Page 5 of Reaching His Heart (The Sartoris 3)

“All right. I’m on the next flight out. See you soon. Keep him until I get there, Ezio. I beg you.”

“I will.”

Chapter 2

Cason stared out the window. A lock his hair flopped over onto his face, blocking his view, but he didn’t bother shoving it back. What was the point?

“Are you going to sit there all day?” Ezio demanded.

Cason kept his back to his brother and pretended to have an interest in the scenery outside his window. “Was there something urgent you needed that only a cripple with one eye can take care of?”

Ezio swore. That wasn’t anything new that Cason hadn’t heard a million times over the last few months.

“Don’t be crass. You’re not a cripple. The doctor says with a little therapy, there’s every chance you can walk again.”

“Tell those lies to Mamma and Sha.”

“If you stop feeling sorry for yourself, maybe you can make some progress!”

Cason’s bedroom door bumped open, and Shakarri strode in carrying Cason’s lunch tray. “Stop all the shouting. I can hear you half way down the stairs. Ezio, don’t bully him. He just needs a little more time.”

“Time to what?” his brother griped. “To sit on his rear end? And why are you carrying a tray? We have servants for that.”

Cason couldn’t help looking at them as they argued. She rolled her eyes at her husband. “I’m taking care of my brother-in-law, unlike you who seem to think it’s your duty to yell at him every day. No one has ever gotten better by being bullied.”

Cason wished they’d leave, but he suffered in silence as they went back and forth.

“I am not a bully!”

Shakarri set the tray down on the table beside Cason’s chair and thumped a hand on her hip. “You are too. If I wasn’t here to stop you, you’d drive Cason crazy. Ever since you stopped being terrified he would die, you’ve been on his back.”

A rare sense of humor stirred in Cason as he noticed the blood drain from his brother’s face. Ezio might bring down whole corporations without blinking an eye, but he almost never won an argument with his wife these days. Cason had no wish to be brought to such a point. He had physical problems enough without mixing a woman into it.

“Why don’t you both get out and let me have my lunch in peace?”

“As if you’ll eat it,” his brother snapped. “I’m coming to the end of my rope with you.”

Cason snorted. “I thought you were born at the end of your rope. If you want, I can hang you from it.”

Ezio growled.

“No, wait maybe we both can.”

The room went silent. Cason knew immediately where he’d made the mistake. He was down all the time since his accident. His family watched him like hawks, harassing him at every hour of the day. Even at night when he was pretending to sleep, he heard someone look in on him. They thought he was suicidal. No one knew it was too much of a hassle to end his life, and how would he even do it? He was as feeble as a baby.

“Cason.” Shakarri cried out and dropped to her knees in front of him. She took hold of his hands and squeezed them. Tears flooded her eyes and spilled down her cheeks. “We love you so much. Please, know that you have so much to live for.”

Like what? He resisted asking because he had already said too much and given them notions of where his head was. “Don’t worry. I’m not going to kill myself.”

Ezio walked to the door, and Cason turned his attention to his brother.

“Finally giving up on harassin

g me?”

Ezio stopped, but he didn’t turn around. “I’ll take care of it, Cason.”

“What does that mean?”

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