by H. Q. Frost
"Why does she want me dead?" she asks as if she can't fathom the cruelty.
"If you threaten anything to do with the Carbon name, you are an enemy."
"I'm not threatening the Carbon name," she insists and moves closer to me.
"You are no longer welcome as a Carbon." My chest burns but I hold an impassive expression.
Her hands wrap around my neck and she stares up at me in reverence. "What if…we try again?"
I don't stop it when she presses her lips to mine. And I don't pull away when she eases her tongue against mine. I latch onto her wrists needing a connection I shouldn't be giving and I kiss her back, but don't allow her all of my affection. In my head I'm telling her yes. I'm getting her on my flight and bringing her back to the estate. I'm explaining to my great grandmother that Magdelena is willing to give me another chance and all can carry on as it should. But that is not our future.
In reality I stop kissing her and she slowly stops trying. She stares up at me and before she speaks, I pull her hands from around my neck.
"The contract has expired, Magdelena." I stare over the top of her head, unable to look into her face as I break her heart again. "You're no longer needed to the Carbons. Including Cole."
Years ago saying that to her wouldn't have made me bat an eye, but today, my cold, tired heart is breaking with hers. I don't have to look at her to see she's crying, and I can't bear to look into her face even if I wanted that confirmation.
"I got what I asked for this weekend. I hope you got the closure you may have needed." I turn my back and leave her in the small room, telling myself to forget about the tingle in my lips her kiss caused. It's time to forget about her.
My son consumes me. The idea is it will help me get Magdelena off my mind but it doesn't. He has too many idiosyncrasies that remind me of her. I find myself encouraging them and I realize the weekend I spent with her almost a month ago was the biggest mistake I could have made. I proved to myself I can be the man she needs and wants and that wasn't the purpose of the weekend. It was to prove to myself I am capable of trying to right my wrongs, but I didn't do that. I only made it worse.
"Callum," my great grandmother's voice travels from the doorway and I jump, in the middle of reading my son a story. I'm never jumpy but my mind hasn't been focused since that weekend.
"Join me."
"I'm in the middle of a lesson." My son will be homeschooled all his life. While I don't have a clue what public or private schooling is like, I know he would enjoy that more than a one on one experience. He's too social to be secluded.
"What's your name?" she asks the maid at her back and I roll my eyes. That's Jasmine. She was Magdelena's favorite maid.
"Jasmine, madam." She curtseys and I roll my eyes at anyone treating my grandmother so formal.
"Please step in for the Duke until we return."
If Cole didn't like Jasmine, I'd protest.
"I'll be right back," I loudly tell Cole, making sure my grandmother heard because if she plans on having me executed without warning, I will fight this time. Kissing Cole's head, I then hand the book to Jasmine and she bows her head. "Look me in the eyes when you address me," I tell her because no one should bow down to me.
"Yes, Your Grace," she says holding eye contact. Fear dances in her blue irises while her pupils expand and contract.
"He's supposed to be reading along so point at each word you read."
He's only pre-primary but the monotonous life he'll live, it'll be better if he advances his brain at a young age. In my youth, I remember being alone often. I had Gee, but I didn't have other children or much of a life outside of the Estate, so I read and studied my father astutely. Up until Magdelena, I thought my father was an exemplary man. I wanted him to be and so I strived to be like him. Now, as I walk toward my great grandmother who is very similar, I regret ever thinking a Carbon was superior. Up to and including myself, Carbons are a wasted breed and I hope the Reifs are free from our tyranny.
"What is it?" I quietly snap at my grandmother, immediately noticing she's alone. Her men aren't flanking her, not lurking around the corners. Completely and utterly alone. I glance around the hallway.
Reaching into a satchel at her side she withdraws a silk handkerchief then opens it, revealing a gun. My steps halt and I stare at the woman. My eyes flash from the gun to her, back and forth. If it's loaded, I can end her life in one swift move. When she offers it to me I stare at it. This is either a test or a set up.
"Do you have protection, Callum?" She tries to offer it to me again but I take a step back.
