Page 91 of Trial of Deceit

Jediah stopped gazing at the backyard to focus on the reflections on the window.Reine dragged a chair from a table, causing an annoying scraping sound to reverberate throughout the room, and settled it before their father.She sat and laid a hand on Kayon’s thigh.He smiled at her, and Reine’s expression softened momentarily.Jediah knew their father used a load of his energy to smile at her.She hooked onto every word as the machine spoke again.

“Every woman in the families begins training to be married when they’re sixteen, but Jediah didn’t want that for you.He wanted you to live a normal life, but he had to give something in exchange for that,” Kayon said.

Reine’s eyes darted toward the window.They lingered on Jediah’s eyes while she asked Kayon, “What?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know?”Kayon asked, followed by a ragged breath.He must have tried smirking.

“Jed…” Reine stood and moved toward him.She stopped beside him, but he didn’t look at her.Not even when Kayon spun his chair around, drove forward, and stopped at his other side.“I didn’t know that you made big sacrifices like that for me… I do appreciate it, and I won’t waste them because of my relationship with Dimitri.”

Jediah scoffed before taking a long puff from the cigar, then removing it from his mouth.He placed it in the overflowing ashtray on the window sill.

“You have to understand… I didn’t mean for our relationship to happen, but I really love Dimitri, and I know that he really loves me.”

“I’m not listening to this.”Jediah turned to leave, pausing as Reine’s fingers wrapped around his arm.

“He wanted to tell you, but I begged him not to do it because I didn’t want to come between your friendship,” Reine explained, on the verge of tears.“Please, Jed… This is just like you and Ash.”

Jediah yanked himself free from Reine’s grip, almost dislocating his arm from the socket.He scowled, hating the desperation her vulnerability brought to her eyes.He’d taught her not to be weak.Yet, here she was.Being weak over a man.A man who should’ve known better than to look at her as anything more than a little sister.

“You and Dimitri are not like me and my wife!”Jediah spat.“You know why I love Ash?She never faked with me.She kept it real even when we showed each other the darkest parts of ourselves to each other.You and Dimitri have to lie and hide because you shouldn’t be together in the first place!”

Anger returned to Reine in full force.“This a wa mi a talk ’bout!Yu don’ understand we!Yu know how Dimitri chip lick after him kill Marquis daughter.Yu know how him did more hurt and distracted when Sashoy leff,” Reine yelled over Kayon’s gargling in the background.She stepped closer toward Jediah until they were face-to-face, glaring with their fists clenched at their sides.“Wa yu did expect fi happen when yu mek him mi driver and gwan like mi caan’ have a life outside a wa you want fi mi?!”

The corner of Jediah’s mouth pulled upward, twisting his lips into the meanest scowl he could muster.His face was drained of all emotion except anger and the desire to punish Reine as he’d punished Dimitri.Jediah’s lips parted to tell Reine to choose her next move carefully, when a louder gargle startled him.

Jediah snapped his head to the side.His eyes widened.Kayon was foaming at the mouth while his body spasmed.

“Daddy!”Reine exclaimed, running around Jediah to get to her father.Her palm slammed against the emergency button on Kayon’s wheelchair, causing a deafening blare to ring out throughout the house.

Shock froze Jediah in his spot.All his major bodily functions became useless except his arms.As Dedrian rushed into the room, Jediah reached an arm behind his body.He got his still-lit cigar and moved it to his lips, his hand shaking as he took a short puff.The nicotine coursed through his veins, rendering senses back to all of his nerves.

Moving the cigar from his mouth, Jediah blew the fumes to the side.A sneer formed on his lips as he watched the scene before him.

Reine crying and begging Kayon to stop spasming.

Dedrian doing her best to stabilize him.

Attempts being futile.

Finally: Kayon Richardson was dead.

Chapter twenty-four

Tensesilenceblanketedtheentire backyard garden.Minus the light ruffling of leaves as the occasional gust of wind passed through, there was no movement.Everyone was as still as statues, staring at the overseer a few feet before them.The pastor, dressed in a simple button-up and slacks, held a Bible in his outstretched hands.His eyes scanned over the small gathering, giving them time to process the scripture he read.

No one was sniffling.

No one shed a tear.

Except Reine.She had on sunglasses that were so large, they looked like they covered half of her face.Still, her tears rolled beneath them, streaming down her cheeks full of blush.Dimitri stood beside her.He had a bandage on his forehead from a nasty cut Jediah had given him during a fight, but that didn’t stop him from allowing Reine to lie on him while he had his arm around her waist.

Jediah was tense beside Ashari.He’d been glaring at Dimitri and Reine since they arrived at the ceremony.His attention only left them whenever he glanced at Ashari and asked if she and their baby were okay.

He scanned the crowd again.His eyes landed on an older man with a head of hair and beard that were dyed black to hide his greys, dressed in full black, and standing beside Elias.The man must’ve sensed Jediah staring at him, for his eyes darted toward Jediah’s.He glanced somewhere in the crowd, then looked back to Jediah with a smirk that disappeared just as quickly as it had appeared.Jediah’s hands balled into fists before it loosened.

Ashari’s brows furrowed.She tried looking about to see what had snagged the strange man’s attention, but nothing seemed out of the ordinary.

A throttling of vehicles broke the silence.Everyone looked in that direction.Guards flanked the slowly approaching fleet of three cars that drove in a single-file, their rifles cocked and ready in their arms.Murmurs traveled throughout the crowd.Jediah reached for the gun tucked into his waist while his other hand pushed Ashari behind him.

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