Chapter Four
“Nothing brings me greater pleasure than her suffering.
To the point of me even forgetting who I am as long as I ensure her pain.
The saying is true, after all.
Evil is not born. Evil is made.”
Zachary
Zachary
The ringing of my phone echoes through the house, mixing with the sound of the night owls hooting in the distance. I tear my gaze away from the surveillance camera showing me the Phoenix’s torment, her face full of pain from the agony the women deliver to her. I snag it out of my pocket and answer on the fifth ring on my way to the bar located in the left corner of my spacious living room. “Talk.”
“You son of a bitch.” That’s all the greeting I get from my sister Lydia, whose voice practically screeches in my ears, not that it annoys me.
Instead, a hollow chuckle slips past my lips, and I pour myself a glass of whiskey on the rocks, and pick it up, allowing the cubes to click against each other, the only sound lately that grounds me .
Alcohol, as I’ve discovered in the last few months, has the magic power to cure any pain raging inside you just for a while and make you numb to any of the monstrous things you are capable of dishing.
No wonder it’s called the drink of the gods; it must have cured them from any guilt they felt whenever they destroyed someone’s life.
“I’ve been called worse.”
“You did this, didn’t you?”
Taking a large sip and groaning in pleasure at the burning liquid sliding down my throat, I say, “You’ll have to be more specific, darling.”
“You organized that beating. She was pregnant, Zach. Pregnant!” she screams in my ear, and my eyes travel back to the screen. I’ve seen the footage so many times at this point I have probably memorized it second by second. Phoenix is lying on the floor, holding onto her stomach, and crying out for help. I can’t hear her voice, but the agony and fear on her face is forever etched in my brain.
Because the same expression is reflected right back at me every single day of my life whenever I look in the mirror.
How does it feel, Phoenix Hale, to be helpless against the cruel fate who takes everything away from you without asking and then never apologizes?
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I finally reply, finishing my drink and throwing the glass on the floor where it shatters, but I don’t give a fuck about that.
At least the fucking help I hired to clean this house will have a job to do instead of just sending reports about my life to my family. They think they’re so sneaky that I don’t know about their little agreement.
Nothing in my life happens without my permission or knowledge, and those who cross me… well, they should be prepared to live hell on earth.
Like Phoenix is right now.
“She lost the baby, Zach!” Lydia shouts, and by how hoarse her voice gets, I know she is barely holding back the tears.
My little sister is very sensitive to such matters, but she really shouldn’t be. She chose a career as a criminal lawyer, and as such, she has to learn to rein in her emotions and stay cold, no matter the situation. Otherwise, the profession will destroy her and claim her soul, stripping her of everything human.
“How could you have done this?” Disgust and hurt lace her tone as if she can’t believe her older brother is capable of such bad things, and in a way, her confusion in understandable.
If someone had told me just a year ago that I would feel nothing from what I’ve done… I’d have laughed in their face, because how can a man be so cruel to a woman?
But now?
Fate has taught me that cruelty is a fickle thing, and sometimes we have no choice but to surrender to its call to show people the true nature of payback.
“Phoenix Hale lost her baby, because she killed my wife,” I tell her, flicking the bottle open and taking a huge sip directly from it and swallowing it harshly, hoping that the quantity of alcohol will shut up my conscience nipping at my mind at the horrendous words I’m speaking right now.
“You’ve become a monster, Zach. A vicious monster.”
Since it’s the truth, I don’t reply. Instead, I drop onto the couch, kicking my legs up on the table while saluting with my bottle when I notice Phoenix’s tears and another shout for help.
No matter how many times I watch this shit, the joy doesn’t go away; it just intensifies as I understand how much I destroyed her life.
But it’s not enough.
Nothing in this life will be enough as long as I live.
“Stay away from her. Do you hear me?”
My hollow laughter bounces off the walls, filling the house—that my wife decorated in a way that brings peace to my mind—in misery. “Or what, little sister? What will you do?” I gotta give her props for even raising her voice to me and having the guts to threaten me. Not many people do that with my power and influence.
After all, going against me means going against the Kings, and no one in their right mind does it.
That’s the reality every single member of my family learned quickly as we grew up, after all we are treated like royalty.
Lydia is a King, but not by blood, and as such, she has no grounds to ever fucking threaten me.
“You’ll see. Phoenix might have accidentally killed your wife, but what you did is far worse.” She takes a moment before adding, “I’m telling Dad about this.”
“You do that.” I hang up on her before she can spit more bullshit at me; although, I wouldn’t mind seeing her face once she knows our dad will do absolutely nothing.
While she might be his princess who he adopted when he married his second wife after my mother’s death, on whom he has doted for the last twenty years… I’m his only heir who, despite my grief for my wife, still continues to bring billions to his company.
Besides, the times when I sought the acceptance of my ruthless father are long gone, given he forgot about me the minute his fucking wife entered the picture with her three kids, and I don’t give a flying fuck about him.
The only person who loved me died six months ago, leaving me alone in this desolate world where I’ve always had to fight for my existence.
Closing my eyes and sliding a little lower on the couch so I can rest my head on the back of it, I will my mind to wipe away the images of Phoenix from my brain and replace it with Angelica’s face when she saw this house for the first time.
How her eyes sparkled with adoration and shock while her heart-shaped lips opened as she drank in the beauty around her, running barefoot on the emerald-green grass and studying the Victorian house from every corner.
“It’s the perfect place to raise kids, Zach. I can’t believe you bought it! Don’t you prefer modern designs?” She flicks her locks back, turning to face me, and I wink at her, hooking my thumbs on my pockets.
“I do, but this is what you wanted, right?” Angelica might have never voiced her wish whenever my stepmother asked about our plans, but I didn’t miss how her gaze always lingered on all those magazines of Victorian-style houses with acres of land filled with lush gardens.
Personally, such houses suffocate me, as I prefer more light and empty spaces all around me, but whatever my woman wants, she gets.