d done. My hands trembled as the video-tape showed a devil-child leap onto his father’s back and beat him over and over and over again with the club he’d used on Jasmine.
I stared transfixed as the tape continued, transforming me from abused to abuser as Cut fell on the floor, covering his face and hands.
I could’ve killed him that day and I would've if Jasmine hadn’t screamed for me to stop.
Hearing her terror wrenched me from the blood cloud I’d swam in, putting her first rather than making my father pay.
I’d scooped her in my arms and charged to the Hall. I’d been the one to get Jasmine to the hospital all while Cut lay unconscious in the barn.
“Turn it off.” Cut closed his eyes, cringing against the scratchy noises of the recording.
I couldn’t breathe properly as I fumbled with the machine and switched it from memory card to fresh start.
Neither of us mentioned what we’d just seen or the past feelings of the incident.
We knew who’d won that night and as a kid I’d expected harsh retribution.
But Cut hadn’t punished me. He’d pretended nothing had happened even while bruises marked his skin.
He’d continued with my lessons but didn’t hurt me any more than normal.
It was as if he wanted to be hurt for what he’d done to Jaz.
Clearing my throat, I held up the lens and pointed it at Cut.
The screen bounced in my hold, but it would have to do.
This was my insurance policy.
Cut understood immediately and dropped his head to the notepad I’d tossed in his lap. He fortified himself from our strained relationship and read my scrawled writing—for Jasmine and Kes and future heirs of Hawksridge Hall.
Occasionally, he looked up, reciting his pledge while staring into the camera. More often than not, his eyes remained downcast, reading his Last Will and Testament quickly.
My hands only shook harder the closer he got to finishing. My fever fogged my eyesight, and his voice threatened to put me in a trance.
I needed to rest and fast.
Finally, he finished.
Once his declaration was verbalized, I turned off the camera and placed it beside me for safe-keeping.
I looked at the same speck he stared at, unable to move forward but knowing I had no choice. “Thank you. Not for me, but for Jaz and the workers we employ. You’ve kept them in their homes and jobs.”
A thought pricked me.
I’d planned on dismantling the diamond smuggling ring once Cut was dead, but his unselfish act of preserving the company and giving back my birthright reminded me it wasn’t a matter of shutting down something just because I wanted to.
We had people relying on us. I had to do right by them. I couldn’t steal their livelihoods.
“Take care of those you love, Jethro.” Cut coughed. “Don’t ever let corruption turn you into me.”