by Lana Grayson
He pushed the contract toward me. I didn’t read it, but I hadn’t pulled my gaze from his quick enough. His confidence might have been attractive if he hadn’t thought himself infallible. Nicholas actually believed his presented offense was an offer of freedom, wealth, and charity.
I didn’t need Bennett charity.
And I wasn’t comfortable trapped within the shadow of his stare or the buttery smoothness of his voice.
“When my father died...” I let the word linger. Darius, the bastard snake he was, didn’t flinch. “His will was very specific.”
“And we’ll do our best to honor his conditions,” Nicholas said.
No golden eyes or caramel cadence could save his deal. I set the will on the table. Darius inhaled.
Josiah managed to get power of attorney before Mom married. That passed to me, and I locked the will up tight from Darius with a perverse pleasure. My step-brothers watched as I flipped the pages to the clause that would either protect or damn my father’s company.
I pushed the document to Darius. His expression slimed into a forced civility.
“In the event of Mark Gabriel Atwood’s death, Atwood Industries and all assets as defined in Section 3 (a), shall be passed to his blood male heir.”
“A male heir?” Darius’s voice scraped over the word.
Nicholas cast a glance to his brothers. Max frowned. Reed tossed Hamlet a piece of the pork loin. I waited for the hammer to fall or a mic to drop.
“A technicality, my dear,” Darius said. He cleared his throat. “He didn’t specifically name any of his children. And rightly so. He believed the company would pass to one of his sons, but no one anticipated their untimely deaths.”
“The clause stands.” I hoped I was doing the right thing. “And I’ll honor my father’s wishes. As of today, I will hold Atwood Industries in a trust until I have a son.”
Mom shook another pill from the bottle. Darius said nothing, but the rage, condemnation, and frustration in his clenching jaw read easier than the rest of my father’s will.
The only thing more glorious than Darius’s failure would have been to witnessed such hatred with him behind bars, where the murdering son of a bitch belonged.
Nicholas wasn’t deterred. He flipped through the rest of the pages with a cursory glance.
“You could fight this,” he said. “Ms. Atwood, I understand your aggravation, but we are offering you...everything.”
“Everything can’t bring my father back.” I stared at Darius. He took my mother’s hand, bringing her fingers to his lips with a sneer. “But this is his land. His legacy. Selling it would be no better than selling his memory. I won’t do it.”
I stood. Nicholas followed, but Darius burned where he sat.
“I have work at the office,” I said. It was true, I just wasn’t sure how to do any of it. Damage control, investors to call, reports to write, labs to turn in at school. I nodded toward my brothers and relished a deep breath that rejuvenated me more than any hit from my inhaler. “Excuse me, I won’t be able to stay for dinner.”
I lashed the bag over my shoulder. Darius didn’t dare watch me leave, but my step-brothers stared as I stalked from the room. Suddenly, I wasn’t the only one tense in Darius’s presence.
Nicholas, Max, and Reed silenced, minding their father like the good little sons of the devil they were. Victory tasted sweet, but I didn’t envy their ride home.
I made it to the car before the bittersweet laugh bubbled inside me. Dad would have been proud. My brothers ecstatic.
But me?
I collapsed in the driver’s seat, staring at a home where I couldn’t stay and land I relinquished to an imaginary son that bluffed my way to momentary freedom.
But at least the Atwood name, fortune, and future were safe. I almost hoped the Bennetts would try to fight for what didn’t belong to them.
If only to watch them fail.
3
Nicholas
Life was a struggle to secure two necessities.
Family.
Power.
With one came the other. It was a simple formula my father preached since I was born, and one I repeated each day as I grew into the man he decided I would become.
My father declined Bethany Atwood’s offer to stay for dinner after my new step-sister made one very impetuous mistake.
She challenged him in a way not even Mark Atwood had ever dared.
She’d stake her life on a company that wasn’t hers and a name that bullied, intimidated, and stole every ounce of begrudged respect it earned. My father wasn’t a forgiving man, and hers was an insult he wouldn’t soon forget.
The limo ride to the airport commanded silence. I studied Mark Atwood’s will, marveling in how brilliantly he wove his final wishes to honor his sons. Sarah’s name wasn’t mentioned. If she knew or cared, it didn’t show. The girl waved the will like a flag, as though a strip of paper would protect her.
It wouldn’t. And she’d soon learn what a terrible, regrettable mistake she had made.
I handed the paperwork to Max. He didn’t care to read it, but, under our father’s scrutiny, he took the papers and shuffled the pages. He wasn’t a man who studied contracts and parsed the law. That was my role. I doubted he’d find any other conclusion.
Sarah Atwood played her hand all in—no bluffs, no cheats, and every scrap of luck the Atwoods had saved since they clawed their way into an elite world which didn’t belong to them.
Mark Atwood rotted in hell and danced in glee at this turn of events. It wouldn’t be long until my father lost his patience and sent Sarah there as well.
The private jet waited to depart. My father boarded in silence and slipped into his cabin. My brothers left him to brood. My attention drifted to the window and the fading airport below. The cornfields extended even this far from their farm. Acres upon acres of land—all under the control of one little girl who had no idea how much trouble she caused.
