Page 43

Fane

Two Months Later

I’d always thought Artington was a beautiful city.

It had every season, and none of them were particularly brutal. It was picturesque, like something you’d see flipping through a coffee table book. That’s what it felt like, living in it—from down there.

The crowded streets, the buildings, the trees, the sidewalks—all of it softened by a fine dusting of snow.

But from up here? The people looked like ants.

We were up so high that the penthouse was shrouded in a cloak of clouds more often than not. It made it feel like when the clouds did part, you were looking down from the heavens.

A god overlooking his domain.

My eyes shifted to my reflection in the glass, the city below blurring into the background.

The suit I wore was cut close to my body, tailored to perfection. A dark navy shirt beneath it, paired with a tie the same shade as Cali’s dress.

A dress I hadn’t seen yet. Hard as I’d tried to peek into the garment bag hanging in the hall, Cali had threatened to delete the entire new sex list from her phone if I so much as thought about it again.

The impulse had quickly dissipated.

The ding of the elevator split through the space around me at half past six in the evening, precisely as Ash said it would.

I didn’t bother to turn around. My heart didn’t so much as flutter in my chest when the heavy footfalls that had once stalked me, even in the fleeting moments of peace I’d found growing up, drew closer.

They didn’t haunt me now. They didn’t so much as make me flinch.

The fear I’d once carried—of growing into the same kind of monster as the man responsible for my existence—had long since paled in comparison to the monster I’d chosen to become.

This monster—the one standing here to ensure nothing and no one touched the people I loved? I didn’t mind him.

The footsteps stopped abruptly, and I turned just in time to see the mild amount of shock he felt at finding me in his home.

It felt like an insult to the word to refer to this place as that. This was not a home . William Mackenzie wouldn’t know a home if it slashed his fucking throat.

“Fane.” He straightened, standing a little taller, like that would do anything to improve the way I so thoroughly towered over him. “I hadn’t expected to see you here.”

I tilted my head slightly, slipping my hands into my slacks. “No, I’d say you didn’t. I believe her name was Octavia—the woman you thought would be in your bed right now.”

“You’re dressed a little more formally than usual,” he said, his gaze flicking to my tailored suit.

I shrugged, letting the faintest edge of a smile tug at my lips. “I wanted to do justice to the occasion.”

His steps were slow and measured, a performance I’d seen countless times before. He wasn’t in any rush to cross the room, each step deliberate, meant to remind me that he controlled the pace of this meeting.

I fucking loved how wrong he was.

His eyes were searching, right on the cusp of locking up, when I let the faintest hint of a smile touch the edge of my mouth.

What a fucking imbecile.

Where there was power unjustly earned—stolen and wielded with the intent to create fear—there was ego. My father didn’t know what a threat looked like because he believed that if there was one, he’d be able to see it. That if there was one, it would be as stupidly obvious as he was dense.

Because of that, all it took for his shoulders to relax a fraction was the hint of a smile he didn’t know the meaning of.

“You did me a favor,” he said, his laugh low and ugly. “She wasn’t, let’s say, the freshest mare in the stable.”

I laughed too. Because he might as well have been turning the soil to dig his own grave, and the show was far more entertaining than I’d expected.

“Ah. Of course,” I murmured, my eyes tracking his movements as his body relaxed further.

“I was starting to worry, you know,” he continued, making his way to the liquor cart that sat between two plush, blood-red sofas, also just like Ash had said.

“Oh?” I hummed, nodding when he gestured toward the crystal decanter of whiskey.

“It’s been weeks since we last spoke.” His eyes flicked up, flashing for a second with how deep his displeasure ran at the very idea that I’d made him wait. “I was starting to think you hadn’t heeded my advice.”

I crossed the room slowly, deliberately, taking the glass he held out, a shallow finger’s width of liquid inside.

“Oh, you mean that I should think of my mother.” I nodded once, rounding the sofa with the glass in hand. “And my wife.”

“Wife?” His eyebrows shot up. “I hadn’t realized you’d gotten married.”

The tug at the corner of my lips this time wasn’t rehearsed. “Soon,” I said. Thinking of how I’d referred to Cali as nothing but my wife since that night on the highway and how every time I did her eyes would roll. But there was no way for her to hide that peachy blush that colored her face or the way her eyes lingered on me when she thought I wasn’t paying attention.

