Chapter 5
Duncan wanted Nathan for leverage.
Not alliance.
Not family reunion.
Leverage.
He found Nathan two years earlier living quietly in Oregon under Rebecca’s surname.
No Sterling money.
No crew.
No title.
A carpenter.
Married.
Two daughters.
Ordinary life.
Duncan hated how ordinary it was.
Because ordinary Nathan did not want revenge.
So he fed him history.
Your father denied you.
Your brother took what should have been yours.
Sterling owes you.
The usual poison.
Some of it true.
Enough to make the rest easier.
Nathan refused money.
Refused meetings.
Then Duncan told him about the red box.
Proof.
Letters.
Recognition.
A possible statement from our father.
That interested him.
Not because he wanted command.
Because he wanted evidence that he had not imagined being abandoned.
I understood that.
Duncan did not.
He saw interest and assumed ambition.
He took the red box from the hidden room three weeks earlier.
Oscar saw him carrying it.
Then followed.
At the staircase, Oscar asked what it was.
Duncan panicked.
Grabbed him.
Oscar pulled away.
Duncan shoved.
One step became six.
Cast.
Lie.
Accidental fall.
My hands tightened.
He saw it.
“Say something.”
Duncan’s face hardened.
“It was an accident after the push.”
I almost laughed.
That sentence deserved its own grave.
“You shoved a six-year-old near stairs.”
“He wouldn’t stop following me.”
“Then you stop walking.”
Silence.
Not complicated.
Then Claudia said something I did not expect.
“Where is Nathan now?”
Duncan looked at her.
“He’s here.”
Everything stopped.
“Where?”
“Guesthouse.”
Rafe moved.
I raised one hand.
No rush.
No ambush.
Nathan had done nothing I knew of.
I looked at Duncan.
“You brought my brother onto my property without telling me.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because tonight he was supposed to meet the family.”
I stared.
“Under whose authority?”
Duncan smiled.
“His own name.”
There it was.
The confrontation he wanted.
May you like
Not because Nathan demanded it.
Because Duncan had built a stage and needed someone to stand on it.
