Yeah, I know.

I loved my brother, but his memory was like poison in my blood. I was nothing but a shell of a man trying to fulfill my dead brother’s destiny. That was who Rafe Jackson was.

That night my brother died in the car accident was the night I truly died right alongside him. I might as well have been a passenger. It wasn’t just his life that was cut short. It was mine.

I died that night right along with the man I looked up to more than anyone else.

“I really should get going. I need to still shower and get dressed,” I said, feeling like the walls of my brother’s room were strangling me, and I couldn’t escape fast enough.

My mother nodded, looking relieved that I was leaving the sanctuary she had created for my brother. It was sacred, and I didn’t belong.

“I heard that Sully VanDoren failed the Trials,” she said as she ushered me into the hallway.

“Yeah, but it seemed to work out for everyone in the end,” I said, already knowing where this conversation was heading.

“I know you two are friends, but don’t be like him. Be like that good boy Montgomery. Your father would be mortified if you screw this up. We’d have to leave the Georgia social circle in shame if you do. Your father’s business would never recover.”

Yeah, I know.

“I plan to do this right, Mom. I’m not going to mess up. I promise you.”

“It’s just not fair,” she said as she walked toward the top of the stairs with her eyes downcast and her shoulders slumped. “Timmy was made for this. Groomed to take over. He should be the one fighting for the silver cloak. Not you. It’s just not fair.”

Yeah, I know.

“Goodbye, Mom,” I said under my breath, not that she was listening or even cared.

What was once a happy family was now shattered in a million pieces, and there was no way to fix what would be forever broken.

Timothy was gone.

I was here.

And now I had to walk in his shoes.

Strength, Love, and Honor.

2

Fallon

“Fallon! It’s so good to see you, lassie!”

I set my black coffee on the table outside the cafe just in time to be enveloped in a giant, motherly hug by Mrs. Hawthorne. I’d always called her Mama H. We were on the middle of Main Street but it wasn’t as if Mama H cared. She’d given up caring about what people said about her a long time ago, I suppose.

I hugged her back just as tightly. Fuck anyone who was looking on and tittering behind their hands. Yeah, the black sheep of the town was back. Let the gossipmongers run and tell whom they would.

Though in reality, likely no one would recognize me without my blue-black hair and goth make-up. I was perfectly respectable-looking these days.

In fact, likely no one was looking at us at all. It was just being back here made me fucking paranoid. It was the way they always made me feel here.

Other. Less than. Just the bastard kid of the help.

I gave Mama H one last squeeze and then pulled back. It was not hard to give her a genuine smile, no matter what my life had become lately. And I really meant it when I said, “It’s so good to see you.”

She smiled back at me, round and motherly, almost as much a mother to me as my own. Mom was always so busy cleaning other people’s houses, and Mrs. H and Mom had been best friends for as long as I could remember. Mrs. H had been there for me when Mom was busy or when Mom had to work and couldn’t come to my recitals or shows at Darlington Prep.

I was on scholarship, naturally. One of a few charity cases interspersed with all the rich, privileged kids.

I glanced past Mrs. H and shuddered a little at seeing Main Street. It was one of the few small towns in Georgia that was able to thrive without being a direct suburb of Atlanta. The men of Darlington had businesses that spanned the globe. Some had apartments in New York and abroad, but their home base was always here. Especially when an Initiate was going through the Trials.

The Order of the Silver Ghost was the town’s worst-kept secret.

Everyone knew it existed, and a privileged few actually knew the name of the secret society, but there’d been whispers about what went on at the Oleander Mansion for as long as I could remember. Especially when Rafe and his friends got older, since all their fathers were involved.

Even thinking his name made me flinch.

I pulled back from Mama H and looked around at the elegant Main Street shops. The town thrived because of the men in the Order. After all, all those rich assholes and their wives liked to have fancy local digs to dine in and buy shit no one else in town could afford.

Tags: Alta Hensley, Stasia Black Billionaire Romance
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