I was always paying attention to that woman.

“I look forward to meeting her.” His smile was black tar, sticking and seeping. I forced myself not to picture the thoughts running through his mind.

Patience.

“Your brother really made a mess for us,” he said, swirling the whiskey in his glass, his eyes flicking briefly to the one in my hand. “Take a seat, son.” He gestured toward the couch opposite him with a tilt of his head.

As I walked, I made sure to take my time. Every step deliberate, calculated. Not a single ounce of the tension that word filled me with— son —was allowed to show. Not a single fucking hint.

The look he gave me showed all too quickly the cracks in his paper-thin veneer. The way his hand clenched around the glass he held.

“As I was saying,” he ground out, face starting to flush red with the effort of pretending like we were equals, “You’ll have some late nights ahead of you, playing catch-up on the plan of attack. Your first appearance as the new CEO of Mackenzie Co is next week.”

“The new CEO?” My eyebrows shot up, the surprise on my face exaggerated just enough. “You’re handing me the company?”

His laugh was a jarring, cracking, brittle cackle. It was something that had festered from disuse. “My boy, you’ve spent too much time around that girl thinking with your cock instead of your brain. In name only,” his free hand shot out, snapping sharply twice in the space between us. “Keep up.”

His eyes flicked to the glass in my hand again.

“You’re right,” I said, letting out a small, measured sigh as I sagged into the couch. I let an easy smile spread across my face, slow and disarming, shaking my head like I was finally conceding. My hand lifted the glass toward my lips, a move he mimicked, the whiskey almost touching his mouth.

“You know,” I said, snapping forward suddenly, elbows on my knees. His head jerked, startled by the shift. “I think I learned a lot more from you growing up than I ever gave you credit for.”

“When you were growing up?” He parroted, his expression twisting, caught off guard. It was the kind of curveball he didn’t know how to handle.

“Took me a while to figure it out, but it all cleared up for me after I had time to think about it.” I started to lift the glass to my lips again, and so did he, but this time there was a look of satisfaction on his face.

Wistful, like the memories he was flicking through were treasures instead of scars. He took his first sip of the liquor, a gasp of appreciation for the way I was sure it warmed his throat on its way down.

One sip was fine. One was enough.

I set my own untouched glass on the coffee table and stood up just as my phone buzzed in my pocket.

“I learned what a pathetic piece of shit looks like, real up close and personal.” My voice was conversational, light even, which made his reaction just a little delayed.

“What did you just say?”

“I said,” I replied, walking closer and leaning down a little so he had no choice but to look me in the eyes. My mother’s eyes .

“You’re a fucking loser, William. Has anyone ever said that right to your face before?” I straightened up, flattening a palm against my tie. “I’ll be honest, it feels like a real pivotal moment for us as father and son, if I’m the first.”

“You fucking—” He attempted to lunge for me but caught himself on the edge of the couch, a look of shocking disorientation on his face.

“Oops, careful, pops.” I checked my watch, “You’re entering the fun house stage.”

I reached into the inside pocket of my blazer and pulled out a thick plastic bag, snapping it open with deliberate precision before reaching for his glass.

“Can I be honest with you about something?” I leaned in, a conspiratorial whisper. “I knew this would be easy, but I didn’t think it would be this easy.”

I dropped the glass into the plastic bag I held and turned back to where I set mine down.

“Ash thought this was about how this would go. I, at least, bet that I’d have to take a sip of my drink too, just to convince you to have one of yours.” I shook my head with mock disbelief. “But nope, blow a bit of smoke up your ass and you were as good as gone.”

“What the fu—”

“There is no more talking for you,” I cut him off sharply, turning back to face him. All the easy-going enjoyment drained from my voice. My smile was fucking dazzling when a cry of pain left his lips, his hand flying to brace over his stomach.

“Does it hurt?” I asked, my voice laced with mock curiosity as my lips peeled back further, my head tilting slightly to the side. “I heard it fucking kills,” I whispered, reaching past him for the decanter he’d placed back in the middle of the liquor cart.

I made quick work of slipping on a pair of latex gloves, retrieving the original decanter I’d stowed in the cupboard beneath the cart, and swapping it out seamlessly. The gloves joined the bag with the rest of the evidence, which I tied off with a neat knot.