“She’s cuter than I remembered.” Reed kicked his seat back.
Max smacked the ass of our private flight attendant and earned her giggle. “Careful. That’s your sister.”
“Family first, huh? What’d you think, Nick?”
I poured over the will. How the hell had we lost this? “I wouldn’t want to be Sarah Atwood at the moment.”
Reed shrugged at Max. “Didn’t look like she wanted to be Sarah Atwood either.”
“How bad is it if we don’t get this deal?” Max asked.
I wouldn’t discuss the possibility, not with our father so close. The cabin wasn’t soundproof, and I couldn’t insult his judgment within earshot. Family and power were the most important aspects of life to him—and it was his reason for marrying the Atwood widow and debasing our name to offer the girl more money than their company was worth.
“We’ll devise a new plan,” I said. “A new course of negotiations. This isn’t over.”
Max lowered his voice. “He has me talking to investors.”
“I am as well.”
His fist clenched. “You and me got different ways of talking, Nick.”
“And neither method is effective at the moment.”
Reed stole the will and flipped around the document. “So we expand. Do something besides agricultural support and engineering.”
“For how long?” I asked. “We don’t have the luxury of time. The best we can do is free a couple million and form a project outside the corporation.”
Max raised his eyebrows. “The Atwoods had the assets we needed.”
“That money is gone now.”
“And her bastard brothers knew just how to fuck us with it.”
Reed leaned forward. “What the hell is Dad gonna do to that girl?”
“Not our concern,” I said.
“Bullshit.”
I tightened my jaw. I loved my brother, but sometimes he didn’t think like a Bennett, and that was more troublesome than Sarah Atwood.
“What wouldn’t our father do
to acquire that company?” I said.
Reed and Max fell silent.
The plane delivered us to San Jose in an hour and a half. We landed, and our driver wove through the redwood forest and private land that separated the Bennett Estate from the rest of the world. The gated monstrosity ruled from one of the tallest points in the forest, surrounded with wilderness and streams—the clean, fertile grounds the Bennett family promised to sustain with our research and products designed to assist agricultural enterprises across the country.
Our father hadn’t spoken since leaving the farm. He burned with insult. I understood. Mark Atwood had been the specter of grief that haunted our family for the past seventeen years. We celebrated his death, but none of us anticipated the littlest Atwood carrying on her father’s legacy.
Reed was right.
Sarah defined pretty—a feisty little blonde with more fight in her than freckles on her nose. She was better suited for college textbooks, not contracts and reports—as if she understood anything about the power they contained. She never raised a hand against my father, but her simple smile was the cat-scratch of her nails against his face.
No one ever claimed her family fought fair. In another world, my step-sister might have made an excellent Bennett.
We crossed the foyer, our steps echoing over the imported marble. The split, grand staircase presided over the entry hall, an impressive and immense structure carved for the simple purpose of displaying our wealth and the extravagances built for our pleasure.
My brothers lived outside the estate as the grounds would pass solely to me. In the rare instances we were brought together, we each possessed our own private wing. But twenty-five thousand square feet wasn’t enough space. Not when Max refused to live off his inheritance, and Reed fought to travel overseas—to find a place beyond our father’s influence. It didn’t exist.
My brothers knew their places within the Bennett’s realm of influence. Max, two years younger than me, entered the service, but he never saw combat. Even now, he attempted to hide his limp, but our name failed to secure him a position on the front, regardless of how beneficial it would have been for our image. Instead, Max oversaw security for the Bennett Corporation.
Reed garnered enough sympathy from the fading scars over the right side of his face, neck, and ear that his charity work came easily. His charm helped as well.
We had our roles to fill in the family.
It was the first time in twenty-nine years I had failed at mine.
I staked everything on the assumption she’d sell—not initially, not even amicably—but eventually. We’d wear her down, offer her more money than they deserved for their empire, and treat the Atwood name with a delicacy they hadn’t earned.
But I didn’t anticipate my father gloating at a press conference and announcing our intentions, and I hadn’t realized how much she hated our family. The feeling was mutual, but our rivalry existed between Mark and his sons. Undoubtedly, her father had twisted her, confused her, and used her.
Sarah didn’t even realize the legal complications she created. The stock would tank. Investors would run. Customers would pursue safer companies.
Of course, my offer would stand.
At a substantially reduced price.
“Follow me.” Our father’s voice didn’t echo, but it boomed over the foyer.
Reed clapped me on the shoulder as he crossed into the study, but Max shared my glance, recognizing our father’s strained cadence.
While Mark Atwood built his home with every decadent and gaudy architectural mistake, the Bennett estate hadn’t changed for generations. The French manor, framed with Corinthian stone and imported marbles, was beautiful. Spanning foyers and elaborate halls separated vast wings of meticulously sculpted woodwork and refined parlors. Dark woods and darker colors warmed the mansion, and the masonry forged a certain stonework elegancy.
