Total pages in book: 15
Estimated words: 14237 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 71(@200wpm)___ 57(@250wpm)___ 47(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 14237 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 71(@200wpm)___ 57(@250wpm)___ 47(@300wpm)
He stiffened. Clearing his throat, he nodded once. “That’s about the gist of it.”
“And why did you think you’d be welcome here?”
His eyes narrowed. “Because we’re blood. Because I wanted to meet my—”
“We are not brothers. We merely share the unfortunate disease of similar DNA.”
“It’s because of that DNA that I’m here.”
“In a place where you’re not wanted.”
Temper flared over his face. “Look, all I’m after is—”
“Money?”
His shoulders swooped back as if I’d offended him. “No. Fuck. Is that what you think? That I’ve come here with my hand out?”
“Didn’t you? You must’ve researched me. You must know who I am if you’ve been clever enough to find my personal address.”
The faintest tinge of embarrassment covered his cheeks. “I’ll admit, I did spend a fair deal of time learning what I could about you.”
I went deathly still. “And…what did you find out?”
He studied my coiled muscles. He read my body language correctly: understanding I was moments away from snapping and throwing him out of my home.
Would he run or would he fight?
Leaning back in the chair, doing his best to project calm, he said, “You’re successful. Beyond successful. Your company is worth billions. You own real estate globally. On paper, you’re nothing more than a bigshot corporate bastard who’s probably done his fair share of dodgy dealings but…”
“But?” I snarled.
“I also found a few articles on your wife. The interview you both gave of how she came into your life. A slave you fell in love with. A girl who returned to you even when you freed her.”
Fuck.
That article had been Tess’s idea and one I’d spent a fuck-ton of money suppressing ever since. My role in slaughtering traffickers relied on them being confused on who I truly was. Sure, it didn’t hurt for them to see things online stating me as a wholesome family man. Someone trying to do the right thing. If anything, it helped form the persona that I was a straying son of a bitch who liked to keep broken women and cheat on his meek little wife, but I would prefer not to have criminals think the way to ruin me was to take Tess.
That’d already happened.
It’d almost killed me finding and saving her.
The heart of the man who took her still rotted beneath a rose bush outside.
And despite all my efforts to find her, fix her, and love her the way she needed me to love her, she’d shut down, shut me out, and put me through absolute fucking hell.
I traced one of the faint silver scars on my face from when she’d whipped me. A whipping that’d taken all my strength to endure but it had brought her back to me.
I’d chosen love over loneliness and some dark part of my heart nudged me to listen to this man.
I knew what it was like to hit rock bottom.
To feel so alone that death lured like a welcome utopia.
Forcing myself to relax a little, I softened my snarl. “Seeing as you know so much about me…let’s talk about you.” Steepling my fingers and resting my elbows on the wingback arms, I looked him up and down. “Henri Ward. Is that your real name? Where are you from? Why are you here? Tell me in as few words as possible why I should tolerate you in my home and why I should trust a thing out of your mouth.”
Silence fell as he shifted uncomfortably. His lips twisted as if he chewed on words and discarded them before selecting a few and saying, “My name truly is Henri Ward but that surname was one my mother randomly created, not her true one. I can’t tell you what that is because I don’t know myself. All I’m asking for is…can I have your vow that you’ll listen with no judgement? The whole journey here I promised myself I wouldn’t do this. That I’d follow the usual expectations of conversation between strangers, even if those strangers share blood. I wasn’t going to blurt out my life story or every sordid mistake I’ve ever made. I mean…who does that? Who barges into someone else’s house and vomits up their worst confessions? But…” He shrugged. “If I can’t be honest with my brother, then who can I be? Chances are you won’t want a thing to do with me anyway, so what have I lost by speaking the truth for the first time in my godforsaken life? I can’t tell a therapist. I can’t tell a friend. I definitely can’t tell a lover. I’ve got no one else and…well, that makes you uniquely qualified for me to—”
“Get on with it,” I snapped. “I despise ramblers.”
He hung his head. “Rambling? Christ, I’m trying to be honest for the first time in my life. I need…fuck, I need…” He sighed and looked at the floor. “I-I tried to kill myself last month.”