My phone buzzed in my pocket again, and I rolled my eyes at the persistence of my best friend.

I walked back over to stand in front of my father, but not too close because right as I looked at my watch, he folded over his legs and emptied the content of his stomach onto the floor.

My lip curled back again but this time in disgust, “Gross,” I murmured, shaking it off so I could get to my actual point.

Turns out I was a fan of the theatrics. Who’d of fucking guessed?

“Yoo-hoo.” I snapped my fingers to get his attention, watching as his glazed eyes lifted to meet mine. He leaned back into the couch, his chest heaving, the words he couldn’t say swirling in the haze of his expression.

“You could have avoided all of this.” I gestured lazily between us. “But you had to go ahead and threaten my mother. My wife .” I shook my head in mock disappointment. “I was actually going to just…let you go!” I scoffed, checking my watch again as my phone buzzed for the third time against my leg. “I should be thanking you, really. I imagined you like this—time and time again. But the reality? So much better than what I pictured.”

I bent down and picked up the bag I’d set at my feet.

“I want you to know that no one will remember your name.” My voice was cold and heavy. The fucking hand of the grim reaper reaching out to grip him by the throat. “And if they do, they will know just how insignificant you were. How spectacularly short you fell.”

“You…” he wheezed, chest working exceptionally hard now.

“One more time.” I cupped a hand around my ear, tilting my head toward him and frowning in concentration.

“I’m…going to…fucking…kill you.” Sweat dripped down his face, his mouth twisting in pain and desperation.

“Oh.” I nodded, straightening back up. “No, you’re not,” I said, giving him a small, pitying smile. “But I bet you wish you did, huh?” I said with a wink.

The very same that Cali seemed to be so fond of. My father, though, didn’t seem to hold it in quite the same regard.

The noise he made was full of his last dispatch effort to move. A pathetic belief that he could fight the arsenic in his blood. The delusion that nothing and no one could touch him finally torn to bloody ribbons while I watched him take his final breaths.

I held up my middle finger as his chest rose and fell for the last time and then my phone buzzed again. This time, it didn’t stop.

“You know,” I said, my tone bone-dry as I answered, “I’m in the middle of something.”

“You’re taking forever. I thought he got the better of you,” Ash said, his words muffled, likely around a mouthful of food.

“Your faith in me is inspiring,” I muttered, heading for the elevator and pressing the call button. The doors opened immediately.

“Coraline has been calling me every two minutes, ripping me a new asshole because we’re running late.”

“What’d you tell her?” I’d set my phone to do not disturb for everyone but Ashton. I didn’t want a single part of this to touch Cali.

“That we’ve gone fishing. What do you fucking think I told her?”

It was silent for a second while I waited for him to go on.

“I don’t fucking know?”

“She thinks you’re getting her something special. Like down-on-one-knee special.”

My face fell. “Are you fucking kidding me? You had one secret to keep.”

“I didn’t give her specifics,” he grumbled as I walked out of the elevator, leaving the bag behind. I nodded at two of Ash’s guys as they passed me, their small nods returned in kind as I made my way through the lobby and out to the waiting car.

As soon as the door closed behind me, I removed the phone from my ear and turned off do not disturb . A flood of messages from Cali, Delilah, and Sammy filled my screen.

The last one from Delilah was a bride emoji.

“I’m going to actually kill you,” I bit out, glaring at Ash.

“Well, and I was hoping you would have learned this already, but the first rule is not to tell the other person what you plan to do.”

“You think you’re smart, don’t you?”

“I do,” he replied, nodding with a little smile. “I’m also a generous lover.” He shrugged, “Or so I’ve been told.”

I lunged for him, aiming to get him into a headlock, but there was no fucking chance. He screamed like a baby, clutching his hair and whining about me ruining it.

The car started to move and the silence around us wasn’t stifling, only knowing.

“So,” he started again, breaking it, “What’s the verdict?”

“It’s done.” I nodded, keeping my eyes out the window, feeling…nothing, at that sentiment.

Nothing but relief, for the second time in my life.

“And?” he pressed.

I kept my gaze out the window when I relented with a sigh, reaching into my pocket and pulling out twenty bucks and handing it to him without another word.

“I fucking knew it!” Ash yelled, riding the high of winning our bet, all the way to Delilah’s art showing in the middle of the city.