"For what?" I hold a calm tone and look her in the eyes.
"You're a duke, and your life isn't exactly on the straight and narrow."
I squint my eyes and look at her.
"Go ahead." She offers. "It's loaded."
Making sure not to touch the weapon, I push it back toward her. I have my own gun, but I'll never tell her that. "No. Thank you. I assure you my mundane life as a duke and father will not put me in danger." I turn to walk back to the library but she stops me.
"Kipper has been let go."
I look at her and nod. "Whatever you feel is best. He wasn't employed through me." I try to walk away again but she stops me.
"Magdelena Reif," she says and I mange impassivity while I stare at her.
"What of her?"
"I believe she will try to come for your son." The way she's staring at me indicates she's suggesting something I won't take lightly.
"Let her try. She'll never get him. What would she do, Grandmother? Go to authorities? We have documents showing she signed over her parental rights." I know how to play her game.
"The Carbons don't need the nuisance of her bogus claims. She forced me to take the baby."
"Please, Grandmother, don't call him the baby anymore. He's almost four."
"Put your focus on what matters right now, Callum. That woman is going to try and ruin your life."
"Let her." I shrug and turn, walking away.
"If you don't want to deal with this, I will have it handled," she says and I look back to see her wrapping the gun and her plan reveals itself to me.
"Do you have a plan of action?" I don't put emotion in my tone because she cannot pick up on my worry.
"Yes. Do you want to handle it?"
"Handle what, Grandmother?" I turn to face her completely. "I don't give a fuck about Magdelena Reif's bogus claims. Let her come. Let her try. I will rip her down," I growl with true anger that is brewing because of her plans for Magdelena.
"Callum, the Carbons do not need to be in the light with this sort of scandal. We are too prestigious to have a crazy woman claim she didn't hand over her son with ease. Can you imagine the money we'll have to shell out?"
"What would you have me do, Grandmother?" I ask, lowering my rage to prepare myself for her answer.
"Do as a Carbon would. Your father has had to stand up for this name. Your grandfather has too. Your great uncle as well. Kill her."
My heart plummets but I don't show it. To learn the male Carbons of the past few decades have killed to unrightfully protect their name makes me want to disgrace the name myself.
"You want me to possibly risk my freedom to get rid of a nuisance such as Magdelena Reif?" I scoff.
"Did your father get imprisoned? It's easier to clean up a mess we make than to try and do damage control on a mess someone makes against the Carbons."
"I am a lot of things, but I am not a killer. I don't even want to see that woman. Leave her be until she makes her threats and then I will deal with it." I wave my hand as I walk away from her, trying to keep a steady pace and not show the nerves jittering through me.
Magdelena won't see Kipper anymore and so my grandmother needs to get rid of her because she is no longer monitored. Kipper is no longer an asset so he's gone. She should have offed him.
"Grandmother." I turn back and she looks at me. "Have you come up with the terms to the contract?"
; When is my pending death, you fucking bitch?
"I have been considering things. You have time."
What she's considering is she no longer has Magdelena under her thumb so she can't get rid of me yet. Cole is powerless without legal guardians and only Magdelena and I hold that title. Even if we were to die, Cole will not get full reign until his twentieth birthday. That means Carbon assets will sit in limbo until my son can properly dictate Covington. She needs one of us and she hasn't decided which to kill yet. What she just attempted was to frame me for Magdelena's death. I will still be alive but have no rights, thus giving over my assets to my family superior. That means giving her my son. I can't imagine what she would do to the Carbon name having a fresh slate to start with.
If I didn't know that woman, I would ask her to consider Magdelena and I reconciling, but one of us must die upon principle. Cole offers the old woman nothing. She has enough money and notoriety, there is nothing she needs from him taking my place. It's all on principle. She wants to play god and dictate the Carbon chessboard. The family has always been built to suit, not strictly out of blood.
"I just don't understand," I sob, sitting across from Mary at my kitchen table.
