Chapter Two
Jasper
Golden Oaks, Surrey
“Nothing?” I asked.
“Nothing new,” Phillip, my very highly paid private investigator, said through the phone. “But we’ll keep digging. We’ll get there, Mr. Knighton—we always do in the end. Something will surface.”
“Thank you, Phillip,” I said and hung up the phone.
I threw it down on my desk and leaned back in my seat.
The leather of my chair creaked beneath me, and I tipped my head back and closed my eyes.
The smoke of last night’s cigar still permeated the air, doing nothing to calm the anger burning in my chest.
Another week and another set of unanswered questions.
I took a deep breath and opened my eyes.
My father’s face smiled down at me from his picture above the fire opposite my desk.
I met him square in the eyes and said, “I don’t know where to go from here, Dad.
” A lump clogged my throat, and I had to clear it just to rasp out, “I feel like I’m failing you.
” I rubbed my forehead, trying to keep a hold on my emotions.
“I feel like I’m failing the whole family. ”
Of course, my father didn’t appear to console me, to reassure me. Because he was taken from us two years ago. It was deemed an accident by those at the scene, but anyone who saw that wreck knew it wasn’t. My father was killed, and I had no idea who did it—or why.
I steepled my hands and stared down at the ever-thickening file I’d been studying for months. Pictures and leads that ultimately had only led to dead ends. Whoever was doing this to us was good and knew how to cover their tracks to perfection.
I closed my eyes again. I was so tired, but insomnia was now my closest friend.
I’d have given anything to sleep through just one single night.
I spent every hour of every day like a bloody ghost, running through every person that could have a vendetta against my family in my head.
(News flash: There were a lot.) Questioning how and why somebody was doing this and how the fuck I could stop it.
A knock sounded on my office door, ripping me from my downward spiral. I sat up and ran my hand through my hair, trying to at least look like I’d had some shut-eye of late. “Come in,” I called, already knowing who it’d be.
As predicted, Forrest, my cousin and best friend, came through. He silently moved to the bar at the side of the room and poured us both two fingers of Oban, our favorite whisky.
Forrest sat down opposite me and placed my glass down on the desk. “Nothing new?” he asked. I shook my head and knocked back my whisky in one.
“Shit, Jas,” he said and tutted at me like I was a misbehaving toddler. “Respect the scotch, will you? You’re not a heathen.”
I rubbed my lips together as the Oban burned the back of my throat.
I blew out a long sigh. “I don’t know where the fuck to go from here, Cousin.
” It pained me to admit that. But this was Forrest. The one person I did open up to.
He was the closest to me in age and a lot like me in personality too.
We grew up together, side by side, and he’d pretty much been keeping me going these past couple of years when everything went to shit.
It wasn’t like he hadn’t seen some hard times with his parents too.
Forrest sat back in his chair. “You need to step away from this for a while, Jas. It’s consuming you.”
I glared at my cousin. “My father is dead. My sister is injured, one of our best horses was drugged, and I just know something else is coming our way. So forgive me if I don’t want to ‘step away for a while,’ Forrest.”
“Don’t, Jas. Don’t act like I don’t give a fuck,” he said measuredly, but his green eyes flashed with anger. Forrest may have looked calm and collected on the outside, but he had the bite of a pit bull if he was pushed too far.
All ire seeped from my body, and I sagged in my seat. “I’m sorry,” I said, and meant it. Forrest’s eyes lost their heat too. “I haven’t slept in what feels like months, and I’m all in my head.”
Forrest leaned forward. “You don’t sleep ever, Jas.
I see you haunting the grounds at every hour God sends.
You never see your family anymore. Barely show your face in public.
You look a mess.” Forrest flicked his hand at my overgrown stubble and unkempt, crinkled clothing.
“And worse, you’ve completely given up on everything you love, on any kind of life, just to chase answers we may never get. ”
“Not again, Forrest. I’m sick of hearing it,” I said.
Forrest shook his head, exasperated, and I knew he was about to let me have it.
“You were at the top of the game! You were already smashing what people believed were unbreakable records. You were going to be the greatest show jumper of all time. All time, Jas. Only to throw it away for seclusion in this depressing, dark office, which has turned into your personal prison.” Forrest sighed.