The study surrounded a roaring hearth with floor to ceiling book cases and mementos of my family’s world travels. The most recent addition was a photograph upon the mantle, dressed in a solid silver frame and held in a strict reverence of coiled garland.
My father’s wedding picture—an image of him and Bethany Atwood embraced in their first kiss.
We hadn’t questioned the photograph.
My father motioned for me to sit in the wingback mirroring his leather chair. He made no such arrangements for Max or Reed.
He rarely smoked, but a cigar clipped and passed to me first. He left the box for my brothers and reclined. I let the smoke settle over me. Max puffed and relaxed. Reed waved the smoke away from his neck.
“Our family is being tested.” My father’s rage blazed like the red-hot end of his cigar. “This company is facing a series of challenges we haven’t encountered in many years. It is up to you, my sons, to save us.”
Max nodded. Reed stood, motionless. My father awaited my reply.
“Of course,” I said. “We’ll do whatever is necessary.”
“The company bears our name. It is the source of our pride, and our face upon this world. And now? We find ourselves in a precarious position.” He drew on the cigar. “We need Atwood Industries. I want Atwood Industries.”
Max spoke first, a mistake he consistently made. “Christ. Atwood Industries will bankrupt the family. We can’t keep throwing money at the rat’s nest and hope it burns through the trash.”
My father’s fist clenched. I didn’t have time to intercede.
“Mark Atwood was a blight upon this world. You should be grateful the demons snarled through the dirt to drag his worthless, miserable hide to Hell.”
Max didn’t hesitate. “I am.”
“It is a benefit to this family that his sons have died and the scourge of the Atwood name has been scoured from the earth.”
“What about Sarah?” Reed said.
My father silently seethed, his wrath centering upon whatever memory he harbored of the girl.
“In this lifetime, we’ll face two sets of people. Those who oppose us, and those we may use for our own advantage. The Atwoods opposed us.” The chill in his words would extinguish the cigar. “I will spend every cent, pursue every outlet, and spill blood to redeem our family and ensure the Atwoods are cast into the gutter of their own shame.”
Reed frowned. “And so that means giving them more money than the accounts are worth? How does that vindicate us?”
I waved a hand. “Money is nothing. It’s made and spent, wasted and created every day. But there is only one Bennett family. And now, only one Atwood remains.”
My father exhaled. “And had the cunt taken the offer, their land, crops, animals, and livelihood would have been ours to burn. Instead, we’re faced with greater challenges.”
Max nodded. “Then we make her sell. I’ll do whatever it takes.”
And he did, often and ruthlessly. But no violence would aid us, not when she twisted the circumstances and bound herself in awkward legality. Inheritance law was difficult enough, especially following her brothers’ deaths.
“Selling makes no difference now,” I said.
“The company is held in her trust until...” My father twitched. “She presents a male heir.”
Reed pulled his phone and made a note. “So we scour their family tree. Find a cousin or something.”
“No.”
My father offered nothing more. I lowered the cigar.
“No?” I hesitated. “We let her retain the rights to the company?”
“No, we are not searching for a male heir.”
“Then how—”
“We have no time to waste. We have less than a year before our influence and shareholders are compromised.” My father shook his head. “We could divert resources to find a distant relative willing to sell, but Atwood’s little bitch would thrive during months and months of litigation.”
I straightened. “It is the cleanest solution. A clear-cut buyout. No unpleasant bartering for investors’ votes. No crises. No stock crashes. We�
��ll present to whomever we can find.”
“And it will fail again!” His voice cracked over the room. “She refused our offer. Worse, she humiliated us. Buying the company is no longer an option. And now, we are forced to regain our honor from the Atwoods.” He pitched a goblet of wine into the hearth. The glass shattered. “From the Goddamned Atwoods!”
Reed shifted away from the sputtering fire. “Then what do you—”
“I want Sarah Atwood’s male heir.”
The fire popped. My father’s rasping breath echoed against the crackle of the fire.
The blaze fueled the rage churning within him. He stared, but the Darius Bennett I recognized—the man I emulated and respected—no longer existed. A demonic shell darkened over him as fury crept into madness.
I hated myself for the question I was forced to ask.
“You want her heir?”
My father spoke into the fire. “She forced the clause. Atwood Industries belongs to her yet-to-be-conceived son. All rights and wealth, institutions and assets will be granted to an unborn child.”
A chill slowed my thoughts.
It should have silenced me.
It should have prevented me from understanding exactly what my father wished.
Unfortunately, my conscience flaked to ash years ago. I was Nicholas Bennett. The heir to the Bennett empire. My sins, my crimes, and my regrets existed only to protect the family.
Reed didn’t understand. “She doesn’t have a son yet.”
Max exhaled a curtain of smoke to hide his realization. I shared his shiver. My father’s grin would desecrate everything pure within his power.
Like Sarah Atwood.
“She will have a son,” my father said. “Her heir will belong to the Bennetts.”
I stilled my movements and wished my heart had ceased with it.
“And one of you will create it.”
The clock on the mantle chimed ten o’clock. Not nearly late enough for talk of this nature.
Max hesitated. He posed the question to me to avoid the wide-eyed insanity of our father.