She'd been beautiful once.
John Duncan could still remember every small detail about the day she walked into his office, from the overcast Atlanta sky to the warm golden light of his high-rise law office. She'd come off the elevator a vision in yellow, lighting up the room like a much-needed ray of sunlight. Her hair, honey blond with highlights, had been styled in tight ringlets around her angelic face. Big green eyes, framed by long blond lashes, sparkled with a sense of wonder and admiration at the luxuriousness of his office. Within those eyes, John Duncan had seen an innocence the world had yet to crush.
That's what had drawn him to her. That virtue. Her purity. One look at her, and he'd wanted to know everything about her. The sound of her voice was like music to his ears, a soft, breathy, beautiful siren's song. With one greeting, one soft handshake, he'd fallen, fast and hard with no safety net. It was the kind of rush John lived for, that special kind of reckless abandonment that only desire could bring. She'd hooked him quickly, and she hadn't even known it.
She'd come to his office with good intentions. He'd put out an ad in the paper and online, looking for a paralegal strong enough to weather his temperament. Bless her, she thought she was the woman for the job. Qualified or not, she'd left him so thoroughly captivated that he'd hired her on the spot.
Once she started, John Duncan always found excuses to be around her, to watch her work, to talk to her. Every morning he'd start his day by fixing himself a cup of coffee in the small kitchenette area, listening to her on the other side of the wall as she got herself settled into her desk. He'd lean in the arch and make small talk with her while he sipped from his mug and she prepared herself for the day ahead. She had a lot of small habits that he loved, from the way she always put her purse down under the desk on her left side, to the way she twirled the ends of her hair when she talked on the phone. When she had to think really hard about a question, she liked to chew on her lower lip.
Everything about her was magnificent. Even her handwriting looked like the most elegant calligraphy.
Truly, he'd been blessed.
Most importantly, her assistance had made him rich beyond his wildest dreams. Her attention to detail had come through for him in the eleventh hour. Because of her, he'd been able to complete what promised to define his professional legacy. Her immaculate work, paired with his charm and resourcefulness, made the two of them a dangerous team. It also earned him more money than he could spend in three lifetimes. To thank her, he'd lavished her with gifts. Dinners for just the two of them, always at fancy places where champagne flowed like water and the gold lights were dim. It didn't take her long to find her place within the elite circles he traversed. Like him, she'd found the lifestyle addictive.
The night the deal was signed and sealed, John had confessed his feelings to her over dinner. He'd taken her to one of those fancy five-star places that had table-side service complete with fire and alcohol. He'd been drunk and uninhibited, laying everything out. She'd stared at him from across the table, unsure how to respond to his blunt, slurring candor. She'd been quiet for so long that he'd felt that familiar sinking feeling of rejection in his chest, the swell and sting of shame that had followed him all the way from the ramshackle home he'd lived in back in Rome, Georgia.
But then, as it felt like all hope was gone, he saw it.
It was small, but it was there. A coy, knowing smile.
That's when he knew his paralegal had a wild side, and oh, how he longed to explore it.
And it explore it, he did.
It wasn't long after that night that the rumors began to swirl around the office about them. He knew the other partners had asked because she told him they had. "There's no trouble to be in if there's no trouble to be found," she'd told him, and he'd felt, for the first time in a long time, like he'd found someone cut from the same cloth.
When all eyes were on Brittany Everett, she was professional. All I's dotted, all T's crossed. John struggled to do the same.
The witch-hunt about John's off-the-clock behavior was nothing but jealousy. That's what he told himself. After all, it was easy to be jealous of John Duncan, the playboy lawyer from Atlanta. Everyone loved John Duncan. He was youthful, rich, warm, and charismatic. He was an important man, with lots of important connections and resources, ranging from the gutter to the penthouse. People were drawn to John like moths to an open flame, always open to telling him their deepest, darkest secrets. John didn't know what it was about him that possessed people to confide such things, but John took full advantage of the gift he'd been given. It was how he survived.
