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Sitting heavily, I pinched the bridge of my nose and prepared to have a conversation that would ensure I could never step foot outside Victor’s fortress again.
“Put it on speaker,” Victor whisper-muttered. “I want to hear if Quincy truly knows you.” He grinned as he glanced at Ily as if she was in on this morning’s entertainment. “I’ll be able to tell by his voice, you see. Are you ready, sweetling? Ready to know if the man who’s been fucking you truly is a monster of the Mercer line?”
Ignoring him, I put the call on speaker and replied to Suzette, “Passez le téléphone à Q ...s’il vous plaît. Je dois parler à mon frère.” (Put Q on the phone…please. I need to speak to my brother.)
“Henri?” Her voice rose into glass-shattering octaves. “Est-ce vraiment toi?” (Is that truly you?)
She said my name like my mother used to.
Onn Ree instead of Hen Ree.
“It is. I don’t have long, and I need to speak to Q. Is he there?”
“He just got home!” She slipped into English, copying me with a happy giggle. “He and Tess took Lino to the neighbouring farm to pick out a goat. He wanted one ever since Tess read him a book about the hen, the duck, and the billy goat.”
I swallowed hard as phantom tugs of the old me banged on the cage within my heart. Seemed when the monster sprang out to play, the human part was locked firmly away. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say the pains in my chest were another level of betrayal.
I struggled to speak around the sudden rocks in my throat. “Y-You’re saying…I’m an uncle?”
Suzette paused. “Oh…” She didn’t say anything for a while, then rushed, “Q didn’t say anything when you came for dinner because he’s extremely protective of their son. Don’t…don’t take it personally.”
How else was I supposed to take it?
Fucking hell.
If I wasn’t sure I was making the right decision, I was now.
Fuck him and his perfect fucking family.
Fuck him and his adoring beautiful wife.
Fuck him and his doting darling son.
I didn’t need them.
I had something he could only dream of—freedom to be my true self without any restraints or regrets.
“Henri?” Q’s voice shot down the line as if he’d yanked the phone from Suzette’s hand.
He pronounced my name like it should be spoken, making me despise all of them. Seemed anyone who ever called me Onn Ree didn’t fucking care about me, and I was done.
Anger built.
Unbelievable, unbearable anger.
“Is everything okay?” Q asked. “Are you safe? The tracker isn’t working, and I feared—”
“You feared what? That I’d gotten myself killed?” I snarled, spitting out streams of fury. Fury I hadn’t even known I harboured. Fury that’d been stealthy and oh-so-fucking serene, just waiting for this moment to froth.
He sucked in a breath.
For a moment, neither of us spoke.
Then he chose diplomacy and calm. “Where are you? I’ll send a team to get you. What happened with the meeting you said you set up with the Master Jeweler? Did you meet with him?”
I shot Victor a look.
He smirked right back.
“Oh, I met him. Victor Grand is exactly how you described him.”
“You went to his island?”
“Yep.”
“And he let you return? Just like that?” His voice darkened. “What did you have to do to convince him to trust you?”
“What slave did I have to fuck do you mean?”
The line seemed to tremble. “Did you touch one of them, brother?”
I locked my gaze with Ily across the room. Her golden eyes shimmered with tears, but the salty liquid remained firmly trapped by her thick black lashes.
A flash of all the moments between us.
The visceral reaction I’d had when I first saw her.
The disgust at offering her money for her soul.
The desire as I bid for her at Victor’s twisted auction.
The absolute despair as Victor poured alcohol down my throat.
And finally, the excruciating freedom as she kicked me in the nose.
Like a scrapbook—a Rolodex of unforgettable evolutions.
Settling back in the chair, I tore up that scrapbook and blew the confetti right in my brother’s face. “I met a girl. A sweet, innocent, wonderful girl. With one look, I knew she was different, and if I’d been better, been normal, who knows? Maybe she would’ve become my wife one day. But because I’m my father’s cursed son, I stole her instead of wooed her. I offered her a million euros of your money to sell me her soul, and…she took the deal. I gave her to Victor, and he opened up his island.”
Q’s matching fury crackled down the line. “Ignoring everything you’ve just said so I don’t have an aneurysm, if you only offered her a million, why did I notice a transaction for two?”
I flinched, remembering his strict condition of monitoring my account. He’d be able to see what I spent, but he couldn’t stop me from spending.
