Total pages in book: 87
Estimated words: 84635 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 423(@200wpm)___ 339(@250wpm)___ 282(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 84635 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 423(@200wpm)___ 339(@250wpm)___ 282(@300wpm)
I owed Madison for that…for everything. It was through her that I now had a chance at leading a life of purpose and not just acquisition. A life filled with love.
But first, I had to protect her from my brother’s twisted ambition.
Because I knew my brother was as stubbornly fucked up and flawed as I used to be.
He’d never get over this failure.
“Didn’t you hear?” I pulled back the hammer with my thumb. “My brother is already dead. He died in a car accident. I know—I was at the funeral.”
Jameson’s grin didn’t break. But his eyes went still. “You bastard, you planned this. You planned all of it.”
“I learned from the master. Whether you believe it or not, at first, I was going to let you live. Then you threatened the woman I love.”
He laughed. “Love. What a fucking joke.”
“Skylar would have loved you.”
“The love of a whore cheaply bought. Just like your precious Madison.”
I slowly shook my head as I tightened my grasp on the gun. “Careful, brother. This is your only warning to watch how you speak about her.”
His jaw worked. For one beat, the rage slipped. What was underneath was worse. The face of the boy I grew up next to, the one who used to cheat at races before everything between us went to rot.
Then he sneered. “Or you’ll what?”
For what we were…for what we could have been…I tried one last time to reason with him, with the brother he could be if he wanted. “I didn’t ask to come first.”
“But you did. You always did. Father made sure of that. You had his full attention. It was you he was proud of. You who could do no wrong in his eyes. You were always his only heir.”
“You were there beside me.”
“I was behind you. Always behind you. Do you know what that does to a man? Thirty years of standing in your shadow?”
“Don’t blame me for Father’s failings. I always treated you like an equal.”
“We were never equal,” he shouted as spittle formed in the corners of his mouth. “I was supposed to be first. It was all supposed to be mine.”
“Not anymore.”
He bared his teeth. “It’s not over yet, brother. You don’t have the balls to kill me. The moment you realize that I’m going to put a bullet in you. And then I’m going to fuck that whore you call a bride and then ki—
I took the shot.
He collapsed, and I stood over him while blood—our shared blood—poured out.
He tried to get up, tried to fight it.
I put my foot on his chest, holding him down. I stared down into eyes so much like my own. “I warned you. It didn’t have to be this way.”
“You would have never given up the money. The legacy.” His voice was raspy as the blood pooling under him spread.
“If you had come to me. If you had walked in and said you wanted out. Wanted your own name, your own company, your own life built on something that was actually yours. I would have handed it over and never looked back.”
He stared up at me. His mouth opened. Closed.
I didn’t look away. I made myself hold it. Those eyes that were mirrors of my own. Thirty years of the same face looking back at me from a stranger.
His chest shuddered as he forced out the words. “Fuck you and your whore wife.”
"It was never about the money," I said. My voice came out quiet. Even. "I would have worked it out with you. But then you touched what was mine."
I raised the gun.
With that, I put a final bullet between his eyes and watched as the life faded from him.
Madison launched herself into my arms.
“It’s over,” I whispered against her hair. “Just like I promised.”
CHAPTER 63
MADISON
The storms had finally stopped.
It was sudden.
Not a tapering off of the rain but rather an abrupt departure.
As if Mother Nature had exhausted herself with the drama of it all.
Blue and red police lights flashed across my white dress.
I’d wiped the blood off my face, but splatters remained on the dress.
I ran my fingertips over the rusted drops. How macabre to think the son’s blood now stained the mother’s wedding dress. As if the sins of the present had reached back to spoil the past and yet the past was responsible for the sins of the present. It was a snake eating its own tail.
Ignoring the chaos behind me, I picked up my skirts and headed toward the cliff’s edge.
Far in the distance, a beautiful amber and purple light broke over the horizon.
Dawn had come.
Despite the darkness of the last few days.
Despite the danger and upheaval of that horrible, everlasting storm.
Dawn had come…finally.
As I ventured closer to the edge, the wind whipped the dress about my legs.
I hugged my arms about me.