Series: Webs We Weave Series by Krista Ritchie
Total pages in book: 147
Estimated words: 145038 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 725(@200wpm)___ 580(@250wpm)___ 483(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 145038 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 725(@200wpm)___ 580(@250wpm)___ 483(@300wpm)
My jaw aches from gritting on my molars. I shake my head profusely. “Your mother hates Phoebe for accidentally dumping a glass of champagne on her dress and being whiplashed at your sudden ‘relationship’ with her.” I use air quotes. “What do you think happens to Phoebe at the end of this? Because you can’t protect her from a woman who overrides you in every way, Jake.”
“Help me then.”
“Help you what?”
“Take control.” He rests his forearms on the table, closing in on me now. “Trent stands to inherit everything. The land, the brewing company, the money, all assets. It sickens me. Knowing he’s what my family’s centuries-long legacy is going to boil down to. It can’t end up with someone like him. It shouldn’t even be with someone like my mother.”
“You want to be sole heir,” I realize.
“I want it all,” he confirms. “If there’s a way to push my mother off the board of directors for Koning, and push Trent off, it’d leave me as the most prominent voice. And then I slowly take everything else from them. The cars. The estate. The inheritance. Until there is nothing left.”
He’s not looking to backstab them. He wants to slit their throats. I arch my brows, almost impressed. “You want to leave them destitute?”
“I’d rather have them behind bars, but I’ll take what I can get.”
Yeah.
I feel that. Deeper in my soul than he knows. Because if I could put my parents in the slammer without also joining them, I’d do it.
“What you’re hoping for,” I tell him, “is a miracle. You’re not even close to being first in line. You have two older brothers.” I’ve never met the oldest, but I listen around town. “The way women talk about Trent—they act like he’s Koning Jesus.”
“It’s what he likes people to believe. In fact, I’m not entirely sure he doesn’t also believe it about himself.”
Easy to manipulate. Hard to be around.
I don’t tell Jake that. “And your other brother? He’s desperate for validation from your mother. I’ve seen him practically slobbering at her feet.”
“Jordan is…inconsequential, for lack of a better word. My mother doesn’t take him seriously.”
I widen my eyes. “Great. Now we can just give you a pat on the back and push you ahead of the firstborn favorite and the woman already in power.” I add more seriously, “It’s not that easy.”
“I didn’t think it would be, but with Phoebe, there’s a chance. My mother feels most in control when she can toy with women to manipulate me, but Phoebe won’t bend to her wishes. It makes my mother angry, and her real nature is more likely to come out.”
Her real nature? What heinous things has she even done before?
“You want to blackmail her?” I ask.
“That’s exactly what I want to do. We can record her. Use the damning evidence against her. We can do the same to Trent. Maybe my father, too, if he gets in the way, but I doubt he will. He spends most of his time traveling. He’s never been considered a part of the Koning inheritance. He’s not even on the board. He signed a legal agreement that says he’ll get a small amount upon divorce or her death, and nothing more.”
In this moment, all I can think about is Phoebe. Of what this would mean for her, for us.
I rake two hot hands through my hair.
Jake must read the slight anguish cinching my face. “I know it’d extend the time I’m fake dating Phoebe, but if I end up with this kind of power, I can offer it to you, too. You can stay in this town. You can make a home here, and I’ll protect you. Even if it’s from your parents, if that’s what you want or need. I can pay them off. I can keep paying them off indefinitely.”
He’s offering me freedom.
In a way, I’m also the key to his.
A life without living under the control of our manipulative mothers. A life that’s mine. Not theirs.
It’s what I’ve always wanted.
But I’ve also always wanted to have Phoebe—for her to be mine.
The idea that she could continue to be his (even in a fake capacity) isn’t making me want to clink beers and sail into the fucking sunset. But it also wouldn’t be the first time I hated a piece of a job.
I’m expecting Phoebe and my sister to text their opinions.
When none come, I shove my phone in my leather jacket. “This is a long con,” I tell Jake. “It’s massive, even for us.”
Carter smiles as he says, “For a job that big, you’ll need all of them, mate.” And that’s when I realize, they’re here.
It’s relief and worry, seeing each person I love enter the galley and this fucked-up mess.
ELEVEN
Phoebe
By the time Hailey, Oliver, Trevor, and I meet up with Nova at the marina and board Jake’s catamaran, my emotions have traveled all over the map. I went from wanting to stab Jake and Carter in the face to deciding to chuck the knife away. Am I too understanding? Because I get it.