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I touch Mom’s wrist because even I’m wondering if this is going too far. Intimidation is one thing, but I know what it’s like to watch your own mother get abused. How could she even suggest it?

She glances at me with steely eyes and leans close to whisper. “To be a true leader, you must get stronger. Just watch. Your brother would have.”

That comment digs in right where I’m most tender. My hand slides away from her wrist. Would Adrian really watch something like this? Especially when a child might see?

I can’t imagine he would, but Mom’s words cut deep—she’s suggesting I’m weaker than him.

I’m not. I refuse to be.

I do as she says and lean back into the couch, falling silent.

Slowly, hands shaking less now that she knows exactly what’s at stake, Lucy stands and peels her modest black dress from her shoulders. Lets it pool at her feet like a black hole on the carpet.

She holds my gaze, begging me silently to help, as her panties and bra slip away.

I’m frozen because I can’t be weak. I’m the leader now. The leader has a responsibility to keep everyone in line .

Mom twirls the knife in her grip. “What has Mr. Carter been up to lately?”

“Why do you think I’m lying?” Lucy says, hugging her chest and trying to hide parts of herself. She glances at the man’s jacket on the chair. “I… okay. I brought a man home from a bar but?—”

“Like we care about that. Tell us the truth of where your husband is and why.”

“He disappeared two days ago,” she admits. “I don’t know where he is. That’s not a lie.”

“You know exactly where he is,” Mom says calmly.

“I don’t. I promise.”

“Are you sure?” Mom stands, looking like a small, elegant reaper with the knife. She grabs Lucy’s arm, digging nails into flesh, and draws the blade along Lucy’s forearm.

My stomach lurches like I’m going to puke as red blooms on Lucy’s pale skin. Lucy bites her lip to keep from crying out. I see the exact moment she decides not to alert her kids—a choice to protect them rather than herself.

Mom smiles as if satisfied with her handiwork. “Are you ready to tell the truth now? Or should I slice the other arm?”

Lucy gasps, holding her wound as blood drips to the floor. “Please. Lucas doesn’t tell me anything.”

“She doesn’t know,” I say, but my words are so weak even I can’t hear them.

Mom glances over her shoulder. “When they don’t cooperate, you must show them you’ll take it as far as necessary. ”

A dark foreboding slithers up my spine as I try to process how this is my mother. Is she suggesting we kill Lucy? I want the fucking truth, not blood on my hands.

Mom flips the knife around so she’s holding the blade. She offers it to Lucy. “Use it.”

Lucy’s eyes are weary. “Use… the knife?”

“Yes, dear. Get on the floor and use it. Pretend you’re a whore your husband actually wants. My son would like a show.”

I swallow. No, I don’t want any fucking show like this.

Lucy must see the menace in my mother’s eyes, because she lowers herself to the loveseat and spreads her legs. A sharp intake of breath echoes in the room as her pale and trembling fingers clench tighter around the hilt of the knife. She slides it in.

For a heartbeat, she stares at me. Then she starts moving.

It’s a slow, deliberate motion as she tries to fulfill my mother’s commands in what she thinks is a pleasing way.

The handle of the knife becomes an extension of herself as she guides it, and she’s careful not to let the blade bite into her skin.

I look away, my heart pounding an erratic rhythm. There’s a sickening twist in my gut, a warning to stop this, but I can’t be weak. I can’t be weaker than Adrian.

Still, my hand rests on my gun tucked beneath my jacket.

Mother leans over Lucy like a demonic shadow. “Where’s your husband, dear?”

Lucy trembles. “I don’t know! Please. He’s just out of town.”

“Did he kill Theodore Martinelli? ”

Lucy gasps for breath, tears wetting her cheeks. “Who’s that?”

Mother’s hand fists Lucy’s hair, holding her in place like some feral animal. “Tell us the truth and this will end. You don’t want to be so stubborn you die, do you?”

Desperation has Lucy shaking uncontrollably.

She stops moving the knife and sobs openly.

“You have to believe me! He… he just leaves and I don’t know where he goes.

He fucks other women and I…” Her voice breaks on a sob.