I've just alluded to the depression I've been in. Of course I left out important details like Callum's the one to break my heart…again. When I went to Mongolia I lied to her and my mom, telling them I met a man online and I was traveling to meet him. In hindsight, that was stupid. Callum could have killed me and my family would have been looking for me in Jersey. Well, he didn't physically kill me. He did emotionally. Again.
Mary's staring at me like I'm completely insane. In her eyes I just dumped Kip, met a guy online, fell in love, and then let him break my heart. I've been holding this in since I left Mongolia. I got misty eyed when he walked away from me, but I blamed myself. Shamed myself. Told myself I deserved that. I knew why I was going there. What he would want. I figured if it wasn't to kill me, which I truly believed he wouldn't, then it was to have sex. Well that's what we did. Over and over and I walked around with a sore pussy for a fucking week! It only made me hate him more. Because we didn't just fuck. He made love to me. He said things Callum Carbon would never say, and I fucking believed him. Now I feel like I'm dying.
That weekend I tried not to let the thought that maybe it would really be the last time I saw Callum get to me. I know I need to stay away because his grandmother fucking hates me, but I actually thought Callum would sneak time for me. For the safety of my daughter and family I was willing to wait until his grandmother's death to ever meet my son. But I honestly thought I would get secret visits from Callum for however long it took his grandmother to die. He will never change and I don't know how he deceived me. Why I allowed myself to actually believe Callum may have felt something for me. He used to deceive the people around us, making them believe he was a doting husband, but I knew first hand. This time around, I was the fool deceived by his actions.
"Fuck," I bawl, "It hurts so much." I'm gasping for air, hyperventilating over a man. I have reached the lowest point of my life. And that's pretty bad considering I have the most fucked up life in history. "I'm dying!" I wail and Mary stands, wrapping her arms around me.
"You're being a freak," she compassionately says while rubbing my hair.
I wish I could tell her the truth, but she'd have me committed. Her and my mother know the Carbons took my boy but it was easier to convince them it was because I didn't want two children. Telling them it was because they might die if I didn't, wouldn't have gone over well. Police, FBI, everyone at my ma's parish. It would have been a bigger shit show than it turned out to be. Needless to say, Mary hates Callum probably more than anything in the world. It took her a month to speak to me again, but she wanted to be an aunt, so she had to. Now, my sister's not too stupid, and I think she knows it's best not to hunt for answers when it comes to the Carbons. Obviously they're some affluent fuck-heads or they wouldn't be dealing in arranged marriages and pumping babies into virgins.
"Magdelena," she sighs and begins wiping at my face when I look up at her. "Maybe you should have an extra therapy session this week?" she suggests and it only makes me cry harder. "What was so great about this guy anyway?" Her voice travels into the kitchen and I hiccup through my tears, trying to speak clearly.
"F-f-for starters." I wipe at my tears aggressively. "In his p-picture he was hot. But-but when I got there and he took off all his clothes." My eyes go wide recalling the change to Callum's body. He was sexy before, but now…
"Fucking seriously, Magdelena?" she scolds me, bringing a glass of wine with her from the kitchen.
"Yeah." I nod adamantly. "I wanted more of that." Curling my fingers into my palms, I try not to think about the countless times I pulled my fingertips down the ridges of his abs.
"Let's compare these two losers. Kip and…what'd you say his name was?"
"Kyle," I whimper.
"Two shitty names that start with K. Both at negative one. So for the sake of your argument, who had the better body?"
"Kyle," I blurt. "Hands down. Surprisingly. 'Cause I mean, I've seen a shirtless picture of him before and it was nice. Very nice, but clearly he hasn't updated that shirtless picture."
She scowls at me and I wipe my face again.
"More money?"
"Probably Kyle."
"You can't say probably, Mag," she huffs.
"Kyle." I nod with assurance. He's a fucking duke!
"Treated you better? Even though you say you haven't known Kyle that long."
"Kip," I mumble. "Except for the weekend I spent with Kyle. He was kind of an asshole at first, but I was also being a complete bitch. But then we both made up for it."