It was how he thrived.
Of all the paralegals he'd had over the years — and there'd been many, in and out of his bed, man and woman alike — Brittany had been his favorite. Pure and inexperienced, but adventurous. Always willing to say yes. He could make her do anything he wanted.
She was a gift. His gift.
It was late. The inside of his penthouse was dark, the only light in the room coming from the city lights and moon outside. John Duncan paced the wide open floor space, his bare feet padding on the laminate, both hands on the top of his head. His heart was beating like a jackhammer, a mixture of panic and cocaine. He'd thrown on the first pieces of clothing he could find in the dark, moving about in navy plaid boxers that hung low on his hips and an opulent gold and navy robe that was untied and flaring out like a cape behind him as he moved back and forth like a caged animal. His jaw was set tight, so tight that he was sure his teeth would break if he clamped down any harder.
He was trying, but he couldn't relax.
She'd been beautiful once.
But not anymore.
Looking up at the elegant iron clock on the wall above the brick fireplace, John let out a long, aggravated sigh that resembled a growl. It echoed through the space. "Where the fuck is he?" John grumbled. It felt like hours had passed since he'd called that number he'd so hastily jotted down a few weeks ago in his office. Frustrated, he kicked the leg of his oak coffee table, the two wine glasses on its surface rattling slightly from the impact. Her lipstick, a soft coral pink, was still on the rim of a glass. John ignored it, the same way he ignored the pain that shot from the tip of his big toe to his knee.
John stopped briefly to look out the floor-to-ceiling window that overlooked downtown Atlanta. The gigantic windows were her favorite thing about this place, coupled with the views it offered. The second time she'd come here, he'd taken her in front of it. The sudden memory of it made his veins burn hot, but he tempered it quickly.
His hands were shaking. His guts twisted and rolled. For the first time in years, he felt fear. It gnawed at his insides, threatening to swallow him whole and reduce him to nothing. Ever since the death of his parents years ago, John knew he'd been walking a razor-thin line, and now, he'd crossed it.
This was Rock Bottom. This was the Point of No Return. Now, there was nothing but trouble ahead.
Big. Trouble.
He was yanked from his internal catastrophizing by the sound of gentle rapping at his door. Careful not to trip over himself, John pivoted, robes swirling around his legs as he bolted across the room in long strides. "Fucking finally."
John reached the door quickly, peering through the peephole as he unlatched the dead-bolt. Flinging the door open, John reached out and grabbed the meek man on the other side by the crook of the elbow, yanking him violently inside.
Caught by surprise, the bespectacled man stumbled forward, barely managing to right himself before he fell to the floor. Leaning out the door, John scanned the area for any sign of someone else before he closed and locked the door behind him.
"Jacob's not with you?"
"I did not know I needed to bring him," the man replied. "Given his...current state, I thought it best he rest a while longer."
John shook his head. "Whatever. What took you so long?"
If the man in front of John was thrown off by his harsh greeting, his face didn't show it. Removing the yellow-lensed aviator sunglasses from his face, the man remained stoic as he wiped them on the edge of his rumpled white dress shirt before replacing them on his face.
"I came as soon as you called," he assured John gently, the man's blue eyes narrowing in genuine concern. "What is the trouble, my brother?"
With a cock of his head and a swing of his arm, John motioned for his older brother to follow him. Nodding, Joseph Seed allowed himself to be led through the penthouse. There was a sudden, sinful swell of pride in Joseph's chest that bloomed outward, warm and pleasurable. Their early lives had been a fight for survival, and while the brothers had been separated young, Joseph was happy to see that his baby brother had achieved so much success. John had prospered in ways that Joseph and their oldest brother Jacob could only dream about. John was a man who screamed sophistication and style, something they'd never known.