“I don’t care about him enough to know. I swear. ” She struggles for air between words.

Mother only smiles. “Don’t you know how to use a knife correctly?” She pulls the handle out of Lucy then flips it. The blade is now pointing at Lucy’s opening.

My grip tightens around my gun, and I’m on the verge of puking. How far will she really take this?

Lucy’s eyes widen in horror and she looks like she’s holding back a scream.

“Please don’t. I swear. I swear. I don’t know what my husband does.

He’s either off with whores or working. I don’t know his business.

If he did something to you, I’m so sorry.

I’m sorry he’s an asshole, but I’m not involved. ”

“I told you to fuck yourself with the knife, didn’t I?” Mom says, wrapping Lucy’s fingers around it and pushing the blade closer.

“Please,” Lucy cries, voice cracking with each word.

“I wouldn’t lie to you. I’m only a mother.

I want to raise my kids and stay out of my husband’s life.

I never wanted to marry him, but it was arranged.

His family forced me. I don’t… I don’t want this life.

But my babies. I li ve for them. That’s all.

I’m nobody. Please, don’t…” Her pleading turns desperate. “Please…”

The sounds tearing from Lucy unleash something feral in my heart, bringing everything back in a rush. Mom on the floor. Lucian towering over her, fists clenched. The way she’d cry out, first defiant and then broken. The screams blending together, a sick symphony of pain and powerlessness.

Lucy is only a mother. A woman forced into this life trying to survive.

She’s not a player in this game, yet I’m watching her get treated like one.

My mother is treating her the way Lucian did all women.

And I’m watching?

Mom moves closer to whisper something but I’ve had enough. I’m not going to watch a woman’s pussy get slit open. I’m on my feet, yanking my gun from its holster.

Mother startles and spins around. The knife falls to the carpet.

I grab my knife quickly then press my gun against Lucy’s temple. “Do you fucking know anything about your husband killing Theodore Martinelli? Yes or no.”

“No,” Lucy sobs. “I swear. I don’t know.”

I holster my gun. “Then we’re finished here,” I tell mother. “We’re fucking leaving.”

She doesn’t look pleased, but she follows me out. I close the front door, thankful I can no longer hear Lucy’s sobs .

When we’re outside, Mom doesn’t sound happy. “Julian?—”

“Go home,” I tell her. There’s enough fire in my eyes that she doesn’t protest and climbs in the SUV. Her driver, who’d been patiently waiting this whole time, starts the car.

Once she’s through the gate, I stumble away from Lucy’s house into some bushes, trying to find some kind of distance between what I’ve done and what I’m still becoming.

The night’s cold air hits me hard, and then nausea pulls me to my knees on the grass. I’m sick, twisted inside as I think about what I just let happen.

How could mother do that?

Since when am I the kind of man to permit it?

This is something Lucian would’ve done in a heartbeat. He would’ve fucked Lucy with that knife until she couldn’t scream anymore. Would’ve grabbed a kid and killed them while their mother bled out on the carpet. All for what? For her not knowing anything?

Then he would’ve gone home and ate dinner, as if returning from some normal, boring office job.

Screams wouldn’t echo in his head. He wouldn’t vomit.

He’d feel nothing.

But me, even though I only watched, I’m feeling all of it.

Lucy didn’t know anything. I could hear the tremor in her voice, the fear. She was telling the truth. Doesn’t know shit, yet I let mother get unhinged and do that .

I lost complete control of the situation .

The sickness rises up and I puke in the bushes, heaving until there’s nothing left but bile and self-loathing.

Is this what Adrian went through? Being our father’s favorite?

It’s clear in my mind now—Adrian coming home after nights spent doing “business” with Lucian.

He was often covered in blood and doing his best to hide the trembling.

Actual trembling. He’d never tell me what happened on those nights.

Was it like this? Watching Lucian do terrible things to innocent people? Forcing Adrian to do it too?

I knew my brother well. He would’ve only done terrible things if forced.

But Adrian is dead.

My father is dead.

So who’s forcing me?

No one.

I did this all myself.