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TEMPEST
I’m screaminginto the gag as “Pam”—or Jacqueline Sinclair, as I found out half an hour ago when she came over with smoothies for me and then pulled a fuckinggunon me—shoves Dante and my brothers out onto the patio at gunpoint. For a second, blinded by panic and fear, I lurch to my feet. Instantly, her weapon swivels toward me, her eyes narrowing.
“Please,” she hisses. “Give me a reason to pull the trigger, you little cunt.”
My eyes dart to Dante. His jaw is clenched, his gaze locked on mine with an intensity that both scares me and fills me with strength.
Sit down, little hurricane, he mouths.
I swallow as I sink back onto the chair, watching as the woman I knew as Pam hustles them all toward three chairs across the patio from me.
This isn’t the quiet, somewhat frosty housekeeper who makes me amazing smoothies.
This is the mother of the monster that almost destroyed me.
Part of me is dumbfounded that I never saw who Pam was. Even though Jacqueline and I obviously never met, I mean, she’sJacqueline Sinclair. She was a huge name in the New York City socialite scene for years, and her pictures were splashed all over the society news.
But “Pam” looks nothing like that glamorous, cosmetically perfect blonde woman. I remember Gabriel once telling me that after Brett killed himself and his parents divorced, Jacqueline had fallen into drugs and poverty and passed away herself.
Apparently, that last part was slightly exaggerated. But now that I know who she is, you can see glimmers of the old glamorous Jacqueline behind the grayed, harried, old-before-her-time face of “Pam”.
“You,” she snaps at Alistair. “Tie him up.” She nods her chin at Gabriel. “And don’t jerk me around. I’m going to be checking when you’re done. If it’s loose, I use a bullet. Got it?”
Alistair nods silently, kneeling behind Gabriel’s chair and tying our brother’s hands tight.
“Now him.” She nods at Dante. “And don’t bullshit me,Mr. Black.”
Alistair ties Dante’s wrists behind him. When he’s done, Jacqueline makes Alistair sit in the third chair, where she ties him up herself. She stands, hefting the gun meditatively and smirking as she walks over to me.
“I’ve dreamed of this moment, you know,” she hisses. “Every night, while I clawed my way back from the gutter. After Iinserted myself into your home, andbowedto you,” she sneers. “Made your fucking bed! Did your laundry! Cooked yourfood!”
She shakes her head, a wild look in her eyes.
“You couldn’t just take the fucking money like the rest of those gold-digging little whores who chased after my darling Brett and then cried rape! You couldn’t justtake the fucking money!”
“Because your son was a piece of shit rapist!” Alistair roars behind her.
She whirls, a livid look on her face as she marches over. I scream through the gag as she slams the butt of the gun against my brother’s temple, making him groan and jerk back. Blood trickles down the side of his head as he blinks quickly.
“Don’t youdaretalk about my Brett that way!” She screams. “Slandered! Maligned by the press! Driven to hurt himself like that!” She shakes her head, raises the gun, and aims it right between Gabriel’s eyes.
I start to scream through the gag. Jacqueline pauses, turning to arch a brow at me.
“Something you’d like to say, bitch?!”
Jacqueline marches over to me, swinging the gun in her hand and making me flinch. Dante roars, his arms bulging as he yanks at his binds. Jacqueline ignores him as she reaches out and yanks the gag from my mouth, allowing me to suck in sweet, clean air.
“Let them go! Please!” I blurt, tears streaming down my face. “You can hurt me if you want! Hurt me for what I drove Brett to!”
“TEMPEST!” Dante roars. “Stop it!”
“Don’t talk to her!” Gabriel bellows.
I ignore them both, my eyes leveling with Jacqueline’s.
This is a trade I can easily make. She wants someone to kill, to feel like she’s avenged her shithead son.Fine. That can be me. I can do that. But it’s not going to be either of my brothers. And it’snotgoing to be the man I love.
I stiffen the second the word even enters my head.
