Page 15 of Cruel Heir

I looked around, looking for her. I frowned, noticing that the dorm was empty. The books and papers were still a mess on the floor, so Eloisa couldn’t have gone to her classes. I got up and grabbed my pants next to the bed.

The first thing I did was look for my phone so that I could call her. Finding nothing there, I reached for my jacket. It was already buzzing when my fingers reached it. I rolled my eyes as I saw Kyle’s name on the caller ID.These guys wouldn’t even let a person fuck in peace.

“What? I’m—”

Kyle’s frantic voice cut me off. “Where the fuck are you? Do you not know what happened?!” he practically yelled.

I rolled my eyes again. Kyle had the tendency to announce news like that – as if someone had died or something. “Will you chill out? I just woke—”

“Well, wake the fuck up!” Kyle exclaimed. “Carsons’ factories caught fire! It’s all gone! Even the vineyard is nothing but dust!”

“How?” I didn’t exactly know how to comprehend this information.

How could one react to losing every fucking thing they worked so hard for?

“No fucking clue, but where are you? Luca was just at your apartment,” Kyle replied.

Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck.“I’ll be there.”

“Head back home” were the last words I heard before Kyle hung up.

Shoving the phone in my pocket, I grabbed my gun and dressed up in a hurry. One thing was clear in my mind: we were fucked up if Kyle was telling the truth. If the Carson factories burned down, all the drugs were gone along with the deals we made with other people. Then, we’d be left with nothing.

By the time I exited the dorm, I was finally getting a hold of my senses, and my brain began to process what we could do. But there was no way this was an accident.Someone burned the factories down.

My first guess had been the new entrants. They were trying too hard to make it into the black market by marketing and selling their product in our areas. Perhaps killing two or three of those men ticked off their leader and caused them to retaliate. However, you were bound to have more enemies than friends in this world. There was no way a small-time drug dealer would do something so stupid.

I reached the parking lot and looked for Eloisa’s car immediately. It wasn’t there. I might have been a little slow at the moment and unaccepting of the idea that she was capable of doing something like that – especially after the incredible sex that we had hours ago – but things seemed suspicious.

I had the perfect plan last night. I wanted to hear Eloisa confess before making her pay. However, one look at her, and everything went to shit. As my father put it, “When a man starts thinking with his dick, business goes to shit.”

I watched her drift off to sleep peacefully last night. I decided to wait until the morning to tell her that I was out of the game. It was stupid, but I was willing to do that because I did not want our families to get between us.But I guess all bets are off now.If I found out that the Castillos had any dirt in this, I would shoot them all — even the woman I wanted to be with.

CHAPTER FOUR

Eloisa

“How is that possible?” Father’s voice roared. “Aiden, I need you to find out who’s behind this. Otherwise, the first blame will fall on us. That’s not good for our new alliance with them.”

Nobody had thought of it yet. Nobody really thought I was capable of it. And neither did I.

If someone asked me before tonight about the most psychotic thing I’d done, I’d probably have nothing to tell. But look at me now, I burned down the Carson vineyard and factories with only one man by my side, and his strongest suit wasn’t even violence.

Sam looked like he could faint before we left the area. We did more damage than I had planned, but I didn’t regret it.Look at what Keith Carson made me do.

“Maybe it’s the new entrants?” Aiden asked. “The ones that threatened to—”

“No,” Father uttered plainly, standing near the fireplace.

My family did not suspect anything when they found me in the living room – they merely thought I was here for a visit. Since Nick wasn’t here, everyone was pretty much focused on the problem before us instead of on the person who caused it. I didn’t know if I should feel proud or offended by that.Now, I really sound like a complete sociopath.

Perhaps it was the adrenaline or lack of sleep, but I felt so far from reality. I finally understood why everyone wanted a taste of power. It was addictive, and anyone wielding it could end up insane.

“It was me,” I said.

I looked at my father and brothers and felt angry as I realized that they had been too busy talking among themselves to hear me. It was as if I wasn’t even present in the same room as them.

“It was me!” I repeated, my voice sounding a lot louder than I had expected it to be. I slightly felt conscious as all pairs of eyes focused on me, but I kept my chin up. “I burned down the Carson factories.”

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