John waited for his brother to enter the bedroom, leaning against his obsidian armoire with his arms crossed over his chest, bright blue eyes down at his feet. Joseph followed his brother into the room, his somber face falling at the sight of the young blond woman in John's bed. Her wrists were tied to the bedpost with black silk scarves. She was very obviously dead, her head lulled, chin resting against her naked, battered chest. She'd been beautiful once, but now the bruising was beginning to settle. Her left eye was a gigantic purple lump. John had done nothing to conceal her nudity, the navy satin sheets pooling at her waist. Her pale breasts and clavicles were riddled with angry bite marks and bruises, some faded, some new. The bruising around her neck was becoming visible. Joseph didn't know why, but his eyes were drawn to her discoloring lips. She'd been dead a while.
Gaze drifting, Joseph felt a surge in his chest at the sight of cocaine on the nightstand. John had made no move to clean up the area. Falling back a step, Joseph's back met the cool wall. With a grimace, he took his glasses off in a smooth, fluid motion, his eyes shifting to the ceiling as he murmured a quick prayer under his breath as he crossed his heart with his glasses in his hand.
This...this was not what he'd expected when John had called him, scared and desperate and begging for help. John had said it was an emergency, but Joseph didn't realize that it had been code for his baby brother losing control once again.
Ever since they were children, John had been an impulsive child, petty and spiteful, never seeing the big picture of what his actions meant for anyone besides himself. Selfish. John was a selfish man. But Joseph loved him all the same.
"My brother...what have you done?"
"I...I didn't mean to. I couldn't stop."
John's defense began to tumble out of him in a frenzy as Joseph approached the foot of the bed, his lips pursed into a sad, thin line. Looking over at John, he noted just how tired, helpless, and afraid his brother looked. It invoked images of Rome, of memories Joseph Seed had spent a lifetime longing to forget.
"I couldn't help myself!" John insisted at Joseph's back. "She gave me everything. Drugs. Alcohol. Her body. But she made me so...angry." John raked a hand through his dark, disheveled hair, his other fist banging on the armoire beside him. Joseph noted the cocaine and alcohol had made him jittery and agitated.
And yet...Brittany had still said yes. Because the answer for John Duncan was always yes.
Moving around the bed, Joseph reached out and untied one of the scarves from her wrist. Her hand flopped to the mattress. Joseph shook his head sadly at the state of things. His brother had behaved like a wild, rabid animal.
"These...urges." Joseph chose his words carefully, speaking deliberately and slowly. "Ever since you were a child, they've been there. Haven't they?"
His deepest, darkest shames laid bare at the feet of his brother, combined with his waning high and adrenaline, had John surprised by the sudden, hot burn of tears that zigzagged down his cheeks. There was a brief urge to wipe it away, to fight his emotions and tell Joseph that he was wrong, but he couldn't.
Even after so long apart, nobody knew him like Joseph. Time hadn't erased that.
"Yes. Yes," John confessed.
"God put them there. He gave you a gift."
John's head perked, his eyes narrowing. That wasn't the response he'd expected, but it wasn't an unwelcome twist in the story. Joseph turned to John now, watching as his brother wiped tears away from his eyes with the backs of his hands. John sniffled.
"We need to control it. To use it for His glory." John scoffed.
"They're going to lock me up," John reminded his brother glumly, motioning lamely at the bed. "They're going to find out what I did to her..."
The words on his lips died as Joseph approached, silencing John with a soft touch to the back of his head, bringing John in so their foreheads touched. It was a simple, soothing gesture. In spite of Joseph's somber demeanor, his eyes were wild and giddy. It struck John as a strange contrast.
"I know where we can go, John. A place of forgiveness, far away from the laws of man. Will you use your gifts to help me?"
Relief ripped through John's body like a thunderbolt. Joseph was going to help. Joseph had a plan. Joseph was here, inside his home, offering him a lifeboat to get him out of the mess he'd made.
Looking into the eyes of his brother, John Seed grinned.
"Yes."