“Goodbye,” I replied, then hung up the phone before he could hurt me anymore. My hands trembled from the confrontation. This was why I’d been putting it off. I didn’t want further proof that Hamilton didn’t give two shits about me. “Happy?” I asked Jack on a broken sob. I’d never felt so used in my life.
Jack, seemingly undeterred, grabbed his plate and waltzed over to the kitchen table. “He’s just hurting. He’ll come around.”
“Did you not hear him?” I asked with a scoff. “He’s not going to come around. He wants nothing to do with me, Jack.”
Jack sat down and started picking at his food. “He’s just lashing out. He didn’t mean it. Be a good girl and wipe your eyes. Painful words aren’t meant to hurt if they’re lies.” I ignored my plate with my mouth gaped open incredulously. Jack wanted me to keep trying? After that? “Oh, don’t look at me like that. Sticks and stones, Vera. The boy loves you.”
“The Beauregards don’t do love,” I snapped.
“I know my son.”
“You don’t know him at all,” I argued.
“I know that we have a deal, and you’re going to try your best, or I’ll make things very difficult for your mother and you. I promised to take care of everything if you help me with Hamilton. We both have jobs to do, and you can’t do yours if you’re sobbing at my table. Maybe you need a makeover…”
I shook my head and closed my eyes, more tears streaming down my cheeks. I couldn’t believe this. I knew trusting Jack was a bad decision. “You’ll make me do this? Even though Hamilton has made it clear that he hates me?” I asked.
“He doesn’t hate you. Toughen up a bit. And eat your dinner, it’s getting cold.”
I couldn’t imagine how I could eat. My stomach was twisted in knots. How could Hamilton treat me so poorly when it was me who was hurt? It was me who was betrayed. The whole situation with Saint was still a bitter pill to swallow, and now I had his brutal words to pile on top of it.
I was still processing the Saint dynamic. There was something that had been bugging me about it, and I knew Jack would be able to explain it to me. I cleared my throat, forcing my emotions to settle so I could get some answers. “Can I ask you something?”
“You can ask whatever you’d like.”
“Did you know that Saint is Hamilton’s brother?”
“No. I didn’t,” he answered instantly. “I knew Hamilton had a half brother somewhere out there, but I didn’t realize the paparazzi hounding us was him.” Jack took a slow bite, chewing his food meticulously before continuing in a calm voice, unaffected by any of this. “Saint’s mother isn’t a bad person. Her name is Gabby. She interned at my campaign office. We had a quick affair during a moment of weakness. A couple years after Hamilton was born, she married well, had a son, and moved on with her life. She didn’t think about Hamilton. She didn’t care. I didn’t bother to keep tabs on her because it didn’t matter. She didn’t matter. She wanted to keep everything a secret. Gabby had aspirations to pioneer across the political landscape. She didn’t want her bastard son with a politician to be public information, because it affected her credibility. Her husband didn’t even know. When Joseph went to the press with that story, it ruined her career before it truly started.”
“Such a fucking double standard,” I gritted.
“I agree. Women have to work twice as hard to be taken seriously. They labeled her as some wide-eyed coed so willing to do anything to get ahead, who abandoned her child. I won’t pretend to know Saint’s story, but I’m assuming that his vendetta stemmed from watching his mother’s career go down the toilet. I heard a rumor that she ended up getting a divorce. In the beginning, I tried to help, but she wanted nothing to do with me. Hell, I haven’t seen her in years. We ruined her life, Hamilton and I.”
“Hamilton didn’t ask to be born. And it was Joseph that leaked the story,” I argued. Perhaps I was sensitive about blaming unwanted children for existing, but I didn’t like how Jack worded that.
“You’re correct, Vera.”
I looked down at my feet. “Are you a bad guy, Jack?” I tentatively asked, already knowing the answer, but needing to hear it out loud so I could know for sure.
“Yes,” he replied simply.
Suddenly losing my appetite, I walked out of the kitchen, out the door, and away from the family that broke me.
3
Hamilton
I’m pretty sure I no longer had a job.
I was supposed to be on a flight headed to the rig this morning, but instead, I’d gotten on my motorcycle and headed toward Jack’s house.
Considering my father’s net worth was 13.7 billion dollars and I would inherit half of it upon his death, it felt ridiculous to mourn the loss of seventy thousand a year doing grueling work while isolated in the ocean.
But it was the loss of freedom I grieved.
It was still worth it. She was still worth it.
I’d spent the last nine years of my life on that rig. I made sure to work three times as hard as the next guy to prove that I was worthy. I didn’t want to be known as the trust fund motherfucker with too much cashflow to have a lick of sense. I had something to prove, and over time, everyone grew to respect me and my work ethic. I never missed a day, never was late. I wasn’t really friends with any of my coworkers, but we got along fine because there was a mutual respect shared between us.
We sweat. We clocked in, we clocked out, we spent weeks at a time secluded from the rest of the world, and we brought home a check once a month. It was honest work—the complete opposite of what my father expected of me—the complete opposite of what every Beauregard in history had done. I earned something. I did something. I didn’t have to scheme for my job and for the six thousand dollars a month I earned. No, I just worked. Something my fucking brother knew nothing about.
And all of that was gone now.
Because Vera Garner called me, and I was fucked up in the head about it.
There was a lot of shit in my life that I didn’t take seriously. I drank too much. I’d fucked enough women in various public places. I ruined people. I ruined relationships. My job was one of the few things I’d done right. And now? I’d do right by Vera, too.
From a distance.
I’d arrived at my father’s home late in the evening almost exactly twenty-four hours after talking to Vera.
My girl.
My fucking girl. Mine to protect. Mine to fuck. Mine to love. Mine to keep away from all the bullshit of the Beauregard name. My possessiveness needed to take the back seat, but I refused to let this family ruin her like it did me.
When she called last night, I thought she was trying to get back together with me. But when I figured out she was with Jack? I knew shit wasn’t right. She wasn’t offering forgiveness, she was choking on her words and wrapped up with puppet strings. Even if I couldn’t have her, there was no way in hell I’d let her be used.
I let myself into the front door, and a wave of toxic familiarity washed over me. I both loved and hated this home.
It was the place mom loved most.