Page 14 of Reaper Flame

“I couldn’t agree more,” Hiram said. He seemed satisfied with my reaction, or lack of it. “Besides, a visit to Briarly Manor could be helpful.”

“The wake is happening at the manor?” I asked, grabbing the invitation again. I’d skimmed over the sentences but hadn’t paid attention to the finer details. I turned to face Giles. “Your uncle helped plan this?!”

Giles’s cheeks flushed, and he dropped his cutlery with a crash. His hands clenched into fists as he wrestled to keep his composure. His piggy eyes flitted between me and Hiram. What was I missing?

After a strained silence, Giles finally cleared his throat and found his voice again. “You haven’t heard?”

“Heard, what?” I demanded.

“I’ll leave you to catch up.” Hiram smirked and rose from his seat. “We can debrief later.”

As far as I was aware, I hadn’t missed any of the Blackbird’s updates about what was happening in Port Valentine. From what he said, the Sevens had been splitting their time between staying with Rocky at the hospital and keeping Lapland running as normal.

“Well?” I arched my eyebrow at Giles, who suddenly decided he couldn’t break eye contact with the mounted antelope head on the wall. “Are you gonna fill in the fucking blanks?”

He murmured something under his breath, but I couldn’t make it out. Giles usually enjoyed being the loudest dick swinger in the room, so his sudden shift was out of character.

“Well?” I clicked my tongue impatiently, but still nothing. He knew how to test me. I had better things to do than sit around in his company, like wallow in my own fucking misery. “Are you going to tell me, or should I call Hiram in again?”

Giles’s eyes widened in fear and he muttered, “The money’s gone.”

“The money?” I pressed as he shuffled around in his seat like he’d caught crabs. “What do you mean?”

“The Briarly fortune,” Giles said, more loudly this time. He finally mustered the courage to meet my stare. “All the money’s gone. They took everything. The Sevens took it all! Even the manor!”

It didn’t make sense. How does a family with a seemingly unlimited bank balance fall destitute in a matter of weeks?

“How is that even possible?” I asked.

Zander may have been scheming his father’s demise, but he was no magician. Dollars can’t disappear in a puff of smoke. I’d been to Briarly Manor and attended their extravagant parties. I’d walked the lavishly decorated halls and sipped wine alongside Bryce’s devout followers. Centuries of wealth doesn’t just vanish overnight.

“My uncle made some bad investment decisions,” Giles explained, hanging his head. “Everything was going to be fine… until you came along.”

“Me?” I scoffed. Of course, it was easier to blame someone else than take responsibility for their own fucking mistakes. “I don’t remember putting a gun to Bryce Briarly’s head and telling him to put his money in the wrong places.”

“The Bayside Heights development was our last chance!” Giles insisted. His desperate tone matched the crazed look in his eyes. The look of a man who’d lost everything. “We could have made it all back. Wewouldhave! But Zander snatched the deal from under us, and you made sure Bayside Heights would never be built on again. After that, we had no choice but to sell the manor. Zander bought it... the manor... the money... he has no right! It was rightfully mine! All of it!”

Zander used to spend hours holed up in his office making plans for the future. Since finding out about what Bryce did to his mother, he’d been waiting until his father was in a vulnerable position to take him down. By using me as a pawn in his games, I’d given Zander everything he always wanted.

“Zander didn’t do all of it alone,” I reminded him, leaning across the table. Giles had partnered up with someone who’d been part of taking everything away from him. “Why would you strike a deal with Hiram? Why marry me?”

“Because we want the same thing. Hiram wants to gain control of Port Valentine and, to do that, we need the Sevens gone. We can do it together. I’m going to take back what is mine, and marrying you was Hiram’s collateral to show how serious I was,” Giles said. For a split second, Ialmostpitied him. He and Bryce were so desperate to get their old lives back they were overestimating Hiram’s generosity. He’d never have their best interests at heart. As soon as Hiram helped them get their fortune back, he’d swoop in to take it all. “You didn’t really think that I wanted to marry a stripper slut, did you?”

His words dashed any of my sympathy. Taking everything from them all over again would be a sweet victory. Zander and his Briarly bloodline wouldn’t be an institution in Port Valentine for much longer. It was time to make way for new traditions.

“You think I’m a slut?” I laughed. “You dated Penelope, remember? The bitch’s legs open and close more than a freezer in a fucking mortuary!”

“Don’t call her that!” Giles slammed his fist on the table. His cheeks turned the same color as a strawberry Slurpee. “She’s not like that!”

“Have I touched a nerve?” I asked, putting my index finger to my chin and pretending to think hard. “Where is she now? Let me guess, she ran as soon as the money was gone?”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about!” Giles hissed, then changed the subject. “What about my cousin? Don’t you want to get back at him for what he did?”

“Are you forgetting you and your uncle tried to do the same thing?”

“But we weren’t screwing you,” he sneered, bringing out the vicious side hiding underneath his bravado. “Everyone knows you were the Sevens’ personal whore.”

“Think carefully about what you say next,” I warned, shooting him a glacial stare and rising from my chair. “You’re inmyterritory now, and I have nothing to lose. If Hiram hears you’ve upset me, he’ll cut off your balls and use them as earmuffs.”

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