"And Kip knows your daughter and your family." She puts a tally mark for him and I roll my eyes. "Kip wanted to marry you." He gets another tally mark and I scoff. "Kip used to buy you things and take you on dates." Two more tally marks. "Now onto the things that matter. Who's the better conversationalist."
"Kyle. We have more common interests." I pull my thumbs under my eyes.
"Who has better morals?"
I snort and roll my eyes. "Neither. Take away a point for both. Or ten, because they're both assholes."
"What'd Kip do?" she asks with a cocked eyebrow. I forgot I told Mary I broke things off with him because he proposed and it was moving too fast for me.
"Nothing. Just, I mean obviously he's clueless. He tried to marry me!"
"After two years of dating. It's not that far-fetched. Did he have an affair?"
"Yes." I tense up, not wanting that mark against me. "Well, not really. But he flirted with some random girl."
"Okay," she mutters like that shouldn't make me jealous and it probably wouldn't have because I never loved Kip.
My sister doesn't get jealous over her significant others. Mary has a level head and is always in control. She doesn't have a clue what it's like to live in my head.
"Who made you feel more?"
"Feel more what?" I question.
"No. Just feel." Her hands make claw fingers as she tries to get her point across.
"Kyle," I admit, because I've been feeling the effects of Callum for the past five years.
"Who satisfied you better?" Her eyebrow cocks.
"Kyle," I answer without hesitation.
"Bigger..?" She wiggles the pen in her hand and I giggle. This isn't like my sister but I love her to death for trying to make me feel better.
"They're about the same, Kyle just used it better. Obviously, Mary, if I'm this hung up over him after just one weekend!"
"You sure it was just one weekend?" The way she's staring at me makes me look away. Sometimes I swear she can read my mind.
I nod and drink my wine. "If I drink this you'll have to drive me back to mom's."
"I planned on it. Drink it because you need to calm down." She puts her hand on my knee. "Listen, I know shit’s been rough these past few years but doing this to yourself will only
make it worse. Let him go. He was never worth it." She's talking like she knows Kyle's real name is Callum.
"You're not wired like I am, Mary." I sadly smile at her. "If I could, I would." My throat tightens and I stand, walking to the bathroom.
Yes I just bawled my eyes out in front of my sister, but this cry is for a much different reason. I would let him do it again if only he would show up, and I wish I could tell him that. I hate that I'd let him use me for anything, but I don't know how to stop these feelings.
"Poppy, please hold my hand," I say for the third time, grabbing her coat sleeve.
There seems to be more people out than usual but I think it's all in my head. Everything's been much louder than normal.
"Mommy, a pony!" Poppy screams, pointing at the life size reindeer on display for the holiday.
"It's a reindeer, baby."
She's dragging me toward the display and my phone starts to ring.
"Poppy, just a minute," I tell her, trying to dig my phone out of my pocket. "Poppy, hang on!" I reprimand but she doesn't stop pulling. Seeing it's Lol, I let her hand go and answer. "Lol," I say his name with a mixture of relief and confusion.
"Mag," he says.
"Hi! What's up?" Hope he's calling me for Callum makes my heart flutter. I grip my phone with both hands, trying to keep my smile minimal. Why else would Lol be contacting me?
"I called to say hello."
"Oh." I didn't mean to sound so disappointed but I wasn't expecting just hello. "Um, hi." I look down to grab Poppy; I need to get to my therapy session. "Poppy?" I blurt and spin to look behind me, but she's not there. "Poppy!" I call out and try to see around all the people but it's like they're multiplying by the minute. "Poppy!" I scream, running toward the reindeer display. "Poppy!" shrieks from me when I can't spot my little girl. "Oh my god, Poppy! My daughter! She has a blue hat. Her coat is silver. Poppy!" I scream, spinning in circles pointlessly. "Poppy!"
They say not to wander from the spot you were in when your child walked away from you, but how do you stay still in a situation like this? I'm running, stopping people carrying children and checking to make sure it's not my girl. At one point I stop a woman pushing a stroller and uncover her baby. That's when I'm grabbed.