Chapter 8
Heath
Wainscott Hollow, my heart’s prison. A sane person would never step foot on these shores again had it been the reason for all their sorrows. But no matter how much I want to forget these godforsaken shores, my mind won’t allow me to because it’s the place that houses all my memories of her.
My eyes fall shut as I let the night air and wild winds bring me back to the girl with sandy bare feet and dark hair laughing under the sun as she danced through the tide pools.
As much as I want to escape Katelyn Shaw, I cannot because she’s embedded in who I am, and no one can escape that which truly makes you who you are.
I didn’t want to come back until I had everything she needed.
She called me a nobody, a loser, someone who couldn’t provide her with the luxury she was accustomed to.
So when I left, I built my own empire, was ruthless in my endeavors, all to accumulate a fortune that would surpass her fathers.
I did what I had to, stained my hands with blood to earn money I don’t even want or care about.
My only goal is Kat. For her, there is nothing I wouldn’t do, no horror I wouldn’t bear.
The last words she spoke to me haunt me now, as they did ten years ago.
I don’t love you. I never did.
I spent years trying to forget her, abandoning my memory of her in whatever I could find, but nothing worked. But to unburden one’s self from their darkest and most depraved desires is impossible. She may legally be my sister but try telling that to the beast inside me.
So here I am, holding the fragmented pieces of my broken and blackened heart, shattered by the only woman I’ve ever loved. A woman who was never meant to be mine. The only woman on this earth who’s ever been able to hurt me.
I haven’t yet told Henry I own every parcel of land, every structure, down to every little waterway the naked eye can see from his balcony at Wainscott Hollow.
I disguised myself behind my corporation, although Henry, in his advanced alcoholism, is probably far too gone to notice who he sells what remains of his fortune to.
Absolute retribution is what I’d thought this moment would bring.
To revel in the shock in his eyes when he heard the poor boy from the Bronx, the so-called hood trash he hates, is now lord and proprietor of all he’s ever held dear.
But standing here on the shores of the manor where I spent my happiest days with my wild, untamed girl who liked to catch tadpoles and run free in the dunes, I’m profoundly empty.
Maybe because that very girl’s last words to me were how she didn’t want me, that I was worthless, that the powerful bond I believed we shared was meaningless to her.
When I turn to head back to the manor, I spot two figures in the sand.
The man hovered over the woman, his movements frantic and consumed with rage.
The woman writhes under him as if desperate to be freed.
And then I hear it as if carried to me on the wind.
The voice that lingers in my mind as if she’s just spoken to me.
I’ve come back to Wainscott Hollow only to walk right into the kind of horror I never wanted to see. I know it’s Kat by the sound of her screams.
My steps are frenzied and hurried, puppeteering my body in her direction on instinct. When I reach them, I pull him off her and toss him to the ground. I’m not the same guy I was ten years ago. My body has filled out in ways most young men dream of.
“Get the fuck off her,” I snarl, crowding over the man.
Then recognition dawns on me. It’s Eddie Lind—the not-so-insufferable friend to Henry Shaw.
Despite our familiarity, I pounce on him, my fists connecting to his face in rapid succession until blood begins to soak the sand around his head from my blows.
I’m confident I’ve broken his nose again, if nothing else.
He can’t even get his bearings to sit up, let alone acknowledge our unexpected reunion.
The sight of Kat pains me beyond measure.
Seeing her degraded, ravaged, her dress ripped and Eddie’s cum leaking out of her is too much to bear.
Once upon a time, I might have been fine with occasionally sharing Kat with Eddie.
I liked him. He wasn’t a part of my soul the way Kat was, but he was a part of my life that I look back upon fondly.
But all the years apart from my anger allowed the rage to fester, knowing I didn’t have the required pedigree to be as important to them as they were to me.
These two, the perfect match, equal social standing, financial worth, names of status, a logical pairing.
Knowing he was here with her while they banished me to hell like a rabid dog fuels the flames of wrath inside me.
The gods have cursed me from the moment I laid eyes on her, and no matter what happens in this world, our souls are bound together. There is no beginning and no end to Katelyn Shaw and I.
“This is what you replaced me with? This man who defiles you on the same shores I showered you with my love?”
Eddie crawls away from me in the sand, cupping his bleeding jaw.
“What are you doing here, Heath? Years ago, she told you to pack your bags. She made her choice and chose right. She picked a comfortable life, what she’s always known over the absolute uncertainty and social banishment that would befall her with you.
What could you offer her but shame and the life of an outcast? ”
My knuckles connect to his face again. “Shut your mouth, Eddie. I didn’t ask for your opinion.”
“You can kill me with your fists, but you’ll never undo the fact that she made her choice.”
My shirt is tugged back. Kat screams as she tries to pull me away from him.
Eddie’s blood spills on the sand, but it doesn't quiet the rage inside me. I want him dead. Dead for being here with her when I wasn’t.
Dead for touching her when I couldn’t. Dead for thinking he could have her.
My hands wrap around his throat, and I squeeze.
“Not a choice, Eddie, because no matter what you do, no matter what she says, she’ll always be mine. You’re just a blip. A mistake. A memory I’m about to wipe off the face of this godforsaken planet.”
Kat’s screams do nothing to temper my beast. It’s wrapped around my entire being and erased any sign of the rational man I used to be. “Heath, stop! Heath, you’re going to kill him!”
I shove her off me and pull out the knife I carry in my pocket. I hold the two-inch diameter round wooden handle before opening it up and releasing the blade.
Eddie’s pants are still down around his ankles, his feet restricted. I flip him over. “Get on your knees, Eddie.”
He doesn’t move. He’s frozen.
“Don’t worry, Eddie, I’m not a complete monster. I’ll use lube.”
Eddie's shrill screams permeate the night air as I slice into the flesh above his ass and cut a line. Blood trickles down the wound and gathers around his ass.
“Stop it,” she shrieks, her delicate hands hitting my back, “Stop it! This isn’t like you, You’re not like the rest of them.”
I don’t dare look at her, knowing her eyes will lure me back into her trap. “You’re right, Kat. They aren’t like me.” I pin Eddie by sitting on his legs, my hand coming to press into the center of his back.
With a flick of my wrist, I send the knife spinning in the air. It glimmers as it falls, blade over handle until I catch it by the blade, allowing it to slice into my hand as I push the handle into Eddie’s ass.
“The boy you used to know is dead, Kat. I was once someone who cared about doing right, but that was when I believed good deeds would be rewarded, back when I still had some light in my life. But you, sweet Kat, you extinguished any bit of hope I had left in me.”
Eddie’s screams morph into moans, and I laugh.
“Look at that, would you, Kat? It seems there’s nothing to worry about. Eddie here likes it. Tell her you like getting your ass fucked, Eddie. Especially when it’s by me.”
“Your hand,” Kat exclaims.
Blood wets my hand as it gushes out of my flesh.
I welcome the pain because while I hold onto it, I can’t open my heart to her begging or her tears.
I don’t want to feel pity for Katelyn Shaw.
Hate is all I allow myself to feel for her.
It doesn’t matter that hating her is like hating myself.
We are two beating halves of the same wounded heart because as much as I hate her, I despise myself more for never being able to forget her.