Page 93 of Van Cort
Rhett had been staring at the water for over an hour. It was all going wrong, and he didn’t know how to fix it. An energy coursed through him, rage-filled and barely contained. He’d tried to run it out, and he’d argued with West, and he’d even hit him in the hope that that might make the whole fucking situation go away. It hadn’t. They were still in the same goddamn place and West wasn’t going to Harvard.
He rubbed his hand over his face, swiping angry near-tears from his eyes before they started. Why? Why put them through this? He’d rather take a year’s worth of beatings in one night if it would stop the fucking madness that was separating them. He wasn’t as worried about Lara. She would go to Harvard with him. There was no disputing that, but that meant West would be alone, and he didn’t even know what alone with Lara looked like. They didn’t do that. They were a three. West gave her the side of them that Rhett couldn’t offer with any sincerity. They worked that way. Had always been that way.
Lifting his bottle of bourbon, he drank.
And he kept drinking until the bottle was empty.
It got thrown into the lake as far as his strength would send it, and he just about managed to dampen the shout of agony that wanted to come out of him. No one knew what separating twins felt like. No one. It already felt like part of himself was being ripped out, and he could sense what it would do to his head when reality finally landed and he would have to watch West’s car go a different way from his. They weren’t like normal siblings. They were more than that. They were part of each other. An extension of each other. The only one who remotely understood that was Lara, and she’d feel nearly as empty when the time came, too.
He threw a rock into the water in fury and stumbled back from the exertion, landing on his ass. Thoughts came as he sat there on the damp lawn. He wanted to kill his father for this. He should as well. That would be the sensible answer. They wouldn’t be separated then, would they? No, he’d be the man of the house then, and they could do whatever the fuck they wanted, including never leaving this place because they wouldn’t need to.
Having spent most of the summer preparing Lara for Harvard with extra lessons and principles that he already knew inside out, Rhett had used his time to learn everything about thebusiness empire that was Van Cort. After the sixth subsidiary’s balance sheet had passed by his eyes, and the multiple millions that also provided them with, he realised that there was no need for any of them to go to college at all. The interest alone was enough to pay for a small town’s economic future, let alone their life here. And there were still another eight subsidiaries that Rhett knew of. Their father, for all his faults, was a damn good businessman, it seemed. Or his father was.
Drowning in nothing but anger, resentment and booze, he felt his brow furrow further and further down. He looked at the VC-stamped signet ring that they’d both been gifted last Christmas, stared at the clenched fist under it, and eventually staggered to a stand. Fuck it. What was there left to lose?
The lawn and corridors passed by in a blur of fury and speed, and he burst into his father’s study. The asshole didn’t even slow his pen or bother looking up from his desk as Rhett drew closer to him. He damn well did when Rhett sent the entire contents of the desk crashing to the floor, though.
“West is going to Harvard,” Rhett stated. “Make it happen.”
The slow curl of his father’s lips, as he leaned back in his chair, made it abundantly clear that their guess was right – this was a punishment, but it was in those seconds that Rhett realised it wasn’t a punishment aimed directly at West, or even at both of them. This was the way the bastard would hurt Rhett most whilst he was in college, because if he couldn’t beat on him anymore, what else was there left to do?
“No,” his father said. “West is going to Stanford. You’ll both do as you’re told.”
“Van Corts go to Harvard.”
The asshole crossed his arms and continued with the smirk, one brow cocked, as if goading. “Not this time. There’s no debating it.”
“Then I’ll go to Stanford, too.”
“No. You’ll go to Harvard. You’ll be separated. You’ll learn.”
His father just stared, as if he’d got all the time in the damn world to let the facts sink in.
“All these fucking years and you still feel it necessary to punish me?”
“You punished you, Son. It was your choice. You kept putting yourself in front of me. I would have used the other one more. He’s weaker than you are.” Rhett didn’t even know how to deal with that answer, or what it meant in totality. “He certainly is now. You should thank me for making you into the man you’re becoming.” Rhett scowled at the inference, unsure how he felt about it. “Besides, whatever unholy situation you’ve been involved in has to stop, boy. Van Cort – my fucking name – is a God-Fearing one. No one is seeing your deranged delinquencies outside of these grounds.” Rhett froze under the show that his father knew about them. “If you must fuck the trash, take the girl with you. I suppose you deserve that, but move on to something more worthy of your name. Quickly, boy. You understand? She must be from wealth.”
Whatever shred of restraint Rhett was clinging to snapped. He let every piece of rage, and every piece of fury, and every inch of pain he’d ever felt consume him until he was climbing over the desk to make some kind of point. Both he, his father, and the desk chair crashed to the floor.
They grappled and rolled around the floor, and it didn’t take long before Rhett’s strength, youth, and anger overtook his father’s attempt to fight back. Every punch and hit felt like a balm to him, soothing some corner of his mind that he hadn’t dared visit in all these years. He watched blood and phlegm spit from his father’s mouth as his fist connected and heard the shouts of pain as he kept delivering more punches. At some point in the middle of it, he thought of Lara, and of everything she was to him – how she comforted him in ways West nevereven tried to. He could feel her hand on his cheek that first time when she’d found him, and he could see her eyes piercing through the storm inside him.
She was his soul, his passion.
And then West was there, too. Every laugh they’d ever laughed. Every fight and argument. The boat - he remembered that boat and two runaway seven-year-olds like it was yesterday. Protect West. Always protect West.
He was flung sideways suddenly, and he rolled away and got up straight away to go back for more. His fists were cut, and his arms were sore, but the rest of him felt nothing but adrenalin and power. For the first time in his life, he was in control of his father. He wasn’t backing down from it.
More punches.
More control.
More hatred.
Eventually, the door burst open into the room.
“Rhett, stop!” It was Lara’s father.
Rhett didn’t move or even bother to look back. He had his own father slumped against the wall and floor, his shirt collar gripped in his fist. One more punch, or Rhett just squeezing the fucking life out of the bastard, and this would all be over. He’d be the eldest Van Cort then. And deep down in his bones, he knew it was the best answer for everyone. He couldn’t do it, though, no matter his fury or his continued want for the end result.
