While They Watch

by Sosie Frost

  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 roarin
g 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.

  “You want us to seduce Sarah Atwood?”

  No.

  Seduction never crossed his mind.

  Until Bethany, my father never expressed any sympathy for the family. Their deaths enthralled him, and their misery entertained him. Any misfortune was a cause for celebration.

  No one would seduce the girl.

  “I will have an heir to Atwood Industries.” My father didn’t lower his voice, despite the evil he summoned. “I’ll control everything and everyone within that family.”

  “But—”

  “Everything she loves, and everything she has worked so hard to build and maintain, will be lost the instant that girl bears a Bennett for a son.”

  My father stared at each of us, unshakable and unblinking.

  “I want that Atwood bitch to regret challenging me. We offered her everything. She refused.” His words haunted the room with vulgar threat. “She will regret crossing me every second of every minute of every day it takes her to grow a Bennett in her womb.” He laughed. “And then I’ll watch as her world is destroyed the instant my grandson is born into this world.”

  “You want us...to fuck her,” Reed whispered.

  “No. I want you to breed Sarah Atwood.”

  The fire crackled. The charring pop didn’t disturb me. I would hear it for all eternity as my father damned our family to the deepest, blackest depths of hell.

  Max stood too quickly, wincing as he forced his weight over his bad leg. “Holy Christ, Dad.”

  I poured a glass of wine, offering the Pinot Noir to my father. He accepted.

  “Dad, you’ve married Bethany,” I said. “Sarah is technically our sister.”

  “Step-sister,”

  “Step-sister. But don’t you think the relation is—”

  “Do you plan for this family to fail, Nicholas?” />
  Did he? What did he think he’d accomplish besides serving us with life-sentences and corrupting a young woman’s innocence?

  “Of course not,” I said.

  “Do you intend to let the Atwood whore spit on the generous agreement you created?” He tilted his head. “She did not insult me, son. Her refusal voided your contract. She disrespected you.”

  “And so I should impregnate my step-sister?” I braved a chuckle. “You said it yourself. The clause is a technicality. She holds the trust. If we present that a sale of the company positively benefits Atwood Industries, she would be within her right to accept—”

  “Enough.” My father never raised his voice. I gave him his respect, taught through years of agony endured under his crop, molding me into his perfect son. “She’ll never sell. She’ll control the company until she bears a child and raises it with the same delusions that indoctrinated her into the Atwood philosophy.” My father exhaled. He gestured to my brothers. “Leave us. I will discuss this further with Nicholas.”

  Max and Reed stiffened, unceremoniously dismissed from the conversation.

  I envied them.

  My father appraised me with the grace of an executioner sharpening his blades.

  “You would disobey me in this,” he said.

  I lowered my wine. “No. But I question your motivations.”

  “Why?”

  “It is not...honorable.”

  My father laughed. “And what Mark Atwood did to your mother. That was honorable?”

  I didn’t answer.

  “Life is a war, Nicholas, and death is too often the only solution,” he said. “Imagine when a birth is the ultimate conquest.”

  “She’ll never do this willingly.”

  “And?”

  I expected it. “You’re asking us to rape Sarah Atwood.”

  “I’m asking you to protect this family.”

  “She’ll go to the police. We’ll be ruined.”

  “Then don’t let her talk to the police!” My father waved a hand over the parlor. “This will be your estate, Nicholas. Your home! If you can’t find one place to hide a scrawny little girl—”

  “Dad, listen to what you’re saying!” I stood. His gaze followed—invisible shackles binding me to our name, our home, our pride. “You’re asking us to abduct, rape, and impregnate our step-sister.”