“You want answers. We all do. But we don’t want to lose you in the process.
” Forrest’s green eyes bored into me. “We’ve already lost far too much. ”
My stomach dropped. My family were my everything. And I knew I was theirs too. But I just couldn’t step away from finding out who was after us. I just . . . couldn’t . . .
I was doing all of this for them, for all of us here at Golden Oaks, so no one got hurt again. I was the eldest of us Knightons, the head of the family. It was my job to be sure everyone was protected. As much as I wish it didn’t, my jumping career paled in comparison to that.
My cousin didn’t speak for a spell, but then said, “Let Atticus ride Lord Henry, at least.” I quickly refocused on Forrest. He was all seriousness now.
He held up his hands in reaction to my angered gaze.
“I know he’s your baby. But he’s too good to just sit in the stable or graze in the fields.
Ben is doing his best keeping him fit, but that horse is a titan amongst horses, and he deserves to achieve the accolades he was bred for.
Don’t take him down with you, Cousin. He loves the show ring, and you’re depriving him of what he was born to do. ”
Silence stretched awkwardly between us. Atticus wasn’t touching Henry.
My youngest cousin was an incredible show jumper, but he was not touching my stallion.
As if he’d read my mind, Forrest’s shoulders sagged.
He waited a few tense seconds before he finished off his whisky and stood.
He was only an inch shorter than my six-three height.
Otherwise, we looked more like paternal twins than cousins.
We both had dark-brown hair, short at the sides and longer on top, and scruff on our cheeks and chins.
Though admittedly, Forrest looked a damn sight better than me these days. Only our eye color differed.
“Let’s go,” he said. I raised a questioning eyebrow at him.
“It’s time you came to family dinner again.
It’s been too long you’ve holed yourself up in here, and we’re all done with it.
You’re coming to family dinner to see your cousins and sister, and you don’t have a choice.
” He smirked, trying to break the heavy mood.
“And open a damn window. This place stinks of cigars and brooding man.”
I laughed, and the action felt strange in my chest. It was true; I hadn’t attended family dinner for some time.
In fact, I couldn’t remember the last time I did.
Even with all our touring schedules, whoever was in town would make time for family dinner.
It was something our parents had instilled in us growing up.
Yet even though I was mostly in town these days, I hadn’t attended a single one in God knew how long.
I got to my feet and walked around my desk. Forrest’s hand landed on my shoulder. He waited for me to meet his eyes. When I did, he said, “Stop taking all this on by yourself, Jas. We’re Knightons. We go through the good and the bad together. Let us help carry the burden.”
I smirked at my cousin. “Firstly, never say anything that cheesy to me again. We’re British and that shit doesn’t land.” Humor flashed in Forrest’s wide grin. “And secondly, I’m the eldest here. Stop trying to come for my title and know your place.”
Forrest shook his head, understanding my dry humor. “I don’t want it, Jas. Believe me. And I’m only one year below your thirty-two, so let’s not pretend you have the wisdom here. I’m the brightest of us all, if you’ll recall. I was accepted into Mensa at age six, unlike your underachieving self.”
I headed for the door to the office and opened it, ushering my “bright” cousin through. I immediately caught a glimpse of myself in the large hallway mirror that hung opposite my office. “Shit,” I said, as I ran my hands over my too-long scruff.
I looked terrible.
“That’s what I’m saying!” Forrest said emphatically, and I fell into step beside him. “You’re more grizzly mountain man than English country gentleman these days.”
I rolled my eyes, feeling a flicker of calmness settle in my chest. Forrest was good for me like that. Pulling me out of the darkness. All my family had that effect on me. I’d just stopped letting them in quite some time ago and allowed the darkness to pull me down.
“How’s training going?” I asked Forrest.
“Good.” He nodded his head, but he didn’t elaborate. I was sad to say that I hadn’t kept up with his practices. Forrest was an international five-star eventer—show jumping, dressage, and cross country. And he was consistently at the top of the league.
“You need to come and watch me when the season starts,” Forrest said. “Get out of the house for a while. Lady Aurelia is phenomenal. You need to see her.” Lady Aurelia was Forrest’s pride and joy, a nine-year-old dark-bay Dutch Warmblood mare who had been bred from his father’s